After clawing my way from the bottom of the pack to somewhere near the, um, bottom of the middle, I begin the final week by handing my opponent the three-point question and misassigning the zero. The result: A 4(3)-7(4) romp.
1. This Italian composer of the Renaissance and Baroque eras is celebrated today for his madrigals and sacred Vespers of 1610, but is perhaps best known for being one of the earliest great operatic composers.
What I know about Italian opera can be summed up in one word: Pagliacci. That’s it — just the title. Oh, I suppose I know this opera features a singing clown. But I don’t know who wrote it, and even if I did, I had my doubts that this opera debuted as early as the 17th century. In short, I didn’t even attempt to muster a guess. The answer: Claudio Monteverdi. This was the three-point question that my opponent knew handily.
2. The metal known as electrum, which occurs naturally and can be produced artificially, is an alloy of what two precious metals?
Just as a surprising number of questions are actually theater questions in disguise, my route to this answer came via the games/sports category. Specifically, Dungeons & Dragons. Electrum was one of the precious metals used as currency in the game. Copper was the least valuable, followed by silver, then electrum, then gold, and then platinum. (This is strictly old school D&D I’m talking about — a glance around the Web shows that electrum has been retired from the game.) It made sense, then, that electrum should be an alloy of gold and silver. And thus it was.
(I’m smoothing out my thought process a fair amount here: Actually I underwent quite a bit of agony as I tried to recall whether electrum was more or less valuable than gold. Finally made the right decision, but “gold and platinum” was in my answer box for at least a little while.)
3. The first song that featured a drum machine using digital samples of acoustic drums (the iconic Linn LM-1) to reach number one on the UK Singles Chart and the Billboard Hot 100 did so in 1981/82. It was a single by the pop group Human League — what was the song’s title?
This is a mighty roundabout route to the question “What was Human League’s first hit song?” I don’t know from drum machines, iconic or otherwise, but in 1981 I was just the right age to have “Don’t You Want Me?” implanted permanently into my brain, whether I wanted it there or not.
I much preferred Human League’s later hit, “Fascination.”
4. Give the name of the executive cabinet position in the United States which was created in 1953, and renamed Secretary of Health and Human Services in 1979.
Well, I didn’t know this, but I was pretty sure the first thing I typed — “Secretary of Disease” — was going to be incorrect. So I spent some time trying to puzzle it out. What word is synonymous with health and human services? I finally thought of “welfare” and liked it.
And… whoa! I was actually sort of close. The correct answer is “Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare.”
5. This quintessential example of gothic architecture is located in what European city?
Here’s why I answered Barcelona: Because my neighbor recently went there and came back with many gorgeous pictures of cathedrals. I didn’t think this question referred to anything he showed me, but if the answer was Barcelona, that would have certainly made for an amusing story. Alas, the answer was Cologne.
6. The Legally Prohibited from Being Funny on Television Tour was the name of a 2010 comedy tour of North America headlined by what comedian?
Easy. Conan O’Brien. Easy for me, anyway — this was the zero that baffled my opponent. Ah well.
This was a day when I got fractions of an answer right. Unfortunately, it was also a day when I was facing the opponent in 3rd place in my rundle.
1. Even though I was pretty sure he was a couple of centuries too recent, I guessed Verdi. I’m half right, darnit!
2. I also got this through D&D, though I never played. (My grandmother bought me the D&D starter kit because I had no friends. Think about that for a second. Then my paranoid mother was positive it was going to turn me into a homicidal maniac sitting in my closet.)
3. 1981 was a bit before I became aware that there were other types of music than the country that my parents played all the time, but I knew the song.
4. I said Secretary of Health and Welfare. Two-thirds right!
5. For Barcelona, I’d expect to see a cathedral that was still under construction, 100-some-odd years later. I guessed Chartres.
6. Right idea, wrong story: Charlie Sheen had a brief attempt at a comedy tour that went nowhere, and I thought this might have been it.
Facing a very competent opponent who give entire correct answers knocked me back to 8th place and almost into the D’s. At least, that’s the assumption based on the current split. As for where any of us rokkies ends up, who knows?
1 — Yep, half right as well with Verdi. I didn’t think Verdi could be right, but if I “made up a guess” instead and Verdi turned out to be right, I would have a bad, bad day. My opera knowledge is pretty much limited to that Odd Couple episode where they improbably won a car via an opera quiz on the radio.
2 — Hey, my wife’s a jeweler, and she’s told me about electrum. (Take *that*, D&D-ers!) So it’s … um … oh, why don’t I pay more attention to what she’s saying? Eventually I correctly got to silver and gold, after toying a bit with gold and platinum because of the “um.” And it took great willpower to stick with “silver and gold” despite my feeling that “but everyone will guess that, so it just *can’t* be the right answer.” (I’ve learned that lesson before, the hard way.)
3 — In 1983, I helped found an a cappella group at Princeton called The Roaring 20. They still exist, now populated with people who weren’t even born at the time. http://www.princetonroaring20.com/ One of the songs in our repertoire was Don’t You Want Me and, being a bass, I did the drum part. (Actually, in those early days, I was a utility player, and sang Bass, Bari, and Tenor as needed — Jack of all trades, ace of none.) A Youtube vide of a 2011 performance by the current, very young, group, using pretty much the same arrangement as we started out with, is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLgVWG-rnYc
Of course, I said, “Don’t You Want Me, Baby”, which is how we always used to refer to it, but that was given the points. A discussion of that issue appears in the message boards, here: http://www.learnedleague.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&p=13831#p13826 I did momentarily think about putting only “Don’t You Want Me,” but decided I’d be more likely to get credit for having the extra word than for leaving out a word, given the past history of reasonably liberal scoring. In a different forum, if I knew that only exact titles would count, I *think* I would have correctly gone only with “Don’t You Want Me,” but I can’t be sure.
4 — The way the question was asked almost threw me. I knew that the *department* of HHS had previously been the *department* of HEW, but why were they asking specifically for the name of the Secretary position rather than the name of the department? I thought for a few minutes, but having nothing better to say that the correct answer, I went with it.
5 — And, a geography question to slow me down. I said Copenhagen for no great reason, which I think isn’t as terrible a guess as it could have been — turns out that Copenhagen is amazingly both in Europe *and* on the water, so it had at least a tiny, fighting chance. I have no idea whether there’s any Gothic architecture there.
6 — We happily end our programming day with a TV question. No problem.
A straightforward 5(4)-2(2) victory today, leaving me in 8th place — a tie away from 4th place (4-7 have 25 pts, I have 24 pts but with a very bloated MPD of 23). I’m not yet mathematically eliminated from third (27 pts), but I’m not making any plans.
1: A guess all the way … I said Vivaldi.
2: I knew that gold, silver, and platinum were probably my choices, and I ended up going with gold and platinum on the strength of “‘electrum’ ends with ‘-um’ so I should be sure to include the one that ends with ‘-um’”. Dum.
3: I had no reason whatsoever to know this–I wouldn’t have bet a nickel that I had the right answer. And then I spent a full minute trying to decide whether “Baby” was part of the title, which turned out to be moot as far as the Commissioner’s scoring was concerned.
4: I knew that it took the form “Department of A, B, and C” and that “Health” was still in there. A minute of pondering gave me “Welfare”. But I just couldn’t come up with “Education”.
5: A guess all the way … I said Frankfurt.
6: A gimme.
GavinG and I got the same two right, but he defended a tad better, and I lost 2(2)-1(2).
1. I actually own several Monteverdi recordings, so I knew where to go with this – the full Monte and everything.
2. Several old coins were made of electrum. Also, I knew it from old-school D&D too, which I started playing in 1977.
3. Agreed, Eric. Essentially this was “Name a Human League song”.
4. Government Major from 1983. HEW was very familiar to me.
5. Took 4 years of German. The cathedral was very familiar.
6. Had to guess on this one – had never heard of the tour, but once I got to Conan, I liked it enough that I stopped looking.
I played the #2 ranked player in the Championship Rundle, and he was the only player in the top ten to miss a question (Cologne). I picked up a 9(6)-7(5) win and leapfrogged to 2nd place, only two MPD ahead of 3rd and 2 full points behind first.
1. No idea on this one. Classical Music is always going to be a weak area for me. Guessed Donizetti who is at least Italian (although he’s from the 19th century).
2. Guessed Silver and Titanium (which is not a precious metal, of course). Thought about silver and gold but ended up rejecting it.
3. I know this song all too well though the first half of the clue didn’t help at all. No trouble with the title.
4. It would definitely have helped to know the old acronym. Since I didn’t I thought maybe the Surgeon General had a Physician General counterpart.
5. I’ve seen a number of Gothic Cathedrals in Europe up close so I knew that this wasn’t Prague, Budapest or Zagreb. I decided to go with Salzburg since they have a famous Cathedral (too bad its Baroque, not Gothic). Never would have guessed Cologne.
6. Gimme.
My opponent got the Pop Music and TV answers as well as the US Govt. With perfect defense from both of us I lost 1(2)-2(3).
1. Guessed Verdi along with so many others, despite knowing he was later. My opera knowledge is pretty terrible overall. I wish they gave half points for it.
2. Got there eventually. I don’t know where this came from- I’ve played D&D, but not versions with electrum as far as I am aware.
3. Completely blanked. All I could think of was “We’re Only Human” or whatever it was called. I like the HL song, too.
4. I thought HEW was still a department. Oops.
5. Guessed Berlin. Got the right country, at least.
6. Vaguely remembered that Conan had a tour, and the name made sense.
3rd tie in a row, although I’ve had more answers correct in two of the three. Dropped to 6th in the rundle.
Went down 6(4) – 1(2)
1) Went with Pagannini in homage to the great scene in HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER where they argue over the difference between Pavarotti and Pagannini (“Pavarotti is a tenor, Paganinni is a composer”) Made this my 3 because it’s particularly hard and Classical Music is my opponent’s 2nd worst category, and she nailed it despite that.
2) Was half right, said gold and platinum.
3) I remember the song well, so no problem.
4) Thought Secretary of Public Health sounded right.
5) Had no idea, guessed Bruges
6) I was thinking of shock comics before I realized the title referred to someone contractually barred from appearing on TV and Conan made perfect sense.
1. Knew it wasn’t Verdi. Knew it probably wasn’t Puccini, but I was out of Italian composers, so I put it down.
2. Was utterly convinced that it was silver and copper, for some reason.
3. A great early MTV video; a gimme ordinarily for me, but especially now that my book project has me immersing in videos circa 1981 to 1985.
4. Floundered around before sinking.
5. I thought for sure it was Notre Dame before I even looked at the picture, and I stuck with that theory, thinking it was a side or back view, and that the big flat white boat confirmed that the body of water was the Seine.
6. Gimme gimme gimme.
Another loss, 1(2)-4(4), leaving me just a hair above relegation.