VLVL(7):Annotations, questions, etc, etc. Pt.1

[Matt Treyvaud]

On Wed, 6 Jan 1999, keith woodward wrote:

> 218.8-10:  "_Bardo Thodol_ Really dead":  Although the TBD is 
> concerned with death and transition, I am unsure if it makes this claim 
> re the recently deceased.  Anyone know for certain?

I have the W. Y. Evans-Wentz translation (which I think is a fairly
standard one - it includes Jung's commentary on it, etc.) and it has this
to say:

[Instructions concerning the second stage of the _Chikhai Bardo_: the
secondary clear light seen immediately after death]

 "...When the consciousness principle getteth outside [the body, it sayeth
 to itself], 'Am I dead, or am I not dead?' It cannot determine. It seeth
 itse relatives and connexion as it had been used to seeing them before.
 It even heareth the wailing. The terrifying _karmic_ illusions have not
 yet dawned. Nor have the rightful apparitions or experiences caused by
 the Lords of Death yet come."

Square brackets are in the original, indicating parts not actually in the
text but added to make the English translation clearer. The passage then
goes on to explain exactly what to say to different types of people in
order to break the news. There's no mention of vehement denying, exactly,
but it does say that the unenlightened will frequently not recognise the
_bardo_ (which, as far as I can tell, roughly translates as "state of
being") and will need extra help.

> 224.10:  "woo-woo-woo-type":  I'm not sure if there is any way of being 
> certain whether VanMeter is going up and down the scale or simply up or 
> down it.  Essentially, he is running his hand up (say) the neck of the 
> bass, thereby running up the scale.  If he were going up and down the 
> neck, the (bent) note played would be recorded as a parabolic curve.

What I imagined when I read that phrase was a slide kind of like:
F\E\F#\E\G--(\E). But then when, immediately after, he said the slides
were "something they could relate to", I thought maybe he meant woo-woos
like standard ghosts are supposed to do: you know, they wear white sheets,
float around and go "woooo...woooOOOOOoo.."
 
> 225.8:  "minor chords and a dragged recessional pulse":  In keeping with 
> the moody broody, entropic air of the Thanatoid Roast, the music is 
> morbid.

For the non-religious, 'recessional' means 'of or pertaining to the
recession of the clergy and choir after a church service.' As in, when
they're finished rappin' about God, they all walk away from the
congregation, into the bowels of the Church. (I didn't know this, so in
theory others might not either). 
 
> 225.13:  "combo-ork arrangements":  ???

Combination orchestra. Just means a smallish band of musicians (as opposed
to a 16-piece horn section) as far as I know.

Matt

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 Matt Treyvaud, Abbr. Prim.                       (R.I.P. Kerry Thornley)
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