The Stranglers

The Stranglers are an English rock band who emerged via the punk rock scene.

Scoring some 23 UK top 40 singles and 17 UK top 40 albums to date in a career spanning four decades, the Stranglers are one of the longest-surviving and most "continuously successful" bands to have originated in the UK punk scene of the mid to late 1970s. Beginning life as the Guildford Stranglers on 11 September 1974 in Guildford, Surrey, they originally built a following within the mid-1970s pub rock scene. While their aggressive, no-compromise attitude identified them as one of the instigators of the UK punk rock scene that followed, their idiosyncratic approach rarely followed any single musical genre and the group went on to explore a variety of musical styles, from new wave, art rock and gothic rock through the sophisticated pop of some of their 1980s output.

They had major mainstream success with their single "Golden Brown". Their other hits include "No More Heroes", "Peaches", "Always the Sun" and "Skin Deep".

The Stranglers (album)

The Stranglers is a compilation album by The Stranglers.

Track listing

Punch and Judy

Punch and Judy is a traditional, popular, and usually very violent puppet show featuring Pulcinella (Mr. Punch) and his wife, Judy. The performance consists of a sequence of short scenes, each depicting an interaction between two characters, most typically Mr. Punch and one other character (who usually falls victim to Mr. Punch's club). It is often associated with traditional British seaside culture. The various episodes of Punch and Judy are performed in the spirit of outrageous comedy — often provoking shocked laughter — and are dominated by the anarchic clowning of Mr. Punch.

The show is performed by a single puppeteer inside the booth, known since Victorian times as a "professor" or "punchman", and assisted sometimes by a "bottler", who corrals the audience outside the booth, introduces the performance, and collects the money ("the bottle"). The bottler might also play accompanying music or sound effects on a drum or guitar, and engage in back chat with the puppets, sometimes repeating lines that may have been difficult for the audience to understand. In Victorian times the drum and pan pipes were the instruments of choice. Today, the audience is also encouraged to participate, calling out to the characters on the stage to warn them of danger, or clue them into what is going on behind their backs. Also nowadays, most professors work solo, since the need for a bottler became less important when busking with the show gave way to paid engagements at private parties or public events.

Punch and Judy (opera)

Punch and Judy is an opera with music by Harrison Birtwistle and a libretto by Stephen Pruslin, based on the puppet figures of the same names. Birtwistle wrote the score from 1966 to 1967. The opera was first performed at the Aldeburgh Festival, which had commissioned the work, on 8 June 1968, with David Atherton conducting the English Opera Group. The premiere cast included John Cameron as Mr Punch.

The work caused great controversy with members of the audience, because of the violence of the plot and the nature of the music. Benjamin Britten was reported to have left the premiere at the interval. The first US performance was in Minneapolis, and the first New York performance took place in 1988. The first performance in Austria was in 1991, by Wien Modern, with Birtwistle supervising the production. Birtwistle directed a revival of the opera at Aldeburgh in June 1991.

With reference to the ballet of Igor Stravinsky, Paul Griffiths has characterized Mr Punch as "the exact contrary of Petrushka: a human being behaving as a puppet". David Wright has summarized how Birtwistle and Pruslin attempted to treat the characters and music in an archetypal manner to write what they have described as a "source opera". Jonathan Cross has published a detailed analysis of the opera.

Punch and Judy (dogs)

Punch and Judy were a pair of dogs who received the Dickin Medal from the People's Dispensary for Sick Animals for bravery in service in Israel in 1946. The commendation notes: "saved the lives of two British Officers... [by warning them of and] attacking an armed terrorist who was stealing upon them unawares." The dog and bitch both were severely wounded.

The Dickin Medal is often referred to as the animal metaphorical equivalent of the Victoria Cross.

See also

References

External links