My latest birthday is setting records

Another birthday has crept up and landed. So has the oldest cliché.

Yes, I have considered the alternative. No, I’m not ready to embrace it. But while rummaging through the usual birthday emotions — ho-hum, boohoo, bah-humbug, just-another-day — I suddenly got zapped by a bolt of reminiscence.

I just turned 78. What does that number evoke?

Why, 78 RPM records, of course.

They have not been made since the 1950s. They were supplanted, in very short order, by 45s and 33s. But this child of the 1940s remembers those stiff platters

Macbeth

From page 24 cries in disbelief).

The three witches are a true highlight. Both helping to guide and frame the story as well as providing playful humor and transitional comic relief between scenes, the “Weird Sisters” (portrayed by Mecca Verdell, Keri Anderson and Jordan Stanford) are crucial in maintaining the lively spirit of this production, especially in making use of the ruins-and-park setting.

Costume designer Kristina Lambdin strikes a fabulous balance between the rag-like and the elegant in the witches’ arresting costumes — their white, net-like shawls lend the performance a strange and spooky air.

The witches’ conjuring of Banquo’s descendants as future kings, shrouded but made of shellac resin very well. Walk down Memory Lane with me, if you will…“Blue Suede Shoes” by Carl Perkins, “El Paso” by Marty Robbins, “Rock Around the Clock” by Bill Haley and the Comets, “Sixteen Tons” by Tennessee Ernie Ford.

I owned these and many more 78s. It’s a wonder I didn’t wear out the grooves, so often did I play them. Of course, I knew each number by heart. So, I’d sing along, as loudly as I could.

There were two major benefits to that. One, I would cement those lyrics of long ago into my brain forever. Two, I would greatly annoy my younger brother, who shared a wearing crowns as they emerge from the audience, also gives the play a haunting atmosphere.

The use of shadow projections during the final battle scene between Macbeth and Macduff makes excellent use of the large outdoor space. Larger-than-life silhouetted projections of sword fighters upon the large walls appear behind the two men as they clash.

Before the production begins, there are welcome musical moments in which the entire ensemble “breaks character” and sings spirituals as well as songs from the Great American Songbook, including “Dream a Little Dream of Me.” room with me (but never my record collection or my turntable — some things are just too precious). flexible 45s. As for 33 1/3s, the future clearly belonged to them. Who wouldn’t want eight songs per side as opposed to one?

The play, which runs through July 23, is highly recommended for seasoned fans of Shakespeare plays as well as to those new to Macbeth. For more information, visit chesapeakeshakespeare.com/shows-tickets/macbeth.

Sometimes, for the sake of variety, I’d raid a cabinet in the living room, where the 78s belonging to my parents were kept. Welcome to Bing Crosby, show tunes and some kid from New Jersey named Sinatra.

I would borrow a stack of them and head back to my room. As you’ll recall, each side of a 78 lasted three and a half minutes at most. So as each final chord sounded, I’d lift the still-spinning record off its base and replace it with another.

And yet…

For an art project at school, I combed through my collection and pasted a few 78s onto a large piece of cardboard. The project did not win any prizes, but no one else thought to use records in such an unusual way.

How I See It

By Bob Levey

As the disk jockeys of that era would always say, the hits just kept on coming.

But 78s did not. They were brittle and prone to cracking. They were harder to handle and store than smaller and more

For a dance at the home of The Girl I Had Designs On, I brought along an armful of my hottest hits. Make that two arms full. Alas, the girl was not impressed, either by my arm strength or me.

Then there was the time my brother and I had a major fight, conducted with 78s. He

The GOING HOME Difference

Scrabble answers on p. 31.

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