The Idaho Statesman from Boise, Idaho • A7

MONDAY MARCH 30 2020 7AObituariesIDAHOSTATESMAN.COM No scheduled events at this time Michelle Jenkins: 208-377-6451 GO DO IT: TOP EVENTS Spanbauer. Robert 75, of Meridian, ID passed away No- vember 25, 2019. Cremation under the direction of Crema- tion Society of Idaho. OBITUARIES 100 DEATH NOTICES For Additional Information Call 377-6317 Burial Card of Thanks Death Notices Florists Funeral Services In-Memoriam Ads Miscellaneous Mortuaries Planning To place a paid funeral service listing please call 377-6317 or email: Death notices are accepted from funeral homes only between 11am 2pm Get top for your car at IdahoStatesman.com featuring Cars.com Find or sell a car at IdahoStatesman.com featuring Cars.com Adapted from an online discussion. Hi, Carolyn: My mom passed away a couple of months ago.

My dad made it clear he would not be part of the clean- ing-out process. I live in the same city as my par- ents while my two sisters live on the other coast. My dad is also planning on selling the house in the near future. overwhelmed. Cleaning out my closet has been an emo- tional process and some days I can clean for just 15 minutes, then I need a break.

Any advice? working against my timeline of selling the house. Feeling Overwhelmed Feeling Over- whelmed: so sorry for your loss. What would happen if you just stopped? It sounds as if been emotionally blackmailed into assuming everyone share of the work. Re: Overwhelmed: Either Overwhelmed or the dad should go to pro- fessionals in handling estate sales. They have no emotional investment and will triage stuff: this for the sale, this to donate if it sell, this for the dumpster.

If dad is mov- ing, then he should take the stuff he wants and leave everything else for the estate sale people. Overwhelmed should take any keepsakes she wants and not look back. Anonymous Anonymous: Yes. I lingered a bit before end- ing this chat to see if there was some explanation for why it HAS to be done by the letter-writer. It just make sense.

The father, as the homeowner, is the one accountable, and it can be outsourced. Thanks. Carolyn: My dad said too emotional for him to clean out the closet and house because he lost his wife. He routinely re- minds me that this pro- cess is more difficult for him so I should do the cleaning. Overwhelmed again Overwhelmed again: You lost your mom! No one wins by his making this a competi- tion.

And it is emotional blackmail. Whatever you decide to do, make sure based in your values and beliefs, not your fa- guilt trip. thoughts (in- cluding their gender as- sumptions): I suspect Over- whelmed has always done what the father has said to do. probably been playing these roles the whole life. I hope Overwhelmed listens to Carolyn and thinks about why she feels obligated to do work everyone else is allowed to skip.

Surely Overwhelmed want to keep EVERYTHING of So she can go to the house, take what really matters to her (as long as Dad want it) and walk away, leaving the other stuff behind. Along with a piece of paper with three names and phone numbers of professional organizers or estate-sale people. Seriously, Dad this is yours to manage. I suspect Dad envisions ordering a dumpster and just throwing stuff in it. Or else just used to having someone there who takes care of stuff he want to deal with.

Maybe this their scenario, but when I cleaned out my house, I found a lot of cash stuffed in clothing pockets and books and other hiding places. My friends bought her moth- house and they found things like coin collec- tions in boxes with utility bills from the 1970s. Sometimes you have to go through it all. Email Carolyn at or chat with her online at 10 a.m. each Friday at www.washingtonpost.com.

CAROLYN HAX Mom died, and now Dad wants me to clean house BY CAROLYN HAX Washington Post NEW YORK Country singer Joe Diffie, who had a string of hits in the 1990s with chart-topping ballads and honky-tonk singles like and has died after test- ing positive for CO- VID-19. He was 61. Diffie on Friday an- nounced he had contract- ed the coronavirus, be- coming the first country star to go public with such a diagnosis. publi- cist Scott Adkins said the singer died Sunday in Nashville, Tennessee, due to complications from the virus. Diffie, a native of Tulsa, Oklahoma, was a member of the Grand Ole Opry for more than 25 years.

His hits included Tonk Me Up Beside the Jukebox (If I Than the and the Devil Danced (In Empty Pock- His mid-90s albums Tonk and Rock From the went platinum. Eighteen of sin- gles landed in the top 10, with five going No. 1. In his 2013 single Jason Aldean name- checked the country mainstay. Diffie shared in a Grammy award for best country collaboration for the song Old with Merle Hag- gard and Marty Stuart.

Country singer had tested positive for coronavirus Associated Press JOE DIFFIE, 1958-2020 NASHVILLE, TENN. Singer-songwriter Jan Howard, who had a No. 1 country hit Loving with Bill Anderson and wrote hits for others like Kitty All Over but the has died at age 91, according to the Grand Ole Opry. The Opry, of which she was a member for nearly 50 years, announced her death on Saturday. Howard was a force of nature in country music, at the Opry, and in Dan Rogers, the Grand Ole vice president and executive producer, said in a state- ment.

were all so lucky so many nights to hear her voice on stage and to catch up with her backstage. all bet- ter for having had her in our The Missouri-born Howard had her first hit in 1960 with One You Slip Around and had a string of others including on Your and But she had her biggest success as a duo with Anderson, including Know Be To- and Loving which spent four weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard country chart in 1967. She also wrote for others, including song and Connie hit Never Once Stopped Loving Her most personal song was perhaps which she wrote as a plea for her son safe return from the Vietnam War. He was killed two weeks after its release in 1968.

Another son later killed himself. Howard documented her triumphs and strug- gles in the 1987 autobiog- raphy and She is survived by her remaining son, two grand- children and three great- grandchildren. JAN HOWARD, 1929-2020 Singer-songwriter force of nature in country Associated Press competition in Warsaw in 1959 writing one score with his right hand, one with his left and asking a friend to copy out the third score so that the handwriting reveal they were all by the same person. He would go on to win many awards, including multiple Grammys. In the late 1950s and the 1960s, Penderecki experimented with avant- garde forms and sound, technique and unconven- tional instruments, using magnetic tape and even typewriters.

He was large- ly inspired by electronic instruments at the Polish Radio Experimental Stu- dio, which opened in Warsaw in 1957 and was where he composed. my works the most important is the form and it must serve the pur- Penderecki said in a 2015 interview for Pol- ish state news agency PAP. He said he began the composing process with a sketch of the entire work and then I fill in the white he said. His 1960 for the Victims of won him a UNESCO prize. Written for 52 string instruments, it can be described as a massive plaintive scream.

In the 1970s, believing that avant-garde had been explored to the full, Pen- derecki embarked on a new path, writing music that, to many, sounds romantic and has the traditional forms of sym- WARSAW, POLAND Krzysztof Penderecki, an award-winning con- ductor and one of the most popular contemporary classical music composers whose works have featured in Hollywood films like and died Sunday. He was 86. In a statement emailed to The Associated Press, the Ludwig van Beetho- ven Association said Pen- derecki had a and serious He died at his Krakow home, the Gazeta Krakowska daily said. The statement called Penderecki a Pole, an outstanding creator and a who was one of the best appreciated Polish com- posers. The association was founded by Pende- wife, Elzbieta Pen- derecka, and the commu- nique was signed by its head, Andrzej Giza.

Penderecki was best known for his monu- mental compositions for orchestra and choir, like Luke and Gates of Jerusa- though his range was much wider. Rock fans know him from his work with Jonny Greenwood. A violinist and a com- mitted educator, he built a music center across the road from his home in southern Poland, where young virtuosos have the chance to learn from and play with world-famous masters. Culture Minister Piotr Glinski tweeted that culture has suf- fered a huge and irrepara- ble and that Pende- recki was the outstanding con- temporary composer whose music could be heard around the globe, from Japan to the United warm and good Glinski said in his tweet. interna- tional career began at age 25, when he won all three top prizes in a young com- phonies, concertos, choral works and operas.

A Cath- olic altar boy who grew up in a predominantly Jewish environment, he was largely inspired by reli- gious texts. But his first opera, the 1969 of based on a novel by Al- dous Huxley about the Inquisition, put him at odds with the Vatican, which called on him to stop the performances. He refused. Penderecki wrote music for various historical cele- brations, and conducted around the world. Among the works are the 1966 Luke com- missioned by West Ger- man Radio to celebrate the 700th anniversary of the Muenster Cathedral, and the 1996 Gates of to mark 3,000 years of the titular city.

In 1967 he composed a major choral work, known also as the in homage to the Holocaust victims. His second opera, adise based on the John Milton poem, seemed to reconcile him with the Catholic Church, and in 1979, he conducted a concert at the Vatican for Polish-born Pope John Paul II. Penderecki believed that an artist is a witness of his times who reacts to it with his work and that he must also exceed boundaries and conven- tions to create new things. This approach often cost him, landing critical re- views. In 1980, the leader of Solidarity free- dom movement, Lech Walesa, called him and commissioned a short piece that would honor Poles who lost their lives fighting the communist regime.

Penderecki com- posed which led to the larger that premiered in 1984 in Stuttgart. Penderecki wrote for virtuosos and friends like violinists Isaak Stern and Anne-Sophie Mutter and cellist Mstislav Rostropov- ich. In 2012 he recorded an album with Green- wood, guita- rist. Penderecki said at the time that Greenwood is a interesting compos- and that working with the guitarist made him see his own music from a new perspective. rich, pow- erful, sometimes menac- ing music, especially in his early works, was used in Hollywood movies including Stanley Ku- Martin ter David and William It was also a personal matter for Penderecki to have parts of the used in the Polish World War II movie by Oscar- awarded director Andrzej Wajda, about the 1940 massacre of Polish offi- cers by the Soviets.

Pen- much-loved uncle was killed in that massacre. But Penderecki said his fascination in was not music it was trees. Around his manor house, he arranged a scenic arboretum featur- ing the various kinds of trees and plants that he brought from the most distant corners of the world where his music was played. takes generations to plant a he once said. will do it over some 40 years, but this garden is like an unfin- ished symphony.

Some- thing can always be changed, you can always add new trees, find new He believed that artists are loners, and was him- self a taciturn recluse. But he liked to write music on a Baltic Sea beach in Jastr- zebia Gora with his close family near him. Penderecki was born Nov. 23, 1933, in the southern Polish town of Debica. His maternal grandfather was German and his grandmother was Armenian.

His father, a lawyer, loved to play the violin and instilled in his son a love of music. Penderecki studied violin and composition at the Krakow Conservatory, where on graduation in 1958 he was appointed a professor, and next a rector. From 1972-1978 he also taught at the Yale University School of Mu- sic. His other distinctions include the Living award at the Cannes Midem Classic music event in 2000, and highest dis- tinction, the Order of the White Eagle, bestowed in 2005. Polish music featured in film, concerts around world KRZYSZTOF PENDERECKI, 1933-2020 BY MONIKA SCISLOWSKA Associated Press PATRICK PLEUL dpa via AP, file Polish conductor Krzysztof Penderecki, shown in 2012 in Frankfurt, Germany, has died at the age of 86..