update

I have been having major issues with Internet access, and I've been trying for nearly a month to get AT&T to resolve them; regular posting will resume soon, I hope. Thanks for checking in.

update

The good news is that Computer Crisis 2016 is nearing an end. So I'm just going to lie low until I'm fully functional again, which should be in . . . a few days? a week? soon?

10

I started this blog on 12 February 2006 (at 4:05 PM Pacific time, if you want to be exact), so . . . it's been ten years. That's a pretty large span of my life, and eons in tech-time. When I started, blogs were a new and strange phenomenon, and in a way they still are (strange, though not new), as other forms of social media have risen in prominence. The rise is partly due to the thirst for constant novelty that afflicts anything tech-related, and partly because blogs can be difficult and Facebook and Twitter can be easy. Both of those systems have their charms, though in the way of all things tech, those charms have been exaggerated. Facebook I find useful mostly for updates and photos from people I know – I follow lots of arts groups there, but can't say I really get too much out of their posts, which tend to be blandly promotional. Twitter is an enjoyable constant stream of possibly interesting items – things rise and sink there and life goes on; the beautiful and significant jostle shoulders with the trivial and offensive, and all are fleeting. Both systems tend to attract frenzies of faux (or maybe sometimes real) outrage around topics that are forgotten a week later. I don't find either system much use for discussions of the arts.

Twitter of course has a 140-character limit built in, which is its lure (though I had to make three or four attempts to get my first tweet under the character limit; my irritation was not eased by Twitter telling me repeatedly that I "needed to be more clever" – I can be clever at length, as any reader here knows; what they meant was I needed to be more concise). The character limit means that either you're posting a link to a longer piece (in, perhaps, a blog) or you're just posting a quip. And I love quips, but it's the nature of such things that you already have to know their context, otherwise your little jab or aperçu is merely confusing, and that does limit how much you can say that is original or that requires possibly lengthy explanations. Facebook has no such official limit, but there is a limit to how detailed an entry people will read, especially if not all of your "friends" have friended you because of a mutual love of certain arts. And that's another weakness of both systems when it comes to discussion of the arts: both require that people follow you, whereas with a blog anyone interested in the topic you're writing about can stumble on your entry via various search engines. And there's a certain permanence in that; on Facebook and Twitter – and this is part of their appeal – things disappear and are replaced by shiny new things with dizzying speed, and that's a deliberate feature, so that you'll keep going back and giving them those clicks they need so they can appeal to advertisers, and it's also what makes them so like life. But the reason many of us seek out art is to see and think about something that is, if not standing still itself (as our perceptions and reactions constantly shift), causing us to pause at least momentarily amid the noise and hubbub and to reflect.

So I still think there is a place for blogs, however uneasily they fit into the scene. I have the impression they're considered a bit old-fashioned in tech terms, which is kind of funny. Remember when e-mail was new? People were dazzled. Imagine, you could sit down and send a letter electronically to someone thousands of miles away and it would show up in minutes! And you could receive a reply with equal speed! That's an incredible thing. But people now shrug at it, find it a burden, claim that no one e-mails anymore and it's all about texting for the cool kids. But I still think e-mail is one of the greatest things ever. I try to take a mindful view of technology, which, these days (especially in the Bay Area, where tech companies exercise such powerful control over our economy and even our fantasies), leads some people to consider me a lunatic Luddite. (Which, clearly, I'm not – though not the first of the local bloggers, I was an early joiner. It's a matter of deciding which tech you need, and which tech is just stuff people – or profit-seeking corporations – claim you need.)

I think people have never quite known what to make of blogs. Some local arts groups have been extremely forthcoming and generous, others have never acknowledged my existence – which is fine, I'm not complaining, I have no sense that anyone owes me anything here. (I will admit to looking askance at one local group that pretty much ignores bloggers yet has "tweet seats" for certain dress rehearsals – I don't really want to go on here about why I find "tweet seats" ridiculous, but I'll just say that I do; to sum it up, if you're tweeting during a performance, you're not paying attention, and if you're not paying attention, what do I care what you are saying?). But the ambiguous position of blogs is exactly what makes them interesting: they can be anything, a point people don't always seem to grasp. I've always been surprised at how many people assume the journalistic model is the necessary and only one for blogs – I can see why, but bloggers are not constrained by deadlines or advertisers or considerations of length or of general appeal (or even, to be honest, grammar and coherence). I'm not really a journalist by nature, though; when I see BREAKING at the head of a story (or tweet or FB entry) I usually, literally, LOL, or at least chuckle. It seems silly and overblown to me. If someone asked me what was BREAKING!!!, I'd probably say thousands of unseen hearts and leave it at that. It just conveys such a false sense of urgency about what matters in our lives.

This does bring up something that has always been a thorn in my side (though to some extent it's mostly one I keep jabbing myself with, I don't know that it matters to anyone else), which is the timeliness of posting. I perpetually feel like the White Rabbit, always running and always running behind. I would love to post entries right after seeing something – but first thoughts are not always best thoughts, and sometimes things need to sit inside you for a while, developing. It's all memory once the curtain goes down anyway. And if I were a performer, I would be flattered that someone cared enough about what I did to write about it days or even weeks later – an artist's life is cumulative, and so is a viewer's. But at what point do things slip into irrelevance (and at what point do they resume their "relevance", becoming an interesting light into a now-vanished scene)? It's interesting to see what details survive in the mind, but even with my fairly accurate memory there's bound to be some blurring and forgetting. But quite honestly, I just don't have the time to write things up in more or less timely manner, even if I didn't have semi-serious philosophical objections to a journalism-style mode of deadlines (what are deadlines in the Memory Palace?). I was aware from the start, though, that this might be a problem; the one thing I decided before beginning this site was that I would never apologize or be sheepish about posting "late" – I understood at least that much of my life.

I have to work for a living, and as we all know American workers are burdened with excessive time demands from their jobs. I have a house and garden to take care of. There's laundry and cooking and cleaning and the mundane maintenance of a life. And, obviously, I'm out a lot, going to various performances. And, again obviously, I'm ten years older than I was – my energy has diminished a bit; I find it more difficult than I used to when I don't get enough sleep, and I sleep poorly anyway. Things pile up. And I'm perhaps not the swiftest writer around – even when I write something quickly, I tend to go back and revise obsessively. Years ago I read the Borges story about a man with total recall; the narrator is taken to meet him, and he spends the entire visit reciting every detail of their last visit (so, presumably, if they meet again, he will recall recalling the earlier visit). Sometimes I feel like that: trapped among details and memories of details that I need to get out, only I don't have the time. And of course I'm always fighting against the pressing conviction that I have nothing to say and no one is interested in hearing me say it anyway (I should point out I'm not fishing for compliments here, so there's no need to reassure me; I'm just trying to offer an honest view of my inner life). Unwritten entries pile up in my head, and sometimes I barely realize I haven't actually written and posted them. There's a ghost-blog of such entries that, for me at least, haunts this blog.

So this blog hasn't quite taken the shape I had first intended. For one thing, it's a lot more about poetry now than I thought it would be (and I'm fine with that, though I do sometimes wonder if a more limited focus isn't what people prefer). That seems like a good development to me. But I frequently intend to write about books and movies and recordings and seldom find the time. I keep on with it because blogging is one of the few outlets I've ever found for expressing myself on the things that interest me most in life. So I guess it has been like my life in that it's mostly about a more or less desperate and perpetually failing attempt to carve out enough time for Art.

"who loses and who wins; who's in, who's out"

Not to sound too Harold Bloom here, but I recently re-read The Egoist and was wondering if I was the only person left who still reads George Meredith. I have since learned that I am not, but I think he's not a name that springs to many minds these days – I was recently speaking to a retired librarian who loves nineteenth-century English novels, and she had never heard of him. He flutes and pirouettes a bit too much for twenty-first-century taste (probably I do too), though I think some of his contemporaries also disparaged those tendencies in him, but he's very witty, and intelligent on the subject of wittiness (among other subjects), and astute and lyrical. If you think you'd like something that reads like Jane Austen as written by late-period Henry James, let me suggest The Egoist. Here's some sample hilarity. Clara Middleton is speaking to her fiancé, Sir Willoughby Patterne, as she is starting to realize her engagement was a mistake, and if you find this exchange as hilarious as I do, let me recommend the novel:

". . . but if you read poetry you would not think human speech incapable of —"

"My love, I detest artifice. Poetry is a profession."

"Our poets would prove to you —"

"As I have often observed, Clara, I am no poet."

"I have not accused you, Willoughby."

So speaking of accusing people of poetry, my actual subject here is to list the most popular poems from 2013's "Poem of the Week" series, insofar as I can determine them from Google's analytics, not that those are as extensive as I would like.

#3 is Love, Too Frequently Betrayed (Tom Rakewell's aria), by WH Auden and Chester Kallman, from their libretto for The Rake's Progress.

#2 is the Sonnet On Being Cautioned against Walking on an Headland Overlooking the Sea, because it was Frequented by a Lunatic, by Charlotte Smith.

#1 is the first one in the series, The Reactionary Poet by Ishmael Reed.

That's an eclectic assortment, and I have no idea why those are the most popular; they don't seem like things students would steal for homework, and as far as I could see on Google analytics no one was linking to them, and no comments were left on the top two. Actually one of my personal favorites among my entries also became popular for mysterious reasons. It started as a few goofy jokes about Christmas music but got longer and darker as I wrote ("Tyger, Tyger, burning bright, Won't you guide my sleigh tonight?"). The weird thing is that only about two years after I wrote it did it start climbing the charts, so to speak. At the time I had Statcounter as well as Google Analytics, and I could never tell from either one why that entry was suddenly popular: no one ever left a comment, and I never discovered who, if anyone, was linking to it or forwarding it. Such are the mysteries of the Internet. (If anyone reading this knows the answer, I'm curious to hear it.)

Anyway, the 2014 series has started, so off we go, and as always thank you for reading.

7

Seven years of reverberating, so happy blogaversary to me. Many thanks to all who visit. Please continue to do so!

These are the BART tracks that take me off to events in San Francisco, Berkeley, and Oakland. I spend a lot of time staring at them.

for those wondering

cherry blossoms drop
and absence makes hearts fonder:
haiku hiatus

After posting at least one haiku a day for the past four years I felt I needed a break from the 17-syllable treadmill; after nearly 1500 of them I felt the bucket was clanking down and down in the well and not coming up with much fresh water (though I never know how these things come across to those not living in my head, so I hope I was the only one feeling that way). I may resume them at some point, since obviously I like the form. In the meantime, for those who come here for poetry, I have started a Poem of the Week, and I am planning to post a daily poem during National Poetry Month, the way I did last April. And I will of course continue to post on my continuing adventures in cultural consumption; sadly, since I have a list of about forty entries I mean to write (including my thoughts on posting late, which I've been meaning to do for a while), and new stuff looming on the horizon, taking a break from haiku won't help me there at all, since I write the two things in different ways. Such is life.

Deepest thanks once again to everyone who has read some or all of the haiku (or anything else I've posted here). I hope you've enjoyed them, and please continue to visit.

Alexander's Feast

A few weeks ago at First Congregational Church in Berkeley I heard Philharmonia Baroque’s performance of Handel’s Alexander’s Feast; or, The Power of Musick, conducted by Nicholas McGegan. It’s a setting of Dryden’s poem, in which the banquet entertainment for Alexander the Great after he conquers Persia is a series of varied set pieces used by the musician Timotheus to control the conqueror’s emotional temperature. The ode then ends with a sudden switch to a later time and place, praising the superiority of St Cecilia’s heavenly music. It all sounds very random, like a baroque variety show, but it all flows smoothly and makes perfect emotional sense.

This work was I think one of the first Handel works I bought, so it’s only now, in describing how the ode moves, that I realized how random it is when it is described as a story rather than experienced as music. Hearing various recordings so many times engraves the work on your mind and it takes only a few notes to summon up entire sections which then recede back into memory. That can be a lot for a live performance to work against, but this one sure worked on me because I found the whole evening quite delightful. I have sometimes felt that Philharmonia Baroque tends to be too bouncy and cheerful in a way that slights the darker and grander side of Handel, but the grim and sad sections came through as grim and sad, though perhaps not enough for my companion, who announced afterward that they were all smiling too much up there.

The soloists were all very good. Dominique Labelle was quite sweet and then charmingly flirtatious as she teased out the lines describing how the prince “sigh’d and look’d, sigh’d and look’d, / Sigh’d and look’d, and sigh’d again.” Baritone Philip Cutlip sat oddly separated from the others, perhaps because he had the songs about such less sociable activities as drunkenness and revenge. My favorite part was the ringing tenor of Dann Coakwell.

There were a couple of odd minor mistakes in the program: the libretto says “Words by Newburgh Hamilton” but two pages earlier Scott Foglesong’s program note makes it clear that Hamilton only arranged John Dryden’s work. It seems odd to omit reference on the equivalent of a title page to the man who actually wrote the words. And in the program note Darius is described as Alexander’s father. Philip II of Macedon was Alexander’s father; Darius was father of Xerxes. Interestingly (though also irrelevantly), the ghost of Darius plays the same role as a reminder of fallen glory in what is probably the earliest surviving play in the western canon, Persians by Aeschylus.

Anyway, as I said I enjoyed the evening very much. I’d like to thank Philharmonia Baroque for the very excellent seats (my friend wondered why I was given such good seats; I told him that apparently no one important wanted them, which was lucky for us). I was especially grateful because a month or two before the concert, since I really wanted to hear this piece, I went on-line to buy a ticket and was frankly stunned by the extremely high prices. (To put the cost in some perspective, I heard three concerts by Magnificat for less than the price of one decent seat for this performance.) The thing is, I can think of many reasons why they would set those prices, but not so many reasons to justify my paying them. Their concerts are, in my experience, very well attended, so clearly lots of people can afford their tickets, but as far as I personally am concerned they’ve priced themselves out of the market. I don’t mean to sound crass by ending my reminiscence of aesthetic delight with a complaint about money, but here’s where bloggers and other nonprofessional reviewers can offer a perspective you can't get from professionals, who are used to receiving complimentary tickets. Professional reviewers talking about ticket prices is like a celibate clergy talking about birth control: they’re entitled to their opinion, but it’s not based on any personal risk. I feel a little awkward expressing sticker shock since I was given tickets, but I do feel I needed to mention it.

the Big Apple of discord

The other day I received an e-mail from someone named Amanda Ameer with the subject line "Who is the best arts blogger in America?" With a becomingly modest blush, I opened the e-mail but before I could say, "Mirror, mirror, on the wall. . . " I realized it was some sort of contest, so I'm going to be a little vague about some details here, because though I have read (among other very long books) The History of Clarissa Harlowe in its entirety three times and am up for a fourth, if you hand me a set of contest or game rules I break down well before the end of the first page. Phrases like "four round process" do not encourage me to continue.

There are a number of set debates and discussions I find myself impatient with, because I think the premises are false. When people would debate "allowing gays in the military" I would think, this is a pointless debate, because there always have been and always will be people in the military who are attracted to their own sex; the question is, should we spend time and money rooting them out? Or when people discuss low-paying but virtuous jobs vs high-paying jobs with evil (it is assumed) corporations, I would think, this discussion is pointless, because if there's a moral imperative to do good by others, it's not abrogated just because you decide you want a 401(k); if anything, you can do more good if you have greater income and influence. Or when people discuss whether Mitt Romney or Rick Santorum will be the Republican presidential candidate this year, I think, I wonder how difficult it is to become a Canadian citizen? Seriously, what do I have to do?

What I'm getting at here in my usual hilarious but circuitous way is that the whole premise of the e-mail is false to begin with, because there are judges and public voting involved (just like American Idol or Dancing with the Stars!), so they're not looking for the "best" arts blogger in America, which is so clearly a meaningless concept anyway that it's not even worth discussing; they're looking for the most popular arts blogger in America, or at least the one who can get the most votes, as well as the approval of the judges (Nico Muhly, Douglas McLennan, and Katrine Ames, in case you're wondering), assuming of course that the blogger enters him- or herself (something tells me Alex Ross, Terry Teachout, etc, will not be submitting entries).

Also, about those entries: there are assigned topics. Look, I already have a lengthy list of entries I need and want to write, in between attending even more performances and working full time and generally trying to keep my head above water. I don't need more, especially when they're as unnecessary as Topic #1, the only one so far revealed: "New York has long been considered the cultural capital of America. Is it still? If not, where?" (This contest, I will point out here, is sponsored by a New York organization.)

My first thought after reading that (well, after a generalized "no fucking way") was of that old joke: "But enough about me. What do you think of me?" And then my thought was: a false premise. . . . New York has long been the media (publishing, advertising, public relations) capital of America. Who considers it the cultural capital of America? I mean, besides people who live there, or dream of living there? We still live in a movie culture, and you could make a far more compelling case that Los Angeles, the home of the film industry (and the television industry, despite the head offices in New York City), has been the most culturally influential American city of the twentieth century. (I could even entertain arguments that Detroit, home of the auto industry, has had a greater influence on American culture than either New York or Los Angeles. . . .)

Publicity, connections, all that, can help "culture" happen, or help make people aware of it, but let's not confuse the two things. What you have in New York is mostly abundance: lots of great museums with great art past and present, lots of performers, lots of connections, lots of money. That can produce art, but it can also produce conformity; I always think of Haydn's remark about his isolation in the Esterhazy palaces forcing him to become original. (And, since I'm quoting composers, it's inevitable that someone discussing this contest will quote Bartok on competitions being for horses not artists. . . .) Would Emily Dickinson have written better poems if she'd been immersed in the Boston (or even New York) literary scene of her day? Would she matter more or less to us? (Those of us, that is, to whom she matters at all. It's a big, difficult world out there.)

I assume one of the reasons this topic was chosen for bloggers is so that we can make the obvious points about the digital world breaking down these geographic barriers etc etc. But I think maybe what it's done is just create new power structures, ones which are perhaps less easy to figure out than the old "go to New York and work for the Times" sort of power structure. I'm not so sure this is such a good thing, at least for people like me who always have trouble figuring out power structures, which is why I don't like things that obscure the already shadowy structures even further from view.

Here's where I should point out that though I'm probably sounding full of imperious disdain and arrogance, in my humble heart I know that if a contest involves getting people to vote for you, I am going to lose. I'm just not that popular and never have been (and, honestly, I'm an incredibly nice guy! and I'll prove it: this whole thing is clearly designed to drive traffic to the website of the sponsors, Spring for Music, so here it is, click away, and tell them I send my love). I'm always a little doubtful about the need to import even more rejection and humiliation into my life, so I kind of doubt, given the false premises and all, that this whole thing is worth more of my time than I'm giving it here, despite the $2,500 and the tickets to the Spring for Music concerts at Carnegie Hall, which, as I've already pointed out, I'm just not going to win, under the circumstances. (I do find it a little odd that they don't tell us what the programs are; wouldn't that be crucial information for any "arts bloggers" thinking about entering? I guess the assumption is that if it's in New York, much less Carnegie Hall, it's good enough for the likes of us. Old assumptions die hard.) Look, if anyone wants to crown me with immortal digital laurel, I won't object, but you can hardly expect me to read sheets of instructions. But best wishes to all who enter. I'll just sit here, far away from the golden Apple, fiddling away while Rome burns.

dealing in realities

When I posted my August preview the other day I mentioned that whoever scheduled the Merola production of Barber of Seville was, to quote myself, "simply not dealing in reality." (My original post, and my explanation for saying that, can be found here.) A friend of mine e-mailed me an objection to what I said and how I said it. With his permission I’m posting what he wrote, followed by my response. His text is in blue. I've omitted some stuff that doesn't directly pertain to his argument.

Dearest Patrick,

I was going to leave this in the comments on the fun stuff post then thought better of it because of how it may sound. As you know, I am not retired, unemployed, self-employed, nor am I a student – but I'll be there both nights because I can walk home afterwards – and stop home and have a bite to eat beforehand. I'm not gloating about this, it's just a fact. I don't think the start times are the real issue here as much as the location of your home in relation to the event. Most people don't view that three hour gap as "wasting time" but as an opportunity to have dinner with someone, go home and change, whatever. I find it more difficult and annoying to have to be at something that starts at 7 or 7:30 than at 8:00 and as I've said to you before, I wish this stuff didn't start til 8:30 or 9:00 – which would be more convenient for me but would cause you to go apoplectic – or at least give up on performances altogether. I don't do a lot in Berkeley for the same reason, but that doesn't make them wrong when it obviously works for so many people.

I don't know – I say this to you as a friend and someone I admire and respect, but to say "these people are simply not dealing in reality" sounds pretty harsh to me and I don't think we bloggers are at the top of the list when considerations are made on scheduling the starting times of events – but I do think they are interested in making it convenient for all those folks who want to eat at Absinthe or the Hayes Valley Grill (or at the Grove or Arlequin for that matter) and that's the majority. And for those that abhor late nights, that's what weekend matinees are for, but why would they want to willingly give away comp tickets to performances that won't get them coverage until after it's all over (and to performances that will probably sell better than the evening shows)?

Just wanted to share these thoughts with you.

[from a second e-mail, after I thanked him for responding and told him he should post his remarks or let me post them]:

I just don't want to come across like I'm criticizing you because that's not my intent. I remember when you wrote to me about "War Music" that just because I didn't like how they did it didn't make them wrong for doing it that way, and that's really the spirit of what I'm saying here.

It's up to you whether or not you want to post it and respond [. . . ] and be "nice" in your response, please.

Are you at least going to the Friday performance?

My response now follows. I will point out here that what I said in my original post and what I'm saying here about start times applies generally to performing arts groups in the Bay Area, not just to the Merola Program or the San Francisco Opera.

I was going to leave this in the comments on the fun stuff post then thought better of it because of how it may sound.

It sounds fine. Tone is conveyed not only by what people say but in how the reader reads it. I’m reading it in a positive way. I’m not big on personal abuse but I’m always open to differing viewpoints. I assume people realize that but maybe I shouldn't make that assumption.

As I’ve said all along (for instance, in this post about the Royal Danish Ballet fiasco at Cal), I’m perfectly willing to stick the subject of start times in the FML file if anyone can give me solid reasons why every performance in the Bay Area has to start at 8:00. Please note that in that entry I define what a “solid reason” is.

As you know, I am not retired, unemployed, self-employed, nor am I a student- but I'll be there both nights

I’m sure there were other regularly employed people there; I’m speaking broadly about the attendees. The point I was making is that most people who attend midweek 8:00 performances, aside from the occasional live-performance addict like you and me, are clearly retired people or students, something that is easily verifiable at any performance. I notice that in your write-up (which I will be happy to link to if you wish to identify yourself) you mention how little sleep you got. You have to be very dedicated to the Barber of Seville to make that sacrifice. Most working people aren’t going to make it.

because I can walk home afterwards- and stop home and have a bite to eat beforehand. I'm not gloating about this, it's just a fact.

Yes, that is very handy (I was in a similar situation when I lived in Boston) but you don’t seriously think that most theater-goers live that close to Civic Center, do you? (And if so, what do they do if they want to see something across the bay or downtown?) Also, I know quite a few people (men as well as women) who would not be willing to walk through the neighborhood you walk through late at night. You’re talking about a very small group here – people who, in the first place, are interested in live theater and can afford it, and who live close enough to the theater (or at least a theater) to walk to it, and who are OK with walking alone at night. That's a pretty small subset of potential ticket-buyers. I think the majority of theater-goers are people who work downtown but live farther out.

Let’s also remember that a sizable percentage of them take public transportation, which, in the Bay Area, tends to shut down shortly after midnight. We've all been at opera performances where a lot of the audience is silently screaming "just die already!" because they're afraid of missing the last train. Anything that discourages the use of public transportation is bad. It is way past time when we need to adopt policies that discourage our non-sustainable reliance on cars. (I’m not even going to get into the trouble and expense of parking in San Francisco.)

I don't think the start times are the real issue here as much as the location of your home in relation to the event.

Nope. I don’t think it’s a violation of my personal privacy guidelines to say I live in San Leandro, right next to Oakland, where instead of living in a cramped, overpriced, and relentlessly noisy apartment (as I did in Boston) I can own a pretty nice house with a yard. But it’s not as if I’m out in the boonies, either – the local BART station is a quick walk away, and from there I can catch a direct train that will get me to either downtown San Francisco or Oakland/Berkeley in about 25 minutes.

I get the “one hour” figure I always use by adding in travel to and from the stations and waiting for the train, which can be up to 20 minutes late at night. So the whole trip after commute hours almost always takes an hour. That’s still a shorter trip from Civic Center than to almost anyplace within San Francisco – I’ve occasionally, while staying in the city, spent 30 minutes just waiting for a bus to show up. I could, if I were so minded, come home after work, spend about an hour here, and still get to the theater in time, which I think strengthens my point that there is an absurd amount of time to fill before an 8:00 performance.

If theaters can’t accommodate people who live where I live then they’re in trouble – I would guess most of the local ticket buyers live a similar distance away, even if they're San Francisco residents, and quite a few live even further out, in the Walnut Creek area. It's really great to live as close as you do, but most of the potential audience is just not in that situation.

Most people don't view that three hour gap as "wasting time" but as an opportunity to have dinner with someone, go home and change, whatever.

Well, last time I flew back from New York we sat on the runway for almost three hours, and though I got a lot of reading done (from one of my favorite authors, too – I had Volume 2 of the LOA edition of Isaac Bashevis Singer’s complete stories), I pretty much considered that Jet Blue was wasting my time. I’m very skeptical of institutions that tell me their bizarre delays are really for my benefit.

I’m also wondering how you know this – most people I know definitely regard it as lost time, which is why many of them have dropped live performance in favor of more accommodating forms of culture and entertainment.

Incidentally I have had a couple of friends offer to kill time with me beforehand, which seems like an imposition but they made the offer. But it’s a lot to assume that they’re going to be available when I need them to be, and will be willing to wander off when I need to get to the theater. There are always time pressures when you’re going to a performance, which is why so many restaurants offer special menus for those who have to make a curtain time. I go out to dinner with friends fairly often, but that’s about spending time with them, not using them as filler because theaters, for reasons still unclear to me, insist on starting everything at 8:00.

As I have said before, most working people I know, unless they are hardcore live-performance aficionados, are not even going to consider going to something that won't even start until 8:00 on a worknight. I’ve had retired people say to me that they don’t know how someone who is still working can manage to go to the theater and I’ve had temporarily-fully-employed freelancers tell me they do not know how I can do it. I've had people tell me that when they worked in SF they remember how dull it was waiting for performances to start. The only person I've ever met who doesn't consider the time a waste is you, which of course is a perfectly legitimate position, but as far as I can tell, and in my almost invariable experience, you're in the minority on this.

This does get into the social aspect of theater-going. I realized long ago that no one I knew was interested in going to the theater as often as I was, so I developed the habit of going by myself. I know there are lots of people who view theater as an adjunct to their social life rather than as a thing in itself.

I think of this by and large as the “gracious living” school of theater-going, by which I mean people who see going to the theater as an aspect of their self-image as well-off, cultured people. (To some extent we all do that, no doubt.) I am going to state clearly and emphatically that I am not issuing judgments about whether a more social motivation for theater-going is worse, more trivial, or so forth, than going for the sake of the performance itself. I am stating this clearly and emphatically because though I really do feel people can go to the theater for whatever reason makes them happy, I also have an instinctive stomach-clenching revulsion when people say things like “it’s so civilized!” or “enjoy a leisurely supper beforehand” and suchlike. There is a comic aspect to seeing an aesthete such as myself as an angry proletariat, but there it is. I also reject completely the common stereotype that the "real" lovers of music and theater are of course the poor people up in the cheap seats and never the rich people in the expensive ones, so there that is.

I understand the appeal of a nice night out. But most of the people who feel that way (yes, there are many exceptions, you among them, but I think I’m describing the majority of the group accurately) are, at a deep level, more about self-image than about whatever is actually being performed. These people are no doubt the majority, which explains why we have so much safe theater that pretends it’s edgy.

“Safe” theater is different from bad theater: I’m talking basically about people who want well-known established brand-name performers and works. Nothing wrong with that – there’s usually a good reason why certain works and performers are classics, and we all like to ride our favorite warhorses – but I do think theaters that embrace a role as just another luxury good are making themselves ultimately irrelevant.

All live performance, and this isn’t an Internet thing but rather dates back to the advent of cinema/radio/TV, is – I won’t say “elitist,” because that’s such a loaded term, but “of interest to a minority.” What is new with the Internet is the dumbfounding range of great works that are easily and flexibly accessible. Live performance isn’t the only cultural game in town anymore. Yes, there is something irreplaceable about the experience of live performance (though you could make a valid argument that what you lose in immediacy you gain in breadth of repertory – if the local theaters are doing Barbiere over and over, you can turn to DVD for Moses und Aron).

But it also has many drawbacks: it’s expensive, you are crammed in with a lot of (often irritating) people, and you have to be at a certain place at a certain time. That’s very different from the way that “culture” is, increasingly, consumed. I think theaters would do well to emphasize the specialness of the experience itself, and not sell themselves as just part of a lifestyle, one which only emphasizes the stereotype that live theater is a toy for the contented.

OK, I’m getting a little far afield here, so I’ll go back to your points.

I find it more difficult and annoying to have to be at something that starts at 7 or 7:30 than at 8:00

OK, you're certainly entitled to annoyance, but you don't say why you find it difficult. I have gone to things at Berkeley that started at 7:00, and I have time to take public transportation from work in San Francisco, eat a decent dinner slowly, and still arrive in the theater lobby right after the ushers. And the theater is full when the show starts at 7:00, so plenty of other people are managing to make it there in time. I'm not saying that everyone has to do things the way I do, but I am saying that it is possible to work a regular day and arrive in a different city for a 7:00 performance without an annoying rush. Do you really know a lot of people (who work, and whose jobs have regular hours) who say, “I would love to go to the theater more, but I just can’t get there by 8:00?” (Yes, as I have repeatedly stated, I do know a lot of people who tell me they won’t go to anything that starts at 8:00.)

and as I've said to you before, I wish this stuff didn't start til 8:30 or 9:00 – which would be more convenient for me but would cause you to go apoplectic – or at least give up on performances altogether.

Actually I wouldn’t go apoplectic, I would just do other things with my time. As would anyone who takes public transportation, needs a certain amount of sleep, hates wasting half an evening waiting for an 8:00 curtain, etc. The thing is, theaters are interested in selling as many tickets as possible, aren’t they? Should they really be writing off large segments of potential ticket-buyers?

This may be a problem without a solution; somewhere in the three volumes of Shaw's music criticism, he mentions that audiences tend to be young or old; the middle group is busy with work and family. But I don't think live performance is in such a vibrant state that it can afford to ignore such a large pool of potential ticket-buyers.

I think theaters are already aware that 8:00 start times are a problem, as witness the slowly increasing experimentation with earlier start times – even when they’re misconceived, like the Symphony’s 6:30 Fridays, there is an awareness that 8:00 is a problem for many potential ticket-buyers. (Incidentally I don't see much experimentation with later start times.) We’re all certainly entitled to our personal preferences, but I really think the majority of potential ticket-buyers in this area are not longing for later start times.

I don't do a lot in Berkeley for the same reason, but that doesn't make them wrong when it obviously works for so many people.

Well, exactly: there’s lots of great stuff in Berkeley, not only from Cal Performances but from Berkeley Rep and the Aurora Theater, but if it’s too much of a burden you’re not going to go. Wasting three hours between work and the start of a performance is a burden, and you have not persuaded me that most people don’t see the waiting time as wasted. To some extent, yes, it works for many people in the sense that current audiences are OK with the 8:00 start time, but as I've pointed out, those audiences tend to be made up of retired people, students, and others with flexible schedules. Most working people just don't bother to go.

I don't know – I say this to you as a friend and someone I admire and respect, but to say "these people are simply not dealing in reality" sounds pretty harsh to me

I don’t mean it to be harsh (as it would be if I said something like, “these people are crazy”). I’m not trying to be harsh, or snarky, or “controversial”: I’m trying to be accurate. I think they are not dealing in reality, and I think this is the easily verifiable local reality:

1) Most people in this area have jobs that start at 8:00 in the morning or earlier. I don’t know for sure (it probably has something to do with the financial markets in New York and the three-hour time difference) why my jobs back east were 9:00 to 5:00 and out here they’re 8:00 to 5:00, but such is the case. I frequently get to work between 7:30 and 8:00 and the office is already mostly full and that is not considered unusual. Walk through the Financial District at that hour and the streets are packed. Unless you’re someone who likes to think of himself or herself as the sort of person who stays out late, you’re not going to go to many things that end late, because it makes the next day too difficult.

2) Most Americans do not get enough time off and even those who do often end up not using their allotment because of workplace pressures. Time off is precious. Hours spent waiting for a performance to begin start adding up as wasted hours. Go to the theater enough and you’re going to start adding up the hours spent waiting and you will start thinking this is maybe not the most productive use of your time. It gets back to a conversation I had with you several months ago that really resonated with me: I mentioned that you seemed to have cut back on theater and one of the reasons you gave was to avoid “entertaining yourself to death” at the expense of other things you could be doing with your life. Exactly.

3) Live performance is competing against plenty of cultural choices that are cheaper and more easily accessible. Theaters need as many paying customers as possible, and it is foolish to make it so inconvenient for working people.

Given the fungible nature of reality, people are of course free to dispute the points above, but it needs to be about accuracy, not personal preference. I really don't think that what I'm saying here is the equivalent of "well, I'm here, so they can start now." I think my experience is shared by many.

and I don't think we bloggers are at the top of the list when considerations are made on scheduling the starting times of events –

I’m making this point not as a blogger, but as a frequent theater-goer (who buys expensive tickets and often donates to theaters, by the way – they’re losing more than a $10 ticket when they lose me) who also works a regular 8:00 to 5:00 job. Blogging is essentially irrelevant to what I'm saying here.

but I do think they are interested in making it convenient for all those folks who want to eat at Absinthe or the Hayes Valley Grill (or at the Grove or Arlequin for that matter) and that's the majority.

I’m curious where you’re getting that information. That group couldn’t possibly be the majority because I doubt that all those restaurants combined (and throw in Jardiniere as well) have enough seating to accommodate the audience in Herbst, let alone Davies Hall and the Opera House, on those nights when all three venues are on.

Also: those are fairly expensive restaurants. I prefer to spend my money on tickets. You’re taking an expensive evening and making it even more expensive. I thought theaters were trying to fight the image that they were only for the rich, or for people who didn’t need to work? Look, if theaters want to cater to that crowd (yeah, instinctive revulsion is going on), that’s (quite literally) their business, but, as noted earlier: looming irrelevance. Because even if the fine-diners are the majority (which I doubt), going after that group instead of those interested in theater itself is, as I have pointed out above, the way to cultural irrelevance.

And for those that abhor late nights,

This isn’t about “abhorring”; it’s about a realistic assessment of the hours most working people in this area have to keep. There’s no attempt at curfew here; anyone who likes late nights is free to go to a bar or restaurant after the show. I do realize there aren’t many open then, because there aren’t enough customers for it to be economically feasible. There aren't enough customers because most people have to work early the next day.

that's what weekend matinees are for,

Sure, but weekends get filled up, and so do weekend matinees. Theaters realize this, which is why so many of them charge more for weekend tickets. Wouldn’t it make sense for them to increase the potential number of ticket-buyers, and therefore increase the theater's income, by instituting more realistic start times during the week?

but why would they want to willingly give away comp tickets to performances that won't get them coverage until after it's all over

Again: my point is not about getting comp tickets. I get them so seldom that it's not really a consideration for me. In the original entry I went back and forth on whether it should be “bloggers” or “working people” who had difficulties with 8:00 weeknight performances. I ended up going with “bloggers,” which perhaps obscured my point.

As for not getting coverage, well, even professional reviewers are not going to have a review in print until the run is pretty much over. That’s what happens when your run is over a single weekend. You have the same problem when the performance is a one-off, as are most recitals etc. I assume the benefits of getting the word out about a particular performer or theater group make it worthwhile for them to hand out comp tickets. It’s not really my problem. Though I will happily accept free tickets, I never ask for them and don’t count on them. My point here is about regular theater-goers, that is, people who pay for their tickets.

(and to performances that will probably sell better than the evening shows)?

If weekend matinees are selling better than 8:00 evening shows, theaters might want to do some serious thinking about why that is.

[from a second e-mail, after I thanked him for responding and told him he should post his remarks or let me post them]:

I just don't want to come across like I'm criticizing you because that's not my intent.

As stated earlier, I’m fine with hearing different viewpoints. I’ve usually come from the theater, not Mount Sinai, and I have no tablets of celestial law.

I remember when you wrote to me about "War Music" that just because I didn't like how they did it didn't make them wrong for doing it that way, and that's really the spirit of what I'm saying here.

Indeed. I meant that more to apply to what theaters are staging as opposed to how they’re operating, but it’s still a valid point. And I don’t say theaters are wrong for persisting in the 8:00 start time. I say they’re foolish, because as far as I can see they’re missing out on a lot of their potential audience.

If that’s what they want to do, that’s their choice, but then they really do need to drop the whole “expanding the audience” blah blah blah shtick. Being innovative in this case isn’t about setting up a Twitter feed or whatever the e-thing of the moment is; it’s about taking a hard look at the fundamentals of what you’re doing and how you’re doing it, and maybe doing things differently.

It's up to you whether or not you want to post it and respond [. . . ] be "nice" in your response, please.

I’m actually not sure how to take that. I think I’m always nice, sometimes too much so, though of course I realize that for various reasons people don't always see things my way. But I wasn’t kidding in my original entry when I said I was speaking with love in my heart. I never try to be snarky, I try to be accurate. I’m afraid you have not convinced me that I’m wrong in what I said, so I’ve had to express that. I’ve realized that no matter how carefully I phrase things (and people don’t always realize how carefully I’m phrasing certain things) people are sometimes going to read them in a tone that’s very different from the one I had in mind. There’s not much I can do about that, short of emoticons.

;-)

Are you at least going to the Friday performance?

No, I did not, and here’s a summary of what I did with my evening instead: a light workout, then I worked in my garden for an hour, then washed the dishes and did a load of laundry and some other housekeeping stuff, I checked e-mail, I read about the first book and a half of Sarah Ruden’s new translation of the Aeneid, I listened to my new Kurtag CD, watched an episode of South Park, and was asleep by about the time the second act of Barbiere would have been beginning, which was good because I was exhausted and would rather sleep at home than in the theater. (We've all seen people who nod off as soon as the lights go out: another hazard of late start times.)

I had a good evening: productive and filled with cultural enrichment. I hope yours was also pleasant.

happy blogaversary to me

Five years of reverberating. Deepest thanks to all visitors and readers, casual or constant, and particularly (and always) to V, who suggested it, and who has read every word (or so she tells me).

AT&T Sucks!

So after being without a phone for several weeks, I called AT&T and they sent someone out to take a look. And now I have neither phone or Internet. I am on an ice floe, heading out towards cold and choppy seas. Though presumably I will return at some point, and will post the backlog (haiku, Cyrano, Measha Brueggergosman, Zenshinza Theatre, Makropulos Case, and maybe more) then. Check back soon. I hope.

paging opera

I was tired enough last night so that I figured the perfect way to occupy myself was the rhythmic reformatting required to post, at long postponed last, my opera life list, first mentioned here. So there it is at the top of the right-hand column, in the new “page” section. Only operas seen live counted. I excluded musicals but included operettas, though the lines there can get pretty blurry, as we all know. And I excluded oratorios, though I will probably go back and add them in; it seems too arbitrary to list Semele and Acis & Galatea but not Belshazzar or Jephtha. Such are the Solomon-like decisions one is called upon to make. I think I need to go back through the playbills anyway, because I realized while reformatting that I had apparently missed an entire season (2007, in case you’re wondering) – I kept thinking, wait, I saw Rosenkavalier more recently than that . . . wait, there was that Iphigenie with Susan Graham that was so great! . . . and that Macbeth with Hampson that was so bad. . . . which means I did not do as thorough a job as I had hoped sorting through my playbills.

I had them all in order up through probably the mid 1980s, and then, well, things happened, and it took me a while to sort through the piles scattered in all sorts of boxes and bags and suitcases and to try to figure out what I saw when (it’s surprising how many playbills leave the year off) and whether I had duplicates I needed to toss out (of course I did! but not all in the same place). I guess I still need to do another run-through.

What aggravated me about the playbill situation (well, actually, what aggravated me about me) was that I had intended for years to put them in order, and I could have started at any time to put them once again in order and then I would have had a smaller backlog to deal with. But I kept thinking I needed to do the whole thing, eventually, some day, and not just part, so I persisted in my haphazard storage system until the whole project grew so massive I had to deal with it or just give it up entirely.

Anyway, the list is therefore a work in progress, not just forwards, but backwards. I don’t know if it’s of interest to anyone but me, but that’s true of pretty much everything on here anyway. I’m so close to seeing all of Janacek’s major operas! The Excursions of Mr Broucek, anyone?

Ask and Ye Shall Receive, To Some Extent

My statcounter hasn’t been that amusing lately, not that I blame you personally; lots of people just search for my name or reverberate hills, though occasionally I get “reverberant hills” which always surprises me slightly since I’m so used to the original. Take it up with Mr Shakespeare.

My titles get me in trouble sometimes. After I used “Guys Gone Wild” I got a lot of hits from people who were, I fear, disappointed that they ended up with my entry on San Francisco Opera’s last Don Giovanni. But Godspeed, fellas, and good luck on your valiant quest to find those elusive pictures of drunken shirtless frat boys somewhere on the Internet.

I still get quite a few for Go, Lovely Rose, which I used for an entry on Rachel Portman’s operatic version of The Little Prince. I assume these are mostly from students, since they often take the form of “Go Lovely Rose meaning.” To which I have to say – you’re kidding, right? If you can’t figure out what that poem means, you should be out getting your heart broken before you try to read any more poetry. But that’s the problem with teaching literature – most students don’t really understand it at the age when they’re required to read it. You just hope they remember it’s there when they need it later on.

I assume The Bonesetter’s Daughter is now on reading lists as well, since sometimes people just type in what is obviously the teacher’s thought-provoking question. You’d think they would at least rephrase it to shorten what they have to type. The latest was “Who is the antagonist in The Bonesetter’s Daughter?” Well, I guess that would be me, or possibly M. C-.

Narwhal searches show up frequently – apparently there is a paucity of Internet sites featuring narwhals! – and I’m sorry, but I still don’t have any recipes for them. As for the person searching for “the narwhal bacons at midnight, meaning,” I hate to keep apologizing, but I’m sorry, I just don’t think I can help you, even if you switch bacons for either beckons or beacons. Though maybe it really does mean bacons, and as I said, I’m sorry – no recipes, though I imagine anything you use for walrus would also work.

UPDATE: OK, today (August 31) I had a hit for "narwhal kills Aquaman." Cool! When I was young, the only superhero I liked was Aquaman, mostly because he got to live underwater. I also liked that he wore a cool green-and-gold uniform, rather than the usual red, white, and blue. Having him killed by a narwhal just makes a good thing better!

My translation of Hypocrite lecteur – mon semblable – mon frère! continues to be semi-popular, but I’m embarrassed to say I can’t find it now. Yeah, I'm lazy, but it's been that kind of day – I swept the front yard only to have it covered in leaves once again by the time I finished, I did piles of laundry and immediately started filling the laundry basket again, I did the dishes and already more are piled in the sink. So I'll just figure repeating translations is part of the Sisyphean upkeep life requires: Hypocrite reader, my likeness/reflection, my brother!

Now write the rest of the term paper yourself.

I can offer answers to the person who searched for “Pace, pace mio Dio Chinese meaning,” thanks to consultation with my vast international pool of experts (muchas gracias to Mr G/S Y):

If we take the English meaning as “God, please grant me peace,” then the equivalent in Mandarin could be:

Shang-Tian (the Sky/the Heavens), Qing (Please) Tsi Wo (Give Me) He Ping (the Peace)

Now good luck with that audition.

To the searcher for “Nathan Gunn biceps” – oh, can we just call them Nathan’s guns? – I’m sure he has them, but I really don’t have any other information. I also do not have “naked/shirtless pics” of Gunn, Dimitri Hvorostovsky, David Adam Moore, Brandon Jovanovich, or any one of a number of other comely tenors and baritones – but check out this site, I think he can help you.

As for the person who searched for “shirtless Mickey Rooney,” well, I can’t help you, and you may actually be beyond help.

all this have I done in care of thee

Back in the early days, I had to trudge through ten miles of snow to find a previous blog entry. Now all you need to do is check out the Label List just below the blog archives to the right. These things aren't an exact science and I may do some tweaking, but in case you ever wondered exactly how obsessive and repetitious I can be, here's your chance to do some research, since I've gone back to the beginning and slapped more or less accurate labels on everything.

I'm also trying out removing the "word verification," which I always find a bit annoying, in favor of moderating all comments. I'll see how that works.

Caged

This is my favorite picture of myself ever!

The photo is courtesy of Civic Center's fabulous sfmike.

In case you can't tell what the music is, it's the framed score for John Cage's 4' 33" as currently on exhibit at SFMOMA. A recent e-mail from them describes the piece as "noteless jazz" - um, noteless, sure, but why is it classified as jazz? I suspect it's just to make it sound more intriguing to that ever-desirable hipster demographic they're trying to lure in.

I'm spending the weekend at Carterpalooza, and many thanks to San Francisco Performances for being the only local group celebrating the still-living, still-composing Carter as he turns 100 this week. I'd be impressed and inspired by his continuing productivity even if I hadn't been enjoying his music for decades.

Unfortunately this means I will miss the New Music Seance presented by Other Minds. What a plethora of musical riches - you'd think December 6 was the feast of St Cecilia rather than St Nicholas.

When I started blogging I vowed I would never apologize for posting late, because I knew I would end up sounding like Jim Anchower, so I'll just say that if you're wondering what I've seen since the middle of September, I hope to satisfy your curiosity very soon. In the meantime, go buy some of the new Elliott Carter discs and enjoy!

daily and random inspirations

After one of my recent postings on Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, artist Andrea Way e-mailed me and told me she had spent last year doing a painting a day, and during the month of September she had listened to LHL while painting. You can check out the fabulous results here. This project reminded me of Suzan-Lori Parks’s play-a-day-for-a-year, some of which I saw at The Cutting Ball (by the way, you still have a couple of weeks to see their latest production, Ionesco’s Victims of Duty, which I highly recommend and hope to write about, oh, soonish; and The America Play by Parks is next up at Thick House Theater). I find the whole “one artistic product per day for a year” idea fascinating. I’ve thought about doing it with haiku, but that always seems too easy to me – I mean, five-seven-five, it’s not that difficult, people – but I’ve occasionally exchanged haiku with co-workers as if we were Heian aristocrats and not cubicle monkeys, and apparently it’s more difficult than I think, judging from the unnatural elisions and other blunders I would see. Maybe I will do that.

Many years ago I was associated with a high-school science textbook that ended up never being published, and one of the suggested (not by me) student activities was to “illustrate the concept of osmosis by performing an interpretive dance.” I found this absolutely hilarious, partly because the target audience probably knew as much about interpretive dance as about osmosis and partly because I could imagine the high-school students who would do this, what it would look like, and how stunned their captive audience would be. Well, damned if an idea that seems silly can't really work: check out Jolene’s lovely choreographed version of her Ph.D. thesis over at Saturday Matinee. See, it's frequently said that life is like high school, but sometimes instead art, science, and athletics can all come together, instead of sitting at separate tables in the cafeteria.

Seven, They Are Seven

I’ve been meme-tagged twice, first by Susan-being-kept-awake-by-opera and next by the Opera Tattler, so I guess I’d better cowboy up. This meme kind of threw me because you have to come up with seven random or weird facts about yourself, but, you know, you don’t want them to be too random, and definitely not too weird. So first I’m supposed to list the rules:

1) Link to your tagger and list these rules on your blog. Done and doing!

2) Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog - some random, some weird.

3) Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blog.

4) Let them know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

5) If you don't have 7 blog friends, or if someone else already took dibs, then tag some unsuspecting strangers.

Shouldn't there be 7 rules? I find this a little strange.

Seven facts, or at least factoids, or at least things I'm not too ashamed to reveal:

1) My first complete sentence was, “Go away.” What a winsome child!

2) I won’t eat spaghetti, beets, mayonnaise (OK, sometimes in a dressing in small amounts), or meat that isn’t well-done. I can’t drink coffee since it upsets my stomach, but I like coffee ice cream. I drink tea copiously, but I have to put milk in it or it upsets my stomach too. I like goat cheese but don’t eat it because, somewhat mysteriously, it gives me terrible migraines.

3) I’ve always thought Pamina and Papageno should get together – Tamino’s kind of a drip, isn’t he?

4) I love doing laundry, but I don’t particularly like ironing. I once heard some guy going on about “buying your first car – that’s freedom, man!” and I thought, uh, no, because if you have a car you need a steady supply of money for gas, insurance, and repairs, not to mention for the places the car might take you, and for a steady supply of money you need a job, which means you have to be at a certain place at a certain time day after day – a car is merely the illusion of freedom. But having your own washer and drier – that is freedom!

5) I don’t drive. I know one pedal makes the car go faster and another makes it stop, but I’m a little vague on which is which. The world is just better without having me behind the wheel. Ms S of DC once pointed out that I get road rage as a pedestrian. I also have fairly poor depth perception which got much worse after my eye surgery (detaching retina) eighteen years ago. I sometimes wonder if that’s why I love Japanese woodblock prints, Matisse, and Russian icons so much: flat decorated surfaces.

6) I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve read the complete works of Shakespeare. I always start with Twelfth Night and end with Hamlet, partly because I did it that way the first time and partly because that way I make sure I have something really good at the end: you don’t want the Merry Wives of Windsor just hanging over your head like that.

7) V taught me how to quilt. I’ve completed three and I’ve started the fourth, which I’m making out of old shirts I can’t wear to work any longer because the collars and cuffs are too frayed and the armpits have gotten the way armpits get. I can also chop down (and chop up) a fairly sizable tree. I was kind of surprised how much I liked chopping wood: if I didn't love trees even more, I'd be on a bare lot by now. I like to know how to do these semi-practical things at times. It makes me feel I could survive on the winter prairies, though I probably really couldn't.

Now I’m supposed to tag seven others: well, V, CMB, and MBB. That’s three. Hmmm. Four more? OK, to continue with the random and weird, the Pacifica Quartet because I’m eager to hear them playing all of Elliott Carter’s string quartets in a few weeks.

silent, upon a peak in Darien

I had been dimly aware of Meredith Monk for years, but only as an occasional comet I would read about streaking through distant avant-garde skies. I had never heard a note of her music until last March, when I heard her live. I had been following with interest the intrepid musical explorations of M. C- as part of the M6 ensemble, dedicated to preserving a performance tradition of her music, so I was curious to hear her.

The concert was at a Unitarian church and sponsored by some sort of holistic healing institute that seemed such an unlikely patron for this sort of thing that when I started getting postcards and e-mails from them several weeks afterwards it took me a while to realize they'd gotten my home and e-mail addresses from me and not from one of the many weird mailing lists I'm on. The Unitarian Church was packed that evening (surely an opening that would pique anyone's interest! I offer it gratis to any writers of thrillers out there). sfmike posted on the concert with the speed of which he is justifiably proud. I'd provide a link but there's a picture of me making a goofy face in there so I'll forego the pleasure. I'd be nice about the audience if they were a nice audience, but given the excessive whispering, especially in the second half, I feel free to vent some of my free-flowing rage on them. Most of the crowd looked like rejects from a roadside company chorus for Il Trovatore – bangles, amulets, shawls, string upon string of glittering necklaces wherever I looked, and lots and lots of overacting. And there were a few sturdy and drab souls who looked like – well, they looked like people who would be at a Unitarian Church on just about any Friday night.

Nonetheless I was dazzled by Monk's performance and vocal agility and imagination. There's a children's story – it's probably someplace obvious like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, but you can supply the research if you wish – that describes a type of hard candy that changes flavors from minute to minute. Her music changed colors like that. I finally listened last night to the CD I bought back then and I ended up playing it three times in a row. I think what has struck me the most in the months since, as I've thought about that concert, is just gratitude to Monk for presenting a certain type of Americanness that has seem crushed out of the country, especially in the past eight years – the sense of someone who felt free and brave and open enough to strike out on her own path, and generously welcomed the rest of us to follow along if we wished. It might be eccentricity, it might be self-indulgent or weird, or it might be something that feeds your soul and speaks to you in a way nothing else has, and there's room for all that. It’s been an encouraging thing over the last few depressing months to see that there is still an alternative. I was very grateful to M. C- not only for bringing me to an artist I hadn’t known, but also for getting her to sign my CD, which she inscribed “with deepest thanks,” which sort of abashed me – ah, no, Meredith – thank you.

housekeeping

You will notice a little different look here. I switched to a glam new template, and one unintended result was that I lost the former blogroll. I have re-created it as best I could, but feel free to send me your blog address if you want me to add it; omissions are accidents. I couldn't find some of the URLs when I decided I'd already spent too much time redecorating the blog rather than actually posting in it. Though I have no doubt I will play with the fonts some more, since I like that sort of thing.

And I disclaim any responsibility for blogger's use of begining articles in alphabetizing. If anyone knows how to get around that, please let me know.

blogging with Berlioz

Feuilletonist to blogger is not that big a leap; in fact, this all seems like a case of plus ca change, as so many things do. . . . (All quotations are from the David Cairns translation of The Memoirs of Hector Berlioz, Everyman's Library/Knopf edition; anything in square brackets after this point is from me, not Berlioz.)

The Leonore overture, a truly gigantic piece, played with rare precision and verve, was received with only the feeblest applause, and I later heard a gentleman at dinner complain at their not doing Haydn’s symphonies instead of this ‘uncivilized music with no tunes in it’!! Even in Paris we do not have that kind of bourgeois any more. (p. 288)

[I think we still have them in Boston and San Francisco, though, because I swear I’ve overheard the same remark (possibly from the same old man), only with Beethoven’s name in place of Haydn’s.]

Let me now tell you about the Prague choral society. It is like all such bodies in Germany in being composed almost entirely of amateurs from the middle classes. . . . Unlike some institutions of the sort it does not have as its sole aim in life the rehearsal and performance of ancient masterpieces, to the exclusion of contemporary works. Such institutions are, if I may so describe them, mere sects, musical consistories where under pretext of a real or pretended enthusiasm for the dead they complacently dismiss the living, of whom they know nothing, deplore the growing influence of Baal, and consign all supposed golden calves and their worshippers [that would be Moses und Aron, I suppose] to perdition. These meeting houses of musical puritanism are the repositories of the religion not of the beautiful, whatever its age, but of the old, whatever its quality: a narrow, rancorous religion with its own Bible and the works of two or three evangelists, over which the faithful pore tirelessly, producing ever more subtle interpretations of passages whose meaning is transparently clear. . . . (p. 441)

I have never been able to bring myself to dilate on matters of which I am quite ignorant. It may come, in time and by force of example. Meanwhile you must forgive me if I keep silent. (p. 442)

Not only working men from Prague but also peasants came to the concert that I gave in the theatre, the low price of some of the seats having put it within their means, and I could tell from their fresh, uninhibited reaction to the more unexpected effects in the music how interested they were in what I was trying to do. . . . (p. 444)

. . .the season would open with an English version of that sparkling novelty, Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor. . . . (p. 490)

[OMFG! Hector, I love Lucia but ROFLMAO!!!! And that little jab at opera-house programming was written over one hundred and fifty years ago!]

Shakespeare! Where is he? Where art thou? I feel as if he alone of all men who ever lived can understand me, must have understood us both; he alone could have pitied us, poor unhappy artists, loving yet wounding each other [Berlioz is writing about the death of his wife, the actress Harriet Smithson, whom he had first seen as Juliet and Ophelia]. Shakespeare! You were a man. You, if you still exist, must be a refuge for the wretched. It is you that are our father, our father in heaven, if there is a heaven.
God standing aloof in his infinite unconcern is revolting and absurd [interesting to think that the artist indifferently paring his nails over his creation became the ideal that replaced the Romanticism of Berlioz and his generation]. Thou alone for the souls of artists are the living and loving God. Receive us, father, into thy bosom, guard us, save us! De profundis ad te clamo. What are death and nothingness? Genius is immortal! What? ‘O fool, fool, fool!’ [He closes with a quotation from Othello; his wife also played Desdemona, and in a strange reversal of the play was intensely jealous of him after they married.] (p. 505)

He repeats himself, the reader will say. It is only too true. The same endless rhythm: remembrance, regret, a soul clutching at the past, a pitiful blind urge to arrest the present and hold it as it flies, a hopeless struggle with time, a mad desire to realize the impossible, a desperate craving for limitless love. How should I not repeat myself? The sea repeats itself; its waves are all alike. (p. 552)

[Amen, Brother Berlioz.]