Degas in Boston

Degas liked naked women and portrayed them throughout his career of more than fifty years.  Currently the MFA (Museum of Fine Arts) in Boston has a major show.  We bought tickets ($65) ahead of time which included an audio tour and catalogue and importantly the privilege of cutting the line only to find there was no line.  Caveat emptor.  We now have two catalogues which I would not have bought but will have no trouble figuring out what to do with.  The catalogue is extensive and scholarly and if your interested, quite readable.

Back to Degas and the show which is enormous.  How well you like the show might have something to do with your comfort with nudes.  Much is said about painting: influences,sites, subjects, techniques, time and the fact that many of these were not shown during his lifetime, his habit of not painting faces--this material was scandalous but we never discuss that.  This is art, not sociology but surely social issues intrude.  A nude prostitute whose face was clearly visible was marked for life and eternity, actually.

What struck me particularly was that many of these women were caught in movements which would last only a fraction of a second.  I do not believe that cameras of the time could have caught it although they could now.  A question photography produced was "Why, a painting?  Why not a photograph?"  This was an answer of the day.  Too, there is the texture of the medium--many were monoprints, monoprints reworked, pencil, and so on.  They are quite absorbing and quite lovely.

And not a ballet dancer in the lot.

Kommilitonen! by Peter Maxwell Davies

Kommiltonen! was written to be performed by students jointly for Julliard School and the Royal Academy of Music.  They wanted a piece not only for students but about students noted David Pountney, the librettist, in the program.  Planned at a time when students were not active, it focuses on three incidents of student action with three very different outcomes. (And then there was Occupy Wall Street, not in the opera, but activity seems to be in style again).  The three stories are interwoven--apparently straight line story telling is dead.  Too bad. The three stories require three different musical idioms, German, American and Chinese.  This is a rich work providing opportunity to consider history, philosophy, musical style, artistic choices, performance choices--it could be a college major all by itself. 

The three incidents are the White Rose movement of the Scholl brother and sister in Nazi Germany/  The story of James Meredith and his entry into the University of Mississippi in the 60's, and the Chinese Cultural Revolution.  Three historical incidents.   The Scholls were executed by the Nazis.  Meredith graduated but remained ever controversial.  Wu accommodates to the government, matures to write the  history of the cultural revolution and sings that he knows who murdered his parents but will not reveal their names.

David Maxwell Davies has said that he did not want to write music that would turn students off to twenty-first century music for life.  He was also mindful of the limits of students.  The music is modern but I thought effective.  One does long for a rouse one can go out singing at the ending, but the ending he created is certainly effective.

I found this moving and wish it a long life.

Burmese Days as a play

George Orwell is best known as the author of 1984 and of Animal Farm with one of my favorite lines which I remember as, "All pigs are equal, but some pigs are more equal than other pigs."  However, his first novel first novel was Burmese Days based on his time as a military policeman in Burma.  This has now been adapted as a play by Ryan Mitchell which is being performed at 59E59. 

The play is a well told story of betrayal and intrigue in Burma between the wars as we used to say in the old days, but what makes the play compelling is the skill of a cast of English actors who can shift from character to character across ethnic lines just by changing posture and voice (and accent).  They are amazing, all of them.

Well done.

Burning, play

Burning, a new play by Thomas Bradshaw has a very attractive cast which is a good thing because we see them all, and I do mean all.  The program has a very firm bum on the cover, and I do not believe that any were missed in the production.  Enlightened people may not care, but then why is it on the cover?

This is the story of an artist who withholds his ethnicity from the public because he want his work judged only on the merit of the work and who leaves his blond wife to travel to Germany where his work will be shown in a gallery run by neo-Nazis.  It does not seem as if this will turn out well.  It is also the story of love in its many permutations.  Many questions may be asked about art and history and what matters and what doesn't and do we care about these people.

It is not boring.  One is absorbed throughout so I guess we must care about these people, but one also has the feeling that cliches are being aired, and there is less being said than imagined.

Recommended cautiously.

Two operas by Charpentier

Charpentier compposed in the time of Louis XIV but the official patent to write operas was held by Lully so Charpentier had to work within limitattions.  he was normally limited as to the size of his orchestra and the number of singers.  He also needed to secure the good opinion of Louis.  He wrote an Opera about Orpheus, The Descente d'Orphee aux Enfers,  which may or not be unifinished and another in praise of Louis, La Couronne de Fleurs, which Louis.

The current performance by the Boston Early Music Festival interweaves the two pieces so we may be fairly sure that Charpentier did not see them performed thus.  The music, instruments, costumes, dance and performance, however, are as true the time of composition as it is possible to make them.  The voices were remarkable--well you can say that about anything, can't you?  The voices were lovely. Boston Early Music performances are as authentic as to instruments, style, dance and production as possible, and this was done as a "court stating," that is, the orchestra was on stage, but the singers and dancers were in costume and enacted the scenes.  The program contained and extensive essay on the works and production

This was a lovely evening but not a stirring one.  I must confess to fading out at times.  At one point Orpheus was leading Euridice off the stage and toward a side exit, but I never saw them walk through it.  My husband assures me they left without incident.

Satyagraha,, opera by Philip Glass

It isn't new any more, and you may have seen it at your local movie theater.  Nevertheless I only saw it recently and some thoughts.

Satyagraha, the opera by Phillip Glass tells the story of Ghandi and his politial awakening in Africa by showing scenes from his life sung to a libretto in Sanskrit, an essentially dead language and based on the Bhagavad Gita, a classic of Indian literature.  The Bhagavad Gita tells of Prince Arjuna's conversation with Lord (God) Krishna before a battle is to start.  It was beloved by Ghandi but not directly about the story of the opera.    Africa is where Ghandhi first worked out his methods and thephilosophy of struggle that he later used to free India from colonial rule.  The production makes use of corrugated iron and newspapers from the time.  It is wonderfully creative folding the newspaper into puppets at one point.   There is no attempt to literally translate what the singers are singing but phrases are flashed on the wall from time to time to give one the sense of what is sung.  The scenes are not arranged in chronological order.  The opera has been described as meditative, and it is necessary to let it flow without struggling to make it like something familiar.  An Indian friend commented that the Indian texts have been passed orally exactly the same way for centuries, but in Glass they are difficult to understand as they are reset musically.

It sound impossible--essentially a pantomime to impossible words and minimalist music.  It is not easy, but it works.  It has been described as a masterpiece and is not only worth seeing but worth study.

Opera in NY

According to the Bel Canto Society, there are more than fifty organization in NY that perform opera, and if you think that is a lot, reflect that in 1989 there were around 80.  (I just lost the exact number.)

Anway below is a list of some of the less well-known companies we have run into--just in case you want to try something new:

American Opera Projects
Amore
Amato
Brooklyn Repertory Opera
Bronx
Chelsea
dell Arte Opera Ensemble
Empire
Gotham
Light Opera of NY
Morningside Opera Brooklyn
New York Lyric Opera
New York Opera Forum
Opera Company of 
Opera Feroce
Opera Manhattan
Opera Moderne
Opera Oggi NY
Opera Worksho
Pocket Opera of NY
Regina
Vertical Players
Village Light Opera
Williamsburg Opera

Plus the music schools and the obvious candidates

Le Donne Curiose

Le Donne Curiose by Ermano Wolf-Ferrari was a new work, new composer, new venue for us.  First sung in German in 1903 and then in Italian in New York in 1912, it is a light piece presented with some charm at the Players Club in Manhattan.  The Players Club is an interesting venue, of course, with pictures of its members past--Edwin Booth, John Barrymore, Peter O'Toole--everywhere you look.  However, in the end the venue defeated us.  Rarely for us we left at the second intermission.  The room is flat and was  very crowded so that even though we had "preferred theater seating" as opposed to unpreferred or the pricier "Prohibition package" (the theme of the evening was the 1920's with costumed audience to match), we could not see the singers most of the time.  In addition there were no surtitles so audience members who do not understand sung Italian were clueless.  Those who did understand, however, appeared to enjoy the humor.

The plot concerns a group of women who want to know what goes on at their husband's club and plot to get in.  You can sort of write the scenes yourself.  Self-satisfied men at the club.  Women are curious.  Men rebuff them.  Women plot to get the entrance keys.  And so on.

Light, sort of fun, not worth sitting at the back for.

Opera Moderne is one a New York's many small companies performing less known works with charm.

Arms of the Middle Ages

It seems that the arms department of the Metropolitan Museum willbe a hundred years old next year, and the displays will be redone, but without closing the galleries.  Arms and armor was one of the first five departments formed, and the collection particularly the Euopean medieval and Japanese collegections has always been outstanding.

The Met has a movie made in the 1920's (before sound) showing how armor was put on, how a fully suited man could get on a horse by himself, lie down and get up contary to the way it has been portrayed in the movies.  Nothing less would have been practical. 

Armo has also affected our language.  The example I remember is that  the places where armor pieces came together  were called points. When you put on weight and had to loosen, you "stretched a point."

We learned all of this in a course we are taking which features talks with curators and trips behind the scenes.

Age of Transition: Byzantium to Islam

The Metropolitan Museum of Art has recently opened galleries dedicated to the Art of the Arab Lands (formerly the Muslim galleries).  We have not seen them yet, but they are reported to be marvelous.  One thousand items are on display (and twelve thousand are in storage).

In March 2012 a new show will open dedicated to art of the 7th-9th Centuries, a time when the Arab lands were under Jewish,  Orthodox Coptic Christian and Muslim influences with the Muslim culture becoming dominant.  This is sometimes seen as a dark age, but was actually extremely vital.  The David Plates (currently under the stairwell) will be a part of the exhibit as well as fabrics, and artifacts from many countries, God willing, as they say.  It seems that although the arrangements have been made, we have since had the Arab and new governments may be in place.  Meanwhile the Russians lost a lawsuit in American courts which they claim had no jurisdiction.  As a result Russia is not sending any art for American exhibits at present.  It seems the catalogue is complete--the exhibit may or may not be. 

Regardless, the MMA does a wonderful job, and this is a period of vigorous and interesting change.  The show should be well worth our time and worth planning ahead for.

Relatively Spaking by Coen, May, Allen

Relatively Speaking, three one act plays by Ethan Coen, Elaine May, and Woody Allen is pleasnt evening of theater. 

Ethan Coen, of the Hollywood Coen brother who have made fifteen movies, goes first with the slightest piece, a set of two two character scenes, one between a prisoner with anger issues and his therepist, the second with his parents before he was born--or how he got that way.  Nice acting, crisp drama, but the slightest of the three.

The second by Elaine May had divided results in our house.  I thought it the best of the lot--my husband hated it.  It involves a pathologically self-involved woman, the daughter of her nanny, the daughter's awful husband, and the nanny.  Marlo Thomas was marvelous as the selfish Doreen.  The others were also excellant, and the scenes has wit and flow.  More to the point--these people were memorable.

The last piece by Woody Allen did not work at all for me, but the friend in the next seat howled with laughter, and my husband liked it best. Woody Allen went to the trunk and pulled out every joke he could find and stuffed into a Honeymoon Hotel (actually a motel) in which a father runs off with his son's bride--that is something of a spoiler, and I apologize, sort of.  It is well-built into the scene.  But for me, nothing was there and entire characters could have been profitably removed.

Recommended bit not strongly.

Chnglish by David Henry Hwang

Of all the things we have seen recently I enjoyed this the most even though the reviews were not particularly enthusiastic.

Chinglish is obviously a mash-up of Chinese and English, and in this story about an Ohio businessman attempting to do business in China, misunderstanding is the point.  Much of the play is in Mandarin. All but the Ohio businessman spoke Chinese. Throughout the play dialogue is mistranslated in surtitles to hilarious effect.  There were those who felt it a one joke play and superficial.  I thought it marvelous and with a little significance to it.  The cast is fine especially the woman who plays the assistant to the Minister of Culture in our imaginary province.  But really, they were all really fine.

The author David Henry Hwang also wrote the very popular M. Butterfly several years ago and has an enduring concern with intercultural issue.

Highly recommended.

Other Desert Cities by Jon Robin Baitz

In Los Angeles, a family gathers for Christmas.  Never a good sign in the theater.  They are the parents, a couple in the mold of the Reagans.  The son, a successful television writer, the daughter who is recovering from time in a mental hospital, an aunt who is the traditional acerbic "truth teller."  Except that everyone is given a few deceptions and a few truths. 

It is an absorbing play with a wonderful cast, but I did not feel that it was a great play.  Stockard Channing is especially fine at the mother of the clan.

But unlike most things I write about--you can still see this one, and you probably won't be sorry.

Atys by Jean-Baptiste Lully

Atys by Lully with Les Artes Florissants and William Christie is one of those magical events which knowledgeable fans sign up for as soon as they get word of it--and they had better get word of it early.  Christie is an American living in France for many years and oft honored for his contributions to the revival of Baroque music.  Productions with this company are clever, original and of the highest quality.

Lully was an official court composer and is considered the father of French opera (which had interesting ramifications for composers who were not Lully.)  Atys was written to a story chosen by Louis XIV.

The story, with many ruffles and flourishes, concerns Atys who loves Sangaride who is promised to King Colonus.  Gods and especially goddesses interfere at will.  Confusion abounds.  Atys becomes a pine tree.  The plot is not really the point.  A tragical good time is had by all.

This, by the way, is considered an opera "comique" which indicates that the recitative was spoken rather that sung. 

I due Figar0

Two Figaros?  Wasn't one enough?

I due Figaro (or the second Figaro) is an opera with music by Saverio Mercadante and a libretto by Felice Romani written in 1826 and performed for the first time in America in October 3011 by the Amore Opera.

It is fifteen years after Susanna and Figaro marry.  Cherubino has returned from the war and wants to marry the daughter of the count, who, of course, loves him but is promised to an old fortune hunter.  Cherubino arrives at the court of the Count in disguise and claims his name is Figaro.  You can imagine it.  What--you're Figaro?  I'm Figaro! etc. etc.  Complications insure.

The first thing you realize is that this is not Mozart, but after you over that, it becomes fun.   It does not have a serious note in its score, but it is pretty and fun.

This is the Rill Speaking

This is the rill speaking (as it is on the program) is a one act opera by Lee Hoiby with a libretto by Mark Shulgasser based on work of Lanford Wilson presented in June at St. Peter's Church, Manhattan.  I am just a wee bit behind in my posting.  Operas in churches do not have the best sight lines and often not the best sound, but they do have intimacy, a cast of young and eager singers and an audience willing to try the unusual.  rill was written not as an opera, but close--Wilson wanted to just get the sound of people without thinking about how to stage it which is a very "musical" way to write prose.  There is a plot of sorts--family issues, growing up, but it is more of structure than a story.  It has a little of the feel of Our Town if you are old enough to remember that.

A satisfying evening.

Giasone

This is the week for operas in bars.  Rather an intriguing concept.  If you want a new audience, go where the audience is; although, I suspect that it is more complicated than that.  Giasone is at Le Poisson Rouge which was long ago know as the Village Gate.  It is a fairly large room, very dark, with food available but tricky.  There are tables at the front of the room with half their seats facing away from the stage and then seats in rows where you either have to get food at the bar and carry it to your seat or mark your seats and sit at the bar.
The table seats are more expensive.


Giasone or Jason, in English, is a very early opera by Francesco Cavalli.  This is the story of Jason and Medea as you have never heard it before--no killing of the children and Jason and Medea end up with--oh, I supposed I should not spoil the plot for you.  It has a full cast of gods and goddesses, Jason is sung by a woman, Alinda the maid is sung by a man, some of the gods are children.  You really can't tell what is what if you don't see it or listen with a libretto in hand even though it is sung in English.  


This a very clever production.  The singers were marvelous; several have performed with the New York City Opera.  Two children played Cupid and Apollo and were incredibly accomplished although they did have children's voices which do not project well.  The staging amusing and effective.  The set, mostly composed of a fabric backdrop rather abstractly painted, worked well.


The audience loved it, and so did I.

The Select (The Sun Also Rises)

The New York Theater Workshop has done several plays based on other works.  Now it is Hemingway's turn.  This is the story of Jake who can't perform sexually (war injury--never spelled out) and Lady Brett who loves him but has sex with other men and the drinking and the drinking and the drinking they all do and one of the greatest final lines in all of literature.  


Hemingway was the epitome of the tough guy expecially the tough guy with a stiff upper lip, but Mike Iveson who played Jake Barnes was rather winning.  The other cast members were terrific as was the set.  costumes were very well done except for the Banana Republic shirt.  The sound design, while clever, distracted a little.  A waiter would come, pour air, a pouring sound was heard, and the actor picked up a glass with liquid in it.  Cute but showy.  And I liked it more than it irritated me.


This was a long production--it told me more than I needed to know.  I got that they drank a lot--I didn't need to be told so often that they were "tight" and could have skipped several of the scenes.  Theater is different from the novel.  Following the source too closely etiolates the theatricality of the play.


But I still liked it and would recommend that you see it if you are in NYC at the moment.  There is that lovely final line.

Griselda by Antonio Vivaldi

Griselda, the title character of the opera by Vivaldi, is one of those women too good to be true.  After three long acts of mistreatment by her husband whom she steadfastly loves and never, ever criticizes, she is allowed to return to his good graces.  Hardly the image you want your daughter to emulate especially since in real life such returns to grace tend to be exceedingly temporary.

Peter Sellars in his pre-opera talk enters declaring, "This is a turkey tonight; this is a catastrophe."  He then explains that we have to understand Venice in 1735, Bocaccio's Decameron, the Black Plague, and the importance of the castrati.  Which is asking rather a lot of the audience especiallly when one also needs to understand a little about Peter Sellars and the concepts behind this production.

 Sellars observed that no one presents their true feelings.  The king loves Griselda as he mistreats her to test her character.  The audience represents the citizens of his kingdom who have never accepted the commoner Griselda as their queen.  The king's best friend tries to seduce Griselda.  The princess, secretly the daughter of the king yet engaged to him is in love with another.  And so on.  And on.

The story, in its day, was  wildly popular and there are many, many operas based on it. Vivaldi's with a libretto by Goldoni which was sophisticated for its time had a great success. One can see Griselda as a Christ figure.  He was also mistreated by his father, rejected by the crowd and betrayed by a friend.  So whole we tend to see the docile acceptance of abuse, others may see the nobility of remaining true to one's self regardless of misfortune.

Morningside Opera

Down the stairs and into a small back room at Jimmy's No. 43 (a bar) was a group of tables and an audience of perhaps fifty people to see The Judgment of Paris, a 1703 opera by--well actually four composers (and probably more, but four at the moment) who wrote musical settings for this.  One version was lost, but the Morningside Opera was determined to present the other three.


Which was a complication because I had a teleconference at the time it was supposed to start.  Not really a problem, I thought, I will sit in the car, miss the first opera and watch the other two.  Alas, they weren't doing three operas, they were doing a pastiche of all of them.  My noble husband managed to switch our tickets to a later performance.


Now about the opera which was performed by a cast of unknowns (they ran out of programs, a sure sign of unexpected success).  There is a listing of the cast at the Morningside  website, however, as well as a New York Times Review with the cast listed (Sept 2, 2011, C 3).    Paris is charged with judging which of three Goddesses is the most beautiful and awarding the golden banana to the most beautiful.  Paris sings, "When each is undressed, I'll judge of the best" and they disrobe to a rather modest limit.  The music of Eccles, Purcell and Weldon is lovely. Each singer had a rather straight aria and a "character" aria.  Juno, for example, did a bit as a dominatrix.  Very funny.  The performances were charming and clever.  It was a lot of fun.

The Arts of Survival

One of the joys of travel is visiting local museums, and, for an American, especially in the US where we may meet newly found artists in other venues not to mention being able to read the labels.  Santa Fe is unusually rich in museums for a town of its size (of course, it is also the sate capital).  It also has a number of distinguished art galleries for those who like to wander, but that is another story.

The Museum of International Folk Art is always worth a visit, and a very interesting show at the moment is The Arts of Survival which features the response of folk artists to four very recent natural disasters--Hurricane Katrina, USA, in 2005, and three from 2010--the eruption of Mt. Merapi Volcano in Indonesia, the Pakistan flood and the earthquake in Haiti.  Thus we have four events, four elements (earth, air, fire and water) and four nations but essentially one time period.  All of the artists are of necessity contemporary; the responses are in traditional forms--masks, scroll paintings, puppets and so on.  We see "folk art" not as a fossilized artifact of dead times, but as a living tradition responding daily to the life we live.  Particularly interesting are the quilt tops of Pakistan.  Unusable clothes donated by relief organizations were transformed into works of art to be sold in nearby stores and markets.  It is a rich, fascinating show and also powerful in a way that more traditional art forms often are not.

A number of relief organizations are mentioned in the handouts with the show.  Most are famous and easy to find.  One I though sounded particularly interesting was Aid to Artisans which "gives practial assistance to artisan groups worldwide."

The show will be on until May of 2012.

The Pillow Book

The Pillow Book which has an all-white set, a square with a low bench surrounding it on four sides thus inventing a new form--theater in the square--and all white props including a number of pillows and a gun.  Three character--two women and a man--perform a number of roles in various times and places.  All are of current time but the sequence of events and the consistency of character are not entirely clear.  What is it about?  Man and women, childbirth or not, love or not, truth or not--obviously I am not entirely clear, but the acting is first-rate, the scenes well-shaped and the audience was involved.  It isn't a masterpiece, but it is definitely worth seeing.

At the 59 East 59 theater August 4-20, 2011.

Mass MOCA, Sol Lewitt

Mass MOCA, or the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, in North Adams is a very large museum.  It is located in an old abandoned factory complex of which Massachusetts is abundantly supplied.  These abandoned buildings have been taken over by a museum with no collection--hence temporary exhibits by mostly living artists.  Each exhibit may stay for some time but usually when you visit, you see a different collection from your previous visit.  Whatever you saw before is gone.  There is currently one exception--more about that later.

On our visit in July 2011, the first exhibit we saw was of large pictures of work in various places.  Pictures for the most part of unengaged crowds or groups doing whatever was necessary--sometimes just entering or leaving a plant.  They may you reflect, are engaging in a somber way, but none are "pretty."  This is not glamorous work.

We also saw a very interesting enormous work of slats or sticks in the general shape of a horn of plenty and viewed from the inside with objects interpolated, it had depth, layering, mystery and some of the texture of the late Louise Nevelson.

But the major piece was the Sol LeWitt retrospective of wall drawings.  Remember the temporary exhibits?  These are on display for twenty-five years, four years in the planning and execution and millions of dollars in the making.  Even for Mass MOCA this is a huge undertaking.  LeWitt was a conceptual artist--in other words he contributed the idea and the directions for its execution.  He was active in the planning and the conceptualizing but died recently.  The retrospective covers the years from 1969 to 2011, three floors, and dozens and dozens of works all featuring some variation of lines and colors--not a recognizable object in the lot.

Go, if you can.  It is amazing and powerful and overwhelming.

Amadigi di Gaula, Central City, Big Thommpson Canyon

We are traveling the West for convention, fun and culture, of course.  Health, not so much--a nasty cold that would not go away finally sent me to the emergency room (St Mary's Hospital, Phoenix, AZ and very mice) and has slowed down my finishing a number of chores.  All of the days I had plenty of time to get them done, I slept.

On a more cheerful note we went to Central City Opera for the first time.  Central City is high (literally--8,000 feet) in the  Colorado Rocky Mountains.  On the way we detoured through Big Thompson Canyon and Estes Park, a nice touristy town unrecognizable from our last visit twenty years ago.  The canyon is a spectacular drive.

Handel's Amadigi di Gaula is a trivial opera with a ridiculous plot and lovely music performed by a stellar cast.  Melissa, the evil sorceress, is in love with Amadigi who loves Oriana.  Dardano, Amadigi's best friend also loves Oriana.  Endless complications until Orgando, a sort of good god, enters ten minutes (or less) before the end and sets everything right.  Lots of melancholy singing but this was before dissonance was popular so it is still beautiful. 

Coming out of the opera, we learned that all the water in Central City was off due to recent storms.  We saw them draining reddish water from a hydrant on the way out of town.  Meanwhile the highway was not moving so we took side roads back to Denver getting another beautiful drive.

Women and Art and Quilts

One of the things that irritate me is that women's art is pretty much confined to the things men define as art.  China painting, needlepoint, embroidery and quilting and similar forms are not usually considered "art."  I was once told that these women weren't trained.  Humph!  My great grandmother taught art at Olivet College and also taught and did china painting so I am a little passionate about this.

Over the week end at Cazenovia, I happily discovered an art quilt show, properly judged with both amateur and professional section and contributors from all over the world.  Cazenovia is a charming town with lovely neo-classic houses, a beautiful college, a charming library which contains a museum of curiosities as well as quilts at the moment and a lake.

The college gallery, the library and the Winner gallery at the art park all have sections of the show as well as two I did not see, the Lorenzo house and the New Woodstock Free Library.  The show itself is spectacular with exquisite work ranging from pretty thought-provoking.  I particularly liked "Stump" and "Trapped in a Room With You" by Kathy Nida of El Cajon, CA, and "Burning Fields" by Shoshi Rimer of Bat Yam, Israel, but I could name a half dozen other stunning works. "Basin and Range" with its reds and purples was lovely.

Enough.  Lovely and highly recommended if you can get to Cazenovia.


 

Fort Lauderdale

Saturday, January 15, 2011

A quiet day at sea with two good lectures, Martin Bell, a former BBC correspondent and Member of Parliament spoke on war reporting and how it has changed.  In particular now that reporters are targets, we receive only information from embedded reporters—that is only one side of the story.  In addition reporters are anxious to report a story—that it, to make a narrative even where the connections are not known.  We no longer know what is happening, he said, and this is especially problematic when 90% percent of casualties are civilian, not military.

Steven Rivelino spoke on five trends in Broadway production which can be summarized as while formerly a great show was made into a movie, now movies are made into shows as are musical life work (Mamma Mia).

I walked a mile today and have been pretty much sticking to the spa menu which is tasty and sufficient.

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Port Everglades, the port of Fort Lauderdale is utilitarian like all ports.  The weather is lovely—perfect summer weather, the kind we do not have all that often in summer. 

Internet is really, really slow on the ship—twenty-four minutes  to post a blog entry which I had already written. and I could not get it to transmit a photo so no pictures from here on out unless we are at an internet café.  I will try to post one now of the Empire State Building in Curnard red.

Not such a great shot.  Sorry.

Red Sea and Piracy

 

April 5, 2011, the Red Sea.

Today we sail the Red Sea which we are told has always been called the Red Sea and in a variety of languages despite its lovely blue color.  Apparently it can turn red with sand during storms.  The Red Sea was apparently created by the shifting of tectonic plates.  Our speaker showed slides of the mega-continent of old and how it broke up, but what was completely fascinating to a New Yorker was that the cliffs along the Hudson River near Hook Mountain exactly match some cliffs in Morocco.  The sea is larger than I thought 1500 miles end to end and wide enough that we never see shore.

As we progress north in the Red Sea we are leaving the pirate, and they will begin to remove the extra precautions.  Tonight there will be more lights on Deck Nine but Deck Three, the Promenade Deck, will remain closed after dark, and we still can’t walk the complete circle even during the day.  I suspect Cunard would prefer me not to post the security details on the internet, and I won’t.

 We heard a lecture about the pirates this morning.  There is a lot of international cooperation on this as well as efforts by individual nations.  We got the impression that small, slow ships ignoring international advice are most likely to have trouble.  Things that make a ship safer are following the best practices advocated by the navies, traveling faster than fifteen knots, having a freeboard (space above the water line) greater than six meters, a vigilant crew and taking defensive measures such as razor wire.  All of these are on the ship.  Working against us is that it is a daytime passage. 

In 2005 the pirates operated 165 nautical miles off the coast.  Last year they went as far as 1500 miles.  They have improved their skills and equipment.  If possible they will avoid killing but are not averse to it if given any resistance.  A pirate can earn 5,000 times the average wage of his country.  These are people who want a better life and, in a dysfunctional country, have few means of achieving it.  Reducing piracy will require some progress on land.

Salalah,

April 3, 2011, Salalah

We had never heard of Salalah in Oman and didn’t know much about Oman either.  Oman is a small emirate and religiously conservative. Salalah is its second largest city with about 300,000 people.  We visited the history museum a few miles out of town which is small but well-designed with clear English labels as well as Arabic ones.  We then went to the blow holes far on the opposite side.  The blow holes did not blow so much as sigh weakly.  On the way we passed a dramatic “cave” or cliff overhang.  It was all worth a few pictures.  Lastly we passed the port and went into to town to the frankincense souk and bought frankincense and myrrh.  Something for January 6.  It was a pleasant day, but there was an awful lot of driving around.  We could have taken a tour of the Queen of Sheba’s castle (or archeological site), and the Queen’s garden which could be photographed but not entered, but that had stuck us as very sunny and hot in a sunny, hot land. 

April 5, 2011, the Red Sea.

Today we sail the Red Sea which we are told has always been called the Red Sea and in a variety of languages despite its lovely blue color.  Apparently it can turn red with sand during storms.  The Red Sea was apparently created by the shifting of tectonic plates.  Our speaker showed slides of the mega-continent of old and how it broke up, but what was completely fascinating to a New Yorker was that the cliffs along the Hudson River near Hook Mountain exactly match some cliffs in Morocco.  It is larger than I thought 1500 miles end to end and wide enough that we never see shore.

As we progress north in the Red Sea we are leaving the pirate areas and they will begin to remove the extra precautions.  Tonight there will be more lights on Deck Nine but Deck Three, the Promenade Deck, will remain closed after dark, and we still can’t walk the complete circle even during the day.  I suspect Cunard would prefer me not to post the security details on the internet, and I won’t.

 We heard a lecture about the pirates this morning.  There is a lot of international cooperation on this as well as efforts by individual nations.  We got the impression that small, slow ships ignoring international advice are most likely to have trouble.  Things that make a ship safer are following the best practices advocated by the navies, traveling faster than fifteen knots, having a freeboard (space above the water line) greater than six meters, a vigilant crew and taking defensive measures such as razor wire.  All of these are on the ship.  Working against us is that it is a daytime passage. 

In 2005 the pirates operated 165 nautical miles off the coast.  Last year they went as far as 1500 miles.  They have improved their skills and equipment.  If possible they will avoid killing but are not averse to it if given any resistance.  A pirate can earn 5,000 times the average wage of his country.  These are people who want a better life and, in a dysfunctional country, have few means of achieving it.  Reducing piracy will require some progress on land.

Medea by Cherubini

Glimmerglass Opera is a more challenging venue that Caramoor for those of us who are downstate.  It is a particularly lovely summer opera house, and has the advantage of a Cooperstown location which means access to a lovely town with some fine local museums and the Baseball Hall of Fame.

This summer they are presenting a varied program which I leave the curious to check out.  We went for the Medea.

Medea is the legendary woman who helped Jason steel the golden fleece, killed her brother to slow the pursuers, was left by Jason for another (well-placed) woman and then killed the other woman and her own children for revenge. The opera takes place in the palace of King Creon as Jason and the king attempt to get Medea to just go away.

I have always thought that Medea got a bad rap--she is often presented as only the jealous wife who killed her children for revenge which turns her into the latest headline or a case study.  But Euripides, the Greek playwright who started the story, was interested in much more, and he wrote her  as a much more cornered character--she had committed murder and treason for Jason and had nowhere to go.  As written she makes a very good argument for women's liberation.  When Jason decided to marry the king's daughter and render his first marriage null, it meant Medea had no country, no position and her children would be bastardized--they would have no position and no future..  She really had no way out (Moral of this story for my grand-daughters: never give up EVERYTHING for a man).  Euripides seems to have been interested in the ways man tries to manipulate fate (or the gods) and the price to be paid.

The Cheubini version of the story (the Francis-Benoit Hoffmann version as he wrote the libretto avoids some of the pitfalls if not all of them.  The music is quite lovely as were all of the performances.  Alexandra Deshorties, who sang the title role, gave the most powerfully moving performance I have ever seen.  I was actually glad for the applause to have a moment to get myself under control. 

Guillaume Tell by Rossini

For those unafraid of the heat, a particularly pleasant summer expedition is to Caramoor, the park and summer musical venue.  The grounds are lovely, and a picnic can be packed or ordered in advance and sandwiches can be purchased for those both spontaneous and lazy.  What they do not have is a good supply of picnic tables--take a tarp or blanket and prepare to fight gravity. 

William Tell or Guillaume Tell is one of the world's most famous almost never performed operas.  John had it on his wish list for years and finally flew to Switzerland last year to see it.  Naturally it is now being done here although only in a concert version (they claim semi-staged, but the staging is really minimal.

One of  the reasons it is rarely performed is because of the difficulty of the music, but it is also very long.  Rossini wrote five and half hours of music, and apparently even he never tried to perform the whole thing.    The version at Caramoor is about four hours, and the music is glorious.  The voices are lovely, and oddly enough I almost remember sets and backdrops--I know they weren't there, but the music and plot are easily visualized, and we had just seen Sleeping Beauty so I sets and costumes and spectacle in my head.

One of the glories of Caramoor is the lectures and concerts ahead of time.  Philip Gosset, who often does the lecture is a treasure of scholarship, charm and performance.  He can whip of a theme on the piano seemingly without thinking about it.  He can explain the traditions, the techniques, the various influence, and who performed it when.  The tale of William Tell was originally by Schiller, and   Rossini was an Italian writing in French for production at the Paris Opera.  The opera was then translated into German and the Italian translation is from the German.  There are influences galore for Mr. Gosset to tease out.

Pig, the play

Pig or Vaclav Havel’s Hunt for a Pig by Vaclav Havel, play with music from The Bartered Bride, an opera by Smetana.

Vaclav Havel is a playwright, the first president of the Czech Republic and a leader of the Velvet Revolution which, worked to establish democracy in what was then Czechoslovakia. 

The “play” if play it is a light-hearted romp and wild goose chase with an American reporter, Havel, assorted Czechs and a romantic couple through the Czech countryside in search of a pig suitable for the annual zabjacka festival.  Part shaggy-dog story, part musical piece, it came complete with a pig sandwich—or without; you could have it either way.  With the pig sandwich (a bottle of water and packaged Czech cookies), you also got a front row seat with your name in masking tape on it.  There were also chairs with numbers on which turned out to be for the cast members and presented a real challenge to those looking for a seat.  There was, of course, a place for everybody, and it may have encouraged the lively conversational vibe before the show.  Still, if it were still on, I would recommend you take the play without the sandwich which may have authentic but was also very greasy and salty.  Despite the fact that we were way downtown, there are several pleasant restaurants in the neighborhood.

The cast is terrific and the singing (and you can’t go wrong with Smetana) lovely although on a little of The Bartered Bride made into the evening.  But there are clever shenanigans, lively ‘bits’ and lots of fun.

Through a Glass Darkly, the play

Through a Glass Darkly by Ingmar Bergman, a play adapted from the movie by Jenny Worton.

The plot involved the descent into madness of Karin, played by Carey Mulligan best known for her role at the young girl at the heart of An Education.  Karin is the main character.  She, her husband, her father and her younger brother arrive at a summer cabin for a holiday.  The show is about her gradual separation from reality, but I kept feeling that the best lines were spoken by her cold, artist father who talked of the character limitations and costs of love and of art.  I kept thinking the father as Ingmar Bergman and wanting to shout, “You letting yourself off too easily, and you’re stacking the deck!”  The set is functional and conveys both the unreality of Karin’s mind and the cold summer climate of Sweden.  The actors are fine, and the evening is absorbing.  But I kept wanting to argue with the playwright.

Richard, Coeur de Lion

Richard, Coeur de Lion, an opera by Andre Modeste Gretry presented with the American Classical Orchestra at the New York Society for Ethical Culture, May 18, 2011.

Richard I actually was captured on his way home from the crusades and held for ransom in 1192.  Richard himself was something of a rat, and this is opera comique so the historical accuracy is not a large concern.  It is also a 21^st Century production of an 18^th Century work of a 12^th Century event.  The American Classical Orchestra promotes “music as the masters heard it” so stage effects as well as performance of the period is stressed.  The stage effects were surprisingly well done. 

Gretry was popular in his time, influential and innovative particularly in writing about an historical event.    This is considered one his masterpieces and is certainly worthy of performance.