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The singing year has started for me as well as the Arbourist. My teacher and I have set two goals for this year:
- That I will develop good practicing habits
- That I will finally let my big voice out at its full size
In furtherance of these goals, she’s assigned me big, challenging repertoire that there’s no way I’ll be able to manage without practicing my butt off. Which, it turns out, means All the Wagner.
Since the theme for this semester is Art Song, I’m working on three of his five Wesendonck Lieder. Two (“Traume” and “Der Engel”) I’ve tried before and found I’d bitten off more than I could chew but maybe I’ll be ready for them now; new into the mix this year is “Stehe Still”. It is an absolute privilege to be challenged with such gorgeous music. Here’s Jessye Norman, my vocal hero, singing “Stehe Still”:
Is it an amazing piece of music or what? All those weird intervals, and completely unexpected chord changes, and yet it just completely works!
Richard Wagner wrote the Wesendonck Lieder while he was staying at the estate of Otto and Mathilde Wesendonck. There’s controversy over exactly what may or may not have transpired between Richard and Mathilde, but there’s little doubt that they were intensely infatuated with one another. Wagner put aside his work on the Ring Cycle during his time at the Wesendonck’s, and wrote his Wesendonck Lieder – settings of Mathilde Wesendonck’s poetry – and Tristan und Isolde during this period. Wikipedia entry
On Sunday mornings, I get up shortly after Arb leaves for work, and move from the cozy, snuggly bed to the equally snuggly sofa. I make a cup of coffee and listen to Sunday Breakfast on CKUA, and half-doze under at least one cat (depending on Fiona and V’s current level of detente). This Sunday, as I faded in and out of consciousness, I heard something familiar and yet not. “This sounds like Piazzolla,” I thought, “but I don’t recognize it.” Turns out I was right, it was Piazzolla, and the reason I didn’t recognize it was that I’d never heard this composition arranged for violin and harp. Here, have a listen:
Astor Piazzolla is one of my favourite composers (though if I’m going to actually dance tango I prefer Gardel and Pugliese’s older styles). Piazzolla grew up playing and composing tango music, but was also deeply interested in jazz and classical music and studied classical composition with Alberto Ginastera and Nadia Boulanger. At first he tried to keep his classical and tango work separate, but his true genius lay in bringing his classical and jazz sensibilities to his tango compositions.
Naturally for this time of year, the choir that Arb and I sing in is preparing for our Christmas concert, and there is Jebus-music aplenty. Really that’s OK by me; most of the shit about Santa seriously sucks. One of the beautiful carols we’re doing is Harold Darke’s arrangement of In the Bleak Midwinter. Here’s the final verse:
What shall I give him, poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb.
If I were a wise man, I would do my part.
Yet what can I give him: give my heart!
People don’t think this shit through, they just bleat it out mindlessly year after year.
This is VNV Nation, an Irish/English alternative electronic/industrial duo currently based out of Berlin, but touring to Canada this fall/winter – I’ve already got tickets – and plane tickets because the closest they’re coming is Vancouver.
They were my first exposure to electronic/industrial music – I grew up in a classical bubble – and I was hooked pretty much instantly.
Turn up the volume and turn up the bass before pressing play.
The song is “Joy”, a humanist anthem and my personal anthem as well.
Tom Lehrer is a Renaissance Man of the twentieth century. He’s not only a composer, pianist, and singer, who lectures extensively on musical theatre; he’s also a published and teaching mathematician.
Mystro is a particular fan of Dr. Lehrer’s work and has performed it on several occasions, when our choir replaces rehearsal with Talent Nite.
Last week was our singing teacher’s student cabaret. Upon learning, maybe a month ago, that the Italian aria he had been working on wouldn’t do for a cabaret, Arb had to scramble for some different, lighter repertoire, and decided to follow Mystro’s example. Here’s the song Arb sang, as performed by Tom Lehrer himself:
(and yes, he brought down the house)
I set myself a challenge to get these done before the Olympics closing ceremonies, and I did!
I’m not much for the Hollywood movie-culture scene. Either I’m getting to old or too smart for the usual smarm of what Hollywood has to offer; and on that note I’d like to think of my self in the later rather than the former category.
Ironic self-delusion aside, pop culture these days rarely entices me with its chintzy glitz and shiny images. Enter Iron Man 3. This is the end chapter for Tony Stark and the current Disney/Marvel money machine. IM3 hastily ties up the plot lines started in the previous movies and attempts to give the viewer a satisfying denouement to the Iron Man story (rest assured dear readership the money-mantle is just changing form, prepare yourself for Avengers “9” and Thor Infinity).
Iron man 3 is a mediocre flick, it had all the prerequisite action and ‘witty-dialogue’, but as a final chapter those are now baseline expectations, and thus I expected more.
I suggest looking at rotten tomatoes or metacritic for an actual review of Iron Man 3 because it is not really my intent to review the movie so to speak, but rather set up a preamble to some inane meta-thoughts spawned by the viewing of said movie.
Meta-Thought #1 – How long is the superhero fad going to last? Marvel and DC are currently churning out flick after flick about super powered characters and the woes that they face, but the saturation point must soon be coming. There are only so many times we can genuine feel someone with fledgling superpowers/super-situation rediscover their humanity and victoriously battle evil to save the girl/earth/multi-verse.
Why do I tire of this? Because humanity isn’t that fucking special. Human dignity and worth are crushed as a matter of routine and a large majority of people who are not the ones with Orwell’s perpetual boot stamping on their face do not know or do not care to know about it. We stand atomized in our societies and hem and haw about the injustice going on, while those without the burden of conscience continue to perfect the system that allows for the savage exploitation of so many.
We have ‘super-problems’ in the present on a scale that individuals cannot fix. Yet, we are fed a stream of movies that exemplify individual action and ‘sacrifice’ that always somehow manages to resolve the problems and win the day. I think that the glut of hero movies being promulgated as Triple A entertainment of late represent the subconscious desires of people who feel fundamentally powerless to escape that crushing reality and identify with a idea/role that gives them some feeling of autonomy and power.
Meta-Thought #1A – A meta thought on a meta thought (Groovy!). Gee-Wilikers! How far can the Arbourist go on this thought-wanking experiment? Don’t worry gentle readership it will be all over soon, my interest and angst are waning as writing stuff like this depresses the heck out of me. But, back on topic, (let’s, like good academic writers, paraphrase the last sentence to establish a sense of coherency ((another level of meta! Holy Frak!))) the idea that somehow an individual can rid themselves of the sense of powerlessness through exclusively embracing individual action is at its very foundation misleading. Misleading in the sense that, back here in the real world, it is going to take to change things is mass-coordinated, cooperative action to change what is wrong with our societies.
The great man (and I do use “great man” because it is part of the trope, women-folk with their “feelings” just don’t cut it) that is going to change society for the better does not exist. Great men wannabees are identified and either destroyed or co-opted to work for the system rather than against it. Herein lies my discontent – the model of change we are being shown simply does not work. Individuals, without organizational support, that go against the system are crushed. It is only through collective action and coordination that change can be affected on the societal level. But we’re never given that set of blueprints to base our narratives on.
Why? Because it might inspire people to get together and actually change the system. And that is why Iron Man 3 is a mediocre movie.
(Wow…concluded just about as well as the movie did…)
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