In Carmen, as in almost any other production, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. It wasn’t just the incredible projection of voices that caught my attention – the orchestra and set also stole my attention for much of the show.
As any scene began, the enormous fortress-looking set could not go unnoticed. It was potentially more than two stories high, with steps, and two separate pieces that seemed to mesh together perfectly into one layered setting. It made me realize how many people contributed to the magnificent production.
Notice the set in the background here
The music in Bizet’s Carmen is phenomenal. It is filled with songs that we’ve all heard in other forms of media without knowing its origin. The music is surprisingly catchy – I whistled and hummed to myself on the subway for over an hour. As the show is exclusively in song (reminding me of Les Mis), the orchestra plays an enormous role throughout. The orchestra sets the tone in every scene, it uses drastic dynamics for different moods. For example, a soft, quite dynamic suggests a sweet, somewhat innocent mood. The stronger, deep, loud parts are usually declarations or parts of high intensity (aided by at least 6 upright bases).
Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed the opera – much more than I expected. Whereas I thought I would be sleeping within the first hour, I found myself not being able to look away from the stage for very long. I focussed on the vocals, set, and individual instruments when possible. I enjoyed the plot and character development, as well as the pieces put together to create this unique experience.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rjOrOt6wFw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVY3vKQKSv4
So after last week’s trip to the National Jazz Museum and a discussion on jazz music in my English class, I decided to give listening to jazz a try. I went on Spotify, and under Classical music there’s a playlist called Jazz-Classical Crossings. It takes well known classical pieces such as Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D Minor and “jazzes” it up. I thought it was pretty cool because it mixes two genres of music that normally are 2 worlds apart. If you don’t have Spotify, you can sign up for free, or listen here:
http://www.last.fm/music/Andr%C3%A9+B%C3%A9nichou/Jazz+Guitar+Bach
A little bit about the composer:
Andre Benichou is a French classical guitarist and arranger. He primarily plays the electric guitar and is known mostly for his fusion-jazz electric guitar stylings. His most notable work, and most sought after, is the 1970 recording titled Jazz Guitar Bach.
Sources:
http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Bio/Benichou-Andre.htm
All Over the World
A plane
is a
bird
is a sky
is a bird in
the sky
is a place far away
is a reunion of loved o n e s
is a vivid memory of friends is
a meeting of new friends
is a making of new
memories to be
remembered
is to fly
across oceans
is an adventure is a
journey to begin is a world
waiting… to be discovered
to be explored is a
dream is a
person
wanting
to soar
to glide
to f l y.
Her dog
is a bag is a pail is
a car her
scarf is a marble
is a leaf, fragility
is a key, the
lion is a pit is choke
is an apple is
dead.
The clock is broken
12:07,
now
and forever
keeps going, never stands still
is the desert sands
of time.
The swirl is vanilla is chocolate
is both
never stops is
life’s
soft serve
ice cream
machine.
Trial and Error
A glass is half full
is half empty
is hope to be filled
is joy to be felt is
a better future
is a college education is a life that is full
is people saying “You’re amazing!”
A glass is empty – of hope
is empty of joy is uncertainty is doubt
is failure is fear is people saying “It’s not good enough.”
A glass is growing up, is failing then succeeding
is life is me and you, is the beginning.
A glass
is trying.
According to their website, The National Jazz Museum in Harlem’s mission is “to preserve, promote, and present jazz by inspiring knowledge, appreciation and celebration of jazz locally, nationally, and internationally.” When we came yesterday to visit, they had a running exhibition of Bebo Valdez.
Bebo Valdez, a Cuban pianist, composer, bandleader, and arranger, was born in Cuba in 1918. He left Cuba in 1960 and eventually settled in Sweden. There he played Cuban music and Latin jazz.
His career boosted in 1994 and released CDs, films, and more. One of the more interesting things he created that caught my attention was the movie Chico y Rita. This movie is about a young piano player, Chico, and a beautiful singer, Rita. They fall in love, and perform together.It’s animated, as well, giving an interesting perspective and vision to an adult audience. What’s interesting about this story, however, is that Chico resembles Bebo himself in many ways.
Spoiler Alert:
In the movie Chico is a piano player from Cuba, like Bebo. He also leaves the music scene for decades, like Bebo, and then has a career revival once again and becomes a success.
The film might not be about Bebo’s whole life, but it definitely has some similar life events. Although it doesn’t depict his life exactly as it was, “….it evokes the era that produced him and led jazz musicians like Dizzy Gillespie to work with Cubans, giving birth to a new kind of jazz.” (MPR News)
While there were several poems from Saeed Jones book, Prelude to Bruise, that caught my attention, the poem, Daedalus, After Icarus, was probably the first. Some of that might have to do with the fact that I felt like I understood the meaning behind this poem almost instantly, while for some other poems in the collection, comprehension did not appear until after a couple of extra reads. The poem is quite short, being only two stanzas long, and reference the Greek myth of Daedalus, the great but cursed inventor, and his son, Icarus. The original myth is one that warns of hubris, as Daedalus constructs wax wings for his son and himself to escape Crete. However, Icarus’ hubris gets the better of him as he flies too close to the sun and crashes due to the wax on his wings melting. Saeed Jone’s poem seems to reference Daedalus finally reaching land after his long journey and looking back into the sea, where his son is now lost in. In the scene, there are children, many of whom seem envious of the wings, but one boy in particular mentions how they don’t wants wings. Instead they wants to be fish. The poem almost seems to mock Daedalus, whose only real hope in the past of saving is son was if he invented something that allowed him to be fish. The poem itself seems to be quite dark, with no real interaction between Daedalus with the other characters, with Daedalus more focused on looking out at sea than listening to the requests of children. It was an interesting poem to include in the collection, seemingly because the piece seems to be somewhat out of place. Perhaps the only connection between the poem and the rest of the collection is that the poem references Greek mythology and the collection as a all is supposed to be inspired by Greek epics like the Iliad or the Odyssey. All in all, I enjoyed the poem.
I’m also going to include two of my poems here. The first one was the poem I wrote during the poetry workshop, while the second poem is a found poem that is based on “Previous Condition” by James Baldwin.
Is A Dark Morning
Her shot glass is blue bubbles is tongue is dripping lipstick
is tingling hair on an unwanted mustache
is a red, sweaty face is ripped sheets and no company
is an empty room is heels all over the place
is a painful swollen nose ring is a dark morning
Back In New York
I had been dreaming
woke up in the morning, trembling
Back in New York and hating it
Heavy ceilinged, perfectly square
the color of chipped dry blood
was so hideous
Everyone had gone to bed
Everyone was asleep
Banging on the door
I sat up and lit a cigarette
Don’t let them scare you to death
“Took his crap”
Nothing but a bum
Same rents for same old shacks
Dirty as sin
Had not been painted
We had a stormy relationship
But we stuck
Took a couple of beatings
Worse things have happened
Robbery or murder in my neighborhood
Acted like I didn’t know a thing
Back in New York and hating it
Beaten as a person
As defined by Wikipedia:
Rock climbing is an activity in which participants climb up, down, or across natural rock formations or artificial rock walls. The goal is to reach the summit of a formation or the endpoint of a usually pre-defined route without falling.
Here is an example of a rock climber. This is Alex Honnold, and he is climbing a 2,000 foot rock face in Yosemite … without a rope. Although this is the most extreme kind of climbing, you can get a sense of what sort of determination, agility, and connection to nature somebody who climbs must have.
Most people who rock climb do not consider themselves creating art, and they’re not. However, when they do climb, they are engaged, dynamic, and bold. Dean Fidelman, a rock climber and photographer decided to make rock climbing an art by expressing the qualities he found in this sport in an interesting way: nude pictures. He called this project: Stone Nudes.
Stone Nudes: an extract of the art of climbing. Intended to inspire and celebrate the human form. Stone Nudes draws from the community it represents. Over the last ten years, a body of over one hundred photographs drawing from three generations of climbers has evolved. (Taken from the project’s website)
Dean tries to explore the themes of nature-unrefined, pure, and organic-and the way this theme and the human spirit unite. The rock climbers are photographed climbing nude, because this coincides with the unrefined and natural essence of the landscape. These photographs give a sense of harmony between humans and our natural environment; the person in the picture isn’t separated from the rock, dirt, grass, or trees, but rather a part of it.
The website and gallery of this project is linked here. Some discretion is advised, as the pictures are of people climbing without any clothes. I hope you can see the true beauty in these pictures and this project, enjoy!
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