Modern Life Is Rubbish Confirmed

The thing about auto-tune is that it's impossible to unhear it.

Some Good Sense

I've just been listening to Prof Jonathan Haidt talking what strikes me as a lot of good sense about The Hidden Dangers of Social Media. Not sure how much of his analysis applies to young people in this Far Place, but I have the uneasy feeling that the answer is: an awful lot.

Considering raising a ruckus when I next find myself at a workshop predicated on the worship of our Tech Overlords. But feel like I'm getting too old for all this. Having said that I can't help feel a certain stupid complacency over the good fortune of being born at the right time.

Am certain I would have been addicted to video games if I'd ever have played them.

Something Sad

It's been quite some time since I've taught anything by Federico Garcia Lorca. Am now well into Act 1 of The House of Bernarda Alba, a play which in the ordinary run of things doesn't do all that much for me. Yet this time round it's all electricity. The power!

The thing is, though, that I can't go for more than twenty minutes without thinking of the murder of the great poet, great dramatist, great man. And when I remember I get angry. And deeply, deeply sad. Somehow he has come to represent all the desaparecidos for me, from another time, another dark place.

History is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake - 3

It's 35 years almost to the day since the disaster at Hillsborough that killed 97 Liverpool supporters. An excellent article in the Graun yesterday served to commemorate the terrible event and the years of injustice the community suffered (and continues to suffer) at the hands of figures of authority who both should have known better and, painfully, always did know better in terms of what actually transpired.

I thought the new inquest of 2016 had gone a long way to righting wrongs and serving the cause of truth, but it looks like I was wrong.

The one constant I have unearthed in my study of history is neatly summed up in the lyrics of a popular song:  It's the same the whole world over, / It's the poor what gets the blame / It's the rich what gets the pleasure, / Isn't it a blooming shame? Sometimes you have to laugh to stop yourself from crying.

All Eyes And Ears

After this, in the film, the composer speaks of the appeal folksong had for him and describes British musical life as a pyramid, its apex the virtuosi and composers, then the 'devoted musical practitioners... spreading the knowledge and love of music in our schools, our choral societies, our music festivals', then 'that great mass of musical amateurs who make music for the love of it', and finally 'the great tunes... upon which everything must stand.'

The above is from the excellent notes, by Michael Kennedy, in the booklet accompanying the CD featuring Ralph Vaughan Williams's post-WW2 music for the film The Dim Little Island, that featured in my listening yesterday afternoon. I was thinking, amongst other things, of RVW's ruminations on English music as I attended the play from our Independent Stage yesterday evening. And I was also thinking of what a lovely venue the little amphitheatre makes for an evening show and how much I'd enjoyed being there for our performances of As You Like It in July last year. As I arrived I realised that I actually felt more nervous as a spectator waiting for the show to begin and hoping it would go well than I did last year as someone involved in the making of the experience who had lots of stuff to do, serving to channel whatever anticipatory nervousness I might have felt. Apart from anything else I was mildly worried about the possibility of a sudden downpour which, considering the fact we spectators were out under the darkening evening sky, was likely to disrupt the on-going drama.

In fact, it did start to pour about fifty-five minutes into How to Sell Your Art from the Grave, but if anything this added to the whole experience of the show. The cast manfully - and, indeed, womanfully - kept going for the five minutes of rain whilst a fair number of those watching without brollies (self included) went to grab some of those thoughtfully provided at stage left or take shelter at the covered side of the stage. And the show went on since nobody elected to run away, everyone being thoroughly engaged and wanting to know how the clever plot would work itself out. Oh, and I should say I put a stop to my initial worrying and just opened myself to a rather selfish enjoyment about two minutes into the show by which time it was obvious that it was all well put together and was going to work.

But what has any of this got to do with the art of RVW that I'd been meditating upon, or Art in general? Lots, in my eyes.

I'm of the firm belief that the grounds for the production of great art in a nation lie in receptive audiences and enthusiastic amateurs and the inherent excitement of creativity balanced against the necessary commitment to make things happen; and the pyramid referenced above is a sort of necessary structure for all of this. And yesterday evening I felt that Zackary's finely crafted play, so exact its variety of linguistic rhythms (the demotic, the artistic-critical) and its broader rhythms of dramatic construction, both powerfully reflected and added to the development of drama in this Far Place. The fact that the piece as a whole was a commentary of sorts on how Art might manifest itself here on this not-so-dim but very little island was peculiarly appropriate to my mood and confirmed, for me at least, a simple truth about all nations and all their peoples. We have a deep-rooted, uncompromising, absolute need for Art - drama, music, painting, dance, poetry - whatever form serves for us to find ways of expressing what it is to be alive.

I think everyone who attended the show, felt all the more vitally alive for doing so. And I'm sure everyone involved in its making had their lives deepened and enriched and extended by that experience.

All Ears

18.55

Spent the morning at work, but in a fairly light-hearted manner, on duty at an Open House. Then found myself with a few genuinely free hours. Filled some of them with RVW, the music of, and felt very English; and got on with reading Passion is a Fashion - The Real Story of the Clash, which also made me aware of my essential Englishness. Not quite sure why, but one's nationality is a complex thing. 

21.20

And just got back from further listening, but to the spoken word, for the most part, and an outstanding theatrical evening, of a very Singaporean bent. Of which more tomorrow as I promised The Missus a prata treat for Saturday and it's time to deliver.

Falling Short

I'd been hoping to get to the gym at least eight times in Ramadhan, and thought I'd manage ten. In the event I managed seven visits when fasting - and achieved the eighth today, rather too late. I have an excuse, and it's quite a good one: being super-busy precludes enjoyment of the finer things in life, at least while the busy-ness lasts. (And mine lasted.) And having to deal with a cranky back for a few days didn't help.

But it's a sign of a sort of elderly maturity that the set-back hasn't set me back at all. It's just the way of things and I'll seek to amend that way insofar as amendment is possible. In fact, I'm happy at the idea of bouncing back, something that only failure makes possible.

It's good to begin again, again.

Lost And Found

Carved out a little bit of time today to listen to sweet sounds close up. It's been a little while since I've managed to get up close and personal with the great Richard Thompson, but I put that right today with all sorts of live bits & pieces, concluding appropriately with the Dimming of the Day. 

Strange how one can both lose and find oneself in the same piece of music. 

Words Of Wisdom

Hari Raya Puasa, Eid ul-Fitr; 1 Syawal, 1445

As with last year I attended the second session for Raya Prayers at Masjid Darussalam. The khutbah was in English and spoke deeply to me on Fostering a Confident and Resilient Religious Life. It's strange how what in another context might seem like cliches catch fire and come alive when you see how much they apply to whatever it is is real about one's own life.

As always and ever to all and everyone: Eid Mubarak!

Finally

29 Ramadhan, 1445

It slipped my mind completely yesterday that I'd intended to write something in relation to the fact that the date (western style) marked the anniversary of Mum's death. I suppose I have a reasonable excuse in the fact that it was a hyperbolically busy day, but reasonable excuses don't work for the kind of reasonable guilt I feel over the omission. 

I've come to realise that, for me at least, the chief value of Ramadhan is the way it orients one towards others. Yes, the individual's fast is important, but in the great scheme of things it's the well-being of the whole community that counts. And one's generosity towards others is paramount.

When I think of my dead I think of what more I might have done for them. The answer, inevitably, is a lot.