Chopin at the Opera

Posted on March 30, 2011 by barczablog

There’s nothing quite like cinema to change your viewpoint.  Film has changed my perspective on Frederic Chopin more than once.

portrait of Chopin by Eugene Delacroix

Chopin by Delacroix

I’d grown up with his music around me, aware of him almost from the beginning.  Anyone learning how to play piano must reckon with a few titans of the keyboard.  One inevitably encounters them, particularly Bach and Beethoven, Mozart and Chopin.  Each one is a combination of pleasures and challenges, of requirements to be met and rewards offered in return.

I was dimly aware of the biographical details, a little bit of context.  Chopin is the most ethnic of the four keyboard giants, which is to say, the only non-German admitted to the pianistic pantheon.

And the complexities abound, for when we think of Chopin’s ethnicity, we are really examining two cultural milieu.  As a child Chopin lived in Poland, his Mother’s birthplace, the land of the Polonaise and Mazurka.

As a man Chopin came to Paris, his father’s homeland and the artistic capital of the world for most of the 19th Century, the home of sophistication, style, subtlety.

In my head I always saw two tendencies in conflict.  The Eastern European side, with which I identified as a Hungarian, seemed vulgar and clumsy compared to the restraint and elegance of Paris.  I assumed that the Polish youth would be awed by Paris.  Of course, that was a projection of my own insecurities, my own sense of being the cultural outsider in Toronto, even though I have no accent, nor any reason not to be fully assimilated.

Impromptu

Hugh Grant as Chopin, Judy Davis as George Sand

Then I saw Impromptu, a refreshingly unpretentious 1991 film that encouraged me to shake free of the pretentious views I’d held onto for so long.  It offered a new look at several artists –Chopin, and also Franz Liszt, George Sand, Eugene Delacroix—not as icons, but simply as people.  Whatever you may think of its merits, there are moments in the film that have a wonderful ring of truth.

I’ve had another such wake-up call with a recent film.  Chopin at the Opera is a difficult creation to classify, something in the borderline between documentary, concert and colloquium.  A series of experts across many disciplines talk about Chopin while we hear excerpts played and sung.

Their focus is wonderfully narrow, with a focus on a new series of ideas about Chopin.

In 1830 when Chopin was forced to emigrate at the age of 20, we know a few things from indirect evidence.  Chopin loved the opera.  This has a ring of truth to me as I picture a  recent arrival in Paris, perhaps not able to keep up with the sophisticated conversation of his new home;  what better refuge for the talented young pianist, than an artform practiced in foreign languages?  Whether he understood the operas in Italian or not, their Babel likely mirrored his own disorientation, a stranger in a strange land.

Chopin at the Opera

Chopin at the Opera looks at the mutual influence of opera upon Chopin, and  his own influence upon the culture of his time, especially singers such as Pauline Viardot who sang versions of Chopin’s piano music.  Did you know that Viardot made virtuoso vocalises from some of Chopin’s Mazurkas, achieving fame throughout Europe?

At the same time, the film also issues a series of wonderful provocations about Chopin’s music.  His melodies are at times like bel canto solos.  I find I am hearing Chopin in an entirely new way, and re-thinking Rossini, Bellini & Donizetti as well.

The film is a colloquium in multiple languages (German, French, English), reminding me again of what Chopin must have experienced in his brief life.  Piano & voice engage in dialogues, not placid concert performances, but intense discussions of how to perform, a study in how one discourse informs the other.  We spend much of the film channelling George Sand’s love of Chopin, both in a series of calm readings from her memoirs, and in the use of her home as the setting for the film.

I am mightily stimulated by this little film that tosses out so many provocative phrases:

“CHOPIN HAD NOTHING TO SAY… and that’s why it’s so brilliant”…And I think he’s right.  The speaker –in German—was contrasting Chopin to other composers who employ programmes or texts, and felt that—like Bach—Chopin created absolute music.

“It’s as if Chopin wanted the voice but to do away with language, disengage himself from words”….And another invoked Mendelssohn’s compositions answering “ohne worte”.

“In his time people wanted to associate titles, meanings, texts… but that wasn’t Chopin’s aesthetic at all.”  Again we’re thinking of absolute music, but this time they’d portray Chopin as a kind of anti-romantic holdout, refusing to be tainted by sentimentality or literal-minded readings of his music.

Last year was Chopin’s year.  2010 was the year to commemorate the bicentennial of his birth.  2011 is now Liszt’s bicentennial, also McLuhan’s centennial, so maybe I am a bit late.  Schmidt-Garre made Chopin at the Opera in 2010, presumably as part of the commemoration.  I shall have to spend a little longer with this material before I figure it out.  I am thoroughly stimulated, and suspect you would be as well.

Posted in Cinema, video & DVDs, Opera, Reviews | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Positive about “negative”

Posted on March 26, 2011 by barczablog

When i was in highschool, one of my teachers explained the conventional wisdom of advertising for my impressionable ears.  I still remember my surprise, listening to Mr Kearn tell me that Ford or GM or Chrysler would not ever say anything against one another, because at the same time they were selling their brand, they were also selling cars in general.

Mr Kearn said these companies created their ads in search of something called “market share.”  GM or Ford seek to enlarge their percentage of the total dollars spent on that product.  And by promoting the activity in general, all of the competing companies seek to enlarge the total amount spent on cars (compared to say, cola or Barbie dolls).  Everyone making a car ad sells the joys of driving, promoting the big product –cars– while also promoting their own brand as well.

Positive ads have at least two outcomes:
1) first by showing or speaking of an activity, you promote that activity in a non-specific way. If you show cars you’re selling the glamour or the fun of car ownership, the pleasures of driving, and so on.
2) and second, when you name a particular brand or product, you identify some smaller group within the larger class from #1, such as Ford, or Firestone tires.

Mac PC ads

a sophisticated negative ad

And so, we come to another phenomenon, namely the negative ad. Yes I was thinking of attack ads, made by one political party, drawing our attention to something the opposition has done, such as a false promise or an embarassing quotation.

Not all negative ads are political attack ads.  For example, I call your attention to the long campaign from Mac ridiculing PC.  Mac is cool, PC is businesslike, Mac is reliable, PC crashes.  And so on.  The fascinating thing about this series of ads is how gently they make their attack.  Even so, there’s no denying that this is still a species of negative ad.

As Canadians enter another election, I am thinking about the consequences of negative ads.  I wish our political ads were as sophisticated as the Mac-PC ads, which seem comparatively victimless, compared to the snarling tone of the usual political attack ad.

By the logic of Mr Kearn’s lesson on the positive ad (where we avoid negative language to avoid words backfiring against the product class), there are also possible unforeseen consequences for negative ads.  Or perhaps those consequences are clearly foreseen and even expected by the party planning gurus.

We can picture two different outcomes for the negative ads, just like the positive ads i mentioned above.

The first one is well documented.  When one political party says negative things about a particular politician, it encourages people to shun that person and not vote for the person attacked. That’s more or less the part we’re conscious of, when a politician is picked apart and thereby loses his “market share”, or in other words, loses popular support.

The second?  i don’t know that it’s properly recognized, but it’s equally important.   Just as the positive ad works both in support of a class of product as well as a specific product within that class, so too with the negative ad.  In addition to persuading voters not to vote for the targetted politician, there is an additional broader response to the broader product being sold, namely the political system and our elected representatives.

The negative ad encourages a sort of despair, because it proclaims that politicians need to be scrutinized carefully, that they sometimes are untruthful (haha: as if that were news), that politics is not a nice business, that politics is actually a revolting sad affair.  One loses enthusiasm, loses faith in the good in people, while sinking into a kind of negative expectation. One becomes cynical, as if they were broken-hearted.  Without faith in society & the process, people will not want to vote, and won’t show up.  When people become cynical about politicians, they stop caring about the outcome, and surrender their franchise.

So far I have not reached a state of despair. As we enter the Canadian federal election campaign, one of the by-products that some will aim for is a kind of fatigue, to persuade voters not to show up.  History shows that low turnouts support the incumbent, whereas high turnout indicates a desire for change.  Speaking as a voter who wants a change, i am fearful of the manipulative power of advertising that not only directly addresses the candidates, but may have the power to sap voters’ will to show up, to wear them down, break their hearts, and ultimately persuade them that democracy doesn’t work.  I hope that people show up–whoever wins–so that the outcome is a reflection of the will of the people, a passionate choice, not apathy and despair.

At the very least, elections give us wonderful opportunities for comedy (the following makes fun of both Liberals & Conservatives… i apologize to those from the other parties who might feel left out).

Posted in Essays | 5 Comments

The Nerds Shall Inherit the Earth

Posted on March 20, 2011 by barczablog

My friend Joseph So recently shared a link on Facebook that started a conversation about conductors.

Carlos Kleiber

Carlos Kleiber

“Carlos Kleiber has been named the greatest conductor of all time in the April issue of BBC Music Magazine…  In a poll, 100 conductors including Sir Colin Davis, Gustavo Dudamel, Valery Gergiev and Mariss Jansons were asked to vote for their favourite.”

Here are the conductors’ selections, lifedates & nationalities; boldface signifies conductors who are still living.

1. Carlos Kleiber (1930-2004) Austrian
2. Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) American
3. Claudio Abbado (b1933) Italian
4. Herbert von Karajan (1908-1989) Austrian
5. Nikolaus Harnoncourt (b1929) Austrian
6. Sir Simon Rattle (b 1955) British
7. Wilhelm Furtwängler (1896-1954)
8. Arturo Toscanini (1867-1957) Italian
9. Pierre Boulez (b1925) French
10. Carlo Maria Giulini (1914-2005) Italian
11. Sir John Eliot Gardiner (b1943) British
12. Sir John Barbirolli (1899-1970) British
13. Terenc Fricsay (1914-1963) Hungarian
14. George Szell (1897-1970) Hungarian
15. Bernard Haitink (b1929) Dutch
16. Pierre Monteux (1875-1964) French
17. Yevgeny Mravinsky (1903-1988) Russian
18. Sir Colin Davis (b1927) British
19. Sir Thomas Beecham (1879-1961) British
20. Sir Charles Mackerras (1925-2010) Australian

As much as I agree with many on the list, I couldn’t help wondering: about the few unexpected omissions such as James Levine or Otto Klemperer, and about what such a list tells us.  What is a conductor’s conductor?  Too bad nobody asked the conductors to spell out what they admire in their colleagues. Baton technique or fund-raising prowess? Masterful control of the orchestra or of reviewers & publicity? Clearly tastes are changing, as evidenced by the inclusion of Harnoncourt & Gardiner.

At some point you may begin wondering what any of this has to do with the title of the post: “The Nerds Shall Inherit the Earth.” The nerds of course have the patience to wait for me to get to the point; as usual, we have a lot to learn from the nerds.  I’ll get back to them in a moment.

Conductors at one time were a fearsome bunch.  Think of Leopold Stokowski, Gustav Mahler (yes he was a conductor, not just a composer), or Arturo Toscanini.  They unapologetically re-wrote scores, etching their own personal stamp on music from someone else; and for their audience this was never a problem.

If you think of the imposing shadow Stokowski casts –literally—in Fantasia, you almost have the sense that a composer was lucky to submit to the brilliance of such an artist.  But as I said earlier in reference to the BBC conductor poll, fashions change.  The world has had records (wax, vinyl, and assorted digital formats) for over a century, which means that the worldwide audience exhibits a growing sophistication.  When I recently watched Fantasia with my grand-daughter I found the tone a bit condescending, as if the maestro were so far above us as to be invisible in the clouds.  Conductors of the old school were absolute rulers, tyrants who commanded.

The world has changed of course.  Whether in the world of sports, in management, or the arts, tyranny is no longer acceptable in a leader (even if several countries still seem to put up with pompous asses…but excuse me for venturing off topic).  In its place, there appear to be a number of possible prototypes to replace the old one: if you can call anything “new” that has been emerging for quite awhile now.

One option is the composer-conductor, arguably the original role of the composer, if we recall that Richard Wagner & Hector Berlioz were among the first great orchestral conductors.  Among the Top Twenty we find Wilhelm Furtwangler, Leonard Bernstein and Pierre Boulez.  There are others such as André Previn & John Williams from the world of film music.  This signifies a new option only if the composer-conductor resists the temptation to re-write masterworks; that’s exactly the kind of textual fidelity we see with Bernstein & Boulez.

conductor David Fallis

Toronto Conductor & Scholar David Fallis

Another option is the scholar-conductor.  The scholars are perhaps the ones who have been quietly changing the musical landscape.  Charles Mackerras, Frans Bruggen, Roger Norrington, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, John Eliot Gardiner, René Jacobs all bring a different sort of authority to the podium: the authority of research.  In Toronto we have another such scholar, namely David Fallis of the Toronto Consort & Opera Atelier, whose careful exploration of the text makes him leader on merit, rather than by some sort of divine right of the podium.

Both composer & scholar have legitimacy as the leader of the ensemble.  The older model – of the virtuoso conductor—can also work of course.  Carlos Kleiber came up the usual way, as an instrumentalist, then a repetiteur, and then as a conductor.  James Levine, too, plays the piano with his singers, a talented musician who is a friendly leader rather than a fearsome ogre.

And so we’re seeing several competing prototypes on the podium.  Sometimes we get the slick matinee idol looks of the old powerful maestro, for example Riccardo Muti, Herbert von Karajan or Carlo Maria Giulini.  Alongside that image, we have a gentler sort of conductor, such as Fallis, Norrington, and Rattle.

I watched a movie today that I found online, namely The Schumann Encounter – Robert’s Rescue, starring Simon Callow & yes, Roger Norrington.

You may remember Simon Callow as the boisterous friend in Four Weddings & a Funeral, or Schikaneder in the film of Amadeus. Callow was in fact the original Mozart for the premiere of  Shaffer’s play in 1979.

Norrington –who is also credited with the idea for the film—is in some respects the most daring of the scholars.  Where Bruggen, Harnoncourt, Fallis & Jacobs have explored early music (admittedly a loaded term, and with very different application for some such as Fallis than for the others)  using instruments purporting to be authentic, Norrington fearlessly explores music previously left to the modern orchestra such as the symphonies of Brahms and even Mahler.  It also means that some of his experiments rub people the wrong way, if this critique is any indication.

The complete film is available—at least for the time being—through the link (below).  It’s a charming fantasy, exploring the mind and mythology of Robert Schumann, as exemplified in this little blurb from Schumann’s wikipedia entry:

Chopin’s work is discussed by imaginary characters created by Schumann himself: Florestan (the embodiment of Schumann’s passionate, voluble side) and Eusebius (his dreamy, introspective side)…. A third, Meister Raro, is called upon for his opinion. Raro may represent either the composer himself, Wieck’s daughter Clara, or the combination of the two (Clara + Robert).

In Schumann’s suite Carnaval, opus 9, both passionate Florestan & contemplative Eusebius get a musical self-portrait (“self-portrait” because they are aspects of Schumann’s mind).

Contemplative eusebius:

Passionate Florestan:

The film is heart-breaking in some respects.  Talk about a nerd project!  Here’s a film made for those so fascinated by Robert Schumann that they would enjoy a film exploring his internal demons.  That the film is available online for free suggests that perhaps there aren’t enough of us – Schumann nerds of the world—to have made the film profitable.  While it does have a few silly moments, its chief strength is the way it illuminates something of Schumann’s madness.  I don’t think it matters that at times it resembles a total flight of fantasy.  It’s no more fanciful nor any more inaccurate than the aforementioned commercial success, Amadeus. While Norrington may not be everyone’s cup of tea –as actor, film-maker or his chief strength as conductor—I really like this film.  If you’re a musical nerd maybe you’ll like it too.

The Schumann Encounter – Robert’s Rescue is available at least for the time being via the following address (the URL resists embedding):
http://www.classicaltv.com/v841/classical-music/the-schumann-encounter

Posted in Essays, Personal ruminations & essays | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Honeymoon Song

Posted on March 14, 2011 by barczablog

Composer Ernest Bloch & his children

Today I visited my Mother’s house after church.  I had stayed late  for a rehearsal of the big piece we’re performing in April, namely  Ernest Bloch’s Sacred Service.

It’s funny how things sometimes seem to follow patterns, whether in reality or in our minds.

At church, our music director David Warrack is teaching us music sung in Hebrew.  For everyone at today’s rehearsal, that means we’re singing phonetically without much comprehension (except when we encounter hallelujah or amen).  We’re making music, trying to make sense of words that normally would be a foreign language.  The piece by Bloch becomes an inter-cultural bridge.  While that may seem odd, it’s how people learn oratorios, operas, songs written in other languages; part of the task is  to dig into the text, to properly learn what the text means, its context and how it is to be pronounced.  It’s a wonderfully seductive process, because one never gets to a point where one knows too much.  An Englishman learning Shakespeare or a German learning Bach will always have more they can learn, so you can imagine that newcomers will have that much more to discover.  In the meantime, a text such as Bloch’s score is a magic carpet, taking us into a  whole new world.

Need I mention that the intention of the organizers – who are bringing together choirs from different faith communities—is to encourage inter-faith encounter?  The conversation across faiths (where each faith represents a discursive community, a complex network of codes & symbols) is by definition a cross-cultural experience.

Later, at my Mom’s there i was, doing the same thing.  Now of course that may sound odd.  Isn’t a son from the same culture as his mother?  Yes and no.

A song my Mother heard recently on the radio moved her to reminisce about an experience from long ago, taking her back to her youth.  Songs are funny that way, instantly taking us into reveries & memories in the past.

My Mom suddenly remembered a song she heard on another radio, long ago in Budapest during the first days after the Russians arrived in Budapest.  She was wondering if I could help her to identify the tune.  She sang it for me in Hungarian, and i persuaded her to let me record her singing it (it sounded pretty good by the way!).  The song was a romantic Russian song being played in Budapest on the radio in 1944 or perhaps 1945.  I got the impression it was the equivalent of a “hit“ at the time.

But wait.  A Russian song embraced by the Hungarian populace? as a “hit”?  That seems unthinkable given that the words that usually pop into my head when I think of “Budapest” and “USSR,” are words such as “uprising”, “revolution” or “tanks”.

My mother told me a story that might explain.

During the worst part of the Second World War–when the Nazis and Soviets were fighting it out, often on the soil of other nations– people hid away, fearful, endangered.  Of  course  the way she described it was simply as a horror.

And then one fine day, the bombardments stopped.  Curious, my mom and her family & neighbours emerged from their bunkers & basement hiding places.

As they came to the  surface, the locals encountered men in clean white capes, who said

“Baratajim, ne feljetek, felszabitani jöttunk.  Nincs töb háború.”

Those are Hungarian words, spoken by Russians in unlikely clothes.  After a bombardment, starving people emerge from their bombed buildings to find reassuring men in beautiful white telling them exactly what they dreamt of hearing?  Talk about a theatrical moment!

What did these mysterious men in white say?

“Friends, be not afraid.  We came to liberate you.   There’s no more war.”

I can’t help remembering the arrival of the Martians on Earth in Tim Burton’s Mars Attacks. The translator device says “we come in peace” moments before a Martian fries the symbolic dove of peace with a raygun, first blow in a pre-emptive attack on humanity.

And just like the Martians, the Russians seemed to be saviours to the populace of Budapest, freeing them from the Nazi occupation.  In time this would change.  But in the first blush of liberation, the Soviets enjoyed a honeymoon period.

In time the honeymoon would end.  But at the beginning, if  there was to be a dialogue, if there was to be peace, every effort was made to understand one another.  Anything less is doomed  to failure.

The unlikely “hit” on Budapest radio began with the following lyrics:

Szol az egyik a másiknak
Ne busulj Tovarisch
Minden lány elfelejt rendesen
— mindent  el visz a viz

One soldier confides to another, pessimistic about love.  The populace of a demoralized city likely could relate to the heartbreak of  soldiers long separated from their sweethearts at home.

I found it astonishing to find that fourth line, which translates as
“the water takes everything away”.

In our service today, we read from Psalm 32  (whereas the phrase in the Russian song is completely serendipitous, the psalm was likely chosen because it resonates with what we’ve seen on TV and internet this week after the earthquake & tsunami in Japan) :

“Therefore let all the faithful pray to you
while you may be found;
surely the rising of the mighty waters
will not reach them.”

I will try to find a Russian song with similar lyrics to the one I quoted above.  I seek the one sung in Budapest back in the 40s, when everyone was ready to believe that they came in peace.  Just because the search for peace hasn’t yet been successful doesn’t mean we should stop looking.

I’ll let you know if i find it.

Posted in My mother, Personal ruminations & essays, Spirituality & Religion | 2 Comments

Let us now praise famous women

Posted on March 9, 2011 by barczablog

The real Kay Macpherson? i think you can see her in this photo because she was not one to strike a pose. CLICK on the picture to read more(!!!)

Serendipity is such a wonderful word.  I love that it’s a big long word, implying something complex, when in fact it sounds like a series of vocal accidents.  Accidents are not to be confused with serendipity, for the word always implied to me something more, as if a hidden benevolent hand was at work.

We all get to see and even meet famous people over the course of a lifetime. Surely that must be so.  I feel I’ve had more than my share.  I am grateful, both for the ones i saw from a few feet away, such as Leontyne Price or Pierre Elliot Trudeau, the ones with whom i got to shake hands, such as James Levine or Jon Vickers, and the ones with whom i had the privilege of conversation, such as John Ralston Saul or John Polanyi.  Studying and later working at a University means we can be especially privileged, sitting in a classroom listening to a Northrop Frye or a Linda Hutcheon.

But for all those special people (including loads i forgot to mention, given that i was speaking only of chance momentary encounters in theatres or hallways), I am remembering one person right now, and our encounter for me has always epitomized serendipity.

I was at one time a kind of superintendant, which is to say, i lived in a place while finding souls to rent out space in a house my family owned. What a cool assortment of tenants we had, including some well known acting talent, aspiring rock-stars, to go with the students renting space in the same building.

My Mom suggested we also rent out the parking space.  And that’s how i met Kay & Brough Macpherson.

Kay Macpherson, in Pamela Harris' portrait. Again, CLICK on the picture to read more.

They were the most remarkable couple i ever met.  CB, or Brough (rhymes with “rough” even though he was anything but…) was one of the most important scholars at U of T, even though he was a very kind man with no trace of ego or condescension.  Kay, who outlived him by over a decade, was an important feminist & peace activist, perhaps more preoccupied with action than with recognition, which might explain why i even have to tell you who she was. Kay was one of the founders of the NAC; hm….but you have to be of a particular age to know what that stands for.

It’s so funny, but just now –researching with the help of my old friend google– i discovered that after all these years, i never realized that CB and i went to the same school.  Ha.  We’re both UTS alumni, or– as we would have said it before the place went co-ed in the 70s– “Old Boys”.

I identify with Mime

Kay was always very patient with me, as was CB (…sorry, Kay and everyone else called him “Brough” but i was too awestruck, and called him “Dr Macpherson”). I had such a big mouth, a lot like the character Mime in Act 1 of Siegfried.  On that occasion the god Wotan shows up, and engages in a friendly game of riddles back and forth.  Mime had the opportunity to ask questions that would be useful, but instead was too busy showing off what he knew.  An egomaniac… not unlike moi.  There i was in the presence of some key Toronto intellectuals (their parties included people like Herbert Whittaker and Danny Grossman), but did i ask them stuff? naw, i was too busy telling them stuff.

They were very patient with me.

On International Women’s Day, it seems apt to be remembering them, particularly Kay, who was always so kind.  She made me tea.  She actually listened to me, which wasn’t easy given that i am a big mouth.  I was thrilled to see that she got her memoir done, even as her sight was failing.  The title captures her spirit and the activism of her era:  When in doubt, do both: the times of my life.  I am recalling another picture of her with a big smile in the book.

I miss her.

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Crimp’s Treatment

Posted on March 6, 2011 by barczablog
Crimp

Playwright Martin Crimp

Who is Martin Crimp and where has he been hiding all these years?  Maybe as you read this, you’re thinking “he’s not new to ME”.  Congratulations if you’re able to say that

I just saw my first Crimp play tonight, namely The Treatment.  As I recall –with the help of google—I had a few opportunities in the past couple of years, but didn’t take advantage of opportunities to see Attempts on Her Life, and The City, as well as classic plays Crimp translated from French (his Misanthrope was on just last month according to google, that arena of the belated and the might-have-been).  I feel as embarrassed as a doctor not knowing about a common ailment.  Aren’t drama grads supposed to know famous playwrights?  In my defence all I can say is:

  • I don’t think the reading lists for comprehensive exams include him (at least not yet),
    and (blush cough cough)
  • opera, musicals and film are really my specialties

Suddenly I am excited that another Martin Crimp play — Cruel & Tender– is going to be produced next year at Canadian Stage, directed by Atom Egoyan.

I saw The Treatment tonight at Theatre Glendon, and in the process discovered a distinctive “new” voice: that is if you can call something “new” that has been popular in England for twenty years.  The Treatment premiered in 1993.  I suppose I should cut myself some slack, given that Crimp has gone from comparative obscurity—at least in Canada—to becoming very popular over the past few years.  His writing isn’t easy, which is probably the reason it has taken so long for him to become a major star.  With a dozen parts in the play (only one pair of small parts can easily be doubled) it’s challenging for the producers & performers, as well as for the audience.

The Treatment is a wonderfully meta-theatrical study of modern life.  We slip between two worlds disturbingly connected.  A husband and wife team—Jennifer & Andrew—seem to be seeking a fit subject for a film; or perhaps they’re actually seeking life in their own lifeless marriage.  Another husband and wife –Anne & Simon—struggle with a torture scenario, partly imaginary, partly real; does he tie her up with her consent (and possibly for her pleasure), or is it something she hates and seeks to escape?  Sitting on the boundary between the “real” pain-filled world of Anne & Simon on the one hand, and the vicarious parasitic world of Jennifer & Andrew on the other, we find Clifford the writer. Oh boy, an invitation to meditate on life and art. How could i resist?  Clifford introduces himself to increasingly hilarious effect as a writer who was famous for some hits in the 70s; he works half a year (just enough to pay the bills), and spends the other half-year writing.

Before long, Anne encounters Andrew, who wants Anne’s story AND her body.  We will watch the treatment –as in the title—of Anne’s scenario take us to entirely different versions of the plot.  An alternative writer –Nicky the deadpan receptionist in Jennifer & Andrew’s office—and Jane, the director, object to the passivity of Anne’s character, as an affront to womenkind.  And so they substitute fictition for the reality they had previously been reading and trying out in their studio.  In and of itself that’s not really news: that “look what they’ve done to my song” trope.   But this is deeper and stranger, because art & image come into collision with Anne’s identity & authenticity, while the whole busy apparatus of art & culture are presented in the most cynical terms.

It’s the relationship between the two worlds and their imaginative juxtaposition that energizes The Treatment. We get to watch the film version of Anne & Simon’s violent scenario, juxtaposed against the originals.  As we bounce between the two worlds –that is, the world of Anne & Simon, and the replica thereof—the relationship between the two gets confusing because there is so much going on inside the head of each of the characters.

Lukac

Director Aleksandar Lukac

Theatre Glendon’s production was an adaptation directed by Aleksandar Lukac, which is to say that in addition to the complexities of the original, Lukac added some additional challenges of his own.  I can’t pretend that I know the script –I don’t!—but Lukac told me that he changed the sequence in places, such that we’re sometimes seeing the film version of an event before we see the reality it’s supposed to have captured.  For me, the most wonderful part of the presentation is completely Lukac’ creation, namely the filmed replica of Anne’s story being enacted in a studio space, and then simultaneously projected onto the back wall of the stage.  The result is quite surreal & disturbing, even as it is also wonderfully ironic and full of insight about the nature of the mind and how story-telling & fantasy work.

While there are most definitely issues in The Treatment’s attitude to genders (some will be offended by what they see) it’s amazingly funny.  I laughed so loudly with others in the audience at one point that we made the unfortunate actor playing a waitress start to laugh uncontrollably; I don’t think she or her colleagues realized how FUNNY that scene was until that moment.  Part of me felt sorry for disrupting her performance, while another part loved the sense of surprise.

The play is a meditation upon authenticity and a genuine life.  We see phoniness in abundance, usually layered in ironic delivery, and very few moments when the people onstage are likeable or nice.  We occasionally encounter genuine passion, particularly from Anne & Simon, whose lives are at the centre of this comedic nightmare.

Adam Abbas played Andrew with a deliberate stillness evoking a species of office animal we’ve seen before in films involving politicians & lawyers, as well as films about film such as Altman’s The Player.  At the other extreme of the human spectrum, we encounter the Simon of Vito Corapi, a brooding angry man capable of sudden bursts of poetry; you couldn’t take your eyes off his coiled physical presence whenever he came onstage.  The bridge between the two was Philip Tetro’s Clifford, a splendidly creepy study in the mechanics of selling out, or perhaps a portrait of the artist as a shyster.

The two main female characters are not quite so simple; or in other words, I am still trying to figure them out and want to tread carefully.  Michelle Drutz was Jennifer, the other half of the vicarious couple; in some respects she is powerful, in other respects, another victim.  Anais Rozencwajg was Anne, stepping in and out of a realm of fantasy, in what must be the most complex role in the play.

I was especially pleased by several small portrayals that in their way stopped the show. Whenever Baudride Mbaya’s Bay Lady was onstage it was as if everyone else vanished.  Yes the writing gave her several wonderful lines, but it’s not just that she slam-dunked her best moments; Mbaya happily took the stage when given the opportunity.  Lynda Dawkins was also blessed with some wonderful lines as the blind cab driver (hard to believe right? very funny), which she underplayed, reminding me of a female Stevie Wonder.  Some of the most inventive moments came from Geneviève Melanson’s Nicky, the brilliant receptionist cursed to work for the incompetents (Jennifer & Andrew).  While Nicky never said anything too caustic, Melanson let us see her contempt, and in the process was a huge crowd-pleaser.

Rounding out the cast were Kaila MacDuff & Denix Wilson as the film actors portraying Simon & Anne, often providing an amusing juxtaposition between what we’d seen and what they enact, both onstage and then, when caught by a video camera,  projected to the other side of the stage.  Where were we to look? We often had several options.  Between Crimp & Lukac, there was never a let-down.

Posted in Dance, theatre & musicals, Reviews | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Opera York’s Cosi fan tutte in Richmond Hill

Posted on March 4, 2011 by barczablog

I just saw Opera York‘s Cosi fan tutte in their wonderful new home the Richmond Hill Centre for the Performing Arts, a wonderful home for opera.

a beautiful new theatre

The theatre has been open for over a year, but this was my first visit.  I had heard good things, for instance, that its design was a charming echo of the Four Seasons Centre in downtown Toronto; but that’s hardly surprising considering that it’s once again Jack Diamond who is responsible for the design.  The Richmond Hill space is like mini-me to the space in Toronto, but don’t let anyone tell you that there’s anything wrong with a small theatre.  If i could be assured of getting a seat, i’d happily trade theatres (if we could figure out a way to get it downtown!), because of course it’s already very hard getting a seat; how much harder would it be when instead of roughly 2000 seats, you only have 600?

There are so many good reasons why one should see opera in a theatre this size, it’s hard to focus on one as the key.

  • There’s no bad seat in such a theatre. While i’ve heard the same thing said about the Four Seasons Centre, it’s only true when your’e making a comparison to a really bad space.   In fact with the Richmond Hill space it’s literally true that every seat is good.
  • The acoustics aren’t just good.  If you think about the problem of acoustics–without amplification of course– there’s a limited amount of energy generated by voices and orchestra.  When over 3000 have to share the energy of those sounds, even if those vibrations were perfectly shared (that is, if you have perfect acoustics) there’s less sound available than when 2000 people share the same sound.  Now imagine instead that the sound is poured over a mere 600 people.  Even singing quietly, one can hear every distinct voice.  The soft notes have additional richness.
  • The seats are bigger, the aisles are huge.
  • The parking is free
  • And need i mention that this is a stunningly beautiful space

It’s true that Richmond Hill is not Toronto, but a suburb.  It took me less than an hour just after rush hour to get there from downtown, so it’s not far, but even so, some people aren’t willing to make the drive.  I would say this is a mistake.   Having made the drive, i am planning to repeat the experience, likely with the next performance of Cosi fan tutte.   Richmond Hill is not far away, yet still feels like a small town. Everyone i met today was friendly; no offense Toronto, but you’re pretty rude in comparison.  I had more warm fuzzy encounteres with staff in the lobby before the opera, than i’ve had in the past week at home.  I felt as though i’d gone on a vacation (sigh).

What about Mozart’s opera?

Cosi fan tutte is one of those operas that rewards the risk of employing a youthful cast. The romantic plotlines of opera work better when we’re watching attractive couples onstage.  I am accustomed to seeing this opera treated with a certain respect, likely because of Mozart.  Opera York’s approach is somewhat daring, as the comedy was played with more edge than I’ve seen.  Given that humour is a subjective thing, some might find it a tad over-the-top, but for me it was refreshing.

tenor Ryan Harper

Dion Mazerolle as Don Alfonso, was the vocal star of the evening, showing delicate pianissimos in the famous trio, articulating his words flawlessly, and lending a genuine sense of maturity to the proceedings.  His portrayal was restrained, unlike the antics of the two young men.  Anthony Cleverton’s Guglielmo felt like the straight man in the comic pairings of the two male leads; and Cleverton’s singing was a conventional reading that comfortably negotiated Mozart’s challenges with a lovely warm sound.  Ryan Harper, in contrast, played the funniest Ferrando I have ever encountered, whether in his physicality, his endless repertoire of facial expressions, or his ironic delivery of lines.

The women, too, took a contrasting approach to their portrayals.   Marcelle Boisjoli as Dorabella sang her aria in the first act very comically, whether in her droll singing, moans and a wonderfully long face.  Rachel Cleland was the more serious of the two women as Fiordiligi, which is apt for the way the part is written. Cleland unveiled a big powerful voice for her passionate Act 1 aria (“come scoglio” when it’s done in Italian, but sung in English), yet otherwise  played up maidenly restraint for comic effect.  As the maid Despina, Anna Bateman was very energetic in her comedy, with a lovely clear voice.  At the end Bateman chose an unconventional approach, seeming disgruntled by the outcome, as if disapproving of the entire game played by Don Alfonso, possibly adding a modern feministic tinge to the denouement.  Her darker demeanour was a wonderful contrast to the prevailing jollity at the conclusion.

We had the benefit of two music directors tonight.  Geoffrey Butler, who conducted, steps aside for Saturday’s performance, when Sabatino Vacca our harpsichordist will lead the performance from the keyboard.  Vacca brought a wonderful flourish to many of the recitatives.  Butler kept the orchestra and singers together, leading the performance at a very intelligible pace, which is to say, the singers were mostly clear in their enunciation and never drowned out by the Opera York orchestra.

The costumes – by Amanda Eason—were a persuasive window on the 18th century, including the silliest Albanian outfits I have ever seen.  The first thing that popped into my head was “two wild and crazy guys…” because they were indeed cruising for chicks in tight slacks, plus silly wigs.

Cosi fan tutte has one remaining performance at the Richmond Hill Centre, this Saturday March 5th at 8 o’clock.

Posted in Art, Architecture & Design, Opera, Reviews | 7 Comments

COC take Nightingale to BAM

Posted on March 1, 2011 by barczablog
Brooklyn Academy of Music

Poolside, BAM (psst... didn't that used to be the orchestra pit?). Photo © Canadian Opera Company

Gosh darn…(!)

I am not going to Brooklyn to see the remount of a Canadian Opera Company production that I saw in November 2009; but i figured i would repost excerpts from a review posted to drama.ca, as a kind of preview, plus some photos taken at the site of the current production.  The review makes a tiny mention of the second opera (Madama Butterfly) mounted at the time; but I believe it’s still pertinent to the BAM installation.  In case you can’t tell, I am a huge fan of this production.  I enjoyed re-reading what i wrote in 2009, which is still pertinent now.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The East Is Golden [originally posted November 2009 at drama.ca]

The two operas presented by the Canadian Opera Company this autumn at the Four Seasons Theatre –The Nightingale and Other Short Fables by Stravinsky, and Madama Butterfly by Puccini—appear to be a perfect pair. Both evenings of opera (including short Stravinsky works not usually understood as “opera”) were written in the 20th century. Both take their title from a non-human avian creature. Both rely heavily upon a single female star for their impact. Both are oriental in focus, even if their music is European. And although the East is sometimes red, both works have been box office gold for the COC.

And that is probably where the similarities end.

Whereas the delicate set and costumes of Butterfly make it possibly the fastest production to set up or take down, of all possible operas that the COC has in its repertoire, Nightingale entails a setup so complex that its mise-en-scène upstages the work. But how can one argue with the results? For the second time, the COC handed Robert Lepage a daunting modernist project that he converted not just into an exciting evening of theatre, but a money-maker and guaranteed sell-out requiring additional performances to meet demand. The first time was in the early 1990s when Lepage staged the double bill of Bartok’s Bluebeard’s Castle and Schönberg’s Erwartung.

beside the pit

In addition to the unorthodox placement of the orchestra, there are also several interesting placements of singers, dancers & puppeteers. Photo © Canadian Opera Company

The current project appears to be every bit as forbidding, in the choice of unfamiliar repertoire from a composer known to be dissonant to the ear and difficult to execute. But Lepage and his company Ex Machina hand us a coup de theatre before the show begins. Opera is usually a daunting form to theatre practitioners, placing an enormous yawning orchestra pit full of musicians between the stage and the audience. Under normal circumstances, singers offer variously dramatic interpretations, but only after they have devoted themselves to the imposing task of learning their music and then singing their parts.

Not this time. Lepage evicts the orchestra, filling the pit with water. Did he need to do this? Possibly; but the strongest message it sends is that the normal business of the opera house has been overturned, and that the conductor has been removed from his usual place of oversight.

And the singers who usually give indifferent performances were in for a shock when they came to this production, which changes –if not completely subverts—their usual role. A singing-actor is in fact a curious hybrid, as some have previously observed. Julie Taymor for example, has used dancers with offstage singers in place of the usual hybrid. Lepage turns to the precedent of bun raku, the oriental style of puppets that are a compound figure comprised of a voice and manipulated puppet. The arbitrary separation of voice and animated body makes sense when we remember what opera has been for most of its history: a singer giving almost their entire attention to vocal production, while sparing a comparatively smaller part of their attention for their dramatic portrayal. In the past few decades this balance has shifted somewhat, but even the finest singing actors are required first to bring their vocal technique to a level where they can offer a good dramatic portrayal.

Lepage’s presentation of The Nightingale does not settle for singers who do a little acting. Instead we get puppets, some actually manipulated by the singers: and the singers coped remarkably well with the challenge. The gentlemen in question could hardly be accused of being prima donnas, to be singing, manipulating puppets, and all while slogging through water up to their waist. So in addition to the demotion of the orchestra and conductor, Lepage knocks at least some of his singers off their pedestal as well.

Does it work? I think it depends on where you sit. For the performance when I sat near the front, I was enchanted. But when I was up in the purgatory of the fifth circle–a location that acquired a genuinely Dantesque association—I could not see the show properly. Admittedly, the COC advertised the deficiencies of those seats in advance. Curiously, the appetite for tickets was so strong that nobody seemed to mind until they actually saw the show. The friends with whom I attended that second performance were decidedly unimpressed.

Why did Lepage do it this way, making so many of the puppets too small to be seen from anywhere but the best seats? After all there are some huge puppets in the show, and surely the expense was not the reason. I think there is a clear rationale when one looks at the climactic image of The Nightingale. For most of the opera humans manipulate small puppets, creating a scale that is appropriate for a chamber work. Then the Emperor goes to sleep. He is confronted by Death, a puppet that reverses the usual template with electrifying effect. Suddenly the human is tiny, surrounded by the huge expressive skeleton shape of Death. This reversal struck me as highly symbolic, making the fragile Emperor seem like the puppet, controlled by the powerful figure of Death. Without the tiny scale of the puppets in the rest of the opera, the effect would not have been possible.

In fact, Nightingale comes across primarily as theatrical spectacle, and is only operatic en passant. The figure of the Nightingale is an irrepressible coloratura, capably sung by Olga Peretyatko. The remainder is picturesque, without testing the skills of the COC singers. The most successful singer of the evening—setting the gentle mood of the opening and close of the work, in addition to manipulating puppets—was Lothar Odinius as the Fisherman.

Stravinsky provided the remainder of the program’s Other Short Fables. Although there is one medium-sized work –The Fox, a vehicle for puppets of a completely different style from those in Nightingale—most of the first portion of the evening is a series of miniatures, more of a chamber concert than opera, helping to whet the audience’s appetite for the subsequent spectacle, in a series of works that require patient listening. Conductor Jonathan Darlington and the COC orchestra were more visible playing from the stage rather than the pit, bringing out the delicate colours as much as the occasional dissonance.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you’d like to hear a performance from the 2009 season that was broadcast on CBC, click here: The Nightingale and Other Fables, previously broadcast on CBC .  The BAM production begins March 1st 2011.

Posted in Essays | Leave a comment

COC Nixon

Posted on February 25, 2011 by barczablog
CD

cover of the Naxos CD Nixon in China

Tonight I watched the Canadian Opera Company production of John Adams’ Nixon in China.  I saw the Met High Definition broadcast recently after acquiring the Naxos CD of the opera containing virtually the same cast as the one I saw tonight.  Short of a cast album of a Broadway show, WHEN have I ever had that kind of opportunity?

Never.

The parts of Richard Nixon (Robert Orth), Chou En-lai (Chen-Ye Yuan), Henry Kissinger (Thomas Hammons), and Pat Nixon (Maria Kanyova)—four of the six principals—are the same as on the Naxos CD.  Although two roles are different (Adrian Thompson’s Mao and Marisol Montalvo’s Madame Mao) the musical polish displayed in this COC production is remarkable, and at times astonishing.

I found myself unable to avoid making comparisons to two operas in my recent experience:

  • The Metropolitan’s production of the same opera, conducted by the composer and directed by Peter Sellars who conceived of the project in the first place; it’s being repeated in movie theatres on March 12th; unfortunately there are no remaining live performances in NYC
  • The COC production of The Magic Flute

 

The latter must sound really absurd but I couldn’t help noticing that

  • the most dominant figure in each opera is an over-the-top female sung by a coloratura soprano
  • in each opera there is also a trio of females who are at times like a meditation upon the feminine, or at least a man’s exploration of woman.

Maybe it’s just a fluke? but I can’t help but think that Adams and librettist Alice Goodman must admire The Magic Flute.

More significantly, I was mindful of the differences between the two productions of Nixon in China I’d seen, and want to talk about them because I suspect many people will have seen at least the Met production if not both productions.

The COC Nixon, designed by Allen Moyer (set), James Schuette (costumes) and Wendall K Harrington (video designer), and directed by James Robinson, looks and feels quite different than the Met’s production.  Sometimes the Met production felt as though it were being conservative, compared to the more radical co-production Toronto rented  (produced by St Louis + Chicago + Colorado + Houston +Minnesota + Portland), problematizing and re-thinking the opera.  At other times, i thought that Sellars was the one bringing the subtler approach to bear.

Throughout the first act, which might be a departure point for Sellars, i felt we were on comfortable ground, watching the Nixons get off a reasonable facsimile of a Boeing 707.  When Richard Nixon sings his “News” aria, he is simultaneously shaking hands with a row of Chinese, even as his mind wanders away.  In Toronto, while the lineup mimed shaking, Nixon walked across a different part of the stage, illustrating just how odd this moment is.   Why, after all, shouldn’t an operatic character sing an aria while performing an action?  The Met version gives it as written, whereas the Toronto production unpacks the oddities & complexities throughout the evening.

Most challenging is the use of video.  What exactly are we watching, and just where are we, as this opera unfolds? While we do observe the same actions as in the Met production, we see a series of images on a series of TV screens, as well as the occasional visit from the average American TV viewing family in their living room.  Nixon not only comments on the phenomenon of being in the news, he walks among them, a living icon.  Such moments reverberate with complexities.

This tendency doesn’t work so well for me in Act II.  When Henry Kissinger appears in the COC’s Act II opera-within-the-opera, it’s explained for us by Kissinger’s cognitive dissonance, Pat’s confusion and RMN’s assurances, whereas the mysterious metatheatre is disturbing in the Met’s production.  When Pat jumps into the Met’s revolutionary ballet it feels cataclysmic because she seamlessly blends into the illusionary world of the ballet; Toronto’s equivalent isn’t nearly so disturbing because they made it very clear for us.   I loved the ambiguity in the Met’s production.

There’s a trade-off, of course.  I experienced the big aria from the Met’s Chiang Ch’ing as a mere temper tantrum, interrupting a very powerful tableau.  In Toronto, where the deconstructed ballet in Toronto is less fearsome or powerful as ideology, Madame Mao’s aria comes across as overwhelmingly powerful.  Where the Met version of the aria was decidedly operatic and even fun, i found the Toronto aria, from Marisol Montalvo, very scary theatre.  The chorus of singers and dancers around her seemed genuinely cowed by her aura.  Yes, Montalvo sang wonderfully, but she moved with the lithe grace of a jungle cat, prowling among those she could devour if she wanted.  The scene felt genuinely dangerous.  Wow.

In Act III we have another sort of divergence.  Where the Met’s Act III seems to be a gentle exploration of the inner lives of the characters, the COC version is far lighter, exploiting the dances that are spoken of in the libretto far more than what we get from the Met.  Madame Mao is clearly still a great dancer, observed by a passive & voyeuristic Mao.  The Chairman physically assaults her: a necessary reminder that Mao Tse-tung isn’t just a cute old man, but an authoritarian and a thug.  This picks up on one of her lines, when she says to Mao “Nothing I fear has ever harmed me, why should you?” But he does. There’s nothing as nasty in the Met version.

My favourite passage in Adams’ opera is the very end.  After the reminiscences of the couples, Chou En-lai looks to the future.   I didn’t expect to be moved nearly so much in Toronto by Chen-Ye Yuan as i had been in the movie theatre hearing and seeing Russell Braun.  As you may recall from my earlier review, Braun played historical subtext, that Chou was slowly dying of cancer even as he continued to work with stoicism and dignity. Yuan plays up the hard-work, mimicing images on video of oxen tirelessly labouring.

But I didn’t need any subtext, hearing Chou’s lines in a delicious duet with the COC orchestra:

Just before dawn the birds begin.
The warblers who prefer the dark,
the cage-birds answering.  To work!
Outside this room the chill of grace
lies heavy on the morning grass.

….Listen to it from about 5 minutes into this youtube sample (a different production NB, but fabulous writing from Adams & Goodman).

Aided by the COC orchestra & chorus, conducted by Pablo Heras-Casado, this is one of the finest productions I’ve ever seen at the Four Seasons Centre.  There’s only one remaining performance on February 26th.

Posted in Opera, Reviews | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

Spiritual rather than religious

Posted on February 22, 2011 by barczablog

Conversations online can be as real as the ones we have with the people around us.  A brief little remark I made to a Facebook post from my friend Romy Shiller concerning Roland Joffé’s The Mission has spurred additional conversation.  Please note, before reading any further, I am just a guy who has opinions, and not to be mistaken for any sort of expert (ha…. that will become obvious if you keep reading, AND the fact that while i sometimes make references to other religions i can’t claim to have knowledge of anything far beyond my own experience).  What’s more, I am still far from having figured any of this out, and so would welcome comments & feedback from others.

I think Romy plans to comment on the film at some point.  I made the remark that this film reminds me of the news factoid I’d recently heard.  I understand that “spiritual rather than religious” is now the biggest denomination in the USA, although it may be apocryphal.

It’s based on something i recall reading somewhere.  But perhaps it will make more sense if I explain myself.

I understand “religion” as a system, the combination of beliefs, rules, regulations, and also, the associated institutional processes.  A church encompasses buildings, laws and ideas.  It’s also people, whether they’re on membership lists, sitting in front of the pastor on Sunday, or the ones who only come a few times per year.  A religion is an abstraction that comes to fruition in the practices of churches, synagogues, mosques, or whatever buildings celebrate that particular religion( and one can even imagine religions requiring no buildings).  The practices of the religion began with a series of beliefs, that we sometimes speak of as a “belief system”.  While that belief system is maybe the pre-requisite for a religion, I understand the religion in the institutional and cultural processes that follow, the practices and habits that create communities of faith.

Spirituality, on the other hand, is a much vaguer idea, I would say.  While there are many religions, each of them has rules and books, such that one knows the difference between say, a Presbyterian and a Roman Catholic, between Sunni and Shia, between Orthodox and Reform Judaism.  Spirituality is not systematic in this way.  By my understanding, spirituality is a necessary component of any religion.  If I may be permitted to make a crude analogy, spirit is like the whispering voice in the ears of the prophets.  It is only afterwards—when the whispers have been recorded, and likely turned into the basis for argument, doctrine, and even dogma—that we end up with religions.

Spirituality can exist outside the boundaries of organized religion.  People feel things and have intuition and inspiration, without necessarily anything coalescing into a text or even an explicit word that can be passed on.  I would say that spirituality is as individual as the beauty that is in the eye of a single beholder.  When someone tries to take individual insight and make it intelligible to many people, that is where religion becomes possible;  you have to experience some sort of paraphrasing, a translation of something individual into something that is meant to be read by all people.  Many people hunger for direction, for a sense of meaning to their lives, and so the impulse to share inspiration and to pass along messages that are informed by the spirit is an old one.  If films are any guide, it’s not such a good idea–this business of systematizing beliefs into religions– considering how many horrible things are done in the name of religion.  Hollywood, naturally, distorts the real world.  But long before Hollywood, we had witch-burning, Christians thrown to lions, wars of conquest in the New World.

To loosely paraphase Love Story, Erich Segal’s novel from the 1960s spirituality is belief without having to say you’re sorry.  Does that seem unfair?  Spirituality is a wonderful way to opt out of the systems for morality that normally posit consequences for misbehaviour in the afterlife.

Speaking of belief, I believe religion is man-made.  Am I wrong? I believe that Jesus, Allah, God, or any other deity, must never be blamed for the misconduct of humans, acting in the name of their deity.  Humans commit all sorts of follies in the name of their gods.  I think this observation –that the greatest evils in the world are often those done in the name of a god—is one of the reasons people sometimes fear religion and prefer a safe and undefined spirituality in place of religion.

After all:

  • Spirituality doesn’t have the issues with gender, doesn’t impose second class status upon women or demand that they behave differently.
  • Spirituality doesn’t have the same issues with law, punishment & guilt.  That’s all the result of human systems, based on what’s in religion

I would argue that spirit is what speaks to prophets.  Except in rare cases, the spirit whispers to select people fortunate to be chosen in this way as prophets or channels of something divine.  But when we paraphrase what was said and try to systematize it, we end up with “thou shalt”… do this or that.

The challenging part within religions are never the warm and fuzzy parts. Nobody objects to eternal life or forgiveness.  People object to being told they have to give up something, such as adultery or lying or stealing.  We may know we’re supposed to be good, but the authoritarian side of religion is much harder to reconcile than the warm fuzzy security blanket that is spirituality.

But some of the rules seem ridiculously out of date:

  • Are kosher rules anything more than a prudent defense in the ancient world against trichinosis; in other words, given proper refrigeration, what’s wrong with pork?
  • Are the rules against homosexuality just another objection from a particular time, when men were supposed to reproduce?  the same probably applies to premarital sex, and shouldn’t be confused with concerns about adultery

It’s particularly ironic when—for example – the Bible contains so many obsolete passages concerning the proper rules for polygamy, sacrificial animals & slavery, rules that are comfortably ignored by practicing members of that faith.  How is it that people can cherry pick, singling out some rules to ignore, while using others as weapons against people?

No wonder that so many people identify themselves as “spiritual rather than religious”.

Did God create religions? or are they rather human artifacts, possibly inspired, but still, an interpretive rather than divine creation.  I tend to believe that religions come from people rather than God.  What’s more, I believe we’re doing better in the 21st Century, now that we don’t read holy books such as the Bible as literally as we once did.

What’s the connection to The Mission? The plot of the film, taking place several centuries ago, concerns Jesuits who believe in Christianity’s most radical ideas, such as Jesus Christ himself would espouse; these idealistic Christians are victimized & martyred by a cynical and worldly church. The space between the two (that is, those ideal martyrs, and the cynical Christians) reminds me of that impulse to find a kind of spirituality without the negatives, a series of beliefs (if not an actual system of belief) that avoids the mistakes of the past.

I understand spirituality as an idealistic series of intuitions & feelings, not systematic or coherent, but a vague sense of something that informs our lives.  Religions, on the other hand, are systems that have been very helpful for running our own human world.  Our moral and legal apparatus are inconceivable without the inheritance from the Old & New Testaments.  Religion has furnished a pathway, but like any other way-finding system, the logistics of road construction & signage need to be reconciled to our ability to read signs and not crash into one another on those roads.  The revelations whispered in the ears of many prophets are the mysterious voice of spirit; when the words of those prophets are collected, organized & systematized into rules & regulations, you get a religion, which is meant for all of us who are unable to hear God and want a pathway, not just to salvation, but away from chaos.  We needed religion to avoid anarchy.  Surely religion serves different purposes now.  Can we live without those systems? I wonder what we’re left with if we blithely throw it away.  And maybe that’s why churches are changing so rapidly in the last century.

I am very happy with my religion (i am a Christian by the way), but can’t pretend that this is the way everyone sees things.  Is the opposite of my particular species of Christianity another system, such as Judaism? Islam? Buddhism?  or are all of those variations on the same love of a god; and is the opposite agnosticism or atheism?  I don’t trouble myself with that question–about opposites– because there are so many questions to undertake merely in coming to terms with my faith & spirituality.

I am happiest, i think, when the music is playing.  I sing in the choir, sometimes privileged to sing solos, and sometimes a replacement organist.  In those moments I feel safely spiritual without so many difficult questions to answer, lost in the richness of the musical experience.  It’s funny, but there’s a curious parallel between religion and music.  Excellence can’t happen when we offer unconditional criteria for acceptance.  While one part of my brain is conflicted about judgment (whether we’re talking about the kind of judgment whereby we recognize good and bad behaviour, OR good and bad musical performance), another part of me recognizes that we have to sometimes judge.

I wonder if part of the impulse behind spiritual-rather-than-religious is the quest for unconditional acceptance.  The thing is only God can really be unconditional.  I’ve tried, and i am simply not up to it.  I can hear when people sing out of tune; sometimes I can tell when people are lying.  I think I would be happier if i were tonedeaf (unable to hear wrong notes), if I were more naive (unable to recognize people who lie and cheat).

…but then if I were tonedeaf, how much enjoyment would i get from something like this?

Posted in Essays, Spirituality & Religion | 3 Comments