gravitas

I think I've gotten to a point in life where, though I'm happy, I've lost a sense of carefree lightness that used to characterize my state of being. Does this happen to everybody?

beards, b.o. and beats

On Saturday, I headed into Williamsburg with a few friends, and checked out two new spots. The first stop was a soul and funk dance party at the Glasslands Gallery. This was a prototypical Williamsburg joint-- the exterior was a run down, grimy building with no sign but the street number scrawled in white paint. When we got there, around eleven, the place was mostly empty. The aesthetic inside was unkempt, and the self-aware hipsters with tight pants, beards and occasionally body odour were in full effect. We got there early because after a $3 cover, there was supposed to be free beer from 11 until 12. I knew it was going to be a good night when they handed us Colt 45. To be fair, the music was great, and I gave serious consideration to hanging around until 1 to compete in the funk dance competition.

Instead, a group of us left sometime around 1230 to fulfill Shival's longstanding dream (of at least four weeks) to party at another Williamsburg dance spot: Bembe. Despite having no coat check, and a painfully inadequate bathroom situation, Bembe was awesome. The music was a blend of South and Central American influences, and although I normally find it difficult to dance to these rhythms, I was really feeling the dancing choose on Saturday. The crowd was very chill, everybody was having a good time on the floor, and the drinks were cheap. And no cover! Will definitely head back here at some point. Who wants to dance?

friends, part 2

Since writing the post on friendship a few days ago, I've been thinking about some additional dimensions.

Strong romantic relationships often share many characteristics with friendships. Often, when people are in love, they will describe their significant other as their best friend. The distinction I've been struggling with is whether being in love simply shares characteristics with friendship (and hence 'feels like it'), or whether there is a separable element of friendship that exists in parallel. This is an especially relevant question when thinking about how to move forward with relationships that have ended (I don't mean to be coy here-- I presume most readers of this blog will understand my motivations in discussing this topic). While I certainly hope for the latter, I sometimes fear that the former may be closer to the truth. Thoughts?

Another scenario I was thinking about is that of childhood friends who grow apart. How do we maintain friendships, if at all, when we've grown apart in terms of shared experiences, interests, and inclinations? Many of these dissipate, but some seem to stick around-- and I think there is value here. Value in having somebody who realizes how different you've become, but still cares for you, and will be there for you because of your shared past. These are the things that make us human.

the crying light

beautiful new music.
credit to jing for the introduction.

nkw

"Ooo you make me live"

A few years ago, I confided in somebody close to me that I was lonely; I felt that while I was friendly with a great many people, I didn't have many friends. The lines between acquaintances, friends, family and romantic interests, for example, often blur, and it can be difficult to compartmentalize relationships cleanly. Thinking about what it takes to sustain friendships is an interesting exercise, and I'd be interested to hear some of your thoughts. My intention here is just to express a few disconnected thoughts on the matter.

An old friend with whom I spent a summer in Norway some years ago recently left a message on my Facebook wall about letters that we used to exchange, and suggested we ought to meet up. The whole thing made me feel a little warm and fuzzy inside. What makes it really fascinating is that aside from our month or so in Norway together, she and I have spent literally no time together. Yet this one experience was apparently enough for us to stay in touch and continue sharing experiences over distance and time.

The most challenging thing for me with friendships that are grounded in the past is the shortage of shared experiences-- there can occasionally be a tendency to reduce interactions to nostalgic retellings. Happily, I think I have many close friends from whom I've lived apart for 3 or more years. I often find myself chatting with or writing to one of these people, and I am abruptly and acutely struck by just how much I miss them, and how deeply his or her friendship has affected me.

Few things are as valuable in times of distress as a friend who knows you. A close friend, one whom you've given up trying to impress, one who knows your flaws and weaknesses, one who is willing to just listen is truly a blessing. I've never been somebody who particularly enjoys spending time by myself (being a middle child, I guess). I have a tendency as well, to be repetitive and self-indulgent when things are bothering me. Without the friends I have, unwitting and otherwise, I'd be some kind of mess.

I love my friends, old and new, near and far. Thanks for everything.

parting ways

Last night, I sang in my fifth concert with the Young New Yorker's Chorus. We sang Rachmaninoff's All Night Vigil along with a few pieces by John Tavener. As always, it was a really wonderful experience for me. It was also very nice to have my parents in the audience! Thanks to those of you who were able to come hear us sing. It means a great deal to me.

Today I've had that sort of bittersweet feeling that always hits me after a concert. After weeks of engaging regularly and intensely with the music, I grow attached to the piece. The final days leading up to a concert are often when I find myself letting go and falling in love with the music. There is a sort of sadness, then, that ensues when the concert is over, and I realize that I won't be rehearsing the piece anymore. I like to keep the score and a good recording of the music. And every now and then, I get to sing an old piece that I know again; usually an exciting feeling.

Reluctantly on to the next thing, I suppose.

for the love of fort greene...

this morning, as i was leaving the farmer's market, i walked past fellow neighborhood resident jhumpa lahiri. and so continues my love affair with fort greene.

is he about to emote?

speaking of performance and emotion, check out jack white below on the conan finale

classifying creativity

Recently, I have been thinking about the word creative. It struck me recently that the word is fairly ill-defined, or perhaps too broadly defined to be very meaningful. Most people seem to agree that creativity is something valuable, having vaguely to do with generating unique ideas and expressions.

Consider, however, creativity of the sort that a scientist uses in developing an effective study and how it compares to the creativity of a painter. We may call a stage actor creative, and also praise a business leader for her creative approach to structuring her division. Are we really describing a comparable attribute in these two examples? It feels to me like we've just given a single name to two completely different concepts.

One of the relationships that I've been thinking about lately is between author and performer. The act of writing a work (music, play, film, etc.) undeniably demands creativity. Anybody who performs seriously knows that the same can be said of performance. Performing a piece with committment requires a dedicated, personal knowledge of the work, and an intimate sense of ones self. Indeed, our task as performer's is to communicate that which the page alone cannot do, and this requires creative drive in a very real sense. Nevertheless, for the sake of argument, the performer is still ultimately interpreting. Can it be said that the author is ultimately engaging in a more creative task by creating something from nothing? We occassionally see a performance that shatters this notion, but on the whole, does it have some merit?

Creative or not, I'm just thankful for opportunities to perform. There really is nothing else like it.

As always, I'd love to hear some of your thoughts.

POST-racial

The cartoon above appeared in the NY Post this morning. My initial reaction was to take offense, and I have been thinking about the extent to which this is a legitimate response. Clearly, the paper is well within its right to have published this. Nonetheless, I am surprised and disappointed that an editor saw fit to let this go to print.

To put the cartoon into context, let’s take a look at the relevant facts:

1. Yesterday, a domestic monkey in Connecticut went berserk, attacked somebody, and had to be killed by police.
2. Congress recently passed a large stimulus bill, considered by many to be inadequate to the task at hand. In some respects, this can be considered to be President Obama’s first major legislative success.

The benign interpretation is that the cartoon merely illustrates how attempts by the government to solve the economic crisis are qualitatively no different than those chimps would have come up with; that is, garbage. To be fair, this is not an altogether new image: think about the now trite idea of an infinite number of monkeys at an infinite number of keyboards. In this context, the shooting of the monkey is nothing more than an attempt to link the political activity with the bizarre topical story from (1).

Indeed, Col Allan, Editor in Chief of the Post, said (according to Gothamist):

"The cartoon is a clear parody of a current news event, to wit the shooting of a violent chimpanzee in Connecticut. It broadly mocks Washington's efforts to revive the economy"

Setting aside the poorly established link, and hence, the violence of that combined image, consider the more insidious racial implications.

Historically and presently, African Americans have often been degraded by being compared to monkeys (among many, many other forms of degradation). I find it hard to believe that the editors of even the NY Post would be unaware of this historical social context. Given the prominence of the Obama Administration in the development and passage of this legislation, it is not a very tenuous connection to link the image of the monkey to President Obama himself. This is racist and I believe inappropriate. Further, I find it completely implausible that the editors who allowed this to print would be unaware of this reading.

In my mind, this connects to a broader notion that Barack Obama’s historic election somehow moves us into a post-racial mode of interacting with each other. While few would explicitly suggest this, I sense an extent to which many believe his election has given them license to stop worrying about sensitivity in race relations.

I wonder, in other words, whether there are people who believe that the above cartoon is now ‘fair game.’

In my mind, of course, the answer is still a resounding NO.

I would love to hear some discourse on this topic--

in the flowers

A few weeks ago, I picked up the latest Animal Collective album, Merriweather Post Pavillion. When I've listened to this band in the past, I haven't responded very much, but I really love this new album. It resonates with me, and the soundscape is dense, novel and beautifully crafted.

I suggest you listen to the opening track, In The Flowers, as an example of song construction at its best. I love the way the acoustic tension builds to this powerful, exciting climax starting at around 2:30.

Thoughts?

"i never thought i'd be on a boat..."

can you tell this apart from an actual t-pain song?

protectionism

Watching the economic stimulus package chaotically come together here in the USA, I can't help but be troubled by the dramatic increase in protectionist rhetoric and activity as of late. The "Buy America" provisions seem archane and unhelpful, and the bizarre ammendments that seek to further reduce the availability of H-1B visas to foreign visas are in my mind, completely misguided.

So why restrict visas for skilled foreign workers?

Opponents typically attack the program on two fronts: firstly, that it is abused, and secondly, that it takes jobs away from American workers. The first argument seems to be flawed logically. If the H-1B program is being abused, the solution surely is to implement it better, not to attack a fundamentally sound program. I would note, for example, that as engaged, employed residents of this country stimulate the economy through their activity in the same way that an American would.

On the second point, as well, I would argue that systematically closing your society off from skilled foreign workers does a serious disservice. I have failed to have my H-1B application reviewed twice, because they quota has always run out before my application was evaluated. In neither case did this result in an extra American job. In the first case, my role was transferred to London, which took away from the US economy. In the second case, I was able to work under a different status. In recent years, in fact, both Microsoft and Google have opened up large new offices in Western Canada instead of the US West Coast simply because they've been unable to get the visas for the workers they need.

I am curious to hear what others think about the recent rash of protectionism in general, and the issue of skilled foreign worker visas in particular.

The Long Walk to Vegetarianism...

I'm planning a slow, manageable transition to vegetarianism. I like cold turkey, and will continue to eat it until the end of this year. The idea here is to lay out my plans so that I have some sense of public accountability. I dropped seafood as of the beginning of this month, so I am down to chicken, turkey and fish. So, the plan is as follows:

1 January 2010 - No more turkey
1 January 2011 - No more fish
1 January 2012 - No more chicken

Thinking about 2012 terrifies me.

King of Pop Eternal?

The video below is ten minutes long, but I promise you will be glad to have watched it.



Will anybody else ever be able to do this again?

Let's set aside the technical aspects of the question, because in this case, the answer is an unambiguous and resounding NO. The singing, dancing, presence on stage, and the extent to which he has captivated the audience are basically unmatched. All of this is especially impressive when you consider how minimal the set and light show are compared to modern acts. It's just him out there.

What I am trying to get at is that it seems unlikely that anybody today can have the kind of universal, cross-cultural, cross-demographic appeal or commercial success that Michael Jackson enjoyed in his heyday.

Commercially: MJ has sold literally hundreds of millions of records. Given the way that the music industry has transformed, and given how music sales have been steadily declining, how will anybody even come close to this?

More to the point, the social landscape has changed. As media channels have grown in number and diversity, the notion of 'popular music' has become increasingly fragmented. Simply put, there is more music out there, and no 'common music' that we share as a society. While MTV may dictate what many people listen to, people are also finding new music through independent radio and blogs, through online sharing, through services like pandora, and any number of alternative channels.

On the one hand, this seems to be a positive development, as far creating a broader, more diverse creative public space. It is nice that there are more avenues for performance and distribution of work that may not have wide, mainstream popularity. On the other hand, it's hard to shake the notion that we're missing out without these massive communal experiences. We don't have MJ to bring us together. The energy in the video above is vivid and exciting. As liberating as it is to have ready access to the kind of music that speaks to us, it is just a little more lonely now.

A thought: I think the closest thing I've experienced has been the shared sense of hope and excitement over the election of Barack Obama. I can't help but think that the video above reminds me more of being at the inauguration than it does of any concert that I've been to.

Anyway, Michael Jackson: King of Pop.
Good God, what a performer.

gawking at clouds

Somebody has to lie there
in the grass that covers up
the causes and effects
with a cornstalk in his teeth
gawking at clouds.

--Szymborska