Sunday, June 29, 2008

A few observations about Greek women's shoe culture

In our recent trip to Greece, we visited our niece's new shoe store several times. An unchanging part of Greek life is the presence of at least one shoe store selling mostly women's shoes every block or two of every neighborhood. A lot of time and money is spent on shoes, especially women's shoes. Here are a few observations about Greek women shoe culture that may have some sociological benefit.

1. The most desired color of a shoe for a woman who is not in mourning is either shiny metallic gold or silver. A limited number of other non-metallic colors (red, bright lemon yellow, fluorescent green, depending on the year's fashions) can be considered acceptable.

2. The height of the shoe's heel for a woman not in mourning should be at least 3.0 inches (approximately 7 centimeters). The woman's height and age is not relevant to the height of the heel, nor is her occupation. This rule can be relaxed if the woman is in mourning, or is a grandmother.

3. The heel of a woman's shoe should be able to neatly pierce a watermelon.

4. The shoe should expose the majority of the woman's foot from the bottom of her ankle bone to the tip of her (usually bright red) toenail -- approximately 96% altogether of the foot should be uncovered.

5. It is always summer in a Greek shoe store.

6. The size of a woman's foot must never be measured or suggested by the shoe store owner. Instead, the woman is expected to announce her shoe size, which will be 2 or 3 sizes smaller than the actual size. The owner will shrug and bring out the requested shoes in sizes that are even smaller, suggesting out loud that the woman's foot is in reality smaller than she herself thinks. The woman will smile and gratefully try on the shoes, then angrily reject them as obviously too small and that the size she requested from the blockheaded store owner, as she well knew, was the correct size. She will buy the shoes in that relatively larger size. Which will still be too small.

7. Number 6 is true whether a woman walks ten meters each day or ten kilometers.

8. It is unwise for the shoe store owner to use the descriptive words "sensible" or "practical" in regards to any pair of shoes when speaking with a woman customer. The customer will be offended. The insinuation is that she suffers from a podiatric condition or disability requiring shoes that are ugly but practical.

Sandra Patrikalakis's Certificate Voice Recital

Our soprano friend Sandra Patrikalakis gave a wondeful recital last Sunday at the New England Conservatory. It was a wide range of songs, in five different languages! I especially liked Five Greek Folk Songs, by Maurice Ravel, not because of the Greek connection, but because Sandy sang as if French was her native language, and she seemed to have a special feeling for the songs.

She was very confident and comfortable on stage, very comfortable with what her voice can do. It was startling. Having heard her for so long in a choir, or as part of a larger chorus, it was startling to hear her voice by itself. It was as if we hadn't actually heard her before.

Sandy sings with the Masterworks Chorale and Cantilena, and is the president of the board at Masterworks.

Saturday, June 28, 2008

The movie, "My Father My Lord" -- his name is Abraham

We liked this Israeli film about a Hasidic Rabbi and his son and wife very much (director David Volach). It's lovingly and slowly detailed.

Ty Burr's review in the Boston Globe was laudatory and sympathetic.

The elderly Rabbi Abraham (he seems to be at least in his 60s, with his wife Esther in her early 40s) is devoted to the Torah, his community, and his small family. He defines his life, his world, strictly through the Torah. His young obedient son Menachem gazes up at him while he prays and studies, and senses the instinctual conflicts in the boundaries and dictates of the Torah and his own feelings. You can feel the boy thinking: is it right to expel a mother dove from her nest, dooming the chicks, even though the Torah demands it? Is it right for the Rabbi to angrily demand Menachem tear up a picture of an African native, because the native is an idolater? Is it right that only those who follow the Torah are righteous, as the Rabbi thoughtfully proclaims?

Yet the Rabbi doesn't perform his role without agonizing. It pains him to carry out the demands of his life. He does it because he must. As if to give up on even one of the demands or laws would be the end of his whole construction.

So his name is Abraham: his devotion leads to the film's devastating ending. He can't be blamed for it, can he? Yes, he can be. He can't be responsible for what happens, can he, he who was wrapped up in prayer? He can be.

I would have liked a little less well-mannered reverence in the film, a little less constraint. The tensions between the Rabbi and his wife Esther could have been drawn out more. She's reverent and worshipful to the point of being saintly, yet you can sense her unhappiness and unease. In their bedroom scene, the Rabbi arrives and is apparently disappointed to find her having already said her prayers. She does not speak to him (I think she is not permitted to speak to him, having said her prayers, but she writes on paper to him). Perhaps he was hoping for sex with his wife, and is surprised to find her unyielding. "Are you mad at me, Esther?"

Several times, I was reminded of my last visit to Mount Athos -- the sense of claustrophobia. One day, I was standing in in Daphni, the administrative town on Athos, and looking up and down the streets. I felt a kind of panic. Not a girl or a woman anywhere. Only men. It was a sort of dread, and I felt that several moments watching this wonderful movie.

Monday, June 2, 2008

Brookline Chorus's "Sacred Concert" by Duke Ellington

On May 10, the chorus I sing with, The Brookline Chorus, sang Duke Ellington's Sacred Concert. Although I found myself struggling to rehearse the music, the concert was success for both the chorus and the audience (there were about 600 people in the First Baptist Church of Newton) -- and I felt great.

It was a struggle to rehearse partly because time was tight in the weeks leading up to the concert, because I had never actually heard the music (there are no CDs), and I because I was not especially fond of the music at first. Without hearing and sensing the music, it was difficult to fully express it until the final dress rehearsals. There, finally, we had the White Heat Swing orchestra, the soloists (Rochelle Ellis, the soprano, and Aaron Tolson, the tap dancer). Then it all made sense. Then I could move with it. And naturally, at the concert, Aaron Tolson stole the show. He generated a lot of excitement and pleasure when tapped and leaped in the center of the stage.

Cambridge Community Chorus's last concert by William Thomas

On May 25th, we attended the Cambridge Community Chorus's last concert at Sanders Hall, directed by William Thomas, who is retiring. There were two pieces, Haydn's Harmony Mass, and Samuel Coleridge-Taylor's Hiawatha's Wedding. Our friend Kate was singing in the chorus as an alto. We really enjoyed the concert. I especially liked Haydn's Mass, and enjoyed hearing another chorus performing Haydn (last spring, the Brookline Chorus sang Haydn's Creation Mass).

Loved "She Loves Me," at the the Huntington

We loved it. How could you not? A sentimental story line with Shakespearean comedy overtones about lovers whose identities are hidden from each other, likable characters whose failings and weaknesses are forgivable, great choreography (especially in the bravura nightclub scenes), great acting and singing (Brooks Ashmanskas -- he's so frantic you think he's going to collapse on stage, and yet he always holds holds back just enough to be in confidently in control).

A big crowd on Saturday night, probably the biggest we've seen all year.

Do you have to like and love the characters -- even the characters who embody evil -- for it to be good theater? Is that what it takes to fill theaters?

There's not a lot of like and love in modern plays. Is it enough to simply recognize and empathize with the alienation, disorientation, and amoral vagueness we see in so many plays? It's certainly not enough to make you love the play, and want to see it again.

And of course, the playwright has to write a good play to begin with.