A program of Brahms, by MetroWest Choral Artists, Saturday, October 20, 2012
We went on Saturday night. A church in Wellesley -- Saint Andrew's Episcopal church. At first, when thinking about it, we thought, oh no, a concert of all-Brahms. Guttural German consonants. Overblown romantic poetry. Sopranos belting out about lost youth and loves. Basses gloomily rumbling about death.
But we were wrong. This was really interesting and satisfying, with a wide range of songs and styles. Great solos. Especially liked the pieces from "Four Serious Songs" sung by the baritone Ron Williams. One song, "For that which befalleth the sons of men" is taken from Ecclesiastes 3:19-22:
"Surely the fate of human beings is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: as one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath; humans have no advantage over animals...Everything is meaningless, all go to the same place...So I saw that there is nothing better for a person than to enjoy their work, because that is their lot...."
Williams sang powerfully, with the right kind of rueful, awe-struck tone. It's interesting that Brahms chose these lines. Ecclesiastes frequently addresses or mentions God, but not in these lines.
And of course it was nice to hear a fellow singer from Masterworks Chorale, Rebecca Clark Lightcap, sing her solo, from Zigeunerlieder. It all made for a wonderful concert, and the director, Leonardo Ciampa, deserves a lot of credit for assembling this group.
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
Monday, October 15, 2012
The contrived outrage of "Good People", at the Huntington Theater
Good People, a play by David Lindsay-Abaire, directed by Kate Whoriskey, at the Huntington Theater
We saw the play a few weeks ago. While I still feel the play has significant problems and flaws, I have found myself thinking about it (most of the plays we've seen are forgettable after a few days). Margaret, a woman from South Boston ("Southie"), gets fired from her low-paying cashier's job for constantly being late, supposedly because of complications caring for her adult retarded son. She decides to approach an old boyfriend from Southie (Mike) who has now become a prosperous doctor, for a job. She is so aggressive that what we see is basically a shakedown. We learn that her son is possibly the doctor's son, and in the course of some prolonged and unlikely screaming matches with him in his living room, with his African-American wife present, we aren't sure whether this is true or not.
I didn't like the sitcom humor (someone's always being insulted in a sitcom -- as if every gratuitous insult pushes the laugh button). There are some good scenes, affectionate depictions of Margaret's friends, decent sets. The bingo scenes have nice touches and laughs. The prolonged shouting in Mike's living room, with his wife oddly abetting Margaret's attacks on Mike, went about ten minutes too far. And why is this woman attacking this man? He says he doesn't have a job for her. Instead of end-of-story, she persists. Oddly, we get strains of the current presidential and senatorial political debates in the meandering arguments -- does the have-not Margaret deserve her position in life? Was it all bad luck that kept her poor all her life? Does Mike owe her anything? What if it's Mike's baby? What does that top 1% owe the people on the bottom of the 99%?
When Margaret launches a high-volume blast at Mike about her hard luck, I can't help but feel sorry for her. Of course, she never got any good breaks. She is a disembodied voice screaming at us as well as Mike. The problem is that Mike's presence seems like a contrivance. The playwright needed a "somebody" -- preferably wealthy -- to be the butt of humor and Margaret's outrage. So I finally started to feel most sorry for Mike. If Margaret's child is not his, what did he do to deserve all this?
We saw the play a few weeks ago. While I still feel the play has significant problems and flaws, I have found myself thinking about it (most of the plays we've seen are forgettable after a few days). Margaret, a woman from South Boston ("Southie"), gets fired from her low-paying cashier's job for constantly being late, supposedly because of complications caring for her adult retarded son. She decides to approach an old boyfriend from Southie (Mike) who has now become a prosperous doctor, for a job. She is so aggressive that what we see is basically a shakedown. We learn that her son is possibly the doctor's son, and in the course of some prolonged and unlikely screaming matches with him in his living room, with his African-American wife present, we aren't sure whether this is true or not.
I didn't like the sitcom humor (someone's always being insulted in a sitcom -- as if every gratuitous insult pushes the laugh button). There are some good scenes, affectionate depictions of Margaret's friends, decent sets. The bingo scenes have nice touches and laughs. The prolonged shouting in Mike's living room, with his wife oddly abetting Margaret's attacks on Mike, went about ten minutes too far. And why is this woman attacking this man? He says he doesn't have a job for her. Instead of end-of-story, she persists. Oddly, we get strains of the current presidential and senatorial political debates in the meandering arguments -- does the have-not Margaret deserve her position in life? Was it all bad luck that kept her poor all her life? Does Mike owe her anything? What if it's Mike's baby? What does that top 1% owe the people on the bottom of the 99%?
When Margaret launches a high-volume blast at Mike about her hard luck, I can't help but feel sorry for her. Of course, she never got any good breaks. She is a disembodied voice screaming at us as well as Mike. The problem is that Mike's presence seems like a contrivance. The playwright needed a "somebody" -- preferably wealthy -- to be the butt of humor and Margaret's outrage. So I finally started to feel most sorry for Mike. If Margaret's child is not his, what did he do to deserve all this?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)