Random News Story for Saturday

I know that this is sort of a random post, especially after being so silent. But I needed to say to the world that I am horrified by this news story.

Abortion is not really one of my more passionately held political or religious viewpoints. To put it simply: politically, I believe in a woman's right to choose within some reasonable frame of time that I'm not educated enough to determine (and seems relatively arbitrary anyway, according to my slight knowledge).

Morally, the act horrifies me. And although I'm certainly not generalizing the above incident to all uses of abortion, this case should horrify you as well.

That is all.

-Sean Read more

ROFL.

We were revolutionaries!

What was your first screenname? Mine, I’m almost ashamed to admit was “Daslyfox.” Ha. “Sly Fox”, get it? So why “Da”? Simple. “Da bomb.”

I know. Soooo "I'm-a-loser-1997." Because that’s what year it was that my parents first got the internet. We were surely behind the curve—I mean most of the people who resembled friends (who really is a friend in middle school?) were already online. All of them were already wearing badges stating their self-chosen aliases in attempt to draw a black line around their identity and give people a clearer idea of how they wanted to be seen. Most of these were not the typical bread and butter ones (SeanFox123), of course many of them had a youthful, creative “twist” to them. I won’t embarrass anyone; I don’t remember others’ screennames anyway.

We were all teenagers, eager to carve out a social presence on the net. I sought friends and allies by participating in AOL chatrooms and cheap-o online gaming communities back when those AOL communities were innovative, or at least virtually monopolizing the online community, and none of us had any idea how this all worked.

It occurred to me when I was noting some friend’s screennames that if I were 40 and instant messaging with a young associate in my company across gChat or AIM after friending them on Facebook (I’m a hip and “with-it” executive), their (our) screennames would strike me as infantile. And yet, to me, their friend, they’re nothing. These images are only digital doppelgangers or glances of the people I know and love from a time in their lives I didn’t know them—when they picked their last screenname.

Now we can “safely” use our real names on Facebook or gChat; maybe we’re too grown-up to want those fronts up anymore in any case—too grown-up to want people to think we’re interesting or cool based on a carefully chosen array of letters and digits. We haven’t totally given up yet; we are still attempting clever e-mail identities, blog titles or MySpace “names” (sorry, I hate MySpace, I have no idea what it’s actually called when you can pick a clever alias).

Do these levels of self, or more accurately, these public identifications have precedent? To my knowledge, only with pennames by great authors and fake IDs and passports. Nicknames don’t count, after all. Nicknames come from friends and social circumstances. We’ve named ourselves. And whether my friends have felt that I have been accurately portrayed by anyone of my hundreds of assumed names, or even by my current screenname, DJSharpie27 (the only one I currently have that I have that is truly disingenuous)* is not important. It was our foray, our invention, and our mysterious mutual attraction to this duality that generated the excitement and interest that led our technology to where it is. Despite it all, I don’t care what Bill, Larry, or Sergey or Mark say. We built Web 2.0.

LOL!

*For those who are interested, I want to be a DJ, I love Sharpies, and since the screenname was taken, I used 27, a number I’ve always fancied for some relatively unremembered reason. I think it was a fortune cookie from the China Garden in my hometown during a dinner celebrating the completion of the Homecoming float…one of the best times of my life. I think that’s where it came from anyway. Read more

Artomatic 2008

Last night I went to Artomatic 2008.  Artomatic (tagline: by artists, for everyone) is a cross-section of artists from all over the DC-metropolitan area.  It features photography, ceramics, sculptures, paintings, crafts, sketch-comedy, cabaret and even a tattoo parlour.  I went because some former coworkers of mine, Jim Tretick (Jim's site is down, otherwise I'd link) and Matthew Dailey, were exhibiting.  

Most of the art is modern or pop, so other than the photography and ceramics (which I just love in general), there wasn't that much I really liked.  I think the exhibit that affected me the most was actually Caitlin Phillips' Rebound Designs.  Ms. Phillips takes the covers of old books and turns them into handbags.  Given my reverence for books, even old, decrepit ones, I'm not sure if this is the most awesome idea I've ever seen or sacrilege.  

Still, it was an enjoyable evening, with plenty to see.  Last night we watched a sketch comedy group perform, and checked out the finalists of the second annual Sunday Source Peeps Diorama Contest.  

More importantly, I think, is the sympathetic environment and helping hand Artomatic extends to local artists.  Artomatic is growing in renown in the DC area, and thus attracts an audience full of potential buyers.  In addition to giving them a gallery venue in which to display their art (many of these artists do not have their own shops, or even work full time as artists), Artomatic artists and members give tips and pointers to new artists (including how to set up an affecting (and effective) display).  From talking to Jim, I got the impression that Artomatic is a big family - extraordinarily welcoming of new faces, but also very close.  Artists look out for each other, answer questions about their friends' and neighbors' work

I'm not sure how likely it is that DC will ever have a big art scene, but Artomatic seems like a good start.  Definitely make the time to visit before it closes on June 15.

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I Write Because

I write to alleviate tumultuously bereaved humanity;
impregnate optimistic beams of hope in the lives of
all those miserably divested,

.......

I write to wholesomely free the innocuously
impeccable; from chains of barbaric slavery; and
insanely tyrannical incarceration,

........

I write to wholeheartedly divulge the innermost of my
feelings to this unending planet; walk shoulder to
shoulder and with profound equanimity lingering in my
crystalline eyes; abreast my comrades marching towards
irrefutable righteousness,

.......

I write to incessantly broaden my perspective about
this enthralling earth; enshroud each iota of my
bedraggled demeanor; with the everlasting spirit of
timelessness,

.......

Most importantly; I write because my heart wants me
to; astoundingly proliferating into a mountain of
tantalizing seduction; even as hell rained down from
sky to forever lick the earth.

- Nikhil Parekh,
I Write Because
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The Eroica Effect

Last Sunday my friend Rachel and I were lucky enough to see the Helsingborg Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Andrew Manze at the George Mason University Center for the Arts. The performance centered on Beethoven's Symphony No. 3 in E-flat major, Op. 55, Eroica, but the full symphony was not performed until after the intermission. Instead, M. Manze and the talented orchestra first introduced the audience to Beethoven and his muses.

>

The evening began with Mozart's Overture to the Magic Flute. Beethoven arrived in Vienna, Austria (M. Manze seemed amused that this performance took place in Vienna, Virginia) in 1792. Mozart had died the previous year, but his opera, The Magic Flute, was still widely played. Beethoven had hoped to study with Mozart, but instead, studied with several other composers.

He also had to work for a living. Many rising composers did side work writing dance music for Vienna's many balls. They weren't recognized for their work, as it was considered background music, but it did help pay the bills. For Beethoven, it was also a source of inspiration.

The second piece performed was a modest Contredanse. As Manze wrote in the program notes:

What particularly appealed to Beethoven about this lowly dance form was that it knew no social barriers. Anybody could partake in a Contredanse. Prince danced alongside pauper, servant with master. It chimed with Beethoven's instinctive adherence to the Liberte-egalite-fraternite ideals of the French Revolutions - and his interested in Napoleon (1769-1821). Beethoven was a huger admierer of Napoleon, the outsider (from the island of Corsica) of relatively low social origin who had become primus inter pares of France's ruling class through his skill as a military general, a politician, and a constitutional reformer.

While Beethoven was still struggling, one of the masters he took up with was Haydn, who had been a friend of Mozart and was emerging as his successor. He had just returned from extensive in England, which seems to have led him to use folk music as the backbone for most of his later work. Haydn may have been the impetus for Beethoven's use of the Contredanse to end his ballet, Prometheus, which helped make him famous.

Haydn, now a wealthy man, nearing the end of his career, was able to stretch himself musically. As M. Manze put it: 'Haydn opened the door that no one knew existed.

To illustrate this, the third piece of the night was the Prelude to the Creation; Die Vorstellung des Chaos (The Representation of Chaos), an overture in C minor in slow tempo, written in sonata form. It is beautiful.

This is the moment before the Creation, and the music depicts the void trembling on the edge of genesis. I could almost see the inky blackness hunching and bunching, as if in the midst of labor pains. It bends and folds, grows thin, at times almost translucent, hinting at the existence to be had. But nothing appears. The air shivers with power, but the audience must wait until the next movement, No. 1. Im Anfange schuf Gott Himmel und Erde (In the beginning God created Heaven and Earth), for relief from the building anticipation.

Now, finally, Manze and the orchestra give us a taste of Eroica, but just a taste, since the second half of the performance will comprise solely of the symphony. For now, M. Manze wants to introduce the musical revolution, begun by Haydn when he opened the door, realized by Beethoven who steps through the door.

Manze has this to say about Eroica:

Beethoven's third symphony is indisputably one of the greatest and most important symphonies ever written. Its composition followed a year of crisis for the thirty-two year old composer. Faced with inevitable deafness and plagued by depression, he wrote the so-called 'Hiligenstadt Testament'. This letter, addressed to his brothers but never sent, was discovered after his
death. It shows Beethoven contemplating suicide and describes the moment he chose heroism over cowardice: "The only thing that held me back was my art." Soon he was talking of a new way" "I am not happy with my works so far. Henceforth I shall take a new path." One year later, Eroica shows him on that path... Beethoven presented his fully formed genius to the public's gaze for the first time.

By offering a sample of Eroica, Manze is able to segue into the final piece before the intermission. I wish I could say definitively what it was, but Manze spoke too quickly for me to catch the German name. I want to say that the name begins 'Ein', but he was little known, so Google gives me no leads. The symphony might have been titled 'Symphony for the End of Time,' or that might have simply Manze's description. It is not mentioned at all in the program, but it was also powerful, and vibrantly demonstrated the shift in musical composition following the premiere of Eroica. Music was no longer intended simply to 'edify, amuse and transport' the audience, but rather to challenge and discomfort them.

But finally, the time comes for Eroica. I'm sorely tempted to quote the rest of program, as it really is illuminating, and Manze knows the material far better than I.

Eroica contains four movements. The first sounds like a battle, the second is a funeral march, and the third is a celebration. The central theme of the finale is Beethoven's Contredanse, at it is played as a fugue. Fugues are a technique whereby the composer allows one section, or voice, to develop a theme, and then moves it throughout the orchestra, as each section develops it in turn. In Manze's phrasing, this is the 'democratization' of the orchestra, as most sections are allowed to to play the theme. While Beethoven didn't develop the fugue, or even make it popular (the Baroque composers did that), he use it to enhance the politics of his message.

The total effect of Eroica is an exploration of democracy and the equality of humanity. Beethoven believed in great men, certainly (Eroica means 'hero', and the symphony was originally named for Napoleon), but it was their actions and inner qualities that made them great, not their birth or social status. We are all equal in battle, death and joy, and it is only by acting heroically that we are able to distinquish ourselves. Perhaps I should say instead, we all enter these states equally, or we are made equal in our common experience of these states, but we do not leave them equally. Battle, Death, and Joy provide the moments that allow the meritous to rise.

Perhaps this seems like a non sequitor, but Eroica reminded me of Katherine Mansfield's "The Garden Party", in limited respects. Mansfield's work also deals with death, and joy, or at least amusement, but ends differently. Laura, the central character, begins her day drawn to the workmen setting up the marqee for her mother's party, admiring their humor, their cheer, their physique (p. 61). She asks herself 'Why couldn't she have workmen for her friends rather than the silly boys she danced with and who came to Sunday night supper? She would get on much better with men like these' (p. 62) She decides that she rejects class distinctions, and so takes a big bite of her bread-and-butter, feeling 'just like a work girl' (p. 63).

When she hears that a workman man living in the hovels down the road has been killed in an accident, she attempts to stop the party. However, her mother, matriarch of the family and keeper of the family fortunes (and status) intends to initiate Laura into the requirements of her class.

She is dressed appropriately and then helps act as host for the party, welcoming and then bidding the guests good night. At the end of the night, Laura attempts to reestablish some feeling of common humanity with the workman's family, so her mother indulges her by allowing her to bring leftover sandwiches from the party as a condolence gift. Laura dutifully decends the hill, still dressed in her party finery, only to discover that the world of the poor is a scary place (p. 79). It is dark, and unfamiliar. In How to Read Like a Professor, Foster describes this as a decent into hell, much like Orpheus. But instead of recognizing the commonality of death, Laura flees (p. 82). Her class, and the comforting presence of her old brother, allow her to so, this time. Eventually, however, all who enter, stay, in the underworld.

Beethoven has no such illusions - death is inevitable. However, he also seems to believe in the power of action, and of art. The lesson of the Contredanse is that 'art makes us free, equal, fraternal, immortal, heroic.'

Manze ends his program thus: 'As Mendelssohn reminds us: "The thoughts which are expresse... by music... are not too indefinite to be put into words, but on the contrary, too definite." Beethoven was a composer who was able to take powerful, subversive ideas, and not only express them, but revolutionize our understanding of, and interaction with, music. In another art form, he could have been a Shakespeare, or a Picasso. I've long enjoyed his music, and Eroica has only served to deepen my admiration and sense of wonder.

- M

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Year Zero/In Rainbows

As a prelude, the Fresh Air of 13 March served to get this post (hovering since Year Zero was released last Spring) out of my head. It’s worth listening to.

If you don’t know that the music industry is changing, you’re hiding under a rock. Everyone ought to be aware by now that soon, the very meaning of music as a media and the business will be drastically different from how it is now, especially how it was two years ago. How we purchase music and, to me, more saliently, how we listen to it is undergoing a major revolution.

There are three major examples of this that have recently profoundly influenced my relationship with the industry—Girl Talk is one just by himself, but there has also been the release of Nine Inch Nails’ Year Zero and Radiohead’s In Rainbows.

I love Girl Talk, and an entry on him is coming soon, but for now, I want to address the latter 2. Both albums are similar in that they were released under conditions that were nothing short of revolutionary. For the full story of Year Zero’s release, go to the Wikipedia entry or for the full DETAILS, go to the NIN wiki and for In Rainbows, go to the Wikipedia entry or check out the backlog “In-Rainbows” blog-tags on Radiohead_At/Ease (many of my later links are cribbed from this, the best Radiohead resource on the net).

Basically, Nine Inch Nails leaked tracks on USB keys that were left in restrooms and such containing, along with a track or two, some kind of coded or hidden message that led you to a website that had further hidden or coded messages or some other kind of statement coinciding with the concept of the album. All of it worked together to tell a narrative that registered as if we are all unknowingly trapped in an oppressed society, drugged on some undetectable substance by an authoritarian government. They didn’t just decimate the fourth wall, they decimated all four of them at once—the album’s release blurred the lines between the artist and the audience, reality and a nightmarish dreamscape, perceptions of reality and certainty, and most importantly (in my opinion) self-expression and public consumption/social meaning.

Radiohead’s release held a much more limited meaning artistically, but in the sense of the business, their model is incredibly relevant. One initial report put album sales at a staggering at 1.2 million, although these numbers were later thrown into doubt. Still it seems, that the average listener paid somewhere around 8 dollars, but theoretically only 2/5 downloaders paid. Those numbers are in doubt, as Jonny Greenwood points out in a more recent interview. And this is on top of the stolen ones.

The first conclusion I’m drawing here is that the release of albums is getting much, MUCH more creative of late; there have been other marketing ploys of late—international bonus tracks, iTunes incentives, etc. But Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead achieved unprecedented levels of media buzz and fan exuberance. One reviewer (Pitchfork) of In Rainbows put it thusly—

Like many music lovers of a certain age, I have a lot of warm memories tied up with release days. I miss the simple ritual of making time to buy a record. I also miss listening to something special for the first time and imagining, against reason, the rest of the world holed up in their respective bedrooms, having the same experience. Before last Wednesday, I can't remember the last time I had that feeling. I also can't remember the last time I woke up voluntarily at 6 a.m. either, but like hundreds of thousands of other people around the world, there I was, sat at my computer, headphones on, groggy, but awake, and hitting play.

So these creative releases are certainly heightening the interest in the album and the interaction with the band, as Trent Reznor pointed out by saying in an interview on the Spiral (quoted from Wikipedia, for the Spiral—registration required): “'marketing’ is an inaccurate description of the alternate reality [marketing], and that it is ‘not some kind of gimmick to get you to buy a record - it IS the art form ...’”.

The second conclusion is a terrible one for the future of music, in my opinion. Despite this fan excitement, despite its ostensibly free release, In Rainbows was STILL stolen (DISCLOSURE: and I say this as a hypocrite, after trying to buy the album properly for $10, there was a huge internet snafu due to China issues—so I torrented it like so many other people).

The third conclusion here is that two of the most innovative albums of the last year or so were innovative NOT because of the artfulness of their musicality, but for the artfulness of the business surrounding their release. Indeed, musically, I was disappointed by both albums, although I think it had more to do with me being caught up in that aforementioned fan exuberance than it did with a lack of quality on the part of the albums themselves (I passionately love In Rainbows). But as Trent Reznor pointed out, the ideas concerning the release become some sort of meta-statement. The release became the album and the art itself.

Clearly, we as a society are rethinking what it means to purchase and appreciate music. And as Thom Yorke and David Byrne pointed out in their Wired interview, the very value of music is at stake. I’m curious to see where this will go in the next few years.

As an epilogue, and proof that Reznor and Nine Inch Nails are not letting up, Ghosts I-IV is getting RAVE reviews (VSL, RStone), and they're still getting innovative with fan interaction.

-Sean

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Happy St. Patty's Day!

Just in case you were wondering where you should spend today celebrating, MSN has a guide to 'America's Most Authentic Irish Pubs'.

Personally, I'm happy with my own choice, Pat Troy's, one of my favorite bars ever, and owned and operated by a man who sounds like a leprechaun.


- M

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