The Banal Chew

Farewell

I've been thinking about deactivating this blog, and now is the time. Life sucks and I don't want to write about it. That's all.

It's been a great ride. 

Y'all take care now, you hear?

x

Ravel's String Quartet in F

Perhaps there are others out there who will never forget the first time they heard a particular piece of music.  For me, it is movement 2 of Ravel's String Quartet in F.  The entire work places me in a trance, but this movement tends to reduce me to immobility. 

 

 

Pepper Spraying Cop Meme

I'm not sure who originally created the Seurat-Pike parody, but in the spirit of the meme, I built upon it to come up with my own contribution. (click to enlarge)

The Voice

A singer colleague of mine posted on Facebook a link to a recent NY Times article about pop music singers (eg, Adele) and their voice disorders and treatments. This post prompted others, presumably trained singers, to write comments that alluded to the fault of using bad technique as attributable to the pop musicians' vocal problems.  This argument always makes me cringe a little.  As a classically trained singer who received good, fundamental instruction in the technique of singing from some very fine vocal pedagogues, and yet suffered an inexplicable, devastating, and still inadequately diagnosed, vocal problem at a time when I should have been at the peak of my career, I have a problem with people who discredit singers suffering from voice disorders simply because of "bad technique".  Not only does it engender the us-vs-them mindset when applied by classical music singers to singers of non-classical music, but it is also just plain shortsighted.  And hurtful.

Of course, all of this has been ushered to current media headlines because of Adele and her cancellation of a great many concerts in North America.  Reading one of Adele's blog entries about this issue sheds insight into just how painful this is for an artist.  As McKinley points out in his NY Times piece, pop and country music singers are under intense pressure to commit to brutal touring and performance schedules, pressure applied not only by their managers and others in the industry who want to make lots of money, but also from a place that is inherently more altruistic:  loyalty to their fans and the desire to give punters what they, as paying customers AND appreciators of the artistry, want and deserve. 

By the way, Adele is a trained singer. She was schoolmates with Leona Lewis at The BRIT School, a performing arts school for secondary school-age students that has graduated a host of UK performing artists, including the late, wonderfully talented Amy Winehouse.  I would venture to guess that Adele's current vocal problems are not solely, if at all, related to technique issues.  She is a singer-songwriter of breathtaking talent, and at such an early age it is simply unfair to label her as a bad singer, as many who have posted comments to an online professional forum within the classical music industry have done.

McKinley quotes a number of voice disorder professionals who report that the issue today isn't that there are more singers suffering from voice problems, it's that singers are more comfortable knowing that they can likely ward off a potential future of no singing by taking advantage of current treatments and better medical technology to get the disorder and/or damage under control. This will also allow for sufficient rest and recovery, albeit under less than ideal circumstances, before the brutal schedule begins again. 

The lesson that needs to be learned from Adele's unfortunate illness is not only that (in some cases) singers should keep proper singing technique in mind--and that includes warm-ups, recovery periods and rest, as well as the "how-to" of vocal production--but that the managers and music industry professionals who push these artists beyond what is reasonable should understand that singing is an inherently athletic endeavor, and the body needs adequate rest and recovery after a performance.  Good athletic coaches would never demand of sports athletes what most pop and country music industry managers and producers require of their singers.

(Photo by 50 Watts, licensed under Creative Commons.)

Pop's the Tops

I just hung up the phone from chatting with my dad. He is in hospital again. Thankfully, the prognosis is good, as all tests have come back clear. This is another (and hopefully final) hurdle to jump, post-treatment. His spirits are good, and I have to say that if I can sound anywhere nearly as kind, happy and youthful as he does when I am a septuagenarian, I will be content. What he has been through over the past couple of years is enough to make anyone sound weary, but he doesn't. His stamina and dogged will to overcome some scary medical adversity make me sincerely ashamed of my recent kvetching. I owe it to him to stay strong.

Another fight, another hall

So here I am, sitting with a half-empty glass and wondering WTF.  I love acronyms.

Stuff. Meh.

Today's delivery of another rejection email in my inbox brings me to the conclusion that THIS FUCKING BLOWS!  So instead of using my fingers to mix up some Molotovs to hurl through a number of HR office windows, I'll put them to work on my Mac keyboard.  Less rewarding?  Maybe, but certainly much more civilized.  Besides, I hate the smell of gasoline.

It is times like this that I feel my decision to move to Australia was ill-chosen.  I know the preceding statement will be greeted with difficulty by a few who read this (and, perhaps, with substantial offense), but all I can say in response is, 1) in no way do I say it to undermine or deemphasize the intense and numerous joys that my life in Australia has brought me, 2) there are probably a number of other decisions I have made that were chosen without adequate consideration of the consequences, and 3) please, for the sake of therapy, just let me speak.

Flashback to 1981. A goofy, affable, hard-working and somewhat talented high-school student from a lower middle-class background exits 16th out of a graduating class of 483 from his rural Arkansas secondary school. He is told this is good, but he doesn't care.  All he knows is school, drama, band and choir were his welcomed escape from the stifling existence of working in his dad's shop and being made to feel inferior for a variety of reasons. Determined to be an actor and possessing the grades and talent to attend a number of reputable tertiary institutions outside of his home state, he is dissuaded from the goal of attending one of these well-placed schools by family members who feel threatened by the thought of leaving home. Upon receiving the offer of a full scholarship to attend the flagship state university in his hometown, he decided to accept.  (Hold the confetti, because in 1981, such a scholarship would cost this school about $1500 per year for an instate resident, but to him that was still a lot of money.)  With confusing sadness, he carefully stacked the many brochures and catalogues from exotic places like Boston Conservatory or University of Maryland in the fake, plastic Wal-Mart steamer trunk that housed many other representatives of his early dreams and aspirations, relics which, along with many of his family's other prized possesions, such as discarded clothing, broken lawn mowers and animal husbandry textbooks from his father's ill-fated attempt at university, ended up being stored in a derelict structure known as the "chicken house" at the rear of his grandfather's property. In a few years, these items would perish when the building collapsed and eventually, after both grandparents passed on, razed to make way for further development of the land after it was sold.  The scholarship offered, however, was not to study acting.  It was to study voice, an instrument he came to late in his high school years, and with which he was still uncomfortable.  After many years of being derided for a lack of singing talent by his older sister who, with hate in her voice and a belt in her hand, would often loudly proclaim (when Mom and Dad were busy working in the shop and it was only the two of them in the house), "You can't sing! You play clarinet and I sing in choir, so stick with what you know!"  Receiving no real guidance from school counselors or his parents, other than the admonition not to stray from the backyard, and being brought up only to feel that he should take orders, follow rules, be seen and not heard (if that), and never engage in critical thought, he accepted the scholarship because his private voice teacher during his senior year had arranged the audition and thought it best for him.  Sadly, no one asked him what he wanted to do.

Thirty years later, I realize that those early underpinnings of adulthood have not held me in good stead for the ability to make decisions in later life.  In fact, I do not think I was ever given the tools to make decisions.  Throughout my childhood, everything was either black or white, cut and dried.  There were rules to be followed.  There was no middle ground.  Questioning the theory behind rules or a the philosophy that fueled a mindset led to disastrous results.  When you are brought up being told what to do with no explanation, and when you are shut down or penalized for diplaying an inquisitive nature, it makes sense that you would defer to anyone who might show some guidance.  After many years of this, I am left bitter, sad and without much hope. Mostly, however, I am just scared.  I am broke. I have no career. I am growing older at an alarming rate. I feel voiceless.

Let me now add that I have had a number of wonderful experiences and opportunities in my life. Reading through my CV leads people to amazement. To me, it conjures up loathing and self-doubt, largely because the last decade has seen nothing.  But CVs only represent the educational and professional components of a person's life.  Thank goodness there have been other life events to counter the inverse proportion in which my career has progressed.  I am thankful for Mark, Zane and all of my friends and extended family.  They are the ones who have made me who I am today on a very human and personal level.  For the past few years, as I have tried to eke out a professional existence in this country far away from whatever I have known as "home", they have held me together.  I have fought hard to realize that I am worth this attention.  Now, having accepted that realization, it is time to move ahead with my professional life.  When I approached 40 and returned to graduate school to get my doctorate, I felt I had finally got a good start on this.  Unfortunately, given the meaningless nature of my doctorate in Australia, it opens no doors.  It gives no choice.  So I must face the fact that I, now approaching 50, must consider something different.  People have told me to "think laterally", which I have done.  I have looked for things in an allied field.  I have applied for a great many positions in this regard.  For each, I either near nothing or have received a rejection notice without even garnering an interview.  I am now considering life coaching.  At 49.  Yes, life blows.

Meow

Every day, I wish I had more to smile about. 

It has been over 10 weeks since I got terminated from my job.  Over here in Australia, they call it "retrenched".  Somehow that term seems apt, because this feels like getting ditched. Like a 16 year-old in a baby-blue ruffled tuxedo, whose prom date has just inexplicably abdicated the evening after a quick peck on the cheek at the driveway.

I haven't received one interview.  I do, however, have a few clinical rejection notices, all via email.  Their nature supersedes that of the callousness of the impersonal termination emails I received from my former employer of over 10 years, but, in retrospect, only barely. (I know I worked remotely, but seriously? Not even a phone call?  Not one? From my boss, from anyone?)

Every week, I scavenge through the myriad help-wanted classifieds in print and online, dutifully submitting applications in response to announcements to adequate positions for which I am woefully overeducated and tangibly underqualified. And then, after the send button is pressed or the envelope slotted, I pour one. 

I am drinking too much.  I know I am.  At a recent medical check-up, booked partly as a result of the Australian government's cleverly implemented plan to get those of us pushing the mid-century mark to get our aging arses to the doctor in order to try to ward off those pesky illnesses that end up costing said government way too much money, and partly as something that in my sweaty, sleepless pre-dawn hours I recognize as a tiny whimper for assistance, I answered my GP's obligatory intake question about alcohol intake as an amount that I know is above the recommended intake levels. I attribute to my fading charm and otherwise stellar physical health, the fact that he chuckled and said, "Oh, we'll just put down 1 to 2 drinks per day."  When I got home, I downed an extra glass of Shiraz to that.

Yes, I read the headlines.  I see images of infants born into abject squalor.  I read stories of people burned alive in the streets of their hometown, of citizens who gleefully parade the bloody corpse of their murdered dictator before the eyes of children, of people who feel it's appropriate to slit the throats of living animals without first benumbing them to the fact that they are prey.  I know that I am privileged to live in the comforts of Westernized civiilization.  And yet, somehow and without much merit, that is little consolation.  As my beloved partner jokes, I am a pussy.

Things will turn around.  I know they will.  I hope it comes sooner rather than later.  Until then, I will lick my paws, bury my shit in gravel, and meow quietly in my comfy home.

Each year, the amount of importance

...that I place on my birthday exists in increasingly inverse proportion to the current number of those events. 

(But I very much appreciate all the grand wishes!)

 

 

 

(Image by Kartooner. Licensed via creative commons)

Bluntcards

So naughty. So wrong. But so funny!

 

Enjoy more chuckles here!

Nothing Yet

Just dealing with it in a way that's cheaper than Zoloft.

Apologies in advance

Excuse the pity party, but I feel the need to dance. Cue the music, please.

• Mark left for the US a few hours ago. He will be gone for nearly two weeks. I am too broke to go.
• Zane is in Townsville and Sydney for his school holidays.
• Melbourne is cold and wet.
• I received another rejection email this morning.
• I am still sick with the dregs of the flu. 
• I miss my family and friends in the US.
• I miss Tucson.
• I miss working.
• I miss making music.

Okay, all better.

 

(Photo by rustman. Licensed by creative commons.)

 

 

Don't Ask, Don't Tell...Don't Matter!

Ding, dong. DADT is dead.

On 22 July 2011, after jointly "certifying" that ending this unfair policy would not hinder the USA's ability to fight enemies [sidebar: wtf?], President Obama, Leon Panetta and Mike Mullen notified Congress of their joint decision, and an obligatory 60-day waiting period began. That period ended at 12:00am on 20 September 2011, and this ridiculous policy of discrimination was shelved in the library of disgraceful history.

It's a little late, considering the number of lives it (and its ancestral policies) ruined. But it's another step forward. 

I'm certainly lifting a glass in celebration of its demise tonight.  In fact, maybe I'll just start right now!

Ballarat

A long overdue family day!

Mark, Zane and I caught the early train to Ballarat yesterday morning. The journey is a quick 1.5 hours by rail, during which time you zoom through some beautiful countryside.

After arriving in Ballarat, we enjoyed breakfast near the station at the adequate, yet uninspired Java Lounge.  The eggs Benedict managed to hit the spot and the coffee was weak, but it served the purpose.

After breakfast, we visited the Art Gallery of Ballarat (AGB), which proved to be the highlight of our trip. Like the Bendigo Art Gallery, the AGB is a regional arts center that is highly notable for drawing internationally recognized exhibits.  The role it played in exhibiting segments of the Ballarat International Foto Biennale was first rate. 

From Brian Duffy to Roger Donaldson to Louviere/Vanessa, the displays were as good as any I have seen in the four countries and half-dozen or so world-class cities in which I have lived.  My favorite photographer of the day was Lisa Robinson.  Her collection "Snowbound" has been exhibited in many places over the past few years.  I am a better person for having seen it.

(Ballarat photo by b00ng, licensed via Creative Commons.)

Ecco la Primavera!

Today is the first day of spring here in Australia, or at least it is for many Aussies. Some Indigenous Australians celebrate a seasonal calendar that is organized according to the interaction of climate and the immediate environment. 

For me, spring has always evoked an unusual blend of comfort and excitement. As a child, I saw the season as a herald of something new and intriguing, a time of undiscovered bike paths, spring calves and wildflowers, and more importantly, the end of the school year. It was as if the crocuses screamed an urgent and short-lived alarm, warning us all to live it up before we missed our chance. 

Although my childhood is far, far behind me, my eagerness to enjoy spring is not.

(Photo by Benson Kua, licensed for use by Creative Commons.)

 

Ecco la Primavera / Francesco Landini, performed by Ensemble Sarband