Opera at the (Pearl Beach) Arboretum

 Opera in the Arboretum

It was a picture postcard perfect day for the 10th anniversary of the Pearl Beach Opera in the Arboretum, something the organisers and guests knew to appreciate after the rain and storm of last year.

The sell out crowd was convivial. Everyone brought a chair and many brought a picnic. The artists were splendid, their voices soaring up through the trees.

This year there was no kookaburra in competition, though a friendly magpie swooped in low over the crowd for a closer look.

ACO and Gallipoli

ACO Gallipoli concert (from ACO website)

The latest Australian Chamber Orchestra concert, Reflections on Gallipoli, depicts the horrors of first World War so graphically that is is hard to sit through. Soldier's letters are read by two actors, one of them an Australian with Turkish background. (Congratulations Director Neil Armfield.)

The Western and Turkish musical selections accompanying the readings are inspired as is the singing of soprano Taryn Fiebig.

A series of photos from the conflict is projected on a huge screen behind the musicians and as you watch one face after the next, both allied troops and Turkish forces, you can't help remembering the diggers and their refusal to take part in the glorification of war, much to the chagrin of modern war mongers.

We are continually told that the Anzac spirit defines Australia's national identity and we  remember and revere Gallipoli heroes each Anzac day. As a recent twitter post pointed out, it is ironic that we are now told that the current crop of  passionate men who want to fight in foreign lands are a threat to us all.

Der fliegende Holländer - the movie

Pieczonka as Senta (ROH website)

The newest Royal Opera House Covent Garden version of  Der fliegende Holländer didn't get rave reviews in London but luckily I didn't read them before I saw the movie version in Sydney yesterday because, despite Der fliegende Holländer not being my favourite Wagner opera, I loved this production. The lead singers, Bryn Terfel, Adrianne Pieczonk, Michael Koenig and even the purportedly sick Peter Rose (Daland) sang their roles so convincingly that for once I was carried away by the story.

The only thing that rankled (not mentioned by the two UK reviews I read) was the drinking scene. The drunk sailors were not only bawdy but misogynistic (was this a comment on UK society?) After listening to the words of the sailors songs on the ship this felt particularly like a cultural mismatch. (I found a NZ version of the Dutchman last year similarly culturally unbalanced, with the sailors drunk in an antipodean way .... at least the Covent Garden sailors weren't vomiting everywhere.)

Perhaps the overwhelming misogyny of our times (two women are killed by partners or previous partners in Australia every week) has made me particularly sensitive. I couldn't help thinking as I listened to the sailor's song yesterday how wonderful men sound when they are praising women instead of belittling them.

Darcy and Tristan

I am watching the BBC version of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice on DVD and reading the book at the same time - or actually after each episode. I find it best to see an episode before reading it as then I enjoy it without fretting that the nuances are being lost.  When I read the episode after seeing it, I enjoy all the parts have been left out of the film while admiring the inventiveness of the film makers in being able to include so much.

Today I discovered a very clever auditory device used in the DVD that of course cannot be in the book. At the end of the penultimate episode, as Elizabeth finally realises she loves Darcy while at the same time recognising that current circumstances make it unlikely that his previous avowal of love will ever be repeated, we see Darcy as she sees him and hear a few notes of the music from Tristan and Isolde. Just those few notes are enough to capture the yearning of the lovers. It makes you realise again just how clever Wagner was and just how much his music permeates our culture.

Elizabeth

Darcy

What Richard Wagner is to music, Jane Austin is to the English novel. Every word is irreplaceable; not one would you leave out, nor yet is there one that you would like to add. That is exactly what has been said about the notes in Wagner's Parsifal.

Darcy and Tristan: what a combination.

Malcolm Fraser

Malcolm Fraser via @photosSMH

 Vale Malcolm Fraser.

"Life wasn't meant to be easy, but take courage child, for it can be delightful."

George Bernard Shaw, popularised by Malcolm Fraser.

Malcolm Fraser, an extraordinary man, head of the Liberal Party and Prime Minister of Australia  in  turbulent times (1975-83). He stuck to his liberal values and when his party turned into a tea party around him he became one of it's most trenchant critics.

Computers are (almost) human

So you think you can tell the difference between a computer and a human?

Take the NY Times Quiz to see if you are right:

Meccano for adults

You'd never guess so many nuts and bolts
are needed to make a table!

What is it about making Ikea furniture that is so appealing? I get a buzz from pushing in the bolts and screwing in the screws. They always fit and the pieces are drilled in a way that makes it hard to make a mistake. (When my kitchen installer was flummoxed by a cupboard attachment last year and suggested drilling extra holes, I insisted instead that we demount it and try again from the beginning. It turned out that one of the pieces was upside down and that if extra holes had been drilled the cupboard swing door would not have worked at all.)

This weekend I made a little table and felt again the thrill I felt as a child with my meccano set. Meccano and Ikea furniture have a lot in common, which is probably why I keep going back for more.

Table and chair

Erik Satie played by mini-Maestros

This is a 'must watch' video. The piece is Erik Satie - Gymnopédie No.1, for those who are wondering...

Conductor at Klara Pre-school

Turkey in Music

Turkish music enthusiasts packed the Capitol Theater in Sydney last Wednesday to hear seven virtuosic 'Masters' of Turkish instruments, the Orchestra of Samsun State Opera and Ballet and several Australian guest artists play and sing.  The delighted crowd gave them a standing ovation after almost two hours of non-stop playing and singing.

David Robertson and Beethoven Nine

David Robertson presenting the
pre-concert talk

Normally pre-concert talks tell you a bit about each piece to be played but nothing much that sticks in your head for very long - at least that is my experience.

The talk on Saturday evening before the Sydney Symphony Gala concert (Berg, Bruckner, Beethoven) was quite different.

The SSO Chief Conductor David Robertson not only conducted the orchestra, he gave the pre-concert talk and it was fascinating and very dense.

Robertson spoke of the links between the pieces by Berg, Bruckner and Beethoven in a way that related it our experiences today. When he said that Beethoven wrote his Ode to Joy (Ninth Symphony) at a time when  people's rights were being suppressed and life was anything but joyful it made me wonder whether some musical genius out there is translating our current travails into joyful music.

The concert was a stunner. Soprano Miriam Gordon-Stewart sang  a heart rending and passionate Maria in Act III of Berg's Wozzeck and Simon O'Neill's tenor voice soared above the orchestra and massed choir in Beethoven's 9th. That is quite a feat in a hall with such underwhelming acoustics as the Sydney Opera House.

Tony Abbott a Post Turtle?

Post Turtle

Our beloved Prime Minister a Post Turtle? Well that is what he has been called in response to the news this weekend that he had wanted to invade Irak a second time.

"While stitching a cut on the hand of a 75 year old farmer, whose hand was caught in the drafting gate while working cattle, the doctor struck up a conversation with the old man. Eventually the topic got around to politicians and their role as our leaders. The old rancher said, "Well, as I see it, most politicians are Post Turtles”. Not being familiar with the term, the doctor asked him what a 'post turtle' was. The old rancher said, "When you're driving down a country road and you come across a fence post with a turtle balanced on top, that's a post turtle." The old farmer saw the puzzled look on the doctor's face so he continued to explain. "You know he didn't get up there by himself, he doesn't belong up there, he doesn't know what to do while he's up there, he's elevated beyond his ability to function, and you just wonder what kind of dumb ar*e put him up there to begin with." 
(This explanation is from the Facebook page of Michael Trant  , a longer version of that found in the Urban Dictionary.)

Paintings - when are they finished?

Jugs, some hibiscus and a fairy

Before I can decide if a painting is finished or not, especially a larger work, I need to have it up on the wall for a few weeks. Over time things that are not right start to irritate me and then I take the time to find a solution.

At the moment I am surrounded by the set of small work which was painted over Christmas.

Squirrel, nectarines (white and yellow fleshed) and blue duck.

A larger canvas with a few lines sketched on it is now sitting on my easel. It has been there for three weeks and beckons to me each time I pass by. I know what I want to paint - it is just starting that is the problem.

ACO, Four Seasons, Joseph Tawadros

The Australian Chamber Orchestra has released a new CD - The Four Seasons. Why would you want another four seasons CD you ask yourself? Well, listen to this one and you may decide you do.

Joseph Tawadros plays Oud

I heard the ACO Four Seasons concert yesterday and it is a beaut; a collaboration with Joseph Tawadros who composes for and plays the Oud (Egyptian string instrument) and his percussionist brother James Tawadros who played the Riq', which is like a small tambourine.

Put a group of virtuosic players in a room together and this concert is what you get. It is energetic and obviously fun for all participants. That makes it even more fun for the audience who leave the hall smiling and humming.

The concert is touring Australian east coast cities through February ... catch them if you can.

Valentine's Day

Ophelia : ...

To-morrow is Saint Valentine's day,
All in the morning betime,
And I a maid at your window,
To be your Valentine.
Then up he rose, and donn'd his clothes,
And dupp'd the chamber-door;
Let in the maid, that out a maid
Never departed more.

William Shakespeare, Hamlet (1600-1601)

Chuck Close

Tapestry portrait of Chuck Close

Art, like music, is best consumed live. That was my thought yesterday at the Chuck Close exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney.

The close-up portraits produced by Close and his collaborators are in all the books about 20th Century art, but only when you see them live do you realise why.  Close has worked with 'old-fashioned' techniques or pushed new techniques beyond their boundaries, producing large and usually labour intensive work that is strikingly different from your average portrait.

Detail: tapestry portrait

His work is dominated by grids and seems obsessive: work based on hand drawn computer-type graphics designating exactly which colour should be dotted in exactly which tiny square over exactly which other colour; large works printed using multiple wood-blocks prepared by a Japanese collaborator who is expert in wood block carving; tapestries woven from computer generated images which are startlingly super-realistic.

I left the exhibition with a new understanding of this work and this lifetime of grid exercises

ADDENDUM: I just discovered an interview with Chuck Close that is really worth reading. I had no idea he was incapacitated for much of his life.

Shedding the past

Shedding bark

Shed bark

Some Australian gum species shed their bark in summer.  They become works of art as the bark peels off and lies multi-coloured around them.

Once the process is complete, they stand naked in the woods, pink among their clothed-in-grey neighbours, until the weather blends them into their environment again. They become larger and stronger. The material they shed material provides mulch and fertilises their continued growth.

As I watch the cycle, I wonder if there are lessons for us there?

Naked wood

Better than an iPad

Nature is extraordinary and can keep children occupied for hours and hours.

Dug up from the beach and brought home carefully in salt water,  these two little clams were the subject of hours of scrutiny by my two recent young guests.

The clams were touched, poked, argued about and watched.  There always seemed to be a small figure crouched over the plate where they were kept, observing nature's marvel.

Now the small people have returned home, back to their screens and interminable arguments with their parents about how much screen time is appropriate.  The clams have been returned to the ocean to survive ... or not.

Yes, you too can paint

Painting the pot plants

When I paint in public people come and look over my shoulder. I am always surprised how many of them tell me, "I can't paint, my teacher told me that years ago when I was in school." Sometimes they add wistfully that they have a yearning to paint despite their teacher's advice.

Whatever can the teachers have been thinking, telling children they can't paint? Perhaps it is primary school teachers who were themselves told that they were inept?

My advice to teachers is to lay aside any expectations of how things should look. Painting helps us see things properly and sometimes this takes years.

In this regard I take inspiration from the talented plen-air watercolour artist David Taylor. I took a course with David many years ago. His classes were conducted outside and everyone painted the view except one gentleman who

Painting a figure from a computer game.

produced a series of paintings of colourful circles.

At the critiques each evening, David always found interesting to say about the colour combinations of these circles and every evening I felt enriched by what he had found.

Warwick Fyfe, an Alberich to remember

Warwick Fyfe as Falstaff

Warwick Fyfe is an Australian baritone who stepped in at the last moment and sang the part of Alberich at the 2012 Melbourne Ring Cycle operas.

He stole the show with his wonderful acting while singing this demanding part.

Last November a funding campaign was started called 'Send Alberich to Niebelheim' to raise funds so Warwick could go to auditions in Europe. One of the 'prizes' was an Alberich T shirt. I just got mine so now I am guarding the treasure in suitable attire.

In the meantime the campaign has been oversubscribed (he really 'wowed' the Melbourne audience) and he has done his first audition trip to the UK (has some nibbles we hear) and is off to Europe in April.

Go Warwick!

White fleshed nectarines

I painted some more nectarines, this time white fleshed fruit. They were in a wooden bowl that my father made. 

The fruit had really dark skins and were more difficult to capture than the yellow fleshed nectarines..

I painted them much larger than life sized on a  canvas that was double the size of the one used for the yellow fleshed nectarines. It was also much better quality, thicker and very robust. It was a real pleasure to paint on. I must get some more canvases like it.

The nectarines were very firm when I bought them, but by the time the painting was finished they were perfect for eating and disappeared quickly.