hiss

A few days ago a friend sent me an attachment in the mail, which turned out to be his review of the Lorin Maazel concert. It was peppered with terms like 'agonising', 'excessive rubato', 'awkward braying' and '(the) opening's work's deflation'.

I know that musical appreciation is ultimately subjective - some people may like something, others may positively hate it, but I don't think we can or should just dismiss someone's interpretation, (or to put it in his words 'question (his) interpretative fidelity to the score' ) just because it's different from previous recordings we've heard before. We can't, and shouldn't talk about 'interpretative fidelity' unless we've spent as much time as the conductor did studying the work. And even if you do question his interpretation, just because it was 'agonising' for you doesn't mean it was to the rest of the audience.

I didn't go for the concert. I don't understand why I'm so riled by the review. But I think critics who don't moderate their reviews to achieve (even vaguely) some form of 'objectivity' may have self-esteem issues. Dismissing alternative interpretations as 'eccentric' and accentuating nouns with a string of contradictory adjectives, and adopting a generally condescending tone (even though you might end off with a reluctant acknowledgement of the conductor's ability) does not increase the credibility of a review.

It's not just the overly embellished words that frustrates. It's the 'it was horrible but, well, at least you tried' tone that he used. It isn't easy to make music. It isn't something you can just put together in a week and expect it to rise to the occasion during the performance. It takes hours of practice for players, and for conductors, a lot of thinking, research, listening, and experience (and that's an understatement still). It isn't fair to negate all that effort just to prove one's worth as a 'credible' critic.

But it's also not just the condescension in the piece that frustrates. I felt the review was an in-your-face reminder of conformist society. Ironic that you find it in a world where there's supposed to be 'freedom' to deviate, but hey, we're in Singapore, we can't really expect less. The reviewer expected the Tchaikovsky to be like the recordings he heard, and was disappointed. Yet since when has greatness been built on churning out replicas/safe variations of what has been done before? And with critics who see no value in mincing their words, I don't see how we expect to encourage creativity, innovation, imagination, and all the nice sounding words we see with regard to education policy.

(Again, judgementalism rears it's ugly head.)

picture perfect

Photos of people's faces never cease to fascinate. Some people prefer taking pictures of objects, scenery, animals, but faces are a class of their own. These are not shots of the same people in the same poses with the same smile just a different place which you can't even make out because the faces dominate the whole shot. These are shots taken when the person doesn't notice, doesn't expect, until they hear the click, or see the lens in their face (by which time it's too late).

But it's not so much the face as the eyes. You feel you can read a person if you catch him/her at the right moment, and you'll know if you've caught the right moment if they violently protest after you've taken the shot.

What's the fascination with reading someone? I don't know. Control, understanding, looking for similarities (in the wrong places)

Not too long ago I helped some a group of people take photos of themselves. It took more than 5 shots before they were satisfied (or rather, this one person in particular). Poor lighting, wrong angle, but the smiles were all the same though. Frozen in place, face muscles tightened to perfection. Perfection that is colourless, insipid and forgettable.

Walkabout

(in Henderson as part of field work)

10 a.m., already elderly men congregate in enclaves in coffee shops, in sport shoes, tables full of empty beer bottles and mugs with remnant froth. At a particular care centre, old ladies (mostly) sit at round tables, wedding-dinner style. Except the table is still empty, no one's talking, because they can't make themselves heard over the karaoke singing which can be heard two blocks away, or maybe there's really no point in socialising when they don't even know how they're going to settle expenses for the next few days.

Parents walking with their children; parents whose unspoken expectations lie in the excess pinafore cloth hanging over their daughters' knees.

The dark corridors, the air that suffocates like poverty; neighbours quarrel over water spilt in the corridor to retain some semblance of control over what they have left in their life. Anger as their protest at what life has unceremoniously dumped on them; it's nothing personal.

You hear noise, a baby wailing, the noise of frustration, of pigeons fighting over food, you think you can even hear the noise in the head of the old man who sits stoned, on the bench.

And then there's the community centre, on a hill, quiet, driveway immaculately paved, the huge meeting room with large comfortable chairs, metal railings for the old people, but wiped clean of fingerprints. Maybe no one has had the strength to venture up the hill yet, no one has dared to trespass the visible but denied boundary between the have and the have-nots.

so it turns out

that I'm really an INFJ.

What that means can be found here

You can try the test here

What's fascinating about personality tests is that they tell you a lot you don't know about yourself. Or maybe that's cos they're just inaccurate. Hmm. This one's pretty alright though.

identity confusion

Today I realised that I really can't be a social worker in any permutation/form because I don't know how to say 'social work' in Chinese. Happened while I was getting my hair smeared in pungent white cream; the lady suddenly asked me what I was studying (in Chinese), and the only thing that came to my mind (in Chinese) was 'yi4 gong1' (charity work/volunteering) which isn't really it at all, but is the general perception of social work anyway so I didn't really feel like explaining.

At some VWO interview last week, was in the company of many social workers-to-be, and they were practically glowing with love and peace and self-sacrifice. They were talking about their pet projects, their volunteering at this home and that center, and while I pretended to be reading (but actually eavesdropping not-so-discreetly), what was going on up there was something like this:

help these people are so socially involved where have i been what have i been wasting my life on why haven't i been helping to make the world a better place reach out to the lost save the people that need saving

Followed by:

*guilt*. whatever. *bo chup*. how i have nothing to say about what i want to do for the community except that i think northlight is a great idea. *resignation* (mind is strangely quiet. oops. sleep mode already.)

Mind remains in sleep mode for the rest of the interview.

"Tell me about yourself"

(internal dialogue) You want to hear what I think you want to hear about me. But because I'm not ready to divulge my deep dark secrets, nor the warped functioning of my mind which I'm still trying to figure out, I'll stick to stating traits found in friendster testimonials (grand total of 6).

"So how do you think social work can gel with drama and music?"

(internal dialogue) Erm. I wrote that because I thought it would reduce the chances of me getting shortlisted for the interview.
(what came out) I think drama is relatively underused though rather useful when it comes to engaging people, especially children, to think about issues...forum/interactive theatre if well facilitated can help them make choices about their behaviour, learn how to assert themselves...empower client..blah blah..

And then i stopped myself because i was supposed to remain unenthusiastic. Actually when they stated explicitly the working hours - 12 to 9 pm (weekdays), 9 am to 9 pm (weekends), I just nodded knowingly, but was flipping bounding cartwheeling in my mind because it's such a relief knowing that it's such a clear STOP sign I really couldn't ask for more.

Maybe when I'm 21 I'll finally learn how to make 'responsible, well-informed decisions', with good career moves etc, but if entering the profession means selling my soul and giving up everything that means anything now, from cello/quartet to drama, I'm perfectly happy remaining where I am.

Maybe I'll look at this post sometime in the future, and think what an immature, selfish, ignorant ass I am, but what really matters apart from the here and now (and of course eternity)? Life's too short to think about the future, especially when your only future might be the present.

rituals

This is the year of 21st birthday parties. Am not really getting the hype about the goodness of 21, because responsibility isn't much of an incentive, and independence, well, with most people it comes a lot earlier than 21. R21 movies are about the only legal 'benefit', but that again brings with it some form of moral responsibility, supposing you're not an amoral person.

But I suppose it's a good excuse for social gatherings, (if you're an extrovert you don't need a reason); if for nothing else, it's a good social experiment to see interaction patterns forming among strangers. It is fascinating to observe the sweetly strained dynamics that leads to the unconscious excessive drinking of unnaturally sweet Pepsi, the slipping away for lung-burning activities, breathable air and the cold comfort of other similarly antisocial people.

There's the strict avoidance of eye contact with one particular person,

or someone else making eye contact to express similar sentiments about the music.

There's the ignoring of everyone else to talk to the person you care to talk to.

And then there's everyone else.

i knew it

You Are 60% Boyish and 40% Girlish

You are pretty evenly split down the middle - a total eunuch. Okay, kidding about the eunuch part. But you do get along with both sexes. You reject traditional gender roles. However, you don't actively fight them. You're just you. You don't try to be what people expect you to be.

How Boyish or Girlish Are You?

loosed ends

Violist says, if I ever get into a relationship with a guy, I'll dominate.

Thought about it on the way home, in all its hypothetical-ness, and decided that I disagree. To dominate something/someone, you have to care enough about the way the thing/person/relationship is progressing, and currently, (probably with quartet as the only exception), I feel close to nothing about anything.

Explains why I don't care anymore whether I've to do all the work for group projects, whether I'll finish this essay on time, whether this person is angry/sad/insane -- there's this blankness, a lack of genuine reaction because there isn't enough emotion to fuel any reaction to begin with. Maybe I have Asperger's.

Maybe I don't. Whatever. Anyway I realised that it's possible to condition yourself to stop feeling. Everytime you feel the stirring of any emotion, you suppress it, breathe and blank out, ta-daa. Maybe all that hard work finally paid off. But I don't remember why I tried doing that in the first place. Possible sign of repression. Or maybe I just felt that affect gets in the way of task accomplishment.

This is like a transcript of one internal conversation. Something's happening.