Two Performances

Confession: I had a secret desire to watch Josh Groban in concert next February 14th, when he swings by Detroit to perform at the Fox Theater.

I had the opportunity to buy tickets pre-sale, I had a good idea of how happy I'd be to watch him (when LK can't be around for Valentine's Day, the next best thing is watching a boy-toy crooner in concert), but I had no one to go with me. For all who have never been to Detroit but have heard about the shady alleys, the steam pouring out of potholes at night, the empty streets, the shifting darkness that threatens to swallow you, the lone silhouettes that lurk around corners - they're all true. I didn't want to go to Detroit alone, and because none of my friends here are remotely interested in Josh Groban, I had to abandon my great plan. Now all the concerts around the country are sold out! (Including the one in shady Detroit.) Mr. Groban sure pulls in the crowds. I'll have to be content with his recently-released CD (I have the Internet-only special edition with four extra songs, geek that I am).

Some concerts that I did get to:

- As far as maestros go, Itzhak Perlman commands our attention with both his playing and conducting. I managed to see Itzhak Perlman perform with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra three Saturdays ago. Yes, Detroit, but I had three companions, so I felt safe as a duckling. It was heart-wrenching to watch him maneuver himself from the conductor's position to off-stage and than on-stage again with each round of applause. Perlman has suffered from polio for many years, but he takes each awkward step with great strength and dignity, and when he moves his arms and fingers to either bend notes from his violin, or command music from the orchestra, he is the equal of all the great men that the history of music has known.

- John Logan Skelton is my friend Peiming's piano professor at the University of Michigan, whom I met at a recent Thanksgiving gathering. Last evening, he held a recital that featured new music he'd composed for the poems of Tennessee Williams and E.E. Cummings, poems set to song. Skelton played on a large, dark piano as a soprano and baritone carefully and always respectfully used the words as lyrics that fit beautifully with the music. Most members of the audience were music students who were delighted with the poetry, some of them having read E.E. Cummings previously, although their ears were perhaps tuned more to the lines of music than of words. An occasional piano player, I was impressed how easily poetry melded with another art form. Well, I really shouldn?t have been, since words are essential to vocal music and many song lyrics can be considered poetic. My own delight came about because I had known those words as only written lines or words said aloud at a poetry reading. That evening, they were accompanied by haunting and fitful melodies. The lines soared and wavered in a way I?d never heard them move before; they were borne on voices so smooth and beautiful that the voices became paths for the words to glide and meander with a grace, a quickness, a startling leap. While the words had always set the imagination free, music now lent these poems wings and they traveled further into the listening body to engage more than just a single sense.

Now, if only I can translate these ideas into my mini essay on combining an art form with prose that's due Tuesday. I need a muse!

Posted by Monoceros at December 7, 2003 4:02 PM