Feb
20

Optimism Redux

by Peter

A while ago I wrote a post laying out why I was optimistic, long term, about the human race’s prospects. Very long term. Here’s an interview by Sam Harris with authors of a new book. The book, I assume, and the authors in the interview make some of the same data-based points. As I’ve said, there are any number of possible setbacks, bumps and false starts, but in general the outlook is “better than you think.”

My only critique is the reversal of the quote about newspapers…”if it bleeds,it leads.”

The link to the interview again.

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Jan
31

Recent Musical/Chemical Events

by Peter

We attended a couple of Emory events recently and felt they were worth a post. First we attended one of the free noontime concerts on the 27th sponsored by the Emory Chamber Music Society. This one featured, as usual, the Vega String Quartet along with guest pianist, Gloria Chien. As usual we had a nice lunch at the little cafe in the Carlos Museum on the Emory campus. Jan’s sister, Karen, was along so it was great fun.

Gloria Chien can really play…she played the Debussy Petite Suite with William Ransom to begin, then with the quartet for the Dvorak Piano Quintet. The Debussy was nice…a good clean performance, but the Dvorak was the real deal. We know that piece pretty well and haven’t really enjoyed a performance better. It was one of those magic moments in which hearing the beginning of a piece brings tears. Something about the piece…or the setting..or the playing just seemed so perfect. Needless to say I enjoyed it very much. I always enjoy the Vega Quartet. Sometimes I think the first violinist’s sound is a bit strident, but he’s a fine player as are they all.

Here’s a little of the opening:

Dvorak

Moving on to Sunday, January 29th, we attended what promised to be a fascinating combination of lecture and music. Entitled “The Creation of the World,” the presentation was in two parts. The first was a “contrapuntal conversation” between two Emory faculty members, David Lynn and Dwight Andrews, purportedly “exploring the intersection between science and music.” Both of these people, Lynn from Chemistry, and Andrews, from music, have wonderful credentials in their fields. The program was said to have been based on a long series of conversations between the two on the subject.

I can only say that if the conversation between them lasted more than 5 minutes they wasted a bunch of time. The “intersection” was a train wreck. I can safely say that this is the only lecture that I left knowing less than when I came in. It was possible to get a fuzzy glimpse of what they were after, but only after doing most of their work for them. Lynn was a mumbly sort of guy, using language, at times, that would befuddle most of us. Andrews was bubbly, congenial and hopelessly verbose. He, at least, tried to introduce the audience to a vocabulary through which to understand music. They took turns speaking, both using visuals and audio as they went. Their topics didn’t flow from turn to turn, Andrews took twice as much time as Lynn, and neither was convincing as to a possible intersection in any real way. I think what they meant to say is that both human life and music grew and evolved from very simple beginnings into a wonderfully diverse phenomenon and neither evolution has stopped by any means.

I have to say that I know a bit about this stuff. I’ve been in tremendously rewarding discussions across curricula with many bright people, including those in my family. I know that it is possible to dig into seemingly unrelated phenomena and come up with the beginnings of intersections that are worth digging into and that might lead to new knowledge or new understandings of both fields. Not only that, it is possible to use language that bridges disciplines and that is available to educated people. The two in this presentation must not have gone past the most rudimentary study of each other’s business.

So…yes…I was terribly disappointed. Audiences at Emory for this kind of thing are tweedy types and I see many of the same people (who seem to know each other) at many events. They are placid consumers of intellectualism. None seemed impressed by the lecture, and, like I was, seemed much more interested in the music. Fortunately, the musical portion of the afternoon was much better.

The choices were meant to reflect in some way the topic at hand, and in some ways it did. First on the program was a Bach Adagio and Fugue for solo violin. Domenic Salerni, the first violinist from the Vega quartet, performed. The adagio is brief..the fugue is not. Any fugue for solo instrument (seemingly impossible) is a tour de force for a player. Salerni did well enough…again his sound grates at times, but he was definitely up to the task. To hear the counterpoint emerge from one instrument is always amazing if done well. The idea here is that the fugue develops a complex organism from a simple one line melody. OK…fair enough.

Second on the program was the 3rd Quartet of Bartok played by the Vega quartet. It isn’t so clear what the relationship of this piece to the lecture was. True enough, Andrews talked some about the evolution of dissonance in one of his many forays into musicology, and the Bartok is heard as dissonance by most listeners..at least I assume so. It is such a vital piece…so integrated and tightly drawn. Again…it might illustrate the growth from simplicity to complexity in context with the Bach. If so…OK…fair enough. In any case, it was an excellent performance.

Last on the program was Milhaud‘s La création du monde for a small orchestra of Emory students, ASO players, faculty and others. A sort of pickup group that played very well under the baton of Richard Prior. The piece, as far as I can tell, has no relationship to the topic other than the name. It’s a fun piece, though, and the playing was quite good. The orchestra includes a saxophone, as it must since the piece is one of Milhaud’s jazz-influenced pieces. The titles of the movements, played without pause, refer to the process of creation and ends with “The Man and Woman Kiss.” I guess that about sums it up. Fair enough. It is attractive music with obvious references to jazz and the “chaos” which opens the piece is literally drawn…out of chaos, love. OK…and therefor creation…or at least a kiss. (The biggest bonus to me was the presence of my favorite ASO player, 1st clarinetist Laura Ardan. She was kind enough in the old days to take my good students on when I felt they needed more than I could offer. And a great player.)

All in all it was a good few days for music. Emory offers so much good, and sometimes great, music for free it has become the g0-to when it’s possible for Jan and me. We’re fortunate to have that resource so close to us, and to have the ASO on affordable terms as well. In spite of the disappointment with the lecture, whose potential was so great that it magnified the loss, we enjoyed the evening a lot.

This week it’s the ASO with Thom Wilkins, an old colleague at UTC who has done extremely well for himself. We’ll get to eat lunch with him Saturday. Also a visit to the High on Friday to take a look at the new exhibit on golf and to continue looking at the Picasso to Warhold exhibit. Nice.

 

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Nov
28

How to Fail at Art While Really Trying

by Benjamin

I came across this piece of writing which I don’t think I’ve ever posted anywhere publicly.  It’s one of my favorite stories, tho, so here it is for you guys.
——
My brother is an architect and designer.  His entire life he’s had an amazing ability to draw just about anything with stupendous detail.  He’s also able to disassemble shit and put it back together again with ease – he just SEES things so clearly, and is able to translate that vision from his brains to his hands. 

Me, not so much.

In fact you might say my abilities in both of these areas is, ah… impractical, at best.  I’m not bad at taking things apart, but it’s 6-5 odds against my getting them back together again and functioning properly.  My limitations in this regard led to my two Theorems of the Conservation of Stuff:

1) If you take something apart and put it back together again, you will always leave one piece out, but the thing will still continue to function perfectly normally.

It should be noted that, through repeated practical application of this theory, you can take a thing apart and put it back together enough times such that it will no longer have anything in it at all, and yet it will still continue to function perfectly normally.

2) If you unpack a suitcase and repack it, there’s always one thing which just won’t go back in no matter what you do.

It should be noted that, through repeated practical application of this theory, you can unpack a suitcase and  repack it enough times such that it will be completely empty, and yet you cannot pack anything into it at all.

It was my failure to master any sort of artistic endeavor, perhaps, that led me into the computer sciences.  No drawing required, and my ability to translate what I’m THINKING from my head to my hands appears relatively intact.  Couple this with a keen tendency to focus an unholy amount of attention on one thing at a time, and it makes for a good coder, and, later in life, a good systems designer.  But it does NOT make one any better at drawing.  And, being as I’ve always admired my brother for this ability of his, I decided, in my senior year of college, to attempt to better myself in this regard.  For all intents and purposes, we will call the class I attended “Drawing For Complete Morons”.

I was actually very excited to purchase the required materials for DFCM.  Pens!  Pencils!  Charcoals!  Gigantic Paper Pads! Fixatives!  I felt as if an entire new world was opening up, with an arcane language all its own, and I was going to be indoctrinated into a cult of magic practitioners.  No longer would I bear the shame of my overly developed left-brain-hemisphere – I was going become an arTEEST!  Take THAT, Pascal!  Kernighan and Ritchie can kiss my ass, thank god almighty, free at last!  And so I arrive at the very first session of DFCM, backpack bristling with the implementations of my upcoming transmogrification.  I am ready for anything.

The first thing I realize is that nobody else has brought anything but a few pencils and a Gigantic Paper Pad.  I don’t feel too badly about this, as I’m a total, complete philistine, and I know going in I’m starting with nothing – anything I do wrong I’m going to chalk up to this and keep forging ahead.  I plotz myself down and try very hard to affect the extreme, almost pathological indifference everyone else in the class seems to manage effortlessly, but I’m so excited that I keep breaking into smiles, all the while looking around at different people, not wanting to catch their eye, trying to figure out their major.  After ten minutes of what seemed to me to be an unbearable buildup, the professor finally arrived, and he’s got with him an enormous box of, of… of STUFF : kitchen utensils, dinnerware, handheld yard tools, and the like.

At this point I experience my first real pang of discomfort.  Holy crap, I can’t even draw with a pencil and you want me to try to compose something with an EGG BEATER?  Have you lost your fucking MIND, man?  What am I gonna do, fucking make you an omelet that looks like the Mona Lisa?

But no, the idea, as the professor explains, is simple.  Pick whichever of these things speaks to you.  Pick whichever implement you have with you that you like, and do your best to draw it. All I want to do today is to see where everyone is, so I know how to structure the class.  Well, shit!  That seems perfectly reasonable, let’s get to it then!  I expect there to be a mad dash to the box, as there would have been had you thrown the same challenge to a room full of CompSci majors for whom social skills are not particularly manifest, but everyone is well behaved instead, bordering on that disinterest that fascinates me so.

It is at this point that my left-brain-hemisphere starts to assert itself : I don’t want to tip my hand, as it were.  I know I suck, but I don’t want EVERYONE to know that I suck.  So I need to pick an implement which isn’t going to be impossible for me to draw, which isn’t also something imbecilic like a straw, but that might give me some small chance at showing that I do indeed have some untapped genius simply waiting for the right small appliance to come along to allow it to reveal itself to the world.  The guy in front of me picks the egg beater (show off), I pick something that looks like a long handled colander in miniature, or an enormous tea strainer, with a leather thong tied to the end of it, presumably for hanging.  Not too complicated of a device, I think to myself, I should be able to manage this.  So I sit down and begin to sketch.

The pad I’m drawing on is quite large, 18×24, so this is going to be, by a considerable margin, the biggest drawing I’ve ever attempted.  My enormous tea strainer is nothing like as large as the pad, so right away I’m experiencing difficulty getting the scale right.  First the handle is too long for the size of the strainer part (wad up, throw away).  Next the strainer part is gigantic and I don’t have enough space for the handle (tear up, throw away).  Then I get the bright idea of starting in the middle, but that also ends poorly (tear up, wad up, throw away).  Forty five minutes into a ninety minute class and I’ve got nothing to show.

The fucker next to me, meanwhile, has loosely sketched about the most beautiful god damn garden trowel I have ever seen.  He’s using a pencil, but he’s got so many shades of grey I can’t believe he’s not cheating somehow.  The fucking REAL TROWEL doesn’t look as real as the one that’s on the page.  This is when I get my second pang of discomfort.  There is no way this ends well for me.  It is at this moment that the professor starts to stroll around the room, starting, thankfully, on the other side, to see how we’re doing.  So now I’ve got to really start humping it.

As the professor slowly wends his way around the room, I just totally disconnect my left brain.  I remember a quote about something or another that says to make a statue of a horse, cut everything away from the block that doesn’t look like a horse.  I’m not sure how it applies to my current situation as I’ve no scissors, but it makes me feel better. I calm down, and begin to sketch.

The professor alights behind the guy next to me, pauses for a moment, and breathes “Very nice!”  But me, I’m focused, a drawing machine, totally In The Moment.  I barely register the professor standing behind me for what must be at least a minute.  And then I hear it, at last, the affirmation I have sought my entire life:

“What are you DOING?!”

The tones are unmistakably horror-struck, bordering on hysteria.  Left-brain-hemisphere takes total control again, and I snap out of my trance and see what I have done.  What I see is, without question or fear of contradiction, a gigantic penis, caught in the act of ejaculating.

This isn’t to say I meant to draw a gigantic penis.  I MEANT to draw the little-big tea strainer.  But picture it : I have a large, mostly round bulbous thing with scribbled lines which are meant to be the strainer net but instead looks like pubic hairs.  Attached to this I have a large handle with knobby bit at the end onto which the leather thong is attached, only it looks like… well, it looks like a gigantic penis with a bulbous (circumcised) head with a little hole at the end, and out of the hole is shooting a liquid of some sort.  And given the painfully tumescent condition of the handle, with regard to the over all scale of the thing, it is not likely to be urinating.  No man I ever knew could urinate under that particular circumstance.

“I,” I respond, “have drawn what appears to be a gigantic penis.  I swear to you I’m trying to draw this tea strainer thing here, I’m just… just… I’m really awful.”

“Well,” says the professor, “At least you know it.  How could you improve this drawing?”

Left-brain-hemisphere starts talking, then, and I can’t shut it up.  I don’t even try.

“Well, aside from it’s a gigantic penis, it’s just all out of proportion.  Nothing is the right size.  And I can’t draw a perfect circle so the strainer rim looks all wrong.  And I tried to get the little ridge at the end of the handle but then made the two sides of handle on either side of the ridge different sizes.  And then there’s this business with the actual strainer material, which I didn’t have the first idea how to manage so I tried to sort of abstract it out, otherwise it would have, if you can believe it, looked even worse.  I’m afraid I can’t explain the leather thong at all.”

The professor nods, thinking to himself for a moment – I’m pretty sure he’s trying very hard not to laugh.  I, on the other hand, am trying very hard not to cry.  ”Well, at least you can SEE what’s wrong, and that’s a good start.”

“Am I allowed to burn it?” I ask
“Not in here,” he says, and walks on.
I never went back to that class.  I went directly from the doorway to the registrar and dropped a class for the first and only time in my entire life.  I NEVER give up on an academic subject, but in this case it was clear to me that I should circle the wagons right away, circle tightly around the wounded little animal comprising my right-brain-hemisphere, quivering with embarrassment and shame.  I avoided that building for the rest of the semester.
To this day I am a miserable drawer-of-things.  I stand in complete awe of people who are really good at it – the entire process is an utter and complete mystery to me.  If you want a new distributed security system designed and implemented from the ground up, I’m your guy.  Just don’t ask me to try and draw a picture of it for you.  We will both be sorry.

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Oct
17

This I Believe

by Benjamin

I self-identify as an atheist. I also tell other people I’m an atheist. But I’m not. Not really. It’s just that what I believe about the nature of the divine isn’t easily expressed in terms of a single symbol, or even a bumper-sticker-length catch phrase. So I fudge it a little bit, but as far as most people are concerned, it’s close enough.

The thing is, I approach the difficult question of god in the same way I approach difficult questions I come across in computer science : logically, methodically, always with an eye on the fundamental principles which can be used to solve every problem I’ve come across so far. Computer Science consists of learning a set of basic skills, and using them to construct systems which can do things like simulate the collision of galaxies. The end result may be stupendously complex, but the structure is always built using the same blocks you learned in your freshman CompSci class. What you learn is really a WAY to think about big problems, and not a WHAT to think. You learn to break things down into smaller and smaller parts until you get a piece you know how to cope with, and then you work on that. If you keep doing this, you eventually can solve everything, given enough time, patience and discipline.

So, here is my thinking on god.

God is given 4 aspects : Eternal, Omnipotent, Omnipresent, Omniscient.

Eternal : God has always existed, and will always exist. There is no point at which God has not existed. God is the sum total of the past, present, and future.

Omnipotent : God is all-powerful. This doesn’t just mean that God has all the power in the universe, it means God *is* all the power in the universe. God is the mover of all things, the stopper of all things, the cause, source and destination of every action. You cannot say God didn’t cause the hurricane – this means that some other power did, which means that there’s power in the universe outside of God’s, which violates God’s Omnipotence. God is the mover of the heavens, the burning in the suns, the metamorphosis, the photosynthesis, all processes, all energy.

Omnipresent : There is no place God is not. God is in old candy wrappers and on the moon; God IS the moon, and all the space between the moon and the Earth; God IS the Earth; God is in every molecule, every atom, in all of the universe, God is located in them all. God IS them all.

Omniscient : All knowledge is God’s. The reason for all things is known by God. All possible outcomes of any given set of potentialities are known by God.

Most atheists will tell you that an entity containing all of these aspect doesn’t exist. The thing is, I can think of exactly one. It’s the only possible entity that encompasses all of these concepts, and I know for a fact that it exists. What is that entity?

The universe.

Call it “everything,” if you like. All-that-is. The infinite Unity. The sum total of all places at all times and everything that happens therein. We live in it, with our limited life spans, so we are part of it – part of God. The divine lives in all of us – we live in the divine. God is everywhere, so that means I’m part of God, and God is part of me. God is every-when, which means last Tuesday, tomorrow, and right now. God is every action, which means all that I do is expressing the divine. This is crucial : the divine is an expression of my self. God knows everything, which means all that I know, and a whole lot of stuff that I don’t. But I’m reaching for it. The knowledge is out there somewhere, if I have patience, discipline, and curiosity enough to ask, and can overcome the fear to take the risk.

So what about Jehova, Allah, Baal, Zeus, and so on? Maybe they exist, I don’t know. But I know they aren’t God. If they do exist, they’re nothing more than super-powerful entities with their own limited lifespans, their own limited understanding, and their own limited power. This puts them far ahead of me on the food chain, so maybe they can affect my life. But it seems to me that if Jehova is up there toying with us all, and he has a plan, and he’s proceeding according to his own whim without regard to our desires and dreams, then that’s not benevolent, that’s just being mean. And if his purpose for me crosses my own desires for my life, without reason or explanation, then he’s nothing more than a pathetic bully for doing it. And we all know this truth from our childhood : bullies rule through fear, not love.

In fact I find the idea of a God like this thoroughly depressing. The very idea of it pales in my heart, in comparison to the possibility that we’re all responsible for one another, that we’re supposed to be taking care of one another as best as we can. For in the end, WE are the ones expressing the divine – and the divine does not express itself to us except through the actions of others. So if we are evil, then God is evil; if we love and care for one another, then God truly is love. There’s no external bogeyman forcing you to make the decision, or threatening you with punishment if you aren’t good. YOU are the one responsible for how you exist in the world – it’s your own power, your own knowledge, your own actions that creates God every moment of your existence.

For if you believe in Jehova, or Allah, then make no mistake about this : what you express through your belief has nothing to do with your God, but with YOU. If you hate homosexuals it’s not because God does, it’s because YOU do. If it’s your opinion that women are inferior it’s not because God thinks this, or because it says so in your scripture, it’s because that’s what YOU think, and you’re using your religion as an excuse, as a crutch, as a way to disavow responsibility for your own actions. Conversely, if you love everybody, and reach out to others and do good things, then that’s not Jehova, that’s YOU being a good person. YOU are the benevolent God. You need no proxy to claim your goodness, you ARE your own self-expression.

So, my question to you is this : How do YOU express God to others?

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Oct
17

Optimism II

by Peter

I wrote a post a while back that laid out my general optimism about the trajectory of humanity over time. Lately I’ve been posting in a negative way about this country’s specific tendencies to go backwards. Here is a posting from Sam Harris which is an interview with Steven Pinker about his new book, “The Better Angels of our Nature.” I think that Pinker makes part of my case for optimism in a detailed and scholarly way.

http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/qa-with-steven-pinker/

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Sep
29

I guess if you look for it..

by Peter

….you find stuff. Here’s a short article by Jonathan Schell from the Nation Magazine…yes another liberal rag. You may have to subscribe to the newsletter in order to see the article. I urge you to do it. He suggests, as I’ve been suggesting here, that we, as a nation, are becoming less sensitive in many ways. I’ve been whining about the dog-eat-dog, every man for himself, theme that seems to run through everything we do as a country.

Schell’s addition is to suggest that this isn’t just a political or institutional tendency, but a natural reflection of our loss of our human decency above and beyond…or below and within…what employ in our politics and governing institutions. “Cruelty and its opposites, kindness, compassion and decency, are more personal. They are apolitical qualities that nevertheless have political consequences. A country’s sense of decency stands outside and above its politics, checking and setting limits on abuses. An unjust society must reform its laws and institutions. A cruel society must reform itself.”

I find his argument compelling, if a bit overstated. I’ve never (almost never) failed to find kindness in individual human beings, and, as I’ve said here before, I’m fundamentally an optimist regarding the human condition and its progress toward decency. We are, however, in the midst of one of those steps backward that could, if given a chance by good people, devolve into a much more serious and long-lasting problem.

This situation is truly aside from politics for the moment. Politicians are always willing to ride into power on the emotional strength of anger and fear..and they frequently end up unable to control or manage it. (Yes…I do believe that Obama was right about this stuff, if not politically shrewd enough to keep it to himself.)We’ve seen ample indications of such things in the 20th century, and there are any number of examples in the present world. I’d like not to see this happen in this country.

Sinclair Lewis’ “It Can’t Happen Here,” and Philip Roth’s “The Plot Against America” have chilled me always. I fear it can happen here and anywhere. No, no…I don’t think we’re on the brink of that horror…but anyone with a sense of history can feel it lurking under some things that are happening now.

We’re a decent, kind and compassionate people, aren’t we. Aren’t we?

Here’s a late-breaking addendum: An article by Robert Reich in the Huffington Post echoes my exact language in earlier posts and re-addresses the topic above. Very clearly….very.

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Sep
27

What liberalism has come to

by Peter

In a desperate-sounding column, Mary Sanchez writes an obituary/encomium for Jon Huntsman, the neglected “moderate” Republican candidate. It struck me as I read it that we have come to the point that we yearn for a candidate from the right who at least sounds relatively sane. He is a “tax-cutting, pro-business Republican,” but he has many other attributes that land him in the moderate category. He rides motorcycles. He speaks Chinese. He supports gay civil unions. He is a “cafeteria style” Mormon with an Episcopalian wife. (Woo)

The man is stark raving mad. He is a liberal in sheep’s clothing, or something like that.

I was just thinking as I listen to utterances from Perry, Bachman & Co. that Mitt Romney sounds better and better. But I’d overlooked Huntsman, who is like Romney with a heart and, evidently, a consistent message. It would be nice to think that he might be elected in the event that Obama truly becomes untenable. I doubt it. He won’t win any primaries, I suppose.

Another spirited defense of a Republican candidate came from the right in a column by Thoman Sowell. In it he defends three stances taken by Rick Perry as being “far more reasonable than he appeared to be.” Reasonable is a malleable word, I guess.

In other words, the man is NOT stark raving mad. Are we in the midst of a movement to bring the Republican party back from the brink? If so, that might be a good thing in general.

The bottom line for me is that nowhere in the Republican party do we hear the slightest indication that we might increase revenues in order to pay for the common good. Trickle-down is king, and “the poor will always be with us” is the slogan. Let them eat cake. Dog eat everyone else’s dog.

Dang…the Democrats subscribe to the same thing, actually. How did we get here? Are we still paying for the 60′s?

Long sigh.

 

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Sep
24

Social Contract

by Peter

Another Krugman column here defines further the idea that an accepted order…what he and many others before him have called “the social contract”…has come under fire. In the column he cites the Warren quote mentioned above.

It has become the accepted wisdom that any effort to balance the support of the common good in a fair way among all people of all income levels is “class warfare.” Krugman argues that the real class warfare is being waged against the middle class. (I think it goes without saying that poor people are suffering casualties of immense proportions now…and that doesn’t seem worth mentioning anywhere.) People’s incomes are dropping below the poverty level (which should be much higher) at record rates and the safety net for these people is being shredded daily…even by a government that purports to support the opposite. Middle income people’s incomes are stagnant, and their number is dropping The imbalance is just awful.

I don’t really have solutions, but it seems clear that whatever the intent, the real war is against the middle class. Arguing that reducing the burden on rich people further will in some way build a solid middle class has been shown to be wrong, and continues to be shown wrong every day. I have no idea how rich one has to be, but I’ve said that it would be reasonable to expect me to contribute more to programs that support the common good, and I have no reason to believe that people who have multiples into the thousands of what I have shouldn’t be able to do so without pain and without reducing their so-called “job provider” status.

I cannot for the life of me understand why the income level at which one pays the social security tax has remained constant. It has been shown that extending that ceiling could go a long way toward easing the burden on the system.

What on earth is wrong with a progressive taxation system. The idea that regressive taxation is best for all is a relatively new idea, shown to be ineffective. What the hell?

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Sep
23

Krugman says it for me

by Peter

In this morning’s Atlanta paper, there was a Paul Krugman column that voices what I’ve been saying for a long time…of course more elegantly, but a bit less expansively. The column is here.

I’ve been kvetching about the dog-eat-dog tsunami that is sweeping away the old liberal idea that government represents us as a community, and that we (it) are responsible for our fellow Americans in need. I call myself a “communitarian” because of that sense that if we are not some sort of unified people, why do we call ourselves accordingly. If we are all individuals without a real dedication to each other, we are not a nation at all, really. The assumption that a collection of a bunch of individuals acting in their own interests can be a social whole seems senseless. This thinking is now classified as “socialist” or even “communist.” Oh well.

Here I mean to post some quotes that interest me..found any old where…and try to comment on them, though I’m eminently unqualified most of the time. Starting with Brad Pitt of all people.

“You know, we bitch about raising taxes. I think the argument is that it’s my money, I earned it, why do I have to pay for other people? I get very frustrated with that argument. I don’t mind paying taxes. I live in a country that gave me the opportunity to make money, and most people on this planet do not have that.”

A kind of variation on the Buffet theme, I guess. I don’t have Buffet’s or Pitt’s kind of money, but I worked all my life, as did Jan Mickler, to try to be secure both while working and afterwards. We have been so fortunate in that we love what we do and are grateful that the values of various governments saw fit to let us make a living. At this point, if I’m asked to pay a bit more either into Medicare or Social Security, in order to keep it in place for everyone, I’d be happy (well..you know) to do it. I’m sort of surprised that those who have 10 to 20 times what we have wouldn’t be happy to do even more. But that’s the way it is now, it appears.

The Elizabeth Warren rant is along similar lines. The link here is embedded in an article that argues against the point….fair and balanced here, by cracky! I’m just not impressed with some of the stats, but…fair enough.

The ideas of paying forward and giving back seem dead. Of course we could donate money to various charities, and we do in a limited way, but a government organized so that we can all contribute to the common good is a good way to spread things around. Of course there are inefficiencies. Take a look at the books of various charities if you’d like to see inefficiency, though. As the article points out, there are things that governments have gotten in to that could be handled better some other way. I’m just glad to be able to pay so that the water and air are clean, children are educated, and any numbers of other functions are fulfilled by the lowest bidder on my dime. I’d sure like to have things run more smoothly, but I’ve seen enough of functions turned over to the “efficiencies” of private enterprise to know that if there were perhaps a 3rd way I’d like to see it.

 

 

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Jun
29

A Musical Weekend

by Peter

This past weekend was a real musical feast for us. On Saturday we attended most of a day-long series of concerts called “SONICpalooza.” It was sponsored by Sonic Generator, a Georgia Tech new music ensemble. It was an incredibly impressive event, featuring some of the best performers in Atlanta…of course including Wanda, who had two performances in the evening.

On Sunday, we drove to Chattanooga in the afternoon to hear the final concert of a few days of concerts sponsored by a group called, “New Dischord.” Our friend and my ex-student, Niky Tejero, was performing and we heard about this from her. We wish we’d known sooner, but that’s all we were going to be able to hear anyway.

The weekend was topped off by an evening with Chuck and Ardian Totten…old Chattanooga friends…and by happenstance, my old UTC colleague, Art Jennings was there for the night as well. It had been years since we’d seen Art and it was a real pleasure to see him. He’s now the trombone prof. at U of F and has made a great career for himself after leaving UTC.

The SONICpalooza should, perhaps, have been called “MinimaPalooza.” With few exceptions, the music from beginning to end was drawn from minimalist literature, new and old. Most of it was of the Steve Reich variety rather than the Philip Glass variety. I think I was grateful for that, at least. I thought it was surprising that most of the pieces were from that genre…Ben suggested that perhaps that was a conscious choice and that the concert was a celebration of what has become, for the most part, an historical music. That might have been so, but there were several pieces decidedly not in that style, so they either slipped through the filter, or the event wasn’t organized around minimalism.

I won’t go into any serious discussion of the music…you all know my feelings about musical structure. I will say, however, that while much of the Reichian music was successful within its limits, and was almost without exception beautifully played, there were pieces…two by the same composer…that were excruciating in their drabness. This kind of thing is best heard in a darkened room and under the influence of some substance that can alter the perception of time in such a way that it just doesn’t matter any more. In fact, people who love this music frequently refer to the experience as a gateway to a meditative state. The concert atmosphere is not the right place for this stuff, perhaps.

An exception might be Reich’s Music for 18 Musicians. There is a visual element in that piece that is about as satisfying as the aural component. To watch two percussionists…one on downbeats the other on upbeats…perform as if they were windup toys is fascinating on its own…this is a large ensemble and the usual visual stimuli are imposing. That it goes on for an hour prevents me from serious consideration of its entirety.

For what its worth, there are classical pieces that go on that long, and I don’t like them either! They are usually divided into movements, however, which helps. A piece that comes to mind that is minimal in some ways but was written long before this is Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time. The piece has movements that are so slow moving and ill-defined that the same altered consciousness can be experienced if one is in the mood for that sort of thing. I love that piece. There’s an essay here somewhere about the elements of the Messiaen compared to Reich…but it isn’t going to happen here.

Wanda’s participation in the Reich piece was reason enough to hang in there, and my impression is that the piece was going very well and was being wonderfully preformed as everything on the program was. Her other performance was in George Crumb’s Unto the Hills. I can’t find a cogent description of the piece, but it is very simply a setting of Appalachian songs familiar to many with an accompaniment that is vintage Crumb. Anyone that’s heard Joan Baez’ early work will recognize the tunes, and anyone that’s heard any of Crumb’s music will recognize the style. How they work together is a mystery, but they do. Wanda sang beautifully and with all the simplicity and stylistic integrity that the songs demand. It was a treat.

The other decidedly non-minimal piece was a very effective duo for Eb clarinet and violin called Genshi, by Mark Gresham. It certainly had minimal elements but it wasn’t about that at all. It was performed wonderfully…its a clever piece and worth hearing again. He was at the performance.

As to the New Dischord concert, all I can say is that Tim Hinck is a one man wrecking crew…I don’t really know how he wound up in Chattanooga…maybe his bio will tell..but he is one helluva pianist and composer. The concert was mainly his show and it went pretty well, I thought. This kind of thing was rare in Chattanooga when I was there, but that city supports some pretty forward-looking artistic stuff. Barking Legs and Shaking Ray Levis have thrived there for many years and this concert tapped into that vibe. It took place at The Well venue on Rossville Ave. That’s not tied to the community organization..but is, rather, a church. Its a nice small place with a very good acoustic for small group music. The concert itself wasn’t as professionally done as what Atlanta offers, of course, but it was quite good..not at all wasted time. Niky’s performances were fine..the pieces were interesting enough, and the atmosphere was informal. We’ll look forward to hearing more music from that organization.

Our visit with Chuck and Ardian Totten was very nice…the main musical event was meeting up with Art Jennings again. We’ll look forward to being with that group again. Very smart and warm. Chuck and I played golf at Nob North…it was hot…and it was mediocre. I found that what I once thought is still true: Nothing tastes better on a hot golf course than plain ol’ Budweiser, and golf course hot dogs taste way better than they have a right to. All in all a fun day. Jan picked me up on the way home and we traveled down 75 glad to be back.

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