Dead white males
Part 1: the symphony
EVAN JOHNSON STAFF
Dead White Males is a new column, a futile and misguided attempt to “see what the big deal is” with some of the most revered portions of western civilization’s so-called “High Culture.” This week, in the first installment, I went to the symphony to see if it was as amazing as teen magazines make it out to be.
As part of the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra’s “Musically Speaking” series, the Music and Lovers program on Thursday, March 8 involved not only four delectable main-attractions from four highly revered composers, but also a buoyantly German host, in the form of Maestro Alexander Mickelthwate, who treated the audience to a number of helpful excerpts and explanations in order to better contextualize, historically and esthetically, the evening’s musical choices.
First up was Tchaikovsky’s “Romeo and Juliet, Fantasy Overture,” which was immediately accessible and affecting, jam-packed as it is with beautiful and familiar melodies. I found its “fighting theme” more compelling than its “love theme,” though, as the latter has simply suffered from cultural overkill: you hear it in everything from margarine commercials to car alarms. Plus, I’d much rather be stabbed to death with a rapier than have to fall in love again.
Next came two portions of Richard Wagner’s “Tristan und Isolde” (the Prelude and the Liebestod), a “difficult” and “important” piece of music that initially left me confused and unmoved, though when I went home and listened to it repeatedly, it gradually and retroactively became the evening’s most startling and superior work. Anyway, the difficulty I had shed some light on what Edgar Wilson Nye once said to Mark Twain: “Wagner’s music is better than it sounds.” And the endlessly quotable Nietzsche once queried “Is Wagner a human being at all? Is he not rather a disease?” Well, Wagner has put his disease in me; as long as we all understand “disease” to refer to a love of his music and not approval of his contemptible and well-documented anti-Semitism. After a whisky-befogged intermission, Maestro Mickelthwate led the symphony through the fun and cheeky “Tangazo,” by Argentinean tango-master Astor Piazzolla. Though not as white or dead as the other composers featured in the program, Piazzolla’s number was delightful from the get-go, though it seemed like everyone was having a little too much fun. This is the symphony, not Chuck-E-Cheese. Let’s keep our dignity.
The night ended with Frenchman Maurice Ravel’s (in)famous “Bolero,” a crowd favourite and certified “hoot,” in which a single melodic line begins with a whisper and repeats endlessly as it works its way through the orchestra. Though some listeners are no doubt bored and annoyed by the song’s repetitive nature, I found, tone-deaf as I am, that 16 minutes is just long enough for me to wrap my brain around a simple melody. According to Wikipedia, the song is often jokingly referred to as “the world’s longest crescendo,” though I think that joke is more offensive than funny. Really Wikipedia, grow up.
The program for the evening suggested that I would also be treated to Claude Debussy’s “Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune” (in English: “Goat-man’s Saturday afternoon sex-romp”) but apparently time ran short and it had to be cut, which is too bad, because as French Impressionist composers go, Debussy makes Ravel look like Ralph Vaughan Williams. Burn!
The word symphony, broken down to its roots, means “with/together” and “sound,” so it’s highly disappointing, etymologically anyway, that during the concert my loud humming, whistling and chair-drumming was met with such hostility at Winnipeg’s Centennial Concert Hall. Apparently there’s a whole different set of social mores to be observed when at the symphony, so if you’re used to the vulgar, brainless barbarism of sporting events, “rock” concerts, and poetry readings, you’ve got some catching up to do. Here are four helpful tips:
1. People: leave your burritos at home.
2. If engaging in “heavy petting,” please be discreet.
3. Think you can just walk up onto the stage and laugh at fat tuba guy? Think again. (You can’t.)
4. Bring your 3D glasses if you want, but it won’t make the experience any trippier. Common mistake.
Dead White Males returns next Wednesday, as features editor Dylan Ferguson heads to the ballet to see what all that pirouetting crap is about. Says Ferguson: “I had my pundit’s cap dry-cleaned, I beefed up on all the issues facing contemporary society, and I was ready to cast my vote, make my voice heard, and get high on sweet democracy! Then somebody told me the ‘t’ was silent. Damn. Looks like I’m going to have to get drunk instead.” See you then.
