Arts
The Arts section of Orient Lodge
Harpeth Rising, The Foresters, and Almost Famous
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Sat, 04/14/2012 - 13:41I realize that what kids are interested in often changes from their pre-teen years to their interests in high school, college, or their first careers. I also don't want to be one of those parents with all kinds of expectations on my pre-teen. Yet recent events have caused me to think of Fiona's Radio Show in terms of the movie Almost Famous.
IMDB describes the story line as:
William Miller is a 15 year old kid, hired by Rolling Stone magazine to tour with, and write about Stillwater, an up and coming rock band.
Well, last night we took Wesley over to the Bethany Dog Park, where Fiona ran into some members of the band, The Foresters. Fiona got invited over to their house where she listened to the band practice, and toasted marshmallows. It was a wonderful mix of childhood fun of playing with dogs and roasting marshmallows, and the up and coming young writer hanging out with members of an up and coming band.
No, I don't think any of the kids were claiming to be 'golden gods', and instead of panic calls from the young journalist's mother, Kim was texting with the parents of the band members.
Fiona got home late last night, but was up in time to watch the World Premier of The Legend of Korra this morning, and then head off to the birthday party of a classmate. If we have enough energy, Fiona will switch back to her young entertainment journalist mode this evening to go hear Harpeth Rising this evening at The Buttonwood Tree.
So, I read through the quotes from Almost Famous, and try to find some words of wisdom, either from the young journalist's mother, or his mentor, to end off the blog post with, but in the end, what really matters is having fun, creating things, while trying to make the world a little bit better. So, I hope that Fiona is having fun at the birthday party and that we'll have fun this evening, soaking up some of the creative energy of a really great band.
Internet Avatar
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Thu, 04/12/2012 - 20:27Hardware, Software, Pixels, Sound. Long ago, the four nations lived together in harmony. Then, everything changed when marketers from the Pixel Nation tried to take over the Internet.
My daughters love the show, Avatar the Last Air Bender, and are eagerly awaiting the The Legend of Korra. Through the fan site, my eldest and youngest daughters watched the first two episodes. Afterwards, I told Fiona that she needed to work on her pixel bending. Later, I talked more about it, and it occurred to me that following the four elements of Avatar, there were four elements of the internet and video games.
Hardware, Software, Pixels, Sound. A good internet experience, or video game experience, is likely to be based on most, if not all of these elements. As I thought more about it, it seemed that each of these have long histories.
The Hardware Benders, are the craftsmen and artisans of ages ago. They were the blacksmiths, shoeing horses, later, creating sculptures, moved over to gear heads, ham radio operators, and folks building computers in their garages.
Then, there are the Software Benders. These are the writers, the poets, the bards. They've gone from creating experiences with words in ancient languages to using new languages like Java or C++.
The pixel benders are the painters, from the caves of France to the post-impressionists, and on through photography, videography and animation.
And of course, the sound benders are the musicians from their didgeridoos to their digital synthesizers. The internet experience and the video game experience brings together all of this.
Perhaps this provides a useful way to help get youth to work on their pixel bending and sound bending.
Dominic
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Mon, 03/26/2012 - 19:33Dominic (Black paint on White Canvas) from a poem by e.e. cummings as set to music by Vincent Persichetti.
Recently, I was driving to work, listening to the news on the radio, when a nice turn of phrase caught my ear. It made me think about words as art. Words have always been my preferred media, and much of my writing can be seen as a sketchbook.
When I think of art, I think of form and I think of function. It seems like most words these days are focused on function. Make money online. Try to convince someone of a point of view, or at least preaching to the choir, but where is the form, where is the beauty?
Yes, there is poetry, which is perhaps the closest we get to words as form over function. e.e.cummings was a master of this. It was probably in junior high school that I was in a chorus that performed the poem Dominic by e.e.cummings, put to music by Vincent Persichetti. Mixing media even more, I imagine it as black paint on white canvas.
Today is Robert Frost's birthday, another poet I grew up on. His words have often caused me, not to stop and think, but to stop and ponder, the way I've pondered great paintings in a museum. Trying to use words to describe those words seems to bring us to literary variant of Gödel's incompleteness theorem.
Perhaps the closest I can get of bringing together all of these thoughts is the seventh proposition of Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus,, "Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent".
Dominic.
The Hunger Games
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Sun, 03/25/2012 - 13:19I clicked on Google News and found the top Entertainment story today to be "The Hunger Games", raking in over $155 million on its opening weekend. I glanced at other news. The shooting of tribute Trayvon Williams by tribute George Zimmerman was up at the top of the list, followed by the shooting of at least 16 civilians by a U.S. soldier in Afghanistan. Also, fourteen members of the rebellion, err, Occupy Wall Street, were arrested in New York. (Would that be in the 13th district?)
No, I have not read the books or seen the movie. I've just read enough of the reviews and heard enough discussions to mix things up a little bit. Yet this gets to the bigger question, why is The Hunger Games resonating in our society the way that it is? Likewise, as I mentioned in a previous blog post, why is the book being banned by some teachers?
Is it gratuitous violence that is desensitizing tweens to violence, or is there something more pernicious, a strong woman (what Limbaugh would call a slut), coming to recognize oppression and seeking to find ways of beating the oppressors at their own game?
Is it really like the reality television shows that some have compared it to, a twenty first century version of the panopticon? Or, is there something bigger going on, akin to social media where we all become both the watchers and the watched, where our status updates, tweets and blog posts become a performance in which we seek to outwit the oppressors the way Katniss seeks to outmaneuver her oppressors?
RIP Eric Lowen
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Sat, 03/24/2012 - 12:38I remember the first time I met Eric Lowen. It must have been at the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival back in 2005. He was getting around the muddy fields pretty well back then, just using a cane. But we all knew what was coming. He had told us, thousands of fans sitting on a hill in front of the Main Stage. Eric Lowen had been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's disease.
Over the coming years, we watched as it progressed; the wheelchair, his difficulty playing the guitar, and then he stopped trying to make it through the mud. His long time songwriting partner, Dan Navarro still came to Falcon Ridge. He'd call up Eric on his cellphone and Eric would great his friends and fans from afar.
Eric confronted ALS the way any great music or great artist confronts a challenge and worked hard in the battle against ALS as exemplified in the video, Learning to Fall
Last night, Dan posted on his Facebook page,
At 5:13 pm Pacific time today, March 23, 2012, Eric Lowen peacefully ended his nine-year standoff with ALS (aka Lou Gehrig's Disease), surrounded by family and awash in love, gratitude and beautiful music. We all appreciate the support and well wishes that have come his way these many years, and will always hold dear the shining example he was, and still is, to us all.
I've written blog posts about family members who have passed on, and while Eric is not blood family, he's family in another sense. He is part of the family of people who love music, get together at places like Falcon Ridge, and work towards making the world a better place.
He's part of the family that sings with Dave Carter,
This is my home, this is my only home
This is the only sacred ground that I have ever known
And should I stray in the dark night alone
Rock me goddess in the gentle arms of eden
Eric is now visiting Dave in the gentle arms of eden, and probably stopping off at the rock and roll heaven as well. The words of one of the most popular songs he and Dan wrote comes to mind,
Close your eyes and try to sleep now
Close your eyes and try to dream…we belong to the light
We belong to the thunder
We belong to the sound of the words
We've both fallen under…We belong together
