Fiesta 2.0: More Adventures of the Trio

It was a bitter cold January evening when the trio came together to celebrate Fiesta 2.0 on the return of one of our members to this country. The wind was strong and the moon was full.

Our original plan was to go to the Palisadium Restaurant DaeWon as part of an ongoing playful project of making a movie, and the great food. I had been to Daewon several years ago, a magnificent Korean restaurant overlooking the Hudson. Spectacular! We had talked about this adventure for several weeks. When we called for reservations, we learned that it had closed about a year ago! Not to be dissuaded, we thought we would go to Wonju II restaurant in Edgewater, in a ferry sitting on the Hudson River with a glamorous view of New York City. A review had described this Korean Restaurant as a good experience and the tables might sway a little, not from too much Soju, but from the ferryboat swaying gently with the river currents. This seemed the perfect answer to our dashed hopes of Daewon, even more romantic and a perfect place for our Fiesta. We call it Fiesta 2.0 because we had our first Fiesta more than a month ago when a different member returned from being out of the continental United States. After we had agreed upon this new destination, one in our trio learned from a Korean Cab driver that Wonju II had been out of business for a couple of years. This was beginning to seem like a conspiracy. Two prime Korean restaurants with outstanding food, locations and views were no longer in business!

Since our trio consists of aficionados who relish good Korean food, we are always on the lookout for Korean places that are excellent and unusual. Our criterion for the Fiesta is that we should try some place new. We felt there had to be something worthy of a Fiesta in New Jersey, so we decided to try Dong Bang Grill. What a great find! Located not far from the George Washington Bridge, this restaurant provides an elegant setting with etched glass panels and several dining rooms, along with a beautiful sushi bar. At first it was hard to appreciate the elegance we had stumbled upon, because there was no parking anywhere near the restaurant, and being from Texas, I have trouble with the concept of valet parking. Finally my friends persuaded me that this was the only alternative, but we were still faced with fierce winter gusts that cut to the bone as we left the car and headed for the entrance.

Every table is well appointed and arranged to create an open friendly atmosphere. There are windows that look to the East, including the bridge and upper NYC. After gaining entrance, we went up the stairs and were immediately ushered to a beautiful table near the wall with etched glass panels.

We were ready for a special feast, and the ambiance of the space welcomed us. With the barbecue grill in front of us, we were soon warming up to the prospects of the evening. My companions are much more knowledgeable than I about the nature of the menu, and soon they were conspiring to orchestrate the evening with an array of foods calculated to create an unforgettable sequence.

The first barbecue we had which was not marinated was SAENG GALBI: No frills just all natural 100% Black Angus beef short ribs, followed by DongBang GALBI : Beef short ribs in DB's own authentic marinade. Our soup was SAENGTAE JIGAE, a fresh pollack fish casserole with vegetables. The side dishes were like mini-feasts, plentiful and little taste excursions in their own right.

Perhaps the crowning moment for me was the discovery of OB, the premiere Korean beer. In general I have not been a beer drinker as my father prejudiced me against wanting to taste it by saying to me when I was very young that beer tasted awful, and as far as he was concerned "they could have left it in the horse."

OB had such a compelling taste that I could have stayed all night and drunk myself under the table, but fortunately I had friends who were more sensible. We drank a toast to Fiesta 2.0, to the new year and to the realization of our great and future dreams.

Looking across our neighboring tables we saw CHA DOL BAEGI, thin sliced sirloin steak with no marinade. Since I have never tried it, my friends decided we should conclude our meal with this third and final main course, which was a good decision since good things usually come in threes. We were not disappointed, but I discovered that we had to eat the steak as soon as it left the fire so it would not dry out.

We wanted to go somewhere for dessert and thought there would have to be some great places in Fort Lee, but our waitress knew of none and suggested we drive along main street. We did, and I can tell you that there is nothing grimmer than Main Street in Fort Lee after 10 p.m.

Instead, we went to a wonderful dessert place in Palisades Park, Fruit Gelatoria on Broad Avenue. It appears to be one of the few places in New Jersey that remains open until midnight. One of the attractive features of this Gelateria is that they make their own gelato and yogurt. The selection was extensive and delicious. I tried the mango gelato and my friends had yogurt. The yogurt was the best I have tasted, worth a drive to Palisades Park anytime. Even Fiestas have to come to a close, and although we teased each other about going to the city, I think we were willing to call it a Fiesta.

Outside, the winter evening had crept toward midnight, and the wind was still blowing, but a little less insistent. Inside, we were closing the Gelatoria, as we were the only remaining customers, and they had started to stack the chairs and sweep the floors.

Walking out into the night, I was struck by the silence of the brittle winter air; our celebration seemed punctuated by the full moon so luminous above us.

All in the Voice

Once long ago, when I was set on becoming a composer and fancied myself as a cross between Gershwin and Brahms, I became hopelessly lost over a failed romance, as is expected of overly romantic adolescents. It was the classic rejection. I was smitten by Amanda, but she was less than enthusiastic about me since she already had a hunk of a guy who was on the football team. Amanda was a stunning redhead, who could play the piano inside out and had legs that were the stuff that make movie stars.

I was so distraught, I wandered the city for days. I didn't eat. I ended up late one night on the roof of a parking garage, looking at the city lights, winking as though in reply to the twinkling stars of an exceptionally bright Texas night. Inexplicably, or perhaps predictably, I collapsed. I awoke in a hospital and for some odd reason the doctors thought I had appendicitis and had removed my appendix. My parents had been summoned and they drove 120 miles to see what their son had been up to. The Chair of my department came to see me and showed genuine concern and understanding. I was in a state of bewilderment at this turn of events from unrequited love.

This culminated the day before Thanksgiving. I could not travel home. The doctors released me to the university infirmary. Infirmaries at that time had notoriously low level security so I left the infirmary and found my way to the practice rooms to see if this adversity conjured any masterpieces for me. It had not, but there were snippets of ideas and I played somewhat feebly because the wrapping around my body securing the stitches was so tight.

A woman that I recognized as an alto from the choir came into my practice room.

"What are you doing here? It's Thanksgiving..." Dorothy seemed puzzled, but sympathetic.

"I just had my appendix out, and I can't travel home."

She insisted that I spend Thanksgiving with her family. She was married and had a small daughter. I tried to protest, but she was insistent.

So I went along and was well taken care of and quickly came to adore her daughter, who it turned out was struggling with remarkable courage and cheerfulness although disabled with cerebral palsy.

Days later Dorothy was asked to sing a solo in the choir. When I heard her sing, I was blown away. I had never heard a voice such as this, so resonant and rich that it seemed to emerge from and fill the room. That voice was the inspiration for many songs including one about her daughter, "Always Be My Sweet Little Girl."

I never heard a voice like that again for years until recently I heard someone singing a foreign folksong and the resonance filled the space with a radiance of sheer sound that overwhelmed my senses, much the way a fine liqueur permeates the tongue with intense taste. I was actually stunned to hear such a voice again, as I thought I never would.

The true source of identity is through the voice. The voice begins from the breath in the center of body and is released to the air in a moment of definition. Drawn inward, released outward to the world. Our word "personality" comes from the Latin "per sonare" meaning to speak through. The reason the Greeks wore masks in their dramas, is that they believed the true essence of the character came through the voice, hence the characters in the play were known as dramatis personae.

Somehow in hearing this voice I felt touched by the presencing of identity embodied in the sonority of singing so profound that its essence seems etched immutably in the inward chambers of my permanent awareness.

Naomi Tarantal and the Art of Felting

Felting is the art of transforming garments and materials into works of art. It is an ancient art and appears to be enjoying a revival.

Naomi Tarantal is a visual artist who has worked with many media, and she now finds herself drawn to felting. She recently exhibited her work as part of a Collective at New York University, and her work occupied two windows of NYU Skirball's Windows Gallery located on La Guardia Place. This is a wonderful forum for public art, available 24 hours a day during the exhibit under changing conditions of daylight and night time. Inevitably viewers will also see their reflected images in the window and passing traffic, adding additional layers to the experience.

As the artist points out, she likes the setting with the overlapping sounds and images from the environment because it resonates with the art of felting which utilizes layers as an essential element.

This video interview took place on a crisp January day near the end of the exhibit just after a light snowfall.

Sleepless in Serenity

Here I am in the middle of exhaustion, trying to figure what holds me from sleep... What is this nightly battle that has emerged as a more and more perplexing mystery? It has nothing to do with worry. I am beyond worry. It has nothing to do with ideas racing through my mind refusing to abdicate to quiet serenity. I can be serene, yet sleepless.

In some way I have forgotten how to go to sleep. There is something about sleep that is similar to losing consciousness, but not the same. Actually we are slipping into a different realm of consciousness when we sleep. Sleeping has something to do with dreams, but it is far more eloquent than the sleep center monitoring that counts the REMs (Rapid Eye Movement) to somehow measure the quality of sleep.

So I lie in bed, trying to blank my mind, debating right side, left side, or back, and remembering that I never used to have that debate, so that is different. The radio drones at low volume like a sleep machine. No help.

I have this rich vocabulary of dreams remembered, that once served as an entry point to sleep: a huge house on an estate that I had access to, many rooms that were remote and secret floors that were mysterious spaces where I could make miracles. Another dream was a magnificent block in some suburban place that had urban structures and a mysterious Gothic church sitting on the back corner of the block that seemed dark and daemonic in the midst of urban/suburban glamor. Another dream was a mysterious old building in New York City that was a five story walkup, and I was always drawn to the fourth floor. And of course, I have the classic dreams, the top floor of a building that no one knows about or the second basement that only I had access to.

These dream locations were once portals when I knew how to sleep. Now they are locales, maybe sources for a film script that could launch a wild and imaginative narrative.

The way one proceeds through day after day of sleepless nights is an intriguing experience. Somehow I manage to ignore that I didn't sleep, and my engagement with projects pulls me through the hole of haziness to a clear and lucid state where a new energy is generated through the power of the imagination and new ideas.

I write this entry as an act of sleeplessness... it is a testament to an obsession that ripples through my reality and defines an encounter with the serenities of the night.

Ira Antelis A Natural Winner With Vonnegut Musical: Between Time and Timbuktu

For me, Ira Antelis, was something like Roy Hobbs, the wunderkind of baseball in Bernard Malamud's The Natural, who suddenly disappeared, only to reappear to finally follow his dreams late in life. That metaphor only applies to the way the Antelis was in my life. I saw him as a student, who I also asked to do some teaching because he was so talented. At that time he was writing incredibly successful jingles and was poised for a career in Hollywood as the next big film composer (at least in my mind and fantasy). Then he disappeared from my experience.

Mysteriously, about a year ago, he surfaced in my life through FaceBook. He has been, of course, alive and well, very successful with music production and composing in Chicago. Ira visited New York on business, and we got together for brunch to catch up. He said somewhat casually that he was writing a new musical based on materials by Kurt Vonnegut.

This new work, Between Time and Timbuktu, was showcased at a reading on Thursday, January 14, to a packed audience at The New 42nd Street Studios. This truncated 90 minute version of the musical had an outstanding cast and was enthusiastically received. Timbuktu deserves its chance for a place in the sun, and maybe it will get it.

Based on materials drawn from several Vonnegut sources, Between Time and Timbuktu was originally a television play in 1972 that served as a satire on human freedom and the power of the imagination. As a musical, the materials are folded into a narrative that is sensitive and aptly paced by a skillful and varied score. The musical direction by Jason DeBord was outstanding, beautifully nuanced in a studio setting where such details are difficult to achieve.

Antelis's music serves to elevate the text, adopting a more traditional Broadway style that is a little bit Sondheim, a little bit Rodgers and Hart, and a lot Ira Antelis. The reading was presented with very little dialogue. The music moved the action, and certainly that should continue to be the direction for Timbuktu's narrative design.

Jeremy Dobrish managed to incorporate the materials from the larger domain of the full script and score to fashion a 90 minute, non-stop version that at times seemed a little disjointed. This almost always occurs when a work is truncated, and the problem is compounded when many disparate sources are drawn upon and sculpted to fit together.

Dobrish's direction created a cohesion that some how mitigated the disjointed structure, achieved by a sense of an ensemble performance by the cast, all of which were highly talented, full of energy, and focused for this reading. Gregg Edelman's "everyman" performance as the non-descript hero who wins a jingle contest that launches him into an outer space rendezvous with a distant constellation, eloquently blends the elements of victim and hero and elicits our sympathy and concern. Anita Gillette's comic profile as his mother is effective and at times outlandish...just as intended. Matt Cavanaugh threads his way through the work as the contest announcer who often establishes continuity, at times a little too high-keyed for the space we were in, but adds a deft touch of panache and style. The character of Bokonon may be a bit of a cliche from the 70s, but Cassady Leonard is somehow able to transcend this with a certain sense of wonder and fun. Highlight of the reading is Robert Cuccioli as Dr. Paul Proteus, on trial because of his belief in the human spirit and the destiny of man. His performance was riveting and elevated the moment beyond that of a reading.

Andrew Barrett's lyrics are remarkable. He catches the spirit and rhythm of Vonnegut almost better than Vonnegut. The lyrics manage to transform the TV adaptation into a an entirely new work and unifies the material. What emerges is structure and content that would make Vonnegut proud.

Ira Antellis is clearly engaged in a labor of love. In some ways the music is too good, too overwhelming, too many hits, too many highs, but this may just be the aftermath of a 90 minute extrapolation of the material. There is also a bit of a formulaic feeling to the some of the work, the comic relief song, the ballad, and the final piece, the title song, is a wonderful conception, designed to be the singable hit, but it comes too late, and I wonder if this kind of ballad still works on Broadway. But this show is in the tradition of Broadway at its best, so it's worth a try. I suspect the context may change as the show develops. There is no doubt that Antelis has a gift for melody and for music as narrative. He is as good and better than most that have had tremendous success on Broadway.

Most musicals go through radical transformations from first readings to Broadway. Here's hoping this material evolves as it should into such a hit that I can say I blogged about it before it was so well-known, and that I knew Ira Antelis when...

FIESTA on Eighth Street

There is this trio of friends that somehow seemed to materialize out of nowhere. As such they are often involved in things together, or follow parallel paths that define a singularity of purpose. These things sometimes evolve out of human experience, and there is no real logical explanation. But it is a rare and exquisite experience that you should cherish whenever and however it happens.

As it turned out during the holidays, one of the trio went out of the country, so upon return, we decided to honor the homecoming by indulging ourselves with our own fiesta, which suggests partying --- with lots of great food. Fiesta can be any festive occasion, and of course it is closely related to a feast. A feast is more than just food, it is defined as a "rich and abundant meal." And a Fiesta also implies a celebration, perhaps including dancing and singing, or musicing... and in this case our creative response was in a metaphysical context of a feast so sumptuous that we were somewhat overwhelmed.

The other of our trio suggested a new restaurant known simply as 8st Kitchen on eighth Street in Manhattan. We knew from Internet descriptions that it would be unusual, but we could not have designed on our own a more appropriate venue for our special fiesta. It was as though our friend had some intuition about how elegantly this Asian Bistro would create a special ambiance for our celebration.

8st Kitchen's cuisine is Korean, but served in small courses, French style, so that the emphasis is on tasting and savoring the moment. We began with a cocktail, Pear Soju, mostly because I am a fanatic about Soju in the same way that Toad was obsessed with motor cars in The Wind in the Willows. My friends indulged me and my madness.

We ordered a sparkling water, TAU, which is an ancient Welsh word that means "to be silent" --- quietly exhilarating in its taste, obedient and supportive as a companion to the meal. TAU is meant to be tasted, savored, slowly.

Our host and waiter was Jung-min Kim who transformed our experience into an event that might have been worthy of a Disney theme park. Every dish was presented with painstaking detail and arduous enthusiasm by our host.

Our first dish was Wan Ja Jon, bite-sized patties of beef so delicate and delicious that they seemed to melt in your mouth. The food was so tantalizing we had to deliberately slow our pace. The others of the trio put together a sequence of dishes, so the tasting experience emerged like a musical score.

The second dish was Chung Po Mook Moo Chim, a green-lentil jelly with vegetables and wasabi. It served as a delicate transition from the opening to the third course, Ba Ssak Bul Go Ki Gui, sliced Kobe rib-eye, with a flavorful sauce. This was a powerful middle section, masterfully orchestrated, deep lavish taste with lush texture.

The fourth dish and movement of this culinary suite was O Jing O Bok Keum, stir fried squid with noodles, serving to connect us to the Finale, Bo Ssam, pork belly with
pickled cabbage, daikon salad and oyster (photo by Joe DStefano), a masterpiece of collected tastes that topped off a truly memorable feast.

Our host provided a complimentary Soju drink made of richi, that served as a cadenza to the coda: another gift from the Kitchen, Dae Goo Jon, lightly pan-fried cod fillets brought to us as a surprise. This was a substantial coda worthy of our meal, introducing new tastes, but reminding us of themes from earlier courses.

Our Fiesta was not yet done. We proceeded to a small intimate concert space nearby where a composer was premiering a string duo, a trio with violin, cello, and clarinet, and an electronic sound score. This provided a sonic feast of sounds, giving some chance to refresh the senses, to realign ourselves from our sense of taste and touch, to a heightened sense of sound.

We capped the the evening at bar and restaurant, Murphy and Gonzales, which was both upbeat and low-keyed---whatever you wanted to make it. We ordered drinks (of course) and Mexican appetizers in keeping with our fiesta as a convivial fanfare to welcome the return of our friend.

Sudden Fiction: I Am Come to Create Order

She came into his presence almost magically, as though she had suddenly appeared from nowhere. Her eyes were gleaming, and she smiled to confirm her presence.



Surprised, he acted as though he had witnessed a miracle. Her arrival was a mystery. For hours he had wished to see her. He had fantasies of how she would materialize, but these dissolved in the premonition that she would not come.



She was curiously silent, but her smile leapt across at him, invaded him. She removed her coat and scarf. He turned from the computer.

“I’m surprised to see you.”

“I told you I would come.”


Outside, a winter storm was blustery and scolded the windows with cold, furious gusts. But inside, the moment seemed to glow with expectation.


Their conversation was an exploration, an unfolding discovery. He knew that her speaking created clarity. He had been trapped in the intellectual baggage that often cluttered his work. He found her smile engaging, and the sound of her voice was like music. He recalled Fellini's 8 1/2 where the woman in white looked at the intellectual debris that engulfed the director and murmured, "I am come to create order."



He had an intuition that he had known her before in another time and place... but the karma was the same as now.


She thought she recognized him, but could not be sure. He was older than she remembered. He spoke through silence, and seemed to be waiting to be acknowledged as though he expected her to linger there a while. But she was embarked on a journey. She was living her life, her destiny.

He remembered how they met. He saw her from a distance, but knew instantly who she was and where she was going. He longed to follow her, but was trapped by coordinates set long ago. Their paths were briefly crossing. He wanted to stop Time. He wished that somehow he could know her forever.

How could two people from two unique worlds, so clearly different, share the same space, even for a moment?

He turned back to the computer.

Startled by a blizzardly burst against the window, he looked for the beautiful muse who had created such order from all the clutter.

No one was there.

A dream, a wishful thought, vanishing in the winds of winter.

From Both Sides Now

This is a time for reflection as we begin a new year and a new decade.

I remember a time ago when I felt invincible. I had energy and a spiritual sense that sustained me through everything. Much of this had been attained through incredible experiences including the mentoring by my Father, and an inspiring spiritual presence who touched inside me and transformed my health and my life. Also a meditative inquiry has served to inspire my actions and my being.

As my father aged, his philosophical perspective deepened, but he shared with me the angst that all of us feel since although we are born of communion, we die alone. The genius of our psyche is that somewhere in the depth of us we believe we shall never die. He described his growing angst as though he were walking in the sun and there was no shadow for everything was in front of him, bright and buoyant. But as he grew older the sun had passed overhead and now he saw his shadow growing longer and longer, merging into the unknown darkness that loomed ahead. My last time with my father as he lay dying, he hugged me from where he was lying in bed with such immense power and whispered "Goodbye, John... we have had such a beautiful adventure together." There was a pause... "It's time for me to go." I knew he didn't want to leave us, but he also believed it was not the end of his journey.

So now I have passed from the bright sun to the other side. I feel the lengthening shadow, and I am still in the throes of denial about my mortality. Even though death is seemingly alone, we are sustained by the community that defines us. In the past several years I had rationally planned for my own demise--- I felt the inevitability of the process and even created a time-line that dictated that I start to wrap things up. I was, as the Gershwin song puts it, "Just Biding My Time." No more songs from me. No need. I fully understood the "Hemingway Solution," an existential statement that underscored that we do have power to make a decision about our mortal destiny. Yet, I don't think this is the path for me.

While living out my abbreviated time-line, I focused on working with my younger constituents, of taking joy in their journeys, hoping that I might challenge them to discover their dreams and help them come true...an exciting time for me. I guess I couldn't know that this new community sustaining me would grow... there would be those whose energy and triumphs would inspire me, and I would find myself engaged in a renaissance of creativity, not quite so willing to surrender my mortality to a time-line of two to three years. A few became so close as to perhaps unknowingly reach deep inside of me and awaken the skills and creative energy that had always sustained me until recently. Having resigned myself to the loss of huge chunks of my work and abilities, recent encounters have awakened this inner world that I left abandoned. I found I still have things to say.

I still have songs to sing ---

In spite of silences

So long imposed by emptiness;

Sweet melodies

Still echo and twist

Through corridors long boarded up

And left abandoned.

I still have songs to sing ---

In spite of noises

So intense and interrupting;

Brave harmonies

Still assemble and bound

Beyond the walls so awkwardly erected

And left decaying.

I still have songs to sing ---

Although the world is deafened

And songs must linger in fading tones

Like declining half-life radiation

Dwindling to the aural dimensions

Deciphered only by the inward ear.

So I struggle within myself, for I know that inevitably I must pay the piper for this lovely twilight dance, my winter solstice sarabande. I am nourished by the Spring and Summer creatures so abundant and so full of vision and inspiration, who still dare to dream. The difference from my earlier days is that I was a loner then, but now I feel the need to share a dialogue where utterly new ideas and sensibilities can be born. This collaborative process and possibility has emerged in such a way that I am refreshed by the prospect of dialectic exchange.

I had something of a scare tonight on this first day of a new era, and I was abruptly reminded of my mortality. For a moment I wondered if I would see my friends again, and now the attack has passed. But I realize how sad I will be if I must leave these dear companions before I complete this cycle of renewal. But the joy and the amazement is in this moment and in the doing, in the immediacy of spirit, and the rapport with those close to me who value the journey as much or more than I. Yet, we are now in the midst of winter, and those that know me know how enchanted I am by snow...

Black Holes and The Hole in My Head

So the year is passing.

I can see it spinning and disappearing down a Black Hole which might be exactly how time renews itself, or how the years slip into parallel universes. Maybe it is just Alice and White Rabbit disappearing down the rabbit hole, life pursuing impossible adventures.

It wasn't long ago that it was suggested that Black Holes eventually evaporate into nothingness, which turned the world of physics upside down. There he sat in his wheel chair among his colleagues with that perpetual half-smile and said the math confirms it, prove me wrong. Hawking later declared that both views of physics were correct because of parallel universes. Tell me the emperor wears no clothes.

Of course, physicists had been content with a zero sum game. Ever since Einstein overturned Newton (or did he?), we knew that energy was converted into mass and mass into energy. But the universe could be dissipating into...well...nothing. Where's the fun in that?

Yet, although I'm no physicist, I think someone may eventually proclaim that the universe is multiplying... and it will be true, somewhere ...at least in a parallel universe. (Actually I am a closet physicist. When I was 9, I won a prize for a paper submitted to an international astronomy contest and I have been hooked ever since.) It seems plausible that mass and energy (all the same thing, just as space and time are the same phenomenon) are continuously and incessantly becoming and cycled through parallel universes which are also endlessly cloned. It is rather like wave forms generated from nothingness into somethingness.

I have a hole in my head. I got careless and ended up with the destruction of some grey matter. Physicians said it was minor. I accepted that for a very long time. That was well over a decade ago. I recently saw a picture of this hole in my head. It looked exactly like a Black Hole sitting there a little off center of the galaxy that is my brain. For doctors it is just a matter of brain cells, but I am not convinced.

The problem with the destruction of brain cells is that you can't be sure what you lost, because you just don't know. Now the doctors are great about rehab, but there all those subtle things that have disappeared: memories, names, faces, songs, lyrics, very fine muscle memory, and on and on. Not even the doctors really know how vast and subtle this loss really is... (they seem OK if you can touch your nose with both hands with your eyes closed), and I am thinking maybe that part of me has slipped down a Black Hole into a parallel universe somewhere.

Recently I met someone who had an effect of energizing me about facing my perceived loss. It is a little like the Big Bang all over again inside my head. So I started to try to find my way back to myself. What is really strange is when I encounter some artifact or document that obviously emanated from me, I don't recognize it except to know that somehow it is collected under my ownership.

Occasionally there are some breakthroughs where I recognize a filament on the edge of my past and begin to follow it, or rather it starts to pull me irresistibly to a new place. I feel like I am being pulled into that hole in my head and slipping through it into a parallel universe, familiar, but also very strange...and there they are...there are those lost moments, memories, and musics dancing along with me... Nothing may have been lost after all.

Don't get excited. No neurologist would ever give credence to what I am describing, but I would say don't knock a Black Hole until you've gone down one. Now I know why the White Rabbit was in such a hurry!

Looking in the Windows

Something has inspired me to return to a part of myself that I had shut out after a stroke more than ten years ago, feeling that I had closed the book on that part of my life. In meeting some friends and starting to share something of that remote time, I tentatively have tried to rebuild some vacant parts of myself.

It was rather like looking into windows of the past, except that most were covered and obscure. I wasn't sure what was there. It was a weird experience. I pulled out some scores and tried to read through them... it was very painful to look at music I once knew by heart, and now had to learn from scratch all over again... and not too well at that. My fingers had no memory. However, slowly I started to play a few songs, very haltingly with lots of errors. Frustrating! Then I lapsed into improvising, something that was once spontaneous, but now was halting and insecure.

The improvising started to flow and I felt something kindled and ignited. As I left my space and went out into the city, I found myself improvising a rhythm in my head...some lyrics...Walking by the windows of restaurants and coffee houses, I looked into the windows hoping to see someone I recognised. I have been thinking about composing a new theatre piece, and suddenly looking in the windows became an extended metaphor and a text emerged:

Looking in the window…
Looking for you there
Looking at the people
You're not anywhere.

Looking in the window
Looking for your face
Looking at the strangers
You're not any place…

Looking through the window
Trying hard to see...
Looking at the people
Looking back at me.

Through the glass, I see them
Laughing as they talk…
Wish that I could be them
Instead I have to walk
Searching in the windows
Looking for your smile...
All those endless windows
Detain me for a while...

Maybe you are somewhere
Waiting for my eyes
Sitting with the strangers
In your best disguise.

Looking in the window
Hoping I will find
You inside with people,
Smiling in your mind,
As though we shared a secret...
Knowing I must see
You, inside with people...
That's how it has to be,
Me, outside the window
No where else to go...
What at last I've found
You might never know...

Defeated by the window,
Touching through the pane,
Meeting you as always
In a far domain...
Parted by the window,
By the fate of Time's debris,
The magic of your presence
Somehow has set me free.

Views from the Bridges: Pioneer Internet Artists

A collaborative Internet Production produced in a classroom studio as an Internet experiment proved to be a highly creative project undertaken by Steinhardt graduate students in performing arts at NYU. The event was produced "world-wide" to a limited audience on December 15, 2009, and is a testament to the increasing effectiveness of self-contained user-friendly codecs for interactive creative work. Huddled around the equipment and launching their ideas into cyberspace, these creators seemed more like pioneers forging a path into the future of global collaborations. In the past, such activity required extensive technical support by an institution and an army of Internet2 ITS specialists. Instead, these artists were empowered to establish their own avenues of creative exchange via the Internet.

The artists began by discussing themes that might enable them to work independently while developing their ideas around a common thread of creative work. Their study had involved collaborative work throughout the semester with emphasis on technology and multimedia production, including the technical skills that enabled them to transform almost any space into a multimedia broadcast studio.

The artists consisted of Scott Berenson, Jane Blackstone, Sunmin Kim, JoEllen Livick, Laura Montanaro, Andrew Struck-Marcell, and Julie Song, with Dr. Chianan Yen serving as a technical consultant. Their chief technical Guru was composer and audio/video engineer Professor Tom Beyer. In attendance as an Internet audience was Synthia Payne, an educator, composer, and performer. Other collaborators participated via the Internet using iChat or Skype to join the scenes in the studios. These artists were Mariangeles Fernandez Rajoy, a producer and conceptual/visual artist from Buenes Aires; Ernesto Localle, architect and animator from Buenos Aires; N'seeka MacPherson choreographer and dancer, from Connecticut College in New London; and Ocarina performer SunYoung Mun and Technical Coordinator, SungHoe Ku from South Korea; Musicians Alex Nossa, electric bass, and Michael Scheideman, electric guitar connecting from Harlem; The School of Rock in Charlotte, NC and a graphic artist from Brooklyn.


The group developed a theme around the concept of bridges. There are physical bridges that connect people and land masses, but the Internet itself becomes a bridge that dissolves boundaries and connects people. This metaphor seemed to stimulate a number of ideas. The collaborateurs (this term was coined by JoEllen Livick and seems to serve as a descriptor very well) devised a working title of Views from the Bridges. Some discussion emerged about Arthur Miller's A View From the Bridge, and whether it might have any relevance to this Internet experiment. As it turns out, some of Miller's content was appropriated for Montanaro's work. With Scott Berenson serving as producer, each callaborateur then set about developing a multimedia scene with a target date to mount this creative work (without prior rehearsal) on the Internet December 15th.

Perhaps the most challenging aspect was to develop a schematic of how the Internet Broadcast would be set up, what equipment would be needed, what configuration would be used, and how collaborateurs would function during the set up, for the production as a whole, and for their specific scenes. Ultimately, these kinds of decisions set the criteria for the range of possibilities and improvisational alternatives during the production.

An effort was made to reduce the amount of stress by designing this event as a work in progress and to accept whatever challenges or impediments might arise, but to work through any problems as part of the creative process. Given the time frame, there was no time to rehearse with the distant collaborateurs, although a few quick connections were made as tests.

Six Scenes were developed with transitions between each scene improvised on the Tabla by Andrew Struck-Marcell. The scenes were:

Blocking the Box (Scott Berenson)
A View Beneath the Bridge (Laura Montanaro)
What's Up With Talking? (Jane Blackstone)
EtherSketch (JoEllen Livick)
Bridge of the Moments (Sunmin Kim)
Dreaming of Going to Korea (Julie Song)

During the performance, Jane Blackstone took on the role of moderator and M.C. Other collaborateurs worked at cameras, mixers, computers, or helping to manage scenes, as well as perform in scenes. All the artists were serving as videographers, musicians, composers, technologists, cable and adapter specialists, critics, and whatever. They managed to transform the room into a serviceable studio, despite the limited space.

Although the production has the trappings of a live-television studio production, the impact of the Internet participants transformed the space, making an interactive medium dramatically different than the more traditional media of theatres or concert halls. All of the connections with iChat and Skype worked remarkably well, and what was even more impressive, the connections were established within the time frame as needed without exception.

Julie Song improvised an additional connection by using her Air laptop to independently connect with her friends in Korea so they could view the production through her computer camera lens. The production computers were connected by Ethernet, but her laptop successfully connected with Korea with a wireless connection. This suggests a possibility for multiple simultaneous connections using many laptops with one-to-one connections that could be merged as a cohesive, unfolding, and spontaneous event.

An important component, although more silent than we would have wished (we lost the iChat connection at the end were not able to have a final group discussion) was "Synthia" Cynthia Payne aka Synthany, Artist and Educator, adept at audio and video production, editing, coordination, networked music improvisation, recording and event installation. She agreed to be our audience of one (although the other Skype/iChat connections added additional ambience). In discussing this idea with Synthia, we observed that when we have conducted these kind of on-line experiments before, the presence of even one person on the Internet expanded our sense of space and established a sense of a new and different medium. She understood this right away and remarked that the cyber connection seems to create extended space and time, altering our fundamental experience. Synthia appeared in our production as audience, sometimes on the main screem, the side screen, and most often as a perpetual resident on the ceiling.



The theme of bridges was quite successful. "Bridges" as a way of connecting, of crossing borders, of providing access, proved to serve as a prolific source of ideas and images. Also impressive was how these young artists produced everything from scratch in six weeks, including filming, editing, composing, and arranging for counterparts at distant locations and designing and setting up a multimedia environment that successfully worked as an Internet Broadcast Studio. There were lots of glitches, of course, but not really as many as might be expected. It was an experiment that tested the range of artistic expression in the context of engaging technology to enhance the expressive capacity of human activity.

A Collective Experience: Aytia/Matia: Sleep Cycles

At 155 Water Street on Friday night, at the foot of the Manhattan Bridge, in the heart of DUMBO (Down Under Manhattan Bridge Overpass), Aytia/Matia and PAVE presented Sleep Cycles, described as a work of the Collective Unconscious. If anything, it was a wake up call to the 21st Century that an emerging generation is shaping a new consciousness of artistic expression. In many ways the names of the works are not important. This new artist collective, made up visual artists, painters, performers, composers, videographers, audio technicians, light designers, created a space transforming Time into an ongoing, engaging, and commanding experience awash with mixed media and innovative ideas.

Imagine walking into a space of people immersed in visual arts and sound collages that do not compete for attention but contribute to the energy and immediacy of the moment. In the midst of the greetings and anticipation, a young man asleep on a bed appears engaged even though unconscious, and we wonder if perhaps we may be merely the contents of his dreaming. From the beginning, the event is performed as a multi-sensory experience; there are h'orderves in abundance and an open bar, and surrounding us are extraordinary paintings silently embracing us while sound collages fill the room with a subtle presence. We are not waiting for the performance to begin... it has begun and we are enveloped. A reverence for the union of artists and audience permeates our encounter as a palpable presence.

The sleeper awakens and moves from the space, we follow at the urging of an unembodied voice that invites us into a new space. The space is a little primitive, as though hastily contrived... three screens are around us ,and we face a performance space populated on the right and left by what seems to be a spectacular speaker system. Behind us are an array of tech tables fortified with special equipment for sound enhancement, video projection, and lighting. To the left is an enormous space masked by a fabric wall... through the fabric we can see lights that seem like distant stars ... a curtain dividing the space, adding to the mystery of the evening.

Gradually the performance emerges, a video projection of an abstract landscape submerged somewhere in our sleep cycles, ...the soundscape a swirling collage of sounds radiating energy and moments of repose... solo musicians and small ensembles populate the space with musical iterations that suggest that music is undergoing a radical transformation and we are in the midst of a revolution...

There are virtuoso performers such as trombonist William Lang playing Dillon Kondor's Sleep Spindles derived from a melody in the second movement of Webern's Symphony, and deconstructed through fragments that are as gestural as they are sonic. Conrad Winslow's Getting There was a powerful display of interaction, energetic and playful, compelling, performed by a trio composed of Gregory Chudzik, bass, Matt Donello, percussion, and Joshua Modney, violin. Bean Lear's Sea of Monsters, a work adapted from his folk musical Lillian, depicting Lear's on-going romance with the sea, portrays a panorama of underwater creatures in a mischievous and provocative work hauntingly performed by the ai ensemble comprised of Isabel Castellvi, cello, Matt Donello, percussion, Joshua Modney, violin, Alejandro Acierto, clarinet, and Vicky Chow, piano.

There is a break, a clearing... not the usual intermission but an extension of the experience... food and drink in abundance, and The Harry Belafonte Band that conjures and appropriates the past as a part of now...

We are invited back to the space and wear sleeping masks as part of a sensory deprivation experiment, where we listen to the music as it unfolds... the illusion is that it plays inside our heads while each of us create our own images and "lighting" in the enormous caverns of personal consciousness. I am caught up in the sounds of an orchestra that seems invented for the moment. The sounds are vividly present... and I realize as I listen that this is not a recording... the energy in the space is vivid... and as I remove the mask I see that the curtain to our left has been removed, and we are connected to a live orchestral performance that is positively incandescent under the baton of Conrad Winslow. The orchestra is performing Pyramid Scheme, four movements by Grayson Sanders that flow through three axis (X=4 aspects of natural sound, Y=arc of energy for each movement, Z=timbre):

I. Space/Wood
II. Fluid Motion/Water
III. Patterns/Air
IV. Clusters/Metal.

Here is a brief excerpt...which of course cannot do justice to the whole... but it is included here to underscore the ephemeral presence of the experience... even the shakiness of the image suggests an ambience of a fleeting moment, the orchestra is filtered through the audience but has an immediacy that evokes the power and energy of these intense musicians in concert... a sounding presence... spontaneous, amplified by human energy as well as the enhancement of technology.

There are touches of Webern, Schoenberg, minimalism, Stravinsky, Pop, Rock, film scores...but the work is not eclectic. Rather Grayson Sanders fuses these elements and others into a personal voice that is compelling and authentic. The orchestra performs with passion and conviction. I have the sense that the incredible, combustible energy permeating the space must have been similar to the early part of the 20th century when a young George Gershwin burst upon the New York Scene infusing the practices of Tin Pan Alley, Jazz, folk, symphonic and European music into a new distinct post-modern style that would revolutionize every cryptic corner of the musical establishment.

A word must be said about the musicians who were outstanding. The concertmaster, Amanda Lo, is to be commended for assembling a first rate ensemble with absolutely no redundancy. In addition, the producers of this evening should be acknowledged for the originality of their approach and what they managed to achieve. In the space of a day they converted a raw space into an artistic, mixed media collage that played out as a holistic experience for everyone. One suspects that this emerges from the shared vision of the collective's founders, composers Ben Lear and Grayson Sanders. Their achievement is almost epic and demonstrates the persuasiveness of their artistic vision.

This was an extraordinary evening, an inspired confluence of thinkers, dreamers, musicians, technicians, and artists providing a path for future work. We applaud the deep conviction of the artists to merge the performance and audience as a unified entity coalescing as the essence of the artistic experience.

Across the Ether

When the new work of Varèse spilled across the conventional musical scene of the early twentieth century, he found himself stumbling among the ruins of the 19th Century. He was a pioneer, inventing genres, exploring new sounds, and is acknowledged as the "Father of Electronic Music." His music established a new ethos, so that including Varèse's Ionisation as the finale of Across the Ether provides a metaphor of this work reaching across Time to make a sounding presence for a new and growing artistic awareness, a new manifesto.

Across the Ether was an Internet2 multimedia performance on November 1 among distant sites including New York University, University of California Santa Cruz, Stony Brook University, and Bergen Community College. The NYU portion of the performance was in Loewe Theatre at 35 West Fourth Street, but the presence of California, New Jersey, and Long Island permeated the space, transforming it into a new artistic medium that would have made McLuhan proud.

The performance, based on interaction, spontaneity, and improvisation, unfolded with the air of a happening of the 70s, but through connections that dissolved the borders separating the collaborators as they merged in mutual and simultaneous spaces at each location, parallel universes of artistic activity. The NYU space projected to three screens that merged live and processed images and mixed images and sound from the distant sites as part of the artistic presence of the event. Ionisation provided the finale as performed by the NYU Percussion Ensemble under the inspired conducting of its director, Jonathan Haas. To hear this work performed live is a sonic treat, and this masterwork sounded as fresh and innovative as it did more than half a century ago. After the curtain call, performers combined in an improvisation of music and movement that celebrated the idea of pioneers in a journey through a new medium. Even now Across the Ether serves as a permanent web archive of the event, where collaborators continue to post the various media and interactions that comprise the event.

To be sure there were technical difficulties. Connections were lost and regained, much like travelers on a journey to remote regions separated from their origins by vast distances. In this production space stretched across the continental United States and the performers learned firsthand that indeed, Space IS Time. The imaginations of musicians, actors, filmmakers, dancers, and creative technical collaborators formed a medium of exchange that produced extraordinary moments of chemistry, a fragile chimeric collage reaching across the ether in a project of discovery.

The Beauty of Control

Two National Treasures of Korea, Byung Ki Hwang and Myung Sook Kim, combined creative forces and visions in a performance at the Asia Society on Saturday that was an extraordinary expression of beauty and control. Both come from deep traditions of Korean artistry that are deeply embedded in cultural practices centuries old. Byung Ki Hwang's composition for the Gayageum is based on sanjo, a Korean practice that is never scored, while Myung Sook Kim's choreography and dance is grounded in Korean traditional dance which she infuses with contemporary overtones. Consequently each artist, firmly rooted in their traditions, create a work, Taintless Spring, that seems uniquely 21st century.

Central to the music and the dance is the extreme control present that allows the work to gradually emerge as a masterwork for these artists. Supported by Hyun Sook Park at the Gayageum (Byung Ki Hwang controlled the whole with the jang gu) and additional dancers Kyung Eun Park, Jin Il Bae, Jung Lee, Jung Rae Kim, and Ji Hye Chung, Taintless Spring explores the subtle depths of the four seasons, beginning with Spring which unfolds as slowly as ice melting on an early spring day, the shade of bamboo in the stillness of a summer day, the autumnal change that brings a sense of joy, and the winds of winter subdued by the descending snow.

The work seems predicated on the control of the dancers which mirror the finesse and control of the Gayageum with its exacting structure and subtle "after-tone" ornaments that which seem even more exquisitely varied than the human voice. Movement reflects stasis, where movement slowly sculpts space as though each moment is sublimely rich with meaning and meant to be savored.