constant narrator

Happy Holi!

(full flickr set here)

Tonight I went to a concert at the UT School of Music featuring concert cellist Bion Tsang who is in residence there as a teacher. I heard about the show at the last minute and what drew me to it was a piece by Tan Dun, the composer of the Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon soundtrack. Tan does some really interesting things with percussion and this was the first time the piece, Snow in June, was to be performed in Austin. Tsang performed four very different works during the concert but the first half of the performance was much better than the second.

The first piece was breathtaking: Chaconne in D minor for two celli by Bach. Tsang played it with his wife, Amy Levine-Tsang, who is also a concert cellist. It was gorgeous and gave me goosebumps. It was also strange and moving to see a couple play it together. They gave each other sly glaces and nods, as if they were discussing nookie in front of the kids.

The second piece was Snow in June, which was performed with four percussionists, 65 odd instruments, a fair amount of newspaper and several sets of rocks. The instrumentation was awesome – I’ve never seen a marimba, vibes or xylophone played with wire brushes and the sound was incredible. The mallet texture kept changing from soft to thin-hard to thick-hard to metallic to hand-beaten. It was amazing how all these different sounds were drawn out of the instruments. The piece definately felt like a thematic forerunner to the CTHD score, lots of sliding notes and constantly playing with Asian scales but always with one foot firmly in a Western understanding of tonality. Tsang is a wonderful cellist and played beautifully. The percussion ensemble was hard working and having fun with the piece and I’ve now discovered a great marimba player in town, Thomas Burritt. The percussion ensemble at UT will be performing this piece again on Tuesday February 20th. I enjoyed it so much I may go again and try to bring some friends.

Oh little loney blog, I’m sorry. If I’d known how truly easy it was to export my Moveable Type’s mysql database and import it into WordPress after that 1-click install through Dreamhost, I would have done it a year ago. But no, I’m lazy and fear the technology. Which is funny, being that I design it. Ha ha. Not really.

At any rate, I’ve now converted which means I can actually deal with the evil spamcommenterfucks and write here without having to close comments and delete 1273 comments linking to casinos, v1agrA! and hoooo-deeyah.

Now that I’m over the job-quitting > contract/job-hunting > intense contract > job-offer contemplating > job-offer accepting > two holiday weeks hosting the family > suddent trip to San Francisco > starting new job, I should be writing more. For the three of you that care. Yay!

Next major project: the apartment. After I settle into the job for another week or two.

Having the luxury of not having to go to work in the morning, I stopped by I Love Video to peruse their collection. Not only did I bring home a VHS copy of Ang Lee’s first film Pushing Hands which I have been looking for forever, I also grabbed Round Trip because I’m trying to be more spontaneous in the foreign film section lately.

Round Trip is a 2003 Israeli movie in Hebrew and English about Nurit, a mother and bus driver who leaves her husband and takes her two kids from their small northern town to Tel Aviv. Upon getting there she finds it hard to care for them and so starts looking for a nanny that will work for room and board. Enter deliciously beautiful Mushibi, a Nigerian immigrant who sews clothes, works nights cleaning at a hospital and has a son in Nigeria. A relationship blossoms between the two and of course all sorts of complications ensue. The plot isn’t fabulously original, but the movie itself is lovely.

What I really liked is how low to the ground it is. It seems to have a fairly low budget and focuses on people who aren’t anywhere near making ends meet doing what they must to get by. It has excellent acting and characters that aren’t necessarily easy to like. All of this is rare in an American film so it’s refreshing. It’s worth checking out.

I just back from Iowa where my brothers and I threw an enormous and fabulously fun surprise party for my Mom’s 70th birthday. She had no clue.

I have never lied so much in my life.

M and I flew in on Friday, and after a series of “mishaps” (and the most anxiety-ridden morning I can remember) lured her to Iowa City for “lunch” with my brother and his partner. There she opened the door to the Iowa River Power Restaurant to find all my brothers (from all corners of the country), their partners, grandkids, foster-brother and their kids and 70 friends hooting and blowing horns and making noise. It was awesome. I have never seen my mom so speechless for so long. She then proceeded to bawl, get a glass of wine and promptly kiss a handsome young waiter on the lips. My goodness!

I was so proud of all her her friends for not spilling the beans, as they’re all phone hounds and talk to her for hours on end. They were wonderful! The food was awesome, drinks were awesome, the weather was awesome, cake was awesome, it just completely kicked ass. My brother Andrew is a rockstar event planner!

Mom has spent the last few days reliving it with me and her zillion friends on the phone. I think it will give her something happy to chew over for a while.

It took a lot of work and time. We love her, she’s worth it.