Chopin piano recital

Patricia and I went to an all-Chopin performance at Katzen Hall (ASU campus) on Sunday night. (This was after a nice early dinner at the Z Tejas in Tempe - the chicken quesadilla and chile verde were fine indeed.) The premise was the 120th birthday of Arthur Rubenstein, who recorded mucho piano works by his Polish compatriot. Short lecture followed by a film of Rubenstein (which could have been shortened a bunch or skipped altogether). The playing was most enjoyable; we liked the faculty performer plus Ilia Ulianitsky and Helen Jing.

An extremely pleasant evening. Small crowd, which is hard to figure. Info on Rubenstein is here.

The Painted Veil

Patricia and I went to this movie on Saturday (January 20). Actually didn't intend to go to this movie but the time was convenient. Amazingly enough, this makes two movies in a row that I really liked.

In this one, an English bacteriologist is back home in London for a short visit. An immature but aging woman - heck, she was 25 and unmarried - is feeling family pressure to get married. So they're both feeling the clock ticking and get married. He loves her, but not vice versa. They go back to Shanghai where she misbehaves. As punishment, he volunteers to serve in a town ravaged by a cholera epidemic, and forces her to go along. In that setting, they are able to see the finer sides of one other.

I liked the leads (Naomi Watts and Ed Norton) and thought they did a great job. I actually cared that they might find some happiness, which I guess is what a good movie is supposed to do.

I liked the setting - 1920s China - with Nationalist overtones, anti-Western sentiment, etc. Great photography. Based on a novel by Somerset Maugham but I don't know whether it's faithful to the novel. I intend to find out. I guess there have been a couple previous movie versions, including one from the 1930s starring Greta Garbo and Herbert Marshall.

Finished a nice evening with a light supper off the bar menu at The Roaring Fork. A good place. Sometime we need to actually have a dinner there.

Enemies, A Love Story (Isaac Bashevis Singer, 1972)

Listened to this book on tape. Never read anything by Singer before and probably will try more. Very odd plot here. Polish Jew hides in a hayloft for three years during Nazi occupation. Had bad relationship with wife before this; the wife and his two children are shot in a Nazi camp. He marries the peasant/servant girl who fed him and sheltered him in the hayloft, and moves to New York (Coney Island). But he's not in love with her; instead is in love with the beautiful and mercurial Masha, who lives with her mother.

He lies to the peasant that he is a book salesman and needs to travel regularly; spends this time with Masha. Then his wife shows up in America - she had been shot but somehow survived. Somehow they have a very strong relationship after their experiences.

I can't say I've read anything quite like this. Interesting to have the perspective of camp survivors in America. Some of the dialogue, especially with Masha, is quite funny. Overview of loss of faith by folks swept up in the camps.

I guess this was made into a popular movie pretty recently, I need to check it out.

And why was there such a large Jewish population in Poland? Doesn't seem like a natural destination. This book talked about how the Jews were blamed for the black death in the 14th century - poisoning the wells, the usual scapegoat stuff, etc. - and were welcomed by Polish nobles while being expelled from western Europe. The Polish nobles needed the administrative skills etc. No idea if that theory is accurate, there probably were plenty of other persecution incidents (including Polish when it was convenient for them).

The Quiet American (Graham Greene, 1955)

An English reporter living in Viet Nam during time of fighting between French and Vietnamese (Communist) is the narrator. Mid-1950s. The narrator had pretty much "gone native," living with a local woman, regularly taking opium, etc. An American arrives as an economic attache; actually doing undercover work for a "third force" - an unreliable local warlord - in an effort to stave off the Communists. American steals girl from narrator (to his great disappointment) and saves the narrator's life when they are stranded in open country. Narrator recognizes unreliability of naive American, could be said to have a hand in the American's assassination. But he does get his woman back.

I liked this a lot. Never read anything by Graham Greene before and don't know a thing about him. The introduction to this edition of the book said he grew up in the public school tradition of service and would have believed in Britain's historic international role. I'll read more. His bio is here. The book gave one man's take on the situation in Vietnam.

I was listening to a song by Nanci Griffith, who I like a lot, at the gym this evening. She is active in Vietnam veterans' matters. (In fact, during her appearance at the Alaska Folk Festival in 2006, it was reported by one Carol Gales that she yakked about that type of thing too much and didn't sing enough.) Anyway, she mentions the name of this book and the author a couple times in one of her songs about Indochina.

Piano competition

For the second year in a row, Patricia and I attended the Schimmel Bosendorfer USASU piano competition (now that's a mouthful) at Katzen Hall at Arizona State University. This year, we suckered Paul Jr. into accompanying us. The concept is great for the audience -- it combines interesting, nicely-performed piano music with a competition setting. There are three divisions. The "junior" group is fun - kids 16 and under - absolutely amazing what they can do. I include the program notes for Min Soo Hong, who was the most entertaining perfomer of the entire evening. A 13-year-old kid who really went for it. The "senior" group is up a distinct level in quality. I also include the program notes for a young lady from this group who performed well, but she was especially noticeable because of her, let's say, unusual facial expressions and overall contortions.

The adjudication sessions are open to the public but we didn't make it this year. Patricia went last year and I hope we can get to one next year.

(Note the photo of the happy attendees taken with the camera in my new phone - a new era for me in photojournalism.)

This is a nice event which likely will recur annually. I hope it does.

Children of Men

Rare occurrence - we went to the theater and saw a really excellent movie. The premise is that the entire world lost fertility in 2009. The movie is set in Britain in 2027, by which time the absence of children has been felt around the world in similar ways. Basically, people have given up hope - they see no future. Riots, destruction, "the end is near" behavior. Britain "soldiers on" and is seen as a relatively safer haven; thus, it is swamped with immigrants. Britain responds by agressively rounding up, and deporting, illegal immigrants. You can read about the lead characters and the plot in reviews such as this one. A former activist becomes a bureaucrat; he ends up sheperding a pregnant woman (pregnancy being a miracle) to a safe haven while fending off a terrorist group and police.

It was just excellent. There was a chase scene where a car is rapidly reversing down a road while trying to evade motorcyclists; I still can't figure out how they filmed it. Near the end, the lead actor is escorting the pregnant woman out of a building where the terrorist group has holed up and the army is shelling with tanks etc. This definitely was the best scene in the movie. Thoughts: 1) It reminded me of the Stalingrad book - great filming of fighting that goes beyond floor-to-floor urban fighting, it's literally room to room. 2) Again, there was something unique about the filming - it was like a single camera following the action, something like you would think a film crew embedded with the military would do. 3) The scene where he walks out with the woman through the terrorists and then through the military - the identical reactions of the fighters - this is really well done.

Chris, Patrick and Paul Jr. accompanied Patricia and me. Then we had dinner at Elephant Bar. (Where the service didn't measure up to the movie.) But it was a fine outing.