web analytics

Someone Like Michel Legrand Happens Only Once

I deliberately quoted Don Black’s introduction to Monsieur Legrand from the concert’s booklet. I couldn’t think of a better title, given the electrifying performance from Legrand Jazz and the Master himself that I watched on February 3rd at Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall, the renowned concert venue. The triple Oscar and 5 times Grammy winning French composer, Michel Legrand, now in his 70s, takes the stage with a graceful authority and effortlessly conducts the orchestra to bring to the audience the liberating, inspiring music.

-1-

Ever since I was a boy“, quotes Stephane Lerouge in his article Michel Legrand, or Music in the Plural, “my ambition has been to live completely surrounded by music. My dream is not to miss out anything. I love playing, conducting, singing and writing, and in all styles. I do all these activities at once, seriously, sincerely, and with deep commitment“. Although his discovery of music had started long before he’d entered the Paris Conservatory, it wasn’t until Lucette Descaves’ music class that Legrand had felt “at home” with his vocation. This vocation quite literally took him far and wide, and by the early 1950s, still in his 20s, Legrand achieved his first international success in the United States.

From mid-1950s Legrand has been composing for the film. The film that brought him his first major awards (e.g. the Palme d’Or) and became the world-wide hit was, of course, Les Parapluies de Cherbourg (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg), with the very young Catherine Deneuve. I have seen it on Russian TV many years ago, but it is perhaps best-known for Je Ne Pourrai Jamais Vivre Sans Toi (I Will Wait For You) love song. As Lerouge tells us, the film was made against the pessimistic predictions but, as it happens sometimes on such occasions, was massively successful. Following this, Legrand started dividing his time between Europe and America, collaborating with directors like Orson Welles, Clint Eastwood, Andrzej Wajda, Claude Lelouch, and writing scores for Yentl (with Barbra Streisand), The Thomas Crown Affair (with Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway), Never Say Never Again (a James Bond film), Summer of 42 (the war-time drama), The Swimming Pool (with Alain Delon), Wuthering Heights (with Timothy Dalton), Prêt-à-Porter (by Robert Altman, with the international cast including Marcello Mastroianni, Anouk Aimee, and Rupert Everett), etc. His music is always melodic (“melody is a mistress to whom I’ll always be faithful“), and the many awards he’d received, including 3 Oscars, are but “a piece of flattery“: “deep down, it doesn’t make you any better or worse as a composer, your strengths or weaknesses remain unchanged“.

A fantastic biographic article is published at Radio France Internationale. A bilingual non-official fan site is also a great resource.

-2-

If you have been following my Twitter updates (tagged #Legrand), you already know that the biggest thing that surprised and somewhat disappointed me was the age of the audience. By no means did I expect to see many children or teenagers, but the shift to 35+ (or even 40+) was just too obvious. Bridgewater Hall is no M.E.N. Arena, which is yet another reason why the age split became so apparent. And of course I don’t mean that those of Legrand’s generation shouldn’t have come to his concert.

It was a shame, though, that this versatile musician, singer, composer, and conductor hasn’t been seen performing live by many more younger people. This especially goes for the first half of the concert that was dedicated entirely to Legrand’s instrumental pieces. Surely, we have all seen amazing trumpet players and awesome drummers, but to have them all come together to play with the world-known musician is a very different thing. The enthusiasm and artistry of Mark Fletcher alone (drums) can make a huge difference to an aspiring young drummer.

As for me, had I been a little girl, I’d probably have decided to study harp, to play like Catherine Michel. Currently a Professor of Harp at the Zurich Musikhochschule, Michel joined Legrand Jazz to perform the score from Yentl. She is a perfect match to Legrand: you could see that she loves the harp just as much as Legrand evidently adores the piano. The passionate yet graceful performance transfixes the spectator, and I continued humming the melody well after the concert ended.

Just as the first half was inspiring and smooth, so the second wasn’t – or at least this is how it felt to me. The bluntest would be to say that Alison Moyet and Michel Legrand don’t go together well, but clearly they wouldn’t get that far in collaboration, had this been the case. Perhaps, it was the hall’s ambience. Maybe it was something else. Somehow the deep bluesy voice of Moyet didn’t convey the drama of the songs. Between Yesterday and Tomorrow, What Are You Doing The Rest Of Your Life?, Nobody Knows, I Will Wait For You, I Will Say Goodbye, Summer Knows, The Windmills Of Your Mind – it was a good singing, but more? Hardly. If you consider that the songs she performed were written for the films, it is impossible not to act when singing them. I don’t mean staging anything theatrical. The singer can do infinitely more with the voice that just hits the notes. This was particularly evident for me in I Will Wait For You, which is a tearful drama (especially if you’d seen the film). I couldn’t feel (or see) the same kind of passion that spilt over the stage when Legrand Jazz performed alone or with Catherine Michel.

There are still several nights left on Legrand’s UK tour. I absolutely hope that my not-entirely-positive review remains the only one such. And to round it up, here is a list of What Are You Doing The Rest Of Your Life? covers on YouTube, and a Barbra Streisand 1994 performance of the song.

Flickr-Day in History


Two years ago, October 17th 2006 saw a project called “One Day in History” as a part of History Matters campaign organised by the National Trust and key heritage organisations. People of all ages and nationalities, living in Britain, could send a blog post describing what they did on the day.

Whether or not the guys at Flickr knew about this project, they have certainly taken up a similar idea, and last year pioneered 24 Hours of Flickr – a pool of photographs taken on May 5th 2007, capturing a moment in life of over 7 thousand people. You can visit the link above to flick through the photos, and some of them are sure to put you in the mood for Flickr 888, which will take place on August 8th, 2008.

Better yet, Flickr are teaming with MOO, to print exclusive Flickr 888 Postcard Packs, to be available in early autumn. Suddenly there seem to be more reasons to think of participating in this project.

One of the Flickr friends who, I think, should consider taking part is John Grundeken from the Netherlands. You surely have seen his amazing design for a tie, commemorating his adoration for Barbra Streisand. As an artist, John specialises in linocut, and you can view some examples of his work online. I faithfully followed his Paris 2007 and Paris 2008 sets, but, if I am honest, John’s treatment of flora can leave one spellbound. This may sound strange, especially if John reads this, but he photographs flowers and plants, like I photograph streetlights – passionately, copiously, and lovingly. Hyacinths, roses, irises, peonis, orchids… you name it! I should also note his love for gardening and planting, which obviously adds an extra touch to his work. And with John’s permission I have an ace work of his, but just for some more time this is going to remain an ace up my sleeve.

Inside the Bloggers’ Studio

Since 2005 I have been writing about arts and culture (cinema, in particular), and when I used to make The LOOK on QT Radio in Manchester I interviewed several film directors (still under my real name then). Now, I was invited to take part in the online version of the Inside the Actors’ Studio with Sky Arts.

In case you’ve never heard of it, “Inside the Actors Studio is a well established American show that attracts the top film and TV actors and interviews them in a one on one situation in front of a studio audience of drama students”. The programme has just been broadcast on Sky through the whole of January, with guests including Barbra Streisand, Michael J. Fox, Liza Minnelli, and Al Pacino. ArtsWOM, the blog sponsored by Sky Arts, has come up with the brilliant idea to invite some arts and culture bloggers to the online version of the programme, by asking them the same ten questions that the presenter and drama teacher James Lipton asks to each of his guests. I feel very pleased and honoured to have been invited to this project. Many thanks to ArtsWOM for inviting me, it was a thoroughly enjoyable experience.

At the first glance, the questions are simple; in truth, they are anything but simple. The very first question is “what is your favourite word?” I felt it should be the word I very often use, in virtually any kind of situation. And such word is “absolutely“, which I indeed picked from P. G. Wodehouse’s book, A Damsel in Distress. But then I also like the word “okay“, and I realised that I use them both on a very regular basis. I couldn’t possibly choose between them, so I thought it would be absolutely OK to submit two favourite words.

The question that I personally liked the most was about the profession I wouldn’t want to do. For me, it is definitely the dentist. Don’t get me wrong, I’m full of gratitude and admiration for those who work in this field, but I would never ever have gone into this profession myself. I haven’t got the courage, and I wouldn’t be able to stay aloof watching someone’s suffering from toothache day by day. What is interesting, is that a discussion about this profession occurred many years ago, and it showed my ability to use words to a very powerful effect. My mother and I were talking about which profession I should choose, and she suggested dentistry, although she knew well that I didn’t like the natural sciences to such extent. But it wasn’t my dislike of these sciences that I focused on in my short speech. It only took me a couple of minutes to paint a stark ghastly picture of my life as a female married dentist who would dig someone’s cavities in the day and have nightmares of those cavities at night. I explained to my mother that no husband would survive in such conditions. My picture must have been so vivid that my mother never brought this suggestion up again.

And I couldn’t forget about Michel Polnareff. Judging by his song On Ira Tous au Paradis and my liking of it, we’re both fairly sceptical about the church and religion. We may be wrong in our scepticism, but in truth I expect us both to get past the Pearly Gates, au paradis. How did Billy Joel put it? “You may be wrong, but all I know is that you may be right“. Absolutely.

You can read my answers in the part 9 of Inside the Bloggers’ Studio, and I do recommend you follow the link to all parts – ArtsWOM Features (scroll down to part 1 to read them in ascending order). For all the variety of answers we, bloggers, provided to questions about favourite words and professions, there are a few similarities: we all want to go to paradise, and many of us treasure sincerety and dislike fakery and narrow-mindedness. You can all have a go, too: just take these questions and repost them with your answers on your blog.

What is your favourite word?
What is your least favourite word?
What turns you on?
What turns you off?
What sound or noise do you love?
What sound or noise do you hate?
What is your favourite curse word?
What profession other than your own would you like to attempt?
What profession would you not like to do?
If Heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the Pearly Gates?

Happy New Year!

And so, I’ve been in Llandudno since December 28th, and at this very moment I’m sitting at my hotel’s lounge, occasionally looking at Great Orme and the lights along the Promenade, but mostly typing and sending greeting letters and messages to my Russian friends. I spent a wonderful weekend, strolling up and down the streets in Llandudno, but for some reason I found easier this time to jot down my impressions in Russian first. Whereas with my trip to Carmarthen in June I first wrote my memories in English and then in Russian, this time Llandudno Diaries are first appearing in my Russian LiveJournal.So, the turn of the year is the time to look back and to see if one has kept up with their yesteryear’s resolutions. Last year I said I’d be looking to find more ways to express my creativity – and indeed I learnt to make slide shows and eventually accompanied the latest of them with my own narration. I wanted to keep writing great content – and this apparently has happened, as by the end of 2007 I have had my blog written about, shortlisted at the Manchester Blog Awards, and now included in the Open Directory Project. I wanted to travel, and I’ll say a few words on the subject later on, but in general this has been achieved, as well. I wanted to keep on meeting interesting and talented people and to continue to know those whom I already knew. This has happened, too, and I can particularly single out one such person who is fascinating enough to be lurking here and there on this blog, when it is appropriate. I’ve been following this person’s work for a number of years, this year I had the chance to attend a meeting with them, and what doesn’t stop amazing me is the amount of new things this person can tell every time they give an interview. I can only say that I’m looking forward to more in 2008.

One thing that I never did was visiting Moscow. Needless to say, this becomes my 2008 resolution #1. It must really be astonishing – and quite frustrating, too – that every time I say to myself “I must go to Moscow” something creeps up and I have to postpone the visit. I think the surest way to get me back to my native shores is by buying myself a ticket, as that way I’ll feel obliged to just drop everything and go.

So, in 2008 I resolve to continue with both blogs, hopefully by making the content more wide-ranging, since now I can produce short slide shows and animated stories. I’m planning to travel more. I don’t mention that I’m planning to write more, as this is what I’ve always been doing.

I’m looking forward to more inspiring meetings, trips, events. I hope that the inspiration I get from other people’s work, from nature etc. will be the inspiration for you. Which is where I want to thank once again all of you who have been leaving comments and emailing me to thank me for blogging and to encourage me to keep on with my enterprise. And I would like to thank everyone who wrote about and linked to me this year, this was a joy, a surprise, and always an honour to me.

Two things I can note about 2007. First concerns the travels: it’s all been about Wales. In June I went to South Wales; in December I went to North Wales. I don’t know what it tells (if it’s supposed to tell anything), but so it goes. The second thing concerns music. On a couple of my profiles elsewhere I noted my huge interest in music, since I love singing. 2007 has been entirely Italian in this respect. It started with me making great friends with an Italian colleague who began to send me YouTube links to such artists as Mia Martini, Mina Mazzini, Lucio Battisti. It continued with me going on my own for some time, when I discovered Patti Pravo. And it culminated in my making friends via LiveJournal with a few Russian aficionados of Italian music of the 1960-70s. I’m yet to see where it all takes me in 2008, but the start has been compelling enough to carry on in this direction.

As my circle of friends and acquaintances has grown considerably this year, I shall not repeat the last year’s personalised greetings. Instead I shall wish all of you, my friends, readers and occasional visitors, a very Happy New Year! Let all of you know that you are very dear to me for all your talent, wisdom, creativity, sense of humour and the simple fact that you are!

I should not forget to list the Top Ten posts in Los Cuadernos de Julia, as seen from Google Anaylitcs profile:

Barbra Streisand in Manchester

Lonely Shepherd (James Last and Georghe Zamfir)

Sonnet no. 3 (Edna St Vincent Millay)

My Fair Cabbage

If I Could Tell You (W. H. Auden)

Histoire de Melody Nelson (Serge Gainsbourg)

O Felici Occhi Miei, Arcadelt, and the Lute-Player

Women and Beauty in Art

Love Me (Michel Polnareff)

Matthew Barney in Manchester

I should note that this is the stats for the entire year, and they don’t entirely correspond to the most recent interest.

Last but not least, to carry on with the last year’s tradition of uploading some Russian New Year postcards, here is something many of you will no doubt cherish. This postcard comes from my family archive, it says Happy New Year in Russian (which is “s nOvym gOdom”) and – wait for this – is 100 years old!

Matthew Barney in Manchester

In April 2003 I was approached by a friend of mine who is now on the editorial board of The Herald of Europe (“Вестник Европы”), to do a few translations for their forthcoming first English issue, from Russian into English. I translated a lot of texts, but then it took them a year and a half to actually publish the journal. By September 2004 the majority of texts became outdated, except one, and that was a review of Matthew Barney’s The Cremaster Cycle by Alexander Parschikov (it is now available online at The Herald‘s website, slightly edited for publication and, alas, uncredited, like all translations). It was a very deep review, as you would consider any review that references Samuel Beckett in the very first paragraph. Back then it was the first time ever that I read the name of Barney, and my natural curiosity was helped by detailed descriptions of all five films.

This, for instance, is what you could see in The Cremaster 1:

One of the protagonists finds herself under a table that is covered with a white cloth. She wears a skimpy light silk dress and dances slowly around the hollow table-leg, lying on her back. Then she makes a hole in the tablecloth with her hairpin, and surreptitiously steals some grapes, which magically roll through her body and pour onto the floor through a hole in the high heel of her mule. When they reach the floor, the grapes link together like necklaces and form regular, symmetrical, mirror-image patterns. The figures they form look like female genitalia, and replicating this, the chains of girls in the football stadium arrange themselves into identical biomorphic shapes. The film has no beginning and no resolution: the balloons will never land, the protagonist will go on building new figures out of the grapes, stretching slowly like a mollusc as she looks for a lipstick; the air hostesses will not break their silence, and the smiles of the girls in the stadium are frozen for eternity. Perhaps, the protagonist, hidden from these sculpture-like air hostesses, expresses their subconscious desires, their biological rhythms and their suppressed eroticism.

The reviewer concluded that

…Barney takes his characters from the Pantheon of digital images that represent nothing but their own electronic essence. In his works we find an epic uniformity, a never-ending movement towards some objective. Nothing is clearly defined or attainable; rather there are opal lights reflecting on surfaces, high-molecular materials, and artificial or natural extensions of the human body. This leaves only one question. Where do these extensions take us?

The Manchester audience, especially that part of it which is better versed in Barney’s art than either me or Richard Fair, probably already knows a very detailed and long-winded answer because Matthew Barney’s genius has now marked Manchester with its presence. All in all, Manchester has done incredibly well for its first International Festival. We had Chopin’s music at the Museum of Science and Industry; Carlos Acosta is performing both classical and modern ballet numbers at The Lowry; jazz musicians entertained everyone who would drop in to the Festival Pavilion; we had a maverick Peter Sellars uttering age-old paradigms at the Guardian Debate; and eventually we had Guardian of the Veil, complete with urinating women and an impotent bull. And all this is against the backdrop of Barbra Streisand at the M.E.N. Arena on Tuesday and the forthcoming final performance of The Tempest at the Royal Exchange Theatre.

On Thursday night Deansgate was swarming with people in all sorts of evening frocks going to see Il Tempo del Postino. I haven’t been to the performance, but the headline “What if an exhibition was not about occupying space but about occupying time? Can contemporary art be interpreted outside of a traditional gallery environment?” doesn’t strike me as novel. André Malraux famously called on creating a “museum without walls”, which in simple terms means a museum in your head where you can wander at your leisure. Which means, in turn, that you’re occupying time while contemplating and interpreting art outside any kind of physical space.

And yet it looks like the show has gone the extra mile because Richard Fair says in his review:

I knew before the piece – Guardian of the Veil by Matthew Barney and Jonathan Bepler – that I was in for something different. Something challenging. Apart from what was going on stage, all around the auditorium were actors dressed in IRA-type uniform brandishing ukuleles. Let me tell you, if that was the chosen weapon of the paramilitary group in the seventies the troubles would have ended a long time ago.

Back to the question then: do art and politics mix? Should art and politics mix? Or should we simply wander from an excited bull to a guy with a dog strapped to his head, simply recognising that their nature as images and wandering off, without ever finding an idea behind an image?

Sometimes I feel that contemporary art is a mere, yet constant, wandering-off.

Read more:

Richard Fair, Manchester International Festival: Day 16 (BBC Manchester Blog)
.
Manchester International Festival: Il Tempo del Postino (Mancubist.co.uk).

Barbra Streisand in Manchester (M.E.N. Arena, July 10, 2007)

 And so, Manchester has finally joined the cities on the route of Barbra Streisand’s first European tour. Some reports prior to Manchester concert expressed fears that the night might fall through because of high ticket prices. Admittedly, pleasure of seeing Streisand on stage wasn’t cheap: add a program’s price (£25) to your cheapest ticket (£75), and you’ll get quite a sum. Looking from my seat in the stalls down on those who sat in the first row in the box did bring certain thoughts to mind. But as the show went on, I realised that with my £75 ticket I bought myself much more than just a lifetime experience.

Like with quite a few other things, it started thanks to my mother. I said before that my mum has got this tremendous ability to discover things – and once Russia has opened her arms to the West after 1991, there was (and still is) a lot to discover. I believe that the discovery of Barbra in my family has started with the song Woman in Love, which was in an audio cassette collection. Around 1996-97 the articles about Streisand have really flooded our first Russian editions of Harper’s Bazaar and ELLE. They wrote about her youth, her romances, her music, but, being an adolescent, I was most interested in her portraits. As terrible as it sounds, before I saw those photos, I thought I would never look good in front of the camera. Studying them, thankfully, changed me in many ways. I still haven’t seen a lot of Streisand’s films, but Funny Girl, The Mirror Has Two Faces, and The Way We Were have entered my memory forever. I would watch The Way We Were anyway because of Robert Redford, but the first two we watched because of Barbra. So, it was only natural that when I saw an email about the release of her tickets I knew I had to go. I wanted to surprise my mother, but in the end we had this conversation on Sunday night:

I: Mum, do you want to be jealous?
Mum: Why?
I: Do you know where I’m going on 10th July?
Mum (anticipating pause)
I: I’m going to Barbra Streisand’s concert
Mum (after a long pause, and with a sigh): Yes, I’m very jealous.

Although I’ve been living in Manchester since 2003, July 10th was the first time I went to a concert at the M.E.N. Arena. Contrary to all fears and misgivings, the hall was full: at 7pm people were coming in tides, and by 7.40 there was virtually no room to move in the foyer. The audience’s rapture was palpable; and how could it not be if the man with a black-and-grey scarf around his neck was one of the first to rise from his seat when Barbra appeared on stage for the first time? I cannot say I’ve been to many concerts, but I’m certain I won’t see such frequent standing ovations any time soon. Where I sat, people behind me were humming and singing along with the performer who – we all hope – celebrates the 50th anniversary of her stage career in three years’ time.

As you can guess, from photos on Flickr and from videos on YouTube, the organisers’ appeal against taking pictures wasn’t acknowledged, and we shouldn’t blame the fans for many of whom this was once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see and hear their favourite performer. In the audience there were Mancunians, Liverpudlians, Geordie, as well as Italian and Spanish fans whom Streisand greeted in their native language. When answering questions, she admitted that of all three – singing, acting, and directing – she enjoyed directing more because of what she called ‘inclusiveness’, and this show may very well be the proof of her directorial hold. Alas, we were not introduced to Samantha; instead we saw Streisand putting on glasses and demonstrating her – quite good – piano technique.

The importance of seeing an “old league” performer cannot be underestimated. A rather simply decorated stage was a perfect backdrop for the stunning costumes (designed by Streisand and Donna Karan), a warm smile, and the beautiful, powerful voice of the world’s first showbiz diva. I must admit, after reading several fans’ reviews, that I couldn’t put my feelings about the evening into words better than John Grundeken from the Netherlands did, which is why I hope a lot of you will follow through to Barbra’s Archives to read his heartfelt story of the night at Bercy in Paris. Moreover, John is travelling to London’s concert, as well. What I must absolutely agree with John about is the incredible power of Streisand’s voice: ‘”Starting here, starting now”, her voice sounded so warm and rich. I realised this was the first time ever I wasn’t listening to a recording of her voice, this was the real thing’. And one more fact about John: I am used to seeing people wearing T-shirts with John Lennon’s or Che Guevara’s face, and I made myself a T-shirt with the print of the Beatles’s Let It Be cover. But, upon my word, this was the first time I saw someone decorating a tie with their favourite artist’s portrait. I’ve got a feeling that the world of fashion has already been there, but this tie is special for its colour, design, and image. Above all, the whole work glows with admiration for Barbra Streisand, which makes it really impressive, and this is why I asked John for permission to use the image in my post. Thank you, John.

I have a confession to make. As I mentioned above, my mother is a huge fan of Barbra Streisand. I haven’t been back to Russia since I came to Manchester, which makes almost four years. So as a present for her I recorded several songs from the concert, which are strictly for private use and will not be put up anywhere. However, I noticed that there are many videos on the web, which probably warrants my action: I cut and put together two extracts from the concert. The first extract is a great proof of cordial atmosphere at the M.E.N. Arena, not without a few funny moments. The second is the song Unusual Way from the second half of the concert. Please note that the audio, like all the content of this site, is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution – Noncommercial – Non-Derivative Works 3.0. If you wish to cite it, please do so accordingly.

[To be reuploaded soon – JD]

The songs may very well be the ones that people older than me have already heard Streisand singing live before. Yet, as Paul Vallely from The Independent puts it, ‘she progressed from one song to the next in a way which was not autobiographical so much as the story of the lives of those who listened. She was singing the soundtrack to their joys and sorrows, triumphs and failures’. In spite of my age, Smile, Unusual Way, Papa Can You Hear Me resonate in me deeply, while People and Somewhere fully correspond to the views and ideas I behold dearly and often express in writing and here, in Los Cuadernos, for which you can certainly call me a Cockeyed Optimist.

The peak of the performance for me was when Streisand run and danced barefoot on stage. And it was most lovely to see the audience standing and greeting Barbra with several rounds of ovation. In Russia, it was a part of nearly every performance experience: to call actors or singers come back on stage several times. In four years here, attending theatre and cinema many times, I almost got used to people giving a few claps, standing up and leaving, so seeing this “Russian” reaction felt incredibly warm.

It is evident that I, like many others, enjoyed every minute of two-and-a-half hours of Streisand’s concert, including the interval, when I took the photos of the Arena’s hall that are now scattered throughout this post. And I feel I should comment on a criticism that the show was scripted. Where I sat, on the side, was the perfect place to see both the stage and the screens with running scripts. First, the lines run fast, so unless everyone (Barbra and the Broadway guys) knows what they are to say, they won’t be on time with the script. Most importantly, though, is that they didn’t actually follow the script word for word. Yes, maybe it’s bad to direct your own show, but as a spectator I think it would be worse to listen to an artist, who sounds and looks like a sheep, not knowing what to say. From my own experience of writing scripts or watching written scripts going live I can only say that it’s essential to know where your carriage (be that a play, a radio or TV show, or a performance) is going at any given minute. To ensure that it runs naturally is up to a performer, and for Barbra Streisand it was a piece of cake.

“Barbra – was she worth the money?” – a sly question that has left many a reviewer’s pens. Someone cynical may say a performer like Streisand is used to the crowd’s adoration, but no matter how used you get to people praising you, there are always new people, and every performer needs them, not only because ‘people need people’, but because people need art, and a performer is the mediator between art and the world. This entire contemplation on worthiness reminds me of Maugham’s Theatre, one of my favourite novels. In one chapter, the heroine’s son reproaches her for being “false”. He fails to understand how one minute Julia Lambert can be all emotion on stage, then have a go at the technician during a short interval, and then immediately regain the altitude and power of her performance once again. She feels disturbed, but in the very final passages of the book she realises that the actors give substance and meaning to the lives of people in the audience: ‘… out of them we create beauty, and their significance in that they form the audience we must have to fulfill ourselves… We are the symbols of all this confused, aimless struggle that they call life, and it’s only the symbol which is real. They say acting is make-believe. That make-believe is the only reality’.

You may cue in Vallely’s review or Gogard’s musings on image and reality in Notre Musique. Or you can read the review of one of the concert’s attendees, who (though not without some inner struggle) has taken from this single night something precious and indelible. One thing is certain: art transforms life, and ever since coming out on stage 47 years ago Barbra Streisand has been doing just that.

Links:

Barbra Streisand official website

Manchester reviews: BBC and Manchester Evening News

Paul Valley, Broadway Diva Lives up to Her Billing, The Independent, 11 July 2007

Set list, photos, press and fan reviews at Barbra Archives.

Barbra Streisand group on Flickr

John Grundeken

The Cotton Mill Blog

Barbra Streisand in Manchester set on Flickr

About images:

All images used in this post are copyrighted. The details for the booklet illustrations can be found in the captions to the pictures here. ‘The Tie’ is designed and produced by John Grundeken.

Manchester Bloggers Meet at the Festival Pavilion


What do you do on Monday evening? Come home from work and wind down in front of your TV? No, no, and no, especially when you’re involved in Manchester’s blogging scene and when you know that the BBC’s Robin Hamman and Richard Fair have reserved a table at the Festival Pavilion near Manchester Central. Is there a better way to spend a hard Monday’s night than in a company of familiar and unfamiliar faces, in the heart of your lovely red-brick city, in the location that looks so stupendously grand?

This is exactly what we did tonight, and as I’m writing this post, the clock is close to striking midnight, which means that I haven’t slept for 18 hours. Still, it’s nothing in comparison to Robin who seems to be travelling non-stop in space both virtual and physical. And nothing in comparison to Richard, who admitted with a sigh that he hasn’t got a slightest idea of when he was going to have his holiday. So far the hero of all Alan Rickman’s fans has been faithfully blogging about the Manchester International Festival and is on duty next week to cover the Tatton Park Flower Show. Oh well, I regularly get my own doze of excitement with Search Marketing.

Craig McGinty was over, giving, as usual, a plenty of helpful advice (thank-you, Craig!). I had the pleasure to meet Stephen Newton and Andrew Wilshere, Paul Hurst and Vince Elgey, Edward (whose blog I don’t know yet) and Ian, and to see Stuart Brown again. Apologies to everyone who saw me but whom or whose blogs I don’t know – please feel free to add yourself to my map of friends, and we’ll all know who you are and what you do.

In general, this meeting was a good opportunity for me to test my memory. I recognised Stephen Newton from his blog’s profile picture. Better yet, I recognised Paul, who works for one of Wigan’s schools as a media instructor. I saw him one and only time in the summer of 2005, when I went to help out Paul Ridyard, my once colleague at QT Radio in Northern Quarter. There was, however, no difficulty in recognising Phil Wood, on whose show I had my first ever radio placement back in February 2005. Broadcasting from the Pavilion late at night, Phil was, as ever, all smile and professionalism – which is exactly the memory I’ve taken of him from the placement.

The Festival Pavilion is open to everyone during the Manchester International Festival, which is to end this Saturday. I’ve planned to blog about Manchester Peripheral and Carlos Acosta, but before I do either I will go to MEN Arena tomorrow to see Barbra Streisand. This reminds me of two guys who came all the way from Birmingham to see George Michael at the Arena. They met me in Bridge St, and with a sheer distraught on their faces anxiously began to explain that they got lost and that George Michael was unlikely to wait till they find the way to the venue. Standing under my huge umbrella in the drizzling rain I was explaining to them how to get to the Arena, but eventually I began to doubt the guys were actually going there. Anyway, I do know where the Arena is, although, alas, it seems that I won’t be able to take any pictures.

And it’s almost 1am now…

For more pictures, go to: BBC Manchester Blog on Flickr

Update:
First comes an observation: Alan Rickman has got a huge retinue of fans (I shall confess – I am one of them) who, I guess, are following publications about him online via news subscription (I don’t). There is such thing in Google, for instance, as Google Alerts: it saves time ego-surfing and also keeps you updated about your favourite subject. I didn’t check it for other email applications, but I’m sure this service is quite wide-spread. Well, Alan seems to be the subject of such alerts for a few people, and we can count this as yet another beauty of blogging and analysing who visits your blog, and why. I’m sure BBC Manchester Blog has amassed a stupenduous log of “alan rickman” queries since the broadcast of his interview.

And second, as I promised, several links to the posts about the meeting. Robin said on his blog that I wrote “what must be the definitive round-up of the evening”, but what I didn’t do (so tired I was) was that I didn’t say a word about this lovely little thing which you can find at http://www.kyte.tv. To see how it works, head over to Robin and Craig.

Richard Fair (who is the hero of Alan Rickman’s fans in Manchester and elsewhere in Britain, in case I didn’t spell it out right the first time) reviewing the night on BBC Manchester Blog. Also, BBC Manchester Blog on Flickr.

Vince writing about the night on It’s a Blog! Not a Log! and uploading pictures.

Robin Hamman doing a nice mosaic of photos on Flickr.

Paul Hurst uploading many interesting pictures on Flickr, as well as Ed Brownrigg from Mamucium.

Ian from Spinneyhead and Kate from Mersey Basin Campaign each offering their take on the night.

If anyone else writes their impression of the night, please feel free to add links to the comments.

And to round it all up, a picture from Paul Hurst: it shows two die-hard Mancunian bloggers at the meeting. Have I said before that I liked monochrome photography and blur? No? Well, now you all know it.

error: Sorry, no copying !!