A pop-up window flashed “Anita Shreve dies at 71″ while I was on FaceTime.
Suddenly, I felt a pang of regret. I’m attending a major writing conference in Boston next week. I’ve moved to New England, where Shreve had set most of her novels. Everywhere I go, I remember her writing — all those love stories set in Maine, and other parts of this area of the country.
We think in cycles, every full moon, every birthday, every St Patrick’s Day, every Valentine’s Day.
This time last year, I was clearing the home of an 84-year old woman named Maureen. A sudden fall on 4th of July 2016 led her to call 911 and subsequent ambulance transport to a hospital and then a private nursing home. She never returned to her three-bedroom condo in San Fernando Valley since.
In my quest for songs to fit thematic jam sessions and repertoire for thematic concerts, I came across two things that perplex me. Axes of Evil and Exes of Evil. Maybe it’s a play on words, but it made me wonder why someone referred to his ex of 20-years as “mean-spirited”. Do all exes or ex’s become mean spirited? Is mean same as evil?
Music can transport you to another world, another place, another time, another feeling. Such was my motivation yesterday in South Boston and today in Brockton, Massachusetts when I gave a culturally themed concert to take my audience first to New Zealand, then across the Pacific Ocean, to Hawaii.
Whoa! A new Slate article entitled “Student Evaluations Can’t Be Used to Assess Professors” caught my attention today. Research shows that it’s biased in favor of white, cisgender, American-born men. This could explain why my ex-colleague, a white alpha male dog owner, consistently received outstanding evaluations, while I, a female minority, have not.
Since October 2017, I’ve been looking forward to writing an essay on “music and relationships” — a topic I’m not only intimately familiar with but also crave to research and write about. Yet, I procrastinate writing the first word. It’s due next week, and I’m still fidgeting over the central thesis. Is it another familiar writer’s block?
It’s been over a year since I last posted to my Maui blog for newcomers. I had long left and travelled to mainland USA and Europe, back and forth. However, every winter I experience withdrawal symptoms, that is, looking back and wondering why I left that tropical paradise called Maui? If everything was so perfect, why did I leave?
To introduce the joy of ukulele to this area of Dorchester, Milton, and Quincy around Boston, Massachusetts, I’m giving workshops followed by thematic jam sessions. A workshop is a group learning experience, where I teach specific skills needed to play the instrument. A jam session is group playing and singalong, where I provide song sheets and lead everyone in playing together. Workshop participants are encouraged to stay for the jam sessions, especially for the warm-up. If you don’t have your own instrument, I have extras I can lend you for a small fee.
All jam sessions are free. Doors open 15 minutes before the workshop and session. To get on the mailing list, please fill out the Google Form so that I can contact you for your reservation. If there is sufficient interest, I will organize a separate workshop to cater to different age groups. At the moment, the workshops are geared towards preparing participants for jam sessions.
The approach of Valentine’s Day isn’t always welcoming for the heart broken. While lovers dine in restaurants or stroll hand in hand, the jilted and the scorned sit alone, at home, hiding from the rest of the world, mourning love’s labour’s lost, and drowning themselves in love songs that make them cry even more.
Dido’s Lament is one of the saddest but most beautiful arias, sung by a woman grieving over a broken heart before she dies. Such is the famous lament of Dido, Queen of Carthage, when her beloved Aeneas leaves her for a greater calling in Henry Purcell’s opera “Dido and Aeneas.”
The four-minute piece begins with a recitative of Dido saying farewell to her sister Belinda. It’s followed by the famous descending chromatic bass, paving the ominous path to her end. Originally written for a baroque ensemble, the piece has been transcribed for many kinds of ensembles and instruments, but not yet the ukulele. Why not?