July 20, 2007
ACMP offers Chamber Music scholarships
Participants at Beaver Creek will observe five hours of daily coaching by the Afiara String Quartet, residents at the Morrison Chamber Music Center of San Francisco State University. They will also receive one hour of daily coaching and instruction by quartet members.
New opera singer Morris Robinson introduces music to new generation with ‘Going Home’
“As a Black male professional opera singer, I know firsthand that faces like mine are quite rare in that arena,” Robinson says. “With the introduction of my debut CD, I feel it’s important to spread the word in order to make known my existence to our community while simultaneously reaching out to a younger audience to show others the possibilities in other musical areas.”
Among the highlights on Going Home are Walk With Me, Go Down Moses and His Eye Is On the Sparrow. “It allows me to straddle the best of those worlds in order to express my love for opera and gospel in one setting.”
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As his CD heats up the charts, the Atlanta native is starring at the legendary New York Metropolitan Opera as Sarastro in the popular Mozart opera, Die Zauberflote (The Magic Flute).
Gayletha Nichols, director, Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, says, “When I first heard Morris sing back in the summer of 2000, he had this amazing vocal sound; he also had the desire to work hard and develop the skills that would give him a career in opera …”
Y&T DVD/CD Release Set (antiMUSIC)
JAZZ
The true intrinsic value of music study
It is accurately reported that music students, as a group, have higher than average I.Q. and S.A.T. scores. From this, advocates have leaped to the conclusion that music study makes you smarter. Logic 101 reminds us that there may be other characteristics of the typical music student that explains higher S.A.T. scores. For example, music students tend to come from nurturing home environments with parents who are actively involved in their child’s education. Financial resources for music study suggest above-average economic status for the enrichment of educational opportunities. The mere fact that the student stays involved in music rather than dropping out suggests qualities of a high achiever, such as intelligence and discipline. Being smarter is a general characteristic of music students as being taller is a general characteristic of basketball players. When was the last time you heard someone suggest that playing basketball makes you taller? Why do we care about possible non- musical side effects caused by the exposure to music? Do we have similar concerns about other subjects? Would we value physics any less if we knew that it did not lead to improvements in drama?
Beat street: in honor of Black Music Month, here are five great cities where our music is hot
ATLANTA
THE MUSIC: Hip-hop, rhythm and blues
THE LEGENDS: Hip-hop thrives in Atlanta, with local talent churning out chart toppers. Homegrown musicians and producers include Usher, OutKast, Jermaine Dupri, Monica, TLC and India.Arie. The city is also headquarters for record labels So So Def Recordings, Real Deal Records (owned by Evander Holyfield) and LaFace Records. Vocalists Whitney Houston, Regina Belle and Blu Cantrell reside in Atlanta, and Gladys Knight is a native.
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THE SCENE: Apache Cafe (64 Third St., N.W., [404] 876-5436) alternates neosoul and funk grooves with poetry and spoken-word performances. Centennial Olympic Park ([404] 223-4412) offers free or low-cost summer concert series featuring Black artists, Wednesday WindDown and Friday on the Bricks. The Friday series has presented stars like Kanye West and Chingy for a mere $6 admission. Club 112 (2329 Cheshire Bridge Rd., N.E., [404] 261-0155) is a hip-hop dance spot that draws the likes of P. Diddy, who spent childhood summers in nearby Decatur. Vision Nightclub & Lounge (1068 Peachtree St., N.E., [404] 874-4460) features the hottest dance music with at least one night a week devoted to old-school R&B.
WHERE TO STAY: The Renaissance Waverly Hotel, 2450 Galleria Pkwy., (770) 953-4500; doubles start at $219. The Embassy Suites, 267 Marietta St., (800) 362-2779; doubles start at $194.
MEMPHIS
THE MUSIC: Blues, early rhythm and blues
THE LEGENDS: In 1899 Black millionaire Robert Church built an entertainment complex on Beale Street, establishing it as a mecca for Black music. Church’s bandleader, William Christopher “W.C.” Handy, earned the moniker Father of the Blues by penning this gospel-infused music’s first major composition in 1908. More recently, a long roster of R&B superstars such as Otis Redding, the Staple Singers and Isaac Hayes immortalized the Stax record label. Visit the Stax Museum of American Soul Music (926 E. McLemore Ave., [901] 942-7685) for an immersion into the evolution of R & B and soul music.
THE SCENE: B.B. King’s Blues Club (143 Beale St., [901] 524-5464) transports you to a Mississippi Delta juke joint, complete with down-home soul food and authentic, live blues entertainment.
Rum Boogie Cafe and Mr. Handy’s Blues Hall (182 Beale St., [901] 528-0150) Rum Boogie features old-school STAX and R & B, while Mr. Handy’s Blues Hall has an intimate atmosphere and specializes in Memphis blues. Both Rum Boogie and Mr. Handy’s are housed in the same building.
Do Beethoven and Hyundai go together? Well, duh.
T.I. Release Party At The Seminole Hard Rock
Beyond Arabism: music videos and Lebanese revolution
Neither Ghandour’s lyrics nor the video’s images refer specifically to Lebanon, but few who have seen the video are likely to miss the obvious connection, and not only because Ghandour sings in an unmistakable Lebanese accent. The video, directed by Leila Kanaan, evokes in miniature Lebanon’s violent recent history, and it surrounds Ghandour (who is making a futile attempt at return) with the wariness of those who stayed behind and with the taunting ghosts of his unlived, might-have-been life. Ghandour’s personal tragedy of exile, the video suggests, is also Lebanon’s national tragedy of loss.
In the sense that Lebanon’s demonstrators want their country not only to resume its full independence but also to resume its interrupted history, the Ghandour video draws on the same cultural sources as the political opposition. They are both manifestations of a national exceptionalism that may be called “Lebanonism.”
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Lebanonism is a term used by different people to mean quite different things. To such thinkers as Benjamin Barber, it describes an ongoing state of tribal friction. To some economists, it describes the policies that allowed Lebanon to achieve impressive prosperity in a limited time. To some pan-Arabists, it is an offensive code word for Christian domination. But to others, it is the embrace of social pluralism and of difference–libertine and synchretic–from Lebanon’s neighboring cultures.
Thus, when opposition demonstrations broke out in the wake of former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri’s assassination, some observers claimed the phenomenon of Christians, Druze, Sunnis, and others linking arms was a manifestation of a “new Arab nationalism.” Not so, wrote the Middle Eastern analyst Tony Badran: “This is not an Arab nationalist revolution. This is a ‘Lebanonist’ revolution! This is about the coming together of the Lebanese (Druze, Maronite, Sunni, Shiite, etc.) for Lebanon and the idea of Lebanon as a plural society.”
This Lebanonism of pluralism and difference draws on many sources. For example, Lebanon has been an emigrant culture for a long time, and its cultural artifacts feature subjects that may be rare elsewhere. Ghandour’s video reflects an aspect of that emigrant vein. So did Fadl Shaker’s 2003 song and video “Ya Ghayab,” a song addressed longingly to one who has left.