{"id":2253,"date":"2009-07-20T11:20:48","date_gmt":"2009-07-20T15:20:48","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2009-07-20T11:22:28","modified_gmt":"2009-07-20T11:22:28","slug":"justifiable-performances","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/justifiable-performances\/","title":{"rendered":"Justifiable Performances"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/RoLepy8j3Ew?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe><br \/>\nAs maybe a corollary to our recent <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/2009\/07\/18\/rock-aldas-and-grouchos\"><strong>Rock Aldas and Grouchos<\/strong> thread<\/a>, I&#8217;ve been thinking about a few instances of musical and other artistic performances and works that almost singlehandedly justified an entire genre that never previously appealed to me &#8211; and that may cause me some pause to this day.<\/p>\n<p>One of my favorite <strong>Lenny Bruce<\/strong> bits from his <em>Carnegie Hall Concert<\/em> album begins with the self-confessed jazz afficianado talking about this relatively new genre of rock &#8216;n roll. He says that he doesn&#8217;t dig most of it, slipping in a mocking chorus of &#8220;Yackety Yack,&#8221; but that there&#8217;s one song out called &#8220;Spanish Harlem.&#8221; He asks his audience if they&#8217;ve ever heard it, quoting the opening verse. &#8220;It&#8217;s so <em>pretty<\/em>,&#8221; he says. This one rock &#8216;n roll song has clearly opened his mind to the fact that the genre <em>may<\/em> contain other gems. Dig?<\/p>\n<p>Tonight, after the kids went to bed, my wife reminded that I could catch the end of the <strong>Vincente Minelli-Gene Kelly-Leslie Caron<\/strong> masterpiece, <em>An American in Paris<\/em>. I quickly turned it on just in time to catch the mindblowing, long fantasy sequence that ends the movie, a scene that chokes me up in recognition of its beauty just thinking about it. Sure enough the sequence got me for at least the 25th time. I&#8217;m not a big fan of dance and choreography by any means, but Gene Kelly is by far the one dancer I love seeing in action. He&#8217;s so athletic, not showy. I can appreciate him as an athlete more than an &#8220;entertainer.&#8221; Likewise, the fantasy ballet sequence that brings home <em>An American in Paris<\/em> strikes me as a work of art that fully expresses the emotional content of the film. It&#8217;s not some stitched-in talent show piece, as I find most dance sequences, even in the better musicals. The Gershwin music with the choreography and the choreographed camera work speak to me like no other dance sequence I&#8217;ve ever seen. Only <em>Saturday Night Fever<\/em>&#8216;s big dance to &#8220;More Than a Woman&#8221; comes remotely close to speaking to me on any level.<\/p>\n<p>Those of you who know me and know my complete lack of interest in dance and musicals may agree with my wife that my love for <em>An American in Paris<\/em> is the most surprising thing that I love.* I&#8217;m still shocked myself, but as I told her, that scene is so <em>pretty<\/em> and well done that, for me, it singlehandedly justifies the entire art of choreography. It&#8217;s the only thing that keeps my mind open even a sliver to the possibility that any other piece of choreography I&#8217;ll ever see might contain a shred of worthwhile storytelling and emotional content. I&#8217;m still a complete oaf when it comes to appreciating choreographed dance, but at least I&#8217;m willing to believe it has a place in the arts.<br \/>\n<!--more--><br \/><iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/L2xD-HYTPPI?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe><br \/>\nI&#8217;ve been wondering if there&#8217;s an equivalent for me in music, a single performance, artist, album, or song that opened my mind to the notion that an entire genre I&#8217;d previously not liked one bit might actually have some merit. Opera, for instance, is a genre I can&#8217;t stand. I simply hate that style of singing. There was, however, one album I heard working in a bookstore in the early &#8217;80s featuring some famous Spanish opera guy, that was pretty good. I don&#8217;t think it was an opera, per se, but it was done in that style of singing. Then there&#8217;s that brief home movie sequence in <em>Raging Bull<\/em>, with an excerpt from some Italian opera. This instrumental exceprt is a beautiful piece of music, and although I&#8217;ve yet to hear it in full context of the opera &#8211; not to mention with operatic singing, which I fear would ruin it &#8211; it&#8217;s the ONLY segment of opera music that has ever opened my mind to the possibility that the ENTIRE genre might not suck.<\/p>\n<p>Another example, for me, is <strong>Tammy Wynette<\/strong>&#8216;s &#8220;D-I-V-O-R-C-E.&#8221; Although I&#8217;ve since opened my mind to the notion that there&#8217;s a bit of country music that I can directly like without feeling like I&#8217;m donning a lab coat and sucking on my pipe, I will always credit that song with being the one country song that kept hope alive and that, to this day, continues to allow me to listen to a dozen or so country songs each year in hopes of finding another winner.<\/p>\n<p><em>How about you? Do you have a justifiable performance to credit for providing you with just enough motivation to occasionally revisit a genre of music you&#8217;ve never embraced?<\/em><\/p>\n<p><small>*Do I have a thing for Parisian art scene-based musicals? The other most surprising work of art that I love is the movie <em>Moulin Rouge<\/em>. Could SCTV&#8217;s <em>Lust for Paint<\/em>, which made me laugh until I cried as a teen, have fueled this uncharacteristic romantic streak?<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As maybe a corollary to our recent Rock Aldas and Grouchos thread, I&#8217;ve been thinking about a few instances of musical and other artistic performances and works that almost singlehandedly justified an entire genre that never previously appealed to me &#8211; and that may cause me some pause to this day. One of my favorite <a href='https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/justifiable-performances\/' class='excerpt-more'>[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[342],"tags":[178],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2253"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2253"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2253\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2253"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2253"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2253"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}