Archives for March 2010

I am not a fan of those lists of “Top 50 Women Artists” or “Top 10 Young Conductors” or “The 20 Most Powerful Cultural Movers and Shakers” that pop up with alarming frequency in the media.

Having worked for magazines where I’ve been responsible for compiling these things, I’ve seen first hand what a subjective and nepotistic game the list-making can be. And, generally speaking, I don’t think the people who are responsible for compiling the lists really know the entire pool of potential candidates well enough to make decisions. Plus, very often, the people doing the best work are doing it quietly. Their efforts go unnoticed because they don’t necessarily draw attention to themselves. These people are amazing at what they do but don’t generally make these sorts of lists because they’re not big schmoozers and self-publicists.

That being said, I can’t seem to resist reading those lists. Just this morning, ArtsJournal published an article from the BBC about the “inaugural list of 50 women to watch in the arts” in the UK. I think this sort of thing is dumb. And yet for some reason I felt compelled to read the article and check out the list. The question is, why do I bother?

I suppose the main reason is that I’m interested to see if there’s anyone on the list whom I know personally or at least whose work I know. I’m also curious to see whether I’d agree with the compilers’ decisions and whether there are any glaring omissions.

But I wish I’d boycott the lists. They’re bad news.

While cycling down the coast in Kauai last week, I chanced upon an extraordinary sight. I heard the trombones before I saw them, actually. Brass scales and arpeggios caught my ears as I whooshed along, providing an unusual sonic backdrop for the palm trees, sandy beaches and ocean setting.

Eventually, the perpetrators of the sound came into view: two young men wearing blue floral Hawaiian shirts, black slacks and black shoes were standing next to each other on the path by the beach, playing in the open air.

I couldn’t resist stopping. “Is this some kind of art installation or a rehearsal?” I asked. The guys laughed. We got chatting. I found out that they were two members of the Honolulu Symphony‘s brass section. According to the trombonists, the orchestra is pretty much on its knees financially. In a last gasp to keep its players employed, it has been sending out players to do educational programs and give community concerts in different parts of the islands. The players I met had traveled to Kauai to teach workshops in schools and give a benefit concert for United Way with their colleagues from the Honolulu Brass ensemble.

That evening, I attended the concert, which attracted about 200 people. The ensemble played a lot of light music such as a medley of tunes from John Williams’ score for Star Wars. People seemed to enjoy themselves. What I liked best about the performance was its interactivity. The musicians all talked about their instruments and the audiences were given ample opportunity to ask questions throughout. Many questions were asked about everything from technique to repertoire to instrument cleaning methodologies. After the concert, audience members lingered on to talk to the players.

I left feeling quite emotional about the experience of hearing this fine, hardworking group of musicians play. I wonder what awaits them in the coming months? Will they all be out of work by the summer? It can’t be easy making a living as a classical musician in Hawaii. One of the trombonists I met is thinking about moving to San Francisco. He says the Bay Area is one of the few parts of the country where a musician can pick up a decent amount of freelance work owing to all the part-time orchestras in the region. The other player is planning on staying in Hawaii. Picking up and moving isn’t as easy when your wife has professional responsibilities and you have a small child. Whatever happens to them, I wish my seaside brass players courage and fortune for the future.

The weather not being all that cooperative in Hawaii last week, I ended up spending quite a bit of time trying to find fun things to do indoors. At the advice of a sweet and avuncular Michigan lawyer names John who was on Kauai vacationing with his wife, I followed a dirt track just outside the center of the town of Hanalei to hear a slack key guitar concert in a local community center given by a couple of Hawaiian old timers, Doug and Sandy McMaster.

Doug is one of the few people remaining on the islands who practices this old school form of guitar playing. Slack guitar is a soloistic style of playing which came into being in the late 1700s. It’s purely instrumental and doesn’t involve any singing, though originally it was used to accompany hula dancing and chant. It involves alternate tunings to the regular guitar tuning system (around 75 known slack guitar tunings are known of today) and extensive use of the thumb as a self-accomaniment device. The mode of playing was born when Mexican workers, who had come to Hawaii to teach the locals farming techniques (the cow had recently been introduced on the islands) left some of their instruments behind when they went home to Mexico. The locals picked up the Mexicans’ guitars but didn’t know how to recreate the original tunings, so developed their own systems based on what sounded good to their ears. The resulting effect is extremely melodious, sweet and mellow.

What a double-act the McMasters turned out to be! Sandy, a portly lady with a broad grin and the kind of speaking voice that could soothe the temper of the most harried politician, clearly (or at least in performance mode) wears the trousers in the relationship. She casually and almost inaudibly strums a ukelele in most of the pieces and does pretty much all of the talking, telling mystical-tinged yarns about the development of slack guitar and her and Doug’s experiences over the years on the islands. She decides the playlist and tells her partner what to do at every stage. Only at one point during the two and a half hour concert did Doug get a chance to pick a tune and even then he seemed shy to do so and looked for Sandy’s approval of his decision.

Doug, a gaunt gentleman with long straggly hair and a low voice, spent the first half of the concert peeping out from behind dark glasses. He has a sheepish aspect about him and a dry, understated sense of humor. He is also a very amazing musician. I was very glad to be sitting in a place where I could see Doug’s fingers work the fretboard clearly. He gave the impression that he was hardly moving his thumb at all, but the musical structure was often so dense that it sounded like there should be three pairs of hands playing at once, not just one.

As the music flowed evenly like waves lapping a shore on a beautiful day, I shut my eyes and almost fell into a slumber. It’s a good thing that Doug and Sandy serve Oreo cookies and water at intermission — I needed the sustenance to kick me out of my lovely listening lethargy.

If you’re on Kauai, I thoroughly recommend a trip to hear the McMasters play. They perform twice a week, on a Friday at 4pm and Sunday at 3pm in the Hanalei Community Center on Kauai’s north shore.