Category: Music

Tidy Tidbits: Music & Newport

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UNUSUAL INSTRUMENT

For many of us, our first response when you mention an accordion is an oompah band or the Lawrence Welk show and Myron Floren.  This week we had the distinct and unexpected pleasure of hearing a young Chinese woman demonstrate her virtuosity playing classical accordion.  Her accordion is both heavy and elaborate.  It weighs 45 pounds and has a keyboard on the left side and a whole series of buttons on the right.  Hanzhi Wang played a selection of classical pieces by Bach and Grieg among others that had been arranged for accordion;  if you didn’t see her, you would not have guessed you were hearing an accordion.  

 Wang earned music degrees in Beijing and Copenhagen.  Based in Copenhagen, she tours the world performing and has given master classes at the Manhattan School of Music. Hearing her was truly special!

RECENT READING

NEWPORT THROUGH THE CENTURIES

The Maze at Windermere by Gregory Blake Smith

I’ll start by stating that I loved this novel!  What Mr. Smith has done using Newport, Rhode Island, as the venue and presenting five different stories from five different perspectives in five different time periods is simply amazing.  Sandy Allison is a tennis pro in 2011 involved with three women, none of whom he initially sees as a partner for the long term.  Franklin Drexel, a gay blade in all senses of the term, aspires to marry a wealthy widow in 1896 Newport, although he has no desire for women.  

At just 20, Henry James is spending time in Newport (1863) and observing the scene and the people.  He develops a friendship with a young woman named Alice (same name as his sister) and keeps a journal recording his experiences.  A British officer, Major Ballard, is stationed in Newport during the American Revolution and is obsessed with his attraction to a young Jewess. 

Lastly, there is Prudence Selwyn, a young Quaker of 15 whose mother is dead and her father likely lost at sea. It is 1692, she has one slave, and she must figure out how to live her life and support the two of them.  Three of the stories are presented as diaries while the other two, Sandy’s and Franklin’s, are in the third person.  

Themes of love, lust, betrayal, and duplicity, along with how we present ourselves to the world and each other, echo in each individual’s life.  Windermere is modeled on an old mansion, but the physical aspects of Newport such as Doubling Point and the Jewish cemetery which recur down the years are historically true.  I found all the characters fascinating with the British officer being the least likable and least sympathetic.  

The novel is summed up, I think, in the last letter Henry James writes to Alice Taylor:

“…this sense I have that the hundreds of millions of us who breathe upon the earth are each a unique flame, that we are each uniquely composed within the caskets of our bodies and our minds, that each has an experience of the world as different as that of a fishwife’s from a foundryman’s, and yet we all live the same life (millionaire, artist, soldier, slave), we each of us strive to understand who we are why we are here, to love and be loved, and that, for all that striving, we are each of us lost in the mystery of our own heart.”

Gregory Blake Smith was not an author I was familiar with, but this novel came to my attention from a publisher’s e-mail.  Subsequently, I learned it was one of the Washington Post’sten best books of 2018.  For more on the creation of this work, here is a link to an interview with Smith from the Literary Hub.  (~JWFarrington)

Note: Header photo is Chateau-sur-mer in Newport from visitrhodeisland.com. Hanzhi Wang photo from opening nights.fsu.edu and book cover image from the publisher.

Tidy Tidbits: Books & Music

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AUTISM ON THE PAGE, STAGE AND SCREEN

This week the island book club read and discussed The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon. The selection was prompted in part by the play being presented locally at Florida Studio Theatre in Sarasota.  It has been so popular that the run has been extended through March 17.  

The novel was published in 2003 and the group felt that there is much greater awareness of autism now and the range of autistic behaviors from Asperger’s syndrome to high functioning savants.  And, probably also greater acceptance.  Several had seen stage productions, either here or elsewhere. Generally, they felt the play successfully showed being overwhelmed by too much noise and multiple stimuli and then being further handicapped by not being easily able to communicate one’s thoughts and feelings.  

The lead character, 15-year old Christopher, is very smart, but also very literal. He is upset when his neighbor’s dog is killed with a pitchfork.  His mother is not present (he’s been told she died of a heart attack), and his father is angry with him for doing detective work to determine who did in the dog.  Christopher’s efforts and his findings lead him to make a train journey to London to visit his mother. This trip is a huge undertaking. Written in Christopher’s voice, the prose is straightforward and that plus Christopher’s drawings and diagrams are effective in portraying how he thinks.

I recently began watching an ABC television series, also available on Amazon Prime, entitled The Good Doctor.  Shaun Murphy is a young surgical resident who is autistic.  The hospital’s surgeons hesitate to hire him given his difficulties in communicating.  Under pressure from his mentor, the hospital president, they reluctantly take him on.  While socially awkward and at times inappropriate, Shaun is very smart and sees things on images and scans others miss.  It is an amazing depiction of the challenges even a gifted autistic individual faces in dealing with the rest of the world.

MUSICAL OFFERINGS

Music Monday always has someone of note to offer and this past week, it was Russian born pianist Olga Kern.  Ms. Kern is from a musical family with connections to Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff. While clearly talented, having won the Van Cliburn Piano Competition, she is also a delightful personality.  She charmed us with her exquisite playing (Rachmaninoff, Chopin, et al) and with her conversation.

Sarasota and the orchestra have been fortunate to have Anu Tali as music director.  She is winding up her sixth and final year as conductor and this week the orchestra delivered a paean to the community in the form of To Sarasota with Love.  Four principals in the orchestra, violin, horn, cello, and bassoon (all male), were featured in solos or duets.  These musicians, combined with Tali’s fluid, balletic conducting (with hands only and no baton), made for a most enjoyable evening.  She will be very much missed!

RECENT READING

Kitchen Yarns:  Notes on Life, Love, and Food by Ann Hood

Novelist Hood’s book is an engaging memoir with recipes.  She frequently references her Rhode Island upbringing in an Italian American family and her grandmother’s cooking.  The era of Hood’s childhood partly overlapped mine.  She calls out Good Seasons salad dressing, Rice-A-Roni (I never ate it, but certainly knew the ad jingle), and wishing to trade her homemade lunch for a friend’s more appealing one.  I always thought Sarah Wood’s bag lunches with a leftover chicken thigh looked delicious—much more appetizing than my cheddar cheese and mustard sandwich on cracked wheat.    

Hood’s life has had more than its share of sorrow including the early death of her brother and the loss of a child, but her writing is brimming with life and good feeling.  The recipes are mostly comfort food, not sophisticated, and sound tasty on the page.  GoGo’s Meatballs are calling my name! (~JWFarrington)

Note: Header photo of Any Tali by Kaupo Kikhas.

Tidy Tidbits: The Local Scene

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This was a fun week filled with theater, opera, dinners out and in, and long conversations with old and new friends.

SMALL SCREEN

After war in early 20th century Morocco, I’ve taken up a Kiwi crime series.  The Brokenwood Mysteries (available on Acorn) are set on the North Island in a very small fictional town of the same name.  Detective Mike Shepherd is new to the area and has two junior colleagues, Kristin Sims and D.C. Breen.   Often turning up to provide background information and assistance is Jared Morehu, a young Maori man who doubles as a handyman.

Murder is on the docket whether it be drowning in a wine vat, dying on a golf course, collapsing on stage, or cast adrift on the sea.  With four ex-wives and a bit of the city around the edges, Shepherd is passionate about country music and always has a cassette tape or two to pop in when he hops into his car.  These episodes are long, an hour and a half each, but I’m caught up in the experience of life and death in this beautiful somewhat rural area.

NOT TO BE MISSED

Rhinoceros at the Asolo Theater.  Ionesco’s absurdist play, first presented in 1959, has a simple plot line, but raises challenging questions for our time.  How does one remain an individual and true to one’s values when everyone around you is joining the herd?  Creatively staged and wonderfully acted, this production is both humorous and thought-provoking.  We had the added pleasure of seeing this with good friends from Philadelphia.

As a graduate student, the Chief Penguin was a volunteer usher in Boston for five nights when the Metropolitan Opera came to town.  He credits that performance of Bellini’s Norma, starring Joan Sutherland and Marilyn Horne, with sparking his love of opera.  Earlier this week, we were at the Sarasota Opera’s production of Norma, and it was wonderful!  The singing is not quite the level of those divas, but it was very good, especially Joanna Parisi as Norma.  The staging was also nicely done.  There are more performances of both Norma and Rhinoceros.

 

PRE-THEATER DINING

Two of our favorites for pre-performance dining are Muse at the Ringling and Louie’s Modern in downtown Sarasota.  Muse is consistently very good for both lunch and dinner, and we’ve recently enjoyed both.  The quesadilla is a frequent choice of the C.P., and I’m partial to their salads, particularly the green salad topped with grilled chicken and their Caesar.  In the evening, entrees include trout, salmon, and short ribs plus they have crab cakes, always good, as an appetizer.  Service is pleasant and efficient almost to the point of briskness. But they do want to be sure you make it in time for your play!

It’s “the season” as they say, so Louie’s is again offering their Modern Theater Menu (3 courses) for $30.  It’s a good deal!  The portions are a nice size and for each course there is a choice among three options.  We’ve eaten this menu twice recently and the North Palm salad with grapefruit is a light starter, while the salmon with couscous and the chicken breast are both excellent.  The chicken is accompanied by a silky mascarpone polenta and root vegetables.  Dessert offerings include a warm chocolate cake and polenta cake with berries, both of which we’ve sampled.  Muse and Louie’s are both part of the Tableseide group so there can be a bit of overlap between the menus—one example being the delicious and attractively presented burrata with heirloom tomatoes on a coral Himalayan salt block.  

WHAT I’M READING

Ann Veronica by H.G. Wells. Watch for more about this 1909 novel about a modern young woman in a future blog.

 

 

 

Notes:  Brokenwood image from all3mediainternational.com, principals in Norma from mysuncoast.com, and burrata photo from sarasotafoodies.com.  Header photo ©JWFarrington.

Tidy Tidbits: Food for Body & Soul

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RESTAURANTS.  I’m passionate about food and love dining at casual places, fancy restaurants, and even at home.  Here are my takes on several local restaurants, two new ones, one repeat.

DINING FIND

Element in downtown Sarasota is part of Duval’s group of restaurants and is their upscale dining spot.  We went for dinner on a Saturday night and it was moderately full when we arrived.  The space is elegant and contemporary in the way that Louie’s Modern is, and the menu, like Louie’s, pushes the Sarasota envelope beyond the traditional.  There are lots of good restaurants in our region, but most of them skew toward standard fare; therefore, it’s refreshing that Element offers creative cuisine in the form of small plates and sharing plates as well as full size entrees.  And if you are a serious carnivore, there are a number of sizes of filets, strip steaks and pork chops, as well as the option to pre-order a whole suckling pig.  Talk about sharing!

Robert, our waiter, was pleasant and knowledgeable and provided good service.  Another staff member, the new assistant manager from DC, stopped by the table see how we were enjoying our food—a plus for service.  Overall the food was very good!  The bread was warm and came with two flavored butters, and the charred radicchio was excellent as was the caprese salad with homemade burrata and lovely wedges of heirloom tomatoes.  We followed these dishes with the swordfish, crab meat, and potato cake which was very tasty and the pork agnolotti.  The pasta was chewy (it shouldn’t have been), but the tomato sauce was nicely thick with chunks of pork.

The Chief Penguin liked the look of his Old Fashioned as soon as he saw the single large ice cube, and I enjoyed my glass of Chardonnay, a generous pour fitting the price.  On the house, we sampled the apple cake which was lovely.  We were shown to a table in a side area all by ourselves, but overall, we enjoyed a very nice meal and will return.

NEW ITALIAN ON CORTEZ ROAD  

We dined with friends at Eat Organico in one of the little strip malls in Bradenton (the one with Thai Palace) and thought the food was very good.  Several of us sampled their veal preparations—with mushrooms, the piccata, and saltimbocca.  This is real veal—paper thin and tasty!  The house salad had a slightly tangy Thousand Island-like dressing, and there was also a Caesar salad.  Others in our group enjoyed penne with salmon and zucchini and penne Bolognese.  Most entrees came with a choice of penne or spaghetti with tomato sauce.  The sauce was good, but not stellar.  Portions are modest size, but fine for us.

It was a Friday night and other tables were occupied, but not all.  Service was slow and a bit ragged as it took a very long time to get our salads, let alone the glasses of wine we’d ordered.  I’ll chalk this up to it being a new place that hasn’t yet worked out all the kinks.  Will definitely give them a second go!

RETURN VISIT

It’s been awhile since we last ate at The Coolinary in Sarasota and decided it was time to go back.  The Chief Penguin had praise for their Old Fashioned and I tried a Chardonnay I hadn’t had before.  The signature dishes here are Hungarian.  The C.P. sampled the slightly spicy sausage which was excellent, and I had their chicken in paprika sauce with homemade spaetzle— lovely comfort food.  We began with an order of the cauliflower fritters with blue cheese dipping sauce and a tray of toasted nuts and blistered shishito peppers, the peppers a favorite of ours. The owner stopped by the table several times, and we were treated to a taste of sweet wine with the Dobos torte we’d ordered.  We remembered why we like this restaurant and vowed that even though it’s on the second floor, we should frequent it more often.

 

READING:  LATE IN LIFE ROMANCE? 

Author George Eliot, in real life, Marian Evans, was George Lewes’ common-law wife for twenty-five years.  After Lewes’ death, at the age of 60, she married Johnnie Cross, a young man of 40.  In order to avoid calling attention to themselves, they left London to honeymoon in Venice.  

The Honeymoon, a novel by Dinitia Smith, is a recounting of that fateful honeymoon, but even more Marian’s reflecting on her life from childhood to young womanhood to old age.  The novel is thoroughly researched, and the reader learns about all the prominent men Marian was acquainted with (philosopher Herbert Spencer and publisher John Chapman, just two examples), as well as those with whom she was intimate—either by choice or seduction.  It’s an engrossing portrait of a woman who, not beautiful, but very accomplished and literate, craved love and attention.

 

 

SAXY TIME  

One of the pluses of the Sarasota-Bradenton area is the number of concerts presented at local churches.  Many of them have regular music series.  This week we were at a concert by the Washington Saxophone Quartet at First United Methodist Church.  I didn’t know there was this kind of group, but I like the sax and thought it would be fun.  WSaxQ is celebrating its 41st year and, if people know it, but don’t know they do, it’s because the quartet provides the theme and interlude music for NPR’s All Things Considered.  They play music from all eras and deliberately work not to sound like saxophones!

The members of the quartet have each played in one of the US military bands for part of their career.   Among them was a soprano sax, straight with no bell and shaped more like a clarinet; an alto sax of a beautiful copper color; a tenor sax with a prominent bell; and lastly, a seriously big baritone sax.  The concert included music by Bach, Gabrieli, Ravel, Leonard Bernstein, and Duke Ellington among others.  Tenor sax player Rich Kleinfeldt  provided chatty and informative commentary about the pieces and the group.  It was a most enjoyable afternoon.

Note:  Eat Organico photo from TripAdvisor.com; Evans and tenor sax images from Wikipedia.