Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Renée Fleming made me cry

Art can be understood as a prism; authentic art takes light and truth and inspiration, and it refracts the essence into smaller pieces that we can more readily manage - given the limitations mortal beings carry as regards time, and space, and intellect, and emotional capacity...

Believe me, I'm not turning into a classical music aficionado - it's just coincidence that I'm posting consecutive blogs about the impact of long dead composers who wrote in languages I cannot understand! But, there's no way I could possibly let yesterday evening's Renée Fleming concert go by unmentioned; the experience was that awesome.

Renée Fleming, if you don't know, is the premier soloist on the planet. No argument from anyone. She recently shattered a 125 year tradition by headlining the Metropolitan Opera's season opening - the first time in history a woman had been so honored.

The program, with the exception of a group of songs by Strauss and the final encore, was operatic - not necessarily my cup of tea. But, I've got to tell you, she won me over. There is something about beauty and creativity and giftedness on that level that goes way beyond preferences of genre.

Once again I'm writing about my (recently) recurring theme of beauty and art and creativity - and the overarching concept of what I have began to understand as "Gourmet Living".

I believe we are tragically confused in our culture when it comes to understanding what makes life worthwhile, what counts as "blessing", how to measure "satisfaction", and the path to true meaning and enlightenment.

Renée Fleming's first encore was the Puccini aria, "O mio babbino caro", from Gianni Schicchi. I have to admit - and I noticed the scene repeated throughout the Performing Arts Center - the pure beauty of the music immediately made me cry; I could not help it. Tears filled my eyes and we were all transported into the kind of experiential plane of insight that declares, quite clearly, "This is a representation of the music of heaven; this is a moment of revelation; this is your invitation to believe."

So I guess I'm saying Renée Fleming is a kind of evangelist; at least, she's my kind of evangelist.

Art can be understood as a prism; authentic art takes light and truth and inspiration, and it refracts the essence into smaller pieces that we can more readily manage - given the limitations mortal beings carry as regards time, and space, and intellect, and emotional capacity - DEREK



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