on
Bloom’s day visit Cathac books,Duke Street (off
Grafton Street) Dublin for a superb range of
Joyce’s volumes and the stock, VOLUMES AND MAPS,
all of Irish interest. James Joyce might hear, in his
waxy ear, your sigh as you gaze at the snot-green sea
from Sandymount Tower…..........
ANTtI
SIIRALA ,
from
Finland,won the first prize, he has mature insight
and technique far beyond his slight years, standing
out despite competitors in the early rounds of
exceptionally high quality, to pass easily through
others in the Finals. His interpretation of twelve
Etudes by Debussy in the Second Round marking him out
as a scholar too,who is undoubtedly familiar with the
poems of Mallarme.
ANTtI
SIIRALA, PIANIST
Play,
play again, do not leave off...
You are spilling into my
vision of time…..
to Oscillate in these
branches of thought
**********
Silence fastens a phrase
stretching the knots’
Rhythm and hurling a beam
of light
Across water as the bone
skull rises
A bird, companion in flight from the ancient
Meaning that gathered in
our halls
As the harp shattered the
silence of the tribes.
**********
play, play again, for me to hear the origin
Of memory, oscillation of
vision, where
Those faces, masking the
truth of mind,
Drew from me the passion
of life
Generating in blood the
echo of experience;
Hurtled from gasps my
understanding;
Rained merciless sleets of
loss;
Granting my arms the
wrists the palm
And the hand-hold swift in
movement,
Strong to grasp and weld
to the other,
Hand of man my soul of
woman.
**********
Always and forever play,
so that standing
Among shadows even, I will
hear thee;
Always and forever,play beyond the cliff
Always and forever, play
in the meadow
Always to emerge and press
forth a flight...
Thus I heard you
tonight.....
jos
braddell©2003
.This is rich! Quote from
Convention Text on EU which does not
.permit Gaelic but has already arranged for use of
Maltese in the Union Institutions!!
"The
Union shall respect its rich cultural and
linguistic diversity, and shall ensure that Europe's
cultural heritage is safeguarded and enhanced."
..KILKENNY ARTS NEWS
...Students of Kilkenny Art and Design:"Virtual
Notebook"County Hall, John St.Kilkenny
The Ormonde College, Ormonde
Rd.Kilkenny until Friday 6th June
ARTISTS IN LONDON
Beaconsfield
was founded in
1994 with the aim "to educate the public by
providing a streamlined resource for the development
and presentation of contemporary art and initiating
dialogues between artists and their audience".
Set up by artists with a track record for organising
grass-roots events, Beaconsfield uniquely raised
private donations to refurbish the former Lambeth
Ragged School in Vauxhall and public subsidy for its
artistic programme. Beaconsfield's reputation was
founded on such international ground-breaking
projects as Disorders - a 24 hour event in St
Thomas¹ Hospital, 1996, Rude Mechanic - a
visualisation of sound, 1996 and Ground Control -
artists despatches from Lithuania and England, 1997.
Beaconsfield's original mission statement -"to
occupy a niche between the institution, the
commercial and the 'alternative" - has been
realised . The current aim is to maintain and
consolidate Beaconsfield's stated identity and to
emphasise this in ways that challenge conventional
venue programming,and to provide a critical space by:
Initiating dialogue and contributing to debate within
contemporary art practice and beyond, maintaining and
consolidating an artist-led venue; Sustaining an
international network and providing a flexible
resource of national significance ;. Developing the
audience for contemporary art ;
Being attentive to issues of cultural diversity.
.SHANE CULLEN
These ideas were certainly amplified in May - Shane
Cullen's engraved screens of the Irish Good Friday
Agreement were put on exhibition in the Gallery and
two days of debate and speeches were held: The
Politics of Art, hosted by Kevin McNamara MP in the
Grand Committee Room, House of Commons on May 6th;
and secondly The Art of Politics, 7th May in the
Beaconsfield Upper Gallery, where John Hume gave a
fine speech in which he analysed the comparative
differences and/or similarities of practice with
which the Politician and the Artist share. STOP PRESS Which will be found in the navigator
column later in June, will be giving either excerpts
from that speech or a link to it. Meantime,in a
conversation which I had briefly with Professor Liam
Kelly from the School of Art and Design, University
of Belfast, I learned that these screens had
successfully been exhibited in Belfast, and that
people visiting the exhibition had realised that
official documents need not be prohibitively complex,
also well worth reading. It is hoped that they will
be exhibited in New York in the near future and
possibly Israel where Shane Cullen is travelling
soon.
Under the following paragraph I took a photograph of
Shane with a camera which regretably did not
function, I also lost photos of John Hume and my dear
friend Oliver O Donohoe who alerted me to a follow up
of interest that The Handstand took last year in this
matter, and brought me to these events, where in
fact, meeting John Hume a hero in my heart, was a
very happy moment....
.5.All participants
acknowledge the sensitivity of the use of symbols and
emblems for .public purposes, and the need in
particular in creating the new institutions to ensure
that such symbols and emblems are used in a manner
which promotes mutual respect rather .than division.
Arrangements will be made to monitor this issue and
consider what action might be required.
Beaconsfield 2002 info@beaconsfield.ltd.uk
David Crawforth - Director
Alasdair Hopwood - Administration
..
Shane at his first
exhibition of these screens in Dublin.
Gilad Atzmon's CD
Exile
(Tiptoe)
The
first bars of 'Dal'ouna', an ominous bowed double bass,
an incantatory  vocal in Arabic from
the Palestinian singer Reem Kelani and soprano saxophone
from Gilad Atzmon himself, usher you into Exile
with a striking introduction.
This gives way to a
song driven by a repetitive bass figure, jumpy Israeli
riffs, syncopated accordion and subtle drums. Somewhere
between jazz and the music of the Middle East, and
exploiting the similarities between the music and the
experiences of the Jewish and Palestinian peoples.
The song perfectly
states Gilad Atzmon's aim: similarity should outweigh
difference; difference should be celebrated.
Atzmon explicitly
makes the point that modern Israel was founded on a
notion of 'return' and asks: "How can modern
Zionists ... be so blind when it comes to a very similar
Palestinian desire?" To make his point, he's taken
traditional Jewish songs, the anthem of the '67 War, a
melody from the film Salach Shabati and
Palestinian songs, 'Dal'ouna', 'Ramallah', 'Imhaaha', and
reinterpreted them in a jazz context.
Middle Eastern
basslines and and harmonies pass through jazz chord
voicings and arrangements, a chorus will give way to a
synchronised Middle Eastern riff; Hebrew lyrics about
longing for homeland are sung in Arabic, an Eastern
European ballad about a town burnt in a pogrom is
re-christened 'Jenin'.
Much of the album's
success has to be down to Gilad Atzmon's splendid command
of the idioms of jazz and Middle Eastern music. His
soprano and alto sax slips between the two with a
stinging melancholy ('Jenin'), hopeful insistence
('Al-quds') and something like joy ('La Côte'), while
Frank Harrison on piano and Yaron Stavi (bass) and Asaf
Sirkis (drums and percussion) all play with a wonderful
collective touch which is subtle, energetic and
unconventional.
While some may find Exile's
premise provocative, it's satisfying music that reaffirms
the essentially constructive nature of collaboration.
Reviewer: Neil Bennun
..LETTER FROM GILAD
ATZMON:“Orient House
Ensemble” is nominated in two categories for this
year “BBC Jazz Awards”:
1.. Best Album
2.. Best Band
The nominees have been announced for the third
annual BBC Jazz Awards. The opinions of over one hundred
and fifty members of the UK jazz industry have been
polled and the three most popular nominees in each
category. Anyway, if you want to vote
yourself (as long as you vote for us) please go
to the following link:www.bbc.co.uk/radio2/events/jazzawards/
Peace
Gilad and the OHE
"They
Passed from Here"- Iraq’s First Post-war
Play
by Haider
Hamza 14 May 2003 BAGHDAD – The
Al-Rashid Theatre is crying, because it’s not
whole anymore. Located next door to the old Ministry
of Information, the theatre was bombed during the
war, and looted afterwards. The building still
stands, full of gaping holes and burned walls. The
stage still exists, but all around it lays
destruction. The Al-Rashid looks as though it’s
been abandoned for 50 years. But on Sunday, 4 May
2003, a group of young, Iraqi actors made the
Al-Rashid a theatre again, when they staged the first
play in Baghdad after the war. They called it,
“They Passed from Here.” The place was dark
because there was no electricity, the theatre was
only half-full, and the audience seemed to be
composed mainly of foreign press, or the actor’s
colleagues and relatives. But somehow, this small,
determined group of artists created a small miracle.
Abdullah Ali, in the audience, said, “Before the
war I never saw such an honest play, although I have
attended many plays. This time, the actors were
speaking without any chains.”
Always surprising, and chaotic at times - covering
history, philosophy and commentary - the play
attempted to paint a picture of life in Iraq today.
The actors were in constant motion, sometimes
speaking over one another. They never said anything
directly, but instead depended on the audience to
grasp the underlying themes.
“What is freedom, exactly?” the players
asked.
The main theme of the play was survival, and, indeed,
the players call themselves “Al-Najeen”
– the Survivors. The play showed that Iraq has
survived the war, but the war is not finished.
What’s finished is only one face of it; the war
of the bombs. Now, is the time for the war of the
soul, and, while the winner of the war of the bombs
was the one greater in technology, the winner in the
war of the soul will be the one greater in love.
The play thanked America for overthrowing Saddam
Hussein, but cautioned that Iraqis can’t trust
America in the coming struggle. Iraqis have to change
their lives, their ways of living, and they have to
change within themselves first. Saddam may be gone,
but everything else remains, Saddam still lives
within each Iraqi.
“Iraq can’t just take hope,” the
players said in their written description of the
event, “We have to create it ourselves.”
Aala’a Hussein, one of Iraq’s famous, young
actresses, and a member of Al-Najeen troupe, later
commented, “When I came here I was shocked.
Everything’s destroyed. I didn’t imagine it
was this bad.” But Sheherazad, also in the
troupe, said, “I felt so free and determined. I
wasn’t standing on the stage or even touching
it. I was flying in the air.’’
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