Music, concerts
Michael Jackson died today. I am reminded of finding out that he had been severely burned while filming a Pepsi commercial. It was 1984, I was nine, and in the car with my father on the way to the old Home Depot in College Park, GA, when I heard the news on the radio. I remember being affected by this news far more profoundly than any other news I have ever gotten. I became obsessed with Michael Jackson.
I kept imagining that he was in the room with me: I had to look in my closet, could not sleep with the closet door open. I would look behind curtains when entering a room and had to open the shower curtain immediately upon entering the bathroom to make sure he wasn’t there.
Like so many others, I had found so much power and beauty in his Thriller album, a power that carried so much weight because I owned so few records at the time. I found in those songs a part of who I wanted to be, or at least who I could dream to be. Michael’s accident was the first time in my life I had confronted a very mortal event happening to someone I had idolized.
It is odd that this experience made me feel he was present with me, even physically around me. I was afraid of that presence, I think because I felt that if something so horrific could happen to Michael Jackson, something could happen to my dreams as well.
I always especially liked the infectious beat of “Wanna Be Starting Somethin’,” and only recently have decided that “Human Nature” to be one of my favorite pop songs of all time. Years later I had many adolescent fantasies of crushes on classmates listening to “The Way You Make Me Feel,” imagining myself the suave singer and dancer expressing my love and lust for someone.
And just as at nine I idolized Michael Jackson to the point of unhealthy obsession, I cannot imagine what life becomes like when millions of people are similarly obsessed, when so many people feel so intensely connected to you, inspired by you and feel some kind of ownership of you. It must be, ironically, a very lonely place. And for Michael, especially since he achieved that state at so early an age, and continued there for the rest of his life.
His eccentricities I sympathized with, his interactions with young boys I agonized over with disgust and pain. His inability to relate to the world as others did made me sad more than anything. But his life as a real person really has never had meaning for me– it is his music that has held power over me for so long.
I’m not a big follower of popular music, but somehow Rob Thomas’s voice and lyrics speaks to me. It is great to hear a male singer with a strong voice who expresses both vulnerability and strength through music at the same time. He ahs a new album coming out June 30 called “cradlesong,” and the entire album is available to preview free on rhapsody (some kind of music listening service that I have not used before, but which allows enough free plays to hear the whole thing). The link to the album rhapsody http://www.rhapsody.com/robthomas.
This album has a range of different sounds and themes, mostly of course keeping with the Rob Thomas signatures of melancholy angst about difficulties in love, but musically diverse. Several of the tracks remind me of a couple of Phil Collins albums from the 1990s (“Both Sides,” “…But Seriously.” Other points in the album remind me of early alternative music, and some solid rock is there too. I like the multiple influences on this album, it gives layers to it and I think will make for enjoyable multiple listening.
Track Highlights:
2. “Gasoline,” Classic, solid Rob Thomas song.
3. “Give Me the Meltdown,” retro and fresh at the same time, with rock/funk themes and a snappy, quick-paced hook.
4. “Someday,” mellow, polished ballad that, like much of Rob’s work, grows on you and sounds better the more you listen. For me it is the depth of meaning; the more you listen, the more you relate personally to the songs.
6. “Real World ’09,” clearly an updated reference to the 1998 Matchbox Twenty song of the same name– this song is less iconic but more mature and enjoyable nonetheless.
8. “Hard on You,” has definite fuink influences, okay lyrics but interesting sound that carries it.
11. “Snowblind,” enjoyable, reminds me of the “alternative” music I listened to in high school in the early 90s.
12. “Wonderful,” is probably my favorite song on the album, its lyrics and music are sometimes representing different moods at once, and it heightens the overall effect.
13. “Cradlesong,” has strong lyrics, the kind of writing that makes me appreciate Rob Thomas as a poet.
The June 18 performance of the Requiem by Hector Berlioz was perhaps the best performance I have seen at Verizon Hall. The music is powerful, and has great variety that flows from soft moments to all-out rapture.
The Grande Messe des morts, Op. 5 (or Requiem) by Hector Berlioz was composed in 1837 to remember soldiers who died in the Revolution of July 1830 (French Revolution of 1830, not the big, famous French Revolution of 1789-99 with the storming of the Bastille, etc.). As a Requiem Mass it places religious themes into context of grieving and honoring the dead, uplifting both the memorialized and the music.
As for this performance, somehow the sound sounded better than usual, the Philadelphia Singers seemed at their best, and despite some early relestness, the audience was particularly well-behaved. It was nice that the piece was performed straight through without intermission, because the flow and progression added to the enjoyment. Tenor solist Paul Groveswas enchanting. The “Tuba mirum,” portraying the Day of Judgment, was performed with the brass sound literally enciricling the audience and it was clear it gave everyone present pleasure and captured the essence of the intention of the composer.
This was a special night, because music choice, sound quality and general focus seemed to be off a lot this season; I cannot put my finger on it, but it seemed overall this season’s concerts were as a whole weaker than previous years. Naturally I speak only as layperson who enjoys the music, but I hope for the Orchestra’s sake and for my own enjoyment that they are able to make a decision on a permanent artistic director who will help give the Philadelphia Orchestra a consistency and point of view they are currently lacking. Tonight, though, the Orchestra left me looking forward to next year.
