A Double-Feature of Cultural Context and Implied Elitism!
As a film, Grindhouse is a three-hour homage to paracinema, a genre-classification tool that, prior to a week ago, was the province of college film classes and video-store geek collectives. Important within this distinction is that the term "grindhouse" used to describe a location as much as a common filmic structure or aesthetic: specifically, the scuzzy, low-rent theatres that showed scratchy versions of no-budget, crazy-violent exploitation movies. While they wanted to pay homage to a specific viewing context, Tarantino and Rodgriguez made sure their films were as accessible as possible to a large audience, and didn't weigh their respective contributions down with obscure minutae, eliminating casual viewers from enjoying them. Essentially, Planet Terror is a ramped-up, From Dusk ‘til Dawn sci-fi/action/horror flick (that Rose McGowan: talk about Restless Leg Syndrome amirite?), and Death Proof has enough overt lecherousness, roundtable diner conversations about pop culture, and obscure rock songs to qualify as a Tarantino pastiche par excellence. Most filmgoers are not freakishly devoted to subcultural film studies, and no doubt went to see two rather expertly executed films from two cultishly admired directors, connecting with Grindhouse on a purely affective level, not an intellectual one.
Seeing Grindhouse last night reminded me of another novel cultural event that played with notions of location-as-art-enjoyment-context, but less successfully so. Reknowned classical violinist (and IU grad/Bloomington native!) Joshua Bell was commissioned by the Washington Post to perform as a street musician in a subway kiosk. He played Massenet and Bach and Schubert, and was largely ignored by passersby, making about 30 bucks for a morning’s work. Writer Gene Weingarten's point, and it’s a valid (if not overly obvious) one, is that “context matters,” and Bell’s beautiful renditions were essentially “art without a frame.” One of my professors alerted me to the story, and then I noticed that Carl had also donated his two cents, so here are mine. I’ve been very interested for a while now in theories of listening contexts for music (this piece, for instance, came from this fascination), but I feel it necessary to quickly comment here not only on the locational context of the music, but the author’s rather elitist glossing over the idea of cultural capital, more specifically his seeming wonder at the ignorance of the passersby.
It's certainly one thing to offer that any work of art is only as potent as the context it's presented within, and Weingarten goes out of his way to reference Kant, Hume and Leibniz when discussing what "beauty" is, and how it's not uniform, but created in the mind of the observer. Fine enough, but the author also falls into the trap of essentializing these "observers" (despite his reporterly man-on-the-street interviews) as being all cut from the same intellectual and cultural cloth as Bell, classical music-lovers, and well, Weingarten himself (or so he wants us to think). He makes the wrongheaded assumption that those busy morning commuters who didn't take the time to stop and enjoy the beautiful music being played on a centuries-old violin were (pardon me for this) pedestrian. While he wraps up his piece by backing off the "unsophisticated" undercurrent, Weingarten does offer, quoting author John Lane, that they might have the "wrong priorities." Oy. He continues, "if we can't take the time out of our lives to stay a moment and listen to one of the best musicians on Earth play some of the best music ever written...then what else are we missing?" For starters, we're missing an anachronistic, elitist appreciation of what makes something "good." It's not just that classical music is inherently better, but Weingarten apparently despises the iPod, taking the tone of a father trying to get his son to take piano lessons. For the author, the iPod has "perversely limited, not expanded, our exposure to new experiences." Like Carl from above, I am always fond of seeing huge newspapers make an attempt to engage with aesthetic theory in any form or fashion. But Weingarten's elitist and classist distinction between what's intellectually stimulating to listen to in public (classical music, professionally performed) and what's merely "Just Like Heaven" on an iPod (sorry, but put me in this camp if I'm trying to make it to work on time) is far more regressive than it appears at a glance. The century-plus-old distinction, dating back to the earliest days of recorded music, is that "live" is inherently better than canned. That one can't possibly, seriously be enjoying life to its fullest if only listening to an mp3. It's a fun and novel experiment, to be sure, and the piece certainly can't be faulted for bringing issues like this into public discourse. But for an article that poses (at least a little) as an expose on the failure of society to stop and enjoy high culture, it traps itself in the same haughty gallery mentality it's supposed to reveal.
ALSO: Big ups to the WIUX folks who revived the recently dormant Bloomington tradition known as this Culture Shock festival this past weekend, in spite of some nasty weather. They set up two stages with tents and centralized heaters, limiting the atmospheric nastiness significantly. I only caught two entire sets, but they were both great: Black Moth Super Rainbow, which I wrote about here, stunned me with their short, hugely rhythmic bursts and "Kelly Watch the Stars" vocal modulations. Richard Swift, whom I wrote about here, put on a Letdown heavy set, but closed with an extended, psychedelic version of "Holiday" that also managed, coincidentally enought, to work in a vocoder.
TONIGHT: If you're in the area, come out to Landlocked and party with Casiotone for the Painfully Alone. Seriously.
Seeing Grindhouse last night reminded me of another novel cultural event that played with notions of location-as-art-enjoyment-context, but less successfully so. Reknowned classical violinist (and IU grad/Bloomington native!) Joshua Bell was commissioned by the Washington Post to perform as a street musician in a subway kiosk. He played Massenet and Bach and Schubert, and was largely ignored by passersby, making about 30 bucks for a morning’s work. Writer Gene Weingarten's point, and it’s a valid (if not overly obvious) one, is that “context matters,” and Bell’s beautiful renditions were essentially “art without a frame.” One of my professors alerted me to the story, and then I noticed that Carl had also donated his two cents, so here are mine. I’ve been very interested for a while now in theories of listening contexts for music (this piece, for instance, came from this fascination), but I feel it necessary to quickly comment here not only on the locational context of the music, but the author’s rather elitist glossing over the idea of cultural capital, more specifically his seeming wonder at the ignorance of the passersby.
It's certainly one thing to offer that any work of art is only as potent as the context it's presented within, and Weingarten goes out of his way to reference Kant, Hume and Leibniz when discussing what "beauty" is, and how it's not uniform, but created in the mind of the observer. Fine enough, but the author also falls into the trap of essentializing these "observers" (despite his reporterly man-on-the-street interviews) as being all cut from the same intellectual and cultural cloth as Bell, classical music-lovers, and well, Weingarten himself (or so he wants us to think). He makes the wrongheaded assumption that those busy morning commuters who didn't take the time to stop and enjoy the beautiful music being played on a centuries-old violin were (pardon me for this) pedestrian. While he wraps up his piece by backing off the "unsophisticated" undercurrent, Weingarten does offer, quoting author John Lane, that they might have the "wrong priorities." Oy. He continues, "if we can't take the time out of our lives to stay a moment and listen to one of the best musicians on Earth play some of the best music ever written...then what else are we missing?" For starters, we're missing an anachronistic, elitist appreciation of what makes something "good." It's not just that classical music is inherently better, but Weingarten apparently despises the iPod, taking the tone of a father trying to get his son to take piano lessons. For the author, the iPod has "perversely limited, not expanded, our exposure to new experiences." Like Carl from above, I am always fond of seeing huge newspapers make an attempt to engage with aesthetic theory in any form or fashion. But Weingarten's elitist and classist distinction between what's intellectually stimulating to listen to in public (classical music, professionally performed) and what's merely "Just Like Heaven" on an iPod (sorry, but put me in this camp if I'm trying to make it to work on time) is far more regressive than it appears at a glance. The century-plus-old distinction, dating back to the earliest days of recorded music, is that "live" is inherently better than canned. That one can't possibly, seriously be enjoying life to its fullest if only listening to an mp3. It's a fun and novel experiment, to be sure, and the piece certainly can't be faulted for bringing issues like this into public discourse. But for an article that poses (at least a little) as an expose on the failure of society to stop and enjoy high culture, it traps itself in the same haughty gallery mentality it's supposed to reveal.
ALSO: Big ups to the WIUX folks who revived the recently dormant Bloomington tradition known as this Culture Shock festival this past weekend, in spite of some nasty weather. They set up two stages with tents and centralized heaters, limiting the atmospheric nastiness significantly. I only caught two entire sets, but they were both great: Black Moth Super Rainbow, which I wrote about here, stunned me with their short, hugely rhythmic bursts and "Kelly Watch the Stars" vocal modulations. Richard Swift, whom I wrote about here, put on a Letdown heavy set, but closed with an extended, psychedelic version of "Holiday" that also managed, coincidentally enought, to work in a vocoder.
TONIGHT: If you're in the area, come out to Landlocked and party with Casiotone for the Painfully Alone. Seriously.
Labels: methinks
posted by marathonpacks at 11:49 AM
2 Comments:
great piece, eric, though kind of sad when i realized that my first reaction to 'making about 30 bucks for a morning's work' was man, thirty bucks, that's a lot of money. welcome to life as an english major i guess.
I think that Weingarten is merely pointing out the strange dynamic of our modern society, the way in which we deliberately seclude ourselves in public places. I also wouldn't belittle his opinion on public performance, as it undoubtedly speaks louder than say a less faceted recording. A live experience commands all of the senses, and as a performance is never the same twice, much less can be said about an mp3. I believe this to be true in any medium, where factors of performance are the response to space and participation (and of course, the space can benefit the performace, as mentioned- the echo of the subway walls). I might also question your judgement on the topic of "haughty gallery mentality"- I don't believe Joshua Bell or the Washington Post necessarily questions our abilities to recognize the piece, but our efforts to respond to a man intruding as a classical musician in a subway...the mere fact that people did not stop to look questions our awareness of our surroundings (or rather lack of awareness). And (on a basic level) what leaves more of an impression at the end of the day? the cd you listened to for the 20th time or an enounter with really, any good musician? (or a once in a lifetime encounter with first rate Joshua Bell?)
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