Before the Iceland Airwaves Festival started, I spent a few days as a tourist in Reykjavík, mostly geeking out on saga and settlement history. But I did make a hurried stop at the Reykjavík Art Museum, which turned out to be one of many serendipitous epiphanies experienced in Iceland. Read More
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Rúrí at Reykjavik Art Museum
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A Sign of Things to Come: Christmas Music
When my mother was growing up, she never had the kind of Christmas Hallmark sells, and she was determined that my brother and I would have a different experience. She was largely successful, but even so, not all of the traditions imparted were intentional. Some of her holiday ambivalence transmitted to me.
Case in point – our distaste for Christmas music. My mom and I both hate the commercial frenzy of the holidays anyway, but the Christmas muzak assault is the final straw that sends us both running to mail order. With extremely few exceptions, it is just BAD MUSIC that we are all force-fed for a month every year, and to add insult to injury, we are expected to feel nostalgic about it.
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Iceland Airwaves by the Numbers
Uber-geek Souvenir
In science there is only physics. All the rest is stamp collecting. – Ernest Rutherford.
Maybe it’s because I used to be a stamp collector (molecular genetics lab tech), but I can’t resist the urge to measure things that don’t really need to be measured. Iceland Airwaves was a five-day MFA program in music that quite literally changed the way I hear music. When I came home, I put on my old CDs and sometimes I could barely recognize the once-familiar music – I just heard different things.
That should be enough. But no, useless data must follow.
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Chaology: A Post-Airwaves Lesson From the Reykjavik Art Museum
The northern lights failed to create the proper cinematic effect after Sigur Rós’ concert, but the morning-after rain was a perfect visual for the movie version. I tried to write, but it was useless. Such a wide variety of music juxtaposed over such a short time had sparked more new ideas than I could process. My cup had run over so forcefully it toppled off the table and landed upside down on the floor. I had finally achieved the martial artist’s “empty cup,” the beginner’s mind. Read More