Pensacola Opera: Backstage at The Merry Widow
The stage is a different world behind the curtain...
Something I haven't publicized enough over the last year is that I have spent this past season as the in-house photographer ("photographer in residence" as my ever-so-patient wife wearily conceded this evening) for Pensacola Opera.
I've never been an opera devotee. I certainly appreciate the talent and training behind the voices and incredible detail and craftsmanship in the costumes and sets, but it's never been a performance genre I followed closely. However, since my wife began working at Pensacola Opera last year, and I became absorbed in by association to assist with media coverage, I have enjoyed getting to know the art and the people behind it immensely.
About a week ago, the Opera wrapped up its spring performance run of The Merry Widow. For those who don't know (myself counted among that number until I actually saw the show), TMW is a welcome respite from the typical opera tropes of mad scenes, death scenes and arias that hang into infinity. The story is hilarious and, thank God in heaven, it's sung in English. The Merry Widow was a joy to watch and to photograph.
I took an extra day during tech week and logged some shots backstage and in the wings. The energy and focus behind the scenes was amazing.
The Merry Widow
Artistic Director: Kyle Marrero
Maestro: Jerome Shannon
Director: Dean Anthony
Lighting Design: Charles Houghton
Costume Design: Glenn Breed, Wardrobe Witchery
Performed at the Saenger Theatre, Pensacola, FL.
Travel Blog: An Indian Wedding
India, Day 9
A wedding? In India? I was excited when my host informed me that we would be in attendance at a wedding after our morning outreach on day nine. Staying at a home in most areas of India means that you surrender your ability to plan anything longer than eight hours ahead of time. It's just the way the culture operates. In Casablanca, Humphrey Bogart's Rick has a great exchange with a woman in his cafe:
Yvonne: Where were you last night? Rick: That's so long ago, I don't remember. Yvonne: Will I see you tonight? Rick: I never make plans that far ahead.
[video]
Those lines are snappy and witty to hear in a film, but in India, that attitude is more often than not a region-wide reality. By this point, I was accustomed to surprises in my daily itinerary, and I was happy to learn that this surprise in particular was going to be a lot of fun.
Getting to the wedding took some doing; there hadn't been much rain in our area, but there hadn't been a lot of direct sunlight either. As such, the roads were still slurries of muck, always at least five inches deep. To make travel even more fun, we had a little competition for road space as we pulled up to the group of houses in the village where the wedding was to take place. There was a bus parked on one side of the road and several tractors and ox carts going back and forth, and our faithful Bolero had to take the outer edge of the road to get into the village complex. The truck got stuck for a minute or so, but our intrepid Driver was able to negotiate his way through it.
We disembarked and I took in the scene. I've photographed a lot of weddings, but I've never photographed an Indian wedding ceremony. I've always wanted to, but the opportunity never presented itself back home. And now, I was at an Indian wedding, in India. A Christian Indian wedding, no less. Life is funny like that.
An impromptu wedding venue had been constructed in the courtyard between some houses. An immense tent hung from poles on two sides, with the other two sides attached to the houses. Inside, sunlight filtered through the fabric to wash everything and everyone beneath it in an electric, technicolor glow. Musical instruments were held in readiness for the ceremony, while the pre-ceremony environment was supercharged with music from a boombox connected to a set of speakers that blared chants and songs for a good quarter-mile.
The ceremony began about an hour after we arrived, and the girls raised their voices in a chanted refrain as the musicians began making live music. The groom entered from stage right. He was dressed entirely in white, except for his bright ride Puma sneakers. The bride emerged after nearly another hour of music. The music had died down and the ceremony was underway, with a short "homily" from the officiant preceding the vows proper. The content, all delivered in Hindi, was entirely lost on me of course, but I was content to observe the goings-on and assume that the message wasn't too different than the wedding messages I hear back home.
We had to leave before the end of the ceremony, sadly. The wedding began a full two hours behind schedule (even in India, that seemed pretty extreme to me), and Driver had appeared at our elbows to whisper that he was only on the clock for a little while longer, and we needed to move on if we wanted him to drive us home. So, we left early.
I was intrigued by the expressions on the bride and groom's faces. Unlike the weddings I've attended and photographed for years back home, I saw no signs of emotion in the couple. There are usually some hints of shyness or happiness on one or both faces, but on these two, I saw only stoicism. I asked one of my host's colleagues about this.
"Why did the bride and groom look like that?"
"Like what?" He seemed surprised.
"They looked sad."
He nodded. "Ah, yes. They are actually very happy, but they are leaving their families now, so for that reason they are looking sad."
Intriguing.
Andrew McGee: You Can't Sell a Song in Nashville
Sometimes, I really don't know the reason that I blog at all. Originally, it was to promote my photography, but at this point it is simply a constructive outlet for me to flesh out ideas and communicate the things which keep me awake at night. I probably do myself a disservice by writing so much about health and culture instead of specializing in marketable photographic content. But, it's my blog and I'll do what I want.
Tonight, as I continue to work obsessively over my upcoming ebook (unofficially announced several times now, the "official" word is forthcoming), I want to take a break and highlight the work of my friend and colleague, Andrew McGee. Andrew has a pretty remarkable story. After a brush with death that should have sent him on to the great hereafter, Andrew decided to quite stalling and do what he really wanted to do with his life. He moved to Nashville and has created a new life for himself as a singer and songwriter.
Andrew and I met under interesting circumstances. My creative specialty is photography, but I also moonlight as a videographer from time to time. I was most heavily involved in this line of work a few of years ago, and I was introduced to Andrew on a “friend of a friend" basis. Our association was originally pretty simple; another fellow was engaged to write and direct the video for a wonderful song Andrew wrote about the impact of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. My job was to operate the camera.
Long story short, the other guy flaked on the project and I took up the slack from start to finish. As a result, my video and my name were incorporated into the marketing for Andrew's debut album, These Beautiful Hideous Things. That was 2009, and since that fateful day we met on Pensacola Beach, with BP oil cleanup equipment rumbling about us on all sides, Andrew and I have continued to collaborate on videos for his songs. Our greatest accomplishment so far is the weekend last year when I (along with a group of other creative and reliable people who would go on to found The Dream Factory) traveled to Nashville and shot four music videos for Andrew in four days. I don't know about the rest of the team, but that weekend still ranks as my personal best.
Most performers have a blog or social feed of some sort, but Andrew's stands out. Prior to moving to Nashville, he wasn't a stereotypical neighborhood busker; He didn't and doesn’t pass off blurry iPhone photos of random drunks as his "awesome fans" to build up a web presence. Andrew is an FSU graduate with an MBA in marketing, and his blog has some serious substance. His latest entry, You Can't Sell a Song in Nashville, is stellar. Seriously, if more people recognized the realities of whichever industries they attempted to be part of, instead of delaying their own steps toward action in hopes of “getting discovered,” more dreams would see the light of day.
Read Andrew's blog. And listen to his music. Listening to his album is like listening to a good story, and he has another one coming soon.
You Can't Sell a Song in Nashville
http://youtu.be/8bSEZmoPxvo
Bob Dylan - "Mississippi"
Something about Bob Dylan's music always works its way into my soul and calms me down. I would have loved to post a link to the gentler, acoustic version of this song from the Tell Tale Signs bootleg collection, but this is the best that YouTube could provide. Both sides of my family hail from Mississippi, and I plan to spend some time there in the fall doing some research into family history.
Every step of the way we walk the line Your days are numbered, so are mine Time is pilin’ up, we struggle and we scrape We’re all boxed in, nowhere to escape
City’s just a jungle; more games to play Trapped in the heart of it, tryin' to get away I was raised in the country, I been workin’ in the town I been in trouble ever since I set my suitcase down
Got nothin' for you, I had nothin' before Don’t even have anything for myself anymore Sky full of fire, pain pourin’ down Nothing you can sell me, I’ll see you around
All my powers of expression and thoughts so sublime Could never do you justice in reason or rhyme Only one thing I did wrong Stayed in Mississippi a day too long
Well, the devil’s in the alley, mule’s in the stall Say anything you wanna, I have heard it all I was thinkin’ 'bout the things that Rosie said I was dreaming I was sleepin' in Rosie’s bed
Walkin' through the leaves, falling from the trees Feelin' like a stranger nobody sees So many things that we never will undo I know you’re sorry, I’m sorry too
Some people will offer you their hand and some won’t Last night I knew you, tonight I don’t I need somethin’ strong to distract my mind I’m gonna look at you ’til my eyes go blind
Well I got here followin' the southern star I crossed that river just to be where you are Only one thing I did wrong Stayed in Mississippi a day too long
Well my ship’s been split to splinters and it’s sinkin' fast I’m drownin’ in the poison, got no future, got no past But my heart is not weary, it’s light and it’s free I’ve got nothin’ but affection for all those who’ve sailed with me
Everybody movin’ if they ain’t already there Everybody got to move somewhere Stick with me baby, stick with me anyhow Things should start to get interestin' right about now
My clothes are wet, tight on my skin Not as tight as the corner that I painted myself in I know that fortune is waitin’ to be kind So give me your hand and say you’ll be mine
Well, the emptiness is endless, cold as the clay You can always come back, but you can’t come back all the way Only one thing I did wrong Stayed in Mississippi a day too long
Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBshqWuaAWM]
Bob Dylan
"Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues"
When you're lost in the rain in Juarez And it's Eastertime too And your gravity fails And negativity don't pull you through Don't put on any airs When you're down on Rue Morgue Avenue They got some hungry women there And they really make a mess outa you.
Now if you see Saint Annie Please tell her thanks a lot I cannot move My fingers are all in a knot I don't have the strength To get up and take another shot And my best friend, my doctor Won't even say what it is I've got.
Sweet Melinda The peasants call her the goddess of gloom She speaks good English And she invites you up into her room And you're so kind And careful not to go to her too soon And she takes your voice And leaves you howling at the moon.
Up on Housing Project Hill It's either fortune or fame You must pick up one or the other Though neither of them are to be what they claim If you're lookin' to get silly You better go back to from where you came Because the cops don't need you And man they expect the same. Now all the authorities They just stand around and boast How they blackmailed the sergeant-at-arms Into leaving his post And picking up Angel who Just arrived here from the coast Who looked so fine at first But left looking just like a ghost.
I started out on burgundy But soon hit the harder stuff Everybody said they'd stand behind me When the game got rough But the joke was on me There was nobody even there to bluff I'm going back to New York City I do believe I've had enough.