Monthly Archives: December 2018

Thoughts

As We Say Farewell to 2018…

I find myself thinking even more of not only the things I did, but what I felt at various times of the year following events and experiences.

I shed way more happy tears than sad ones and that was reassuring, so the acceptance that I weep when something good happens in life definitely stays with me, as does not holding those tears back. In most of these situations it’s OK to cry, after all. Don’t apologize for happy tears. And there’s still the convenience of crying in the cinema (I’m easily moved, even if it’s a film I’ve seen before – go, art!) if I’ve had a shortage of waterworks.

Among the things that made me weep was kindness towards me, genuine, pure, from the heart, unconditional kindness, especially in hard moments I kept to myself, when people were still not obliged to be kind and were so without knowing.

That’s enough tears!

There were many solutions to what I thought were tangled problems, and the solutions were there all along, mostly contained in, as always, facing facts, and then, sometimes, writing them down. Notebooks are the best.

Other philosophical moments include many confirmations in various situations of this too shall pass, realizations we weren’t lacking something when we thought we were, what drained my inner peace and what replenished it – it’s vital to keep learning how to feed your energy, mental and physical.

I am and always will be a family person.

I want to grab the moments that feel like they define me (again and again) and register that which resonates with me because it’s closest to who I am.

I want to be brave.

I want many things that I feel I’ve had a test run of in 2018, things I hadn’t even expected, and can now proceed with “for real” in 2019.

For a long time now I’ve been making decisions and setting goals instead of resolutions. New Year’s Eve isn’t the only time of year I do this, by the way, I also like to do this for my birthdays. But there’s still something uniquely monumental about the approaching new year, because it affects everyone, I guess. Goals and decisions feel like a better internal setting for me than resolutions, maybe because they can be adapted or changed depending on how the year unfolds, and I do like to leave room for life to work its own magic, despite my extensive list-making.

So, as we say farewell to 2018, I will add thanks for all that has been given to me, hope that I have given back, quietly and sincerely acknowledge all those who have added to the size of my heart, and leave that which has played its part in moving forward, but which I don’t need to take with me into 2019.

For auld lang syne…

 

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Thoughts

Once a YA Reader…

I happened on a Goodreads post about ways to know you’re a YA reader, and felt inspired to make my own notes, because, yeeees, I belong to that tribe (among other genres that I pursue). My thoughts tended to drift in the direction of asking why one might remain a YA reader even after (possibly) exiting the general target audience.

Young, frequently teenage characters arrive at decisions and gain insights we’re still glad about at our age (whichever that may be), with the advantage of settling crucial life lessons way before their 30s and often in a short period of time jam-packed with social activities or even supernatural events.

If it’s fantasy, characters might be of age earlier than us, or age might not be a determining factor at all, otherwise circumstances are introduced which render the character able to do all sorts of things that wouldn’t have been possible if every single law and reality check went through. But that’s why it’s fiction!

Unlike for your own adolescence or early 20s, there’s actually a script for this one.

YA characters are always on the cusp of something breathtaking, dramatic or even life-changing in any setting – bring it on.

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Seen/Heard/Read

Santa Baby covered by Lindsey Stirling

Both the song and the music video have been up for a while, but I’ve been listening and watching on repeat, that’s how much I love how this cover by Lindsey Stirling turned out! And now it’s time to pour out my feelings. My favourite line is I want a yacht and, really, that’s not a lot, just the way she says it with that saucy look, and the dance moves match it perfectly. It might become a daily quote. Oh, and I want that shower cap with sequins on it and, really, that’s not a lot. Of sequins. I just love how they catch the light…

Focus!

Since being uploaded on November 29 the music video has already had almost 2.4 million views at the time of writing this blog post, way to go Lindsey! There are so many things I love about the video, where to start…

Lindsey co-directed and her trademark attention to detail and concepting, not to mention her individuality, are all immediately obvious. From the colour palette switching between pinks, lilacs, whites and blues in various intensity, to the nods to her inspiration sources which she talks about in this behind the scenes video, it’s three and a half minutes packed with gorgeous, fun images.

The opening notes that repeat themselves throughout the song click at once with the imagery of  floating soap bubbles, balloons and lights and lend a modern touch to a classic. And then Lindsey sings! She does, and what a great job. In this inspiring interview on the Build series she talks about her vocal work in particular, saying that she ended up liking her voice on the demos she recorded at first and sticking with it.

I love her confidence as well as the whole tone of her singing, how it ties with the music in her interpretation, the balanced execution and the coquettish, feminine vibe. The fact that she went on to do her own vocals also makes me incredibly excited for what she will produce in the future. In addition, she spoke about the challenge of covering a beloved Christmas classic that many others have covered before as well and coming up with a way to do it that had her mark on it.

Just when you’ve managed to digest it is indeed Lindsey singing Santa Baby, she makes my jaw drop even more by dancing en pointe in ballet shoes! She’s been known not just for her mind-blowing simultaneous violin playing and dancing, but also as an amazingly talented, sharp dancer, especially after her season on Dancing with the Stars in 2017. Her movements are precise and beautiful, you can tell she’s trained, but at the same time the choreography doesn’t look studied or mechanical. Her enjoyment of what she is doing shines through in the scenes, which I’m in awe of even more now that I have a (very) slight inkling of how hard ballet sequences can actually be.

Been an angel all year… Merry Christmas!

 

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Hamburg

The Nutcracker Ballet: Timeless Magic

So the reason I’m including this in the Hamburg section is because my beloved city has a beautiful cinema, the Passage Kino, and for a few years now they have been showing live broadcasts of selected ballets performed by the Bolshoi Theater ensemble in Moscow. I have increasingly enjoyed going to ballet performances as I grew up, but since childhood I have deeply loved three of Tchaikovsky’s ballets: Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty and, a special favourite, The Nutcracker.

These live broadcasts are a fantastic option for those of us who might not always make it to a live performance on stage, but are dying to get their classical Russian ballet fix AND like a good bargain, because obviously prices for the cinema tickets differ considerably from theater ones. AND you can see everything. AND I love going to the movies as well. THOUGH I would also love to one day see a performance in the Bolshoi Theater itself. BUT I also feel patriotic about the Novosibirsk Opera and Ballet Theater, where I saw all those ballets first, and they remain the most beautiful performances I have ever been to.

Anyway, I just went to a live Bolshoi broadcast of The Nutcracker, ’tis the season, and here’s a trailer.

The magical, familiar score of the ballet carried me home and I found myself thinking of The Nutcracker‘s timeless appeal. What made this particular ballet such a hit, year after year? Why did I still feel a strong pull to see it whenever December rolled around?

There is a lot to say about this, without getting technical, and I couldn’t get technical anyway, because I’m not a ballerina or a choreographer, despite my ballet workout confidence.

Everything starts with the story, and I was fortunate enough not only to read the book in different translations, but also to see two lovely animated adaptations that closely followed both E.T.A. Hoffmann’s novella and the musical sequence of the ballet. If you’re curious, one was Russian from 1973 (45 years ago?!) and the other was Canadian from 1990 (that 90s nostalgia…) The Russian version was without words, with the ballet’s music being the narrator, while the 90s adaptation had dialogue.

Of course it was inevitable that at some point both book and ballet fused in my imagination, since the music captures everything about the story that draws you in: the joy of celebrating (not just Christmas), the magic and mystery of a winter night, the underlying fear of what lurks in the darkness, growing up, romance, dreams and reality – there’s a lot!

The ballet is a masterpiece of dancing, and I can tell you this as well: even though I’ve barely scratched the surface of my ballet workouts, I can now actually spot some of the movements we learned, compared to just watching and marveling, and therefore imagine JUST HOW DAMN SKILLED all those dancers are. General tip, if you’re watching or reading something where the characters are doing stuff that awakens your interest, maybe try out a course that teaches it or something related. You might gain valuable insight.

The enduring, exquisite choreography by Marius Petipa seamlessly matches the music of the ballet and I never tire of watching the group dances, especially the airy, joyful Waltz of the Flowers (also a wonderful springtime tune, thus making The Nutcracker music suitable not only for the winter season).

The ballet, in its stunning visual representation, also cleverly leaves plenty of questions unanswered, and that might be another reason for its timeless appeal, because we keep coming back to interpret anew. At the center of the story is the experience of a young girl, Marie, who blooms into a young woman, but how does that work with the timeline (one night)? Of course, logically only adult ballerinas can dance the role, which automatically influences our perspective. Is the godfather a magician? Whose side is he on? Did Marie become the Sugarplum Fairy?

I don’t need to know, because I love the continued delight, wonder and charm of the ballet, and it’s fascinating that music and a performance put together some 125 years ago are still very much alive…

 

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