今日觀舞心得－北藝大舞蹈系年度展演《男風吹》

看完男風吹的心得：

1. 如果聽到某種音樂就會直覺聯想到某類型的肢體動作，這是特定音樂語彙本身就會指向特定肢體語彙，還是是聆聽／觀賞者的後天調教使然？以下半場的兩支舞為例，我聽到十面埋伏的第一個和絃，腦海裡馬上就會浮現武打招式；聽到Ravel的音樂（即使像左手鋼琴協奏曲這麼陰沉的曲子），第一個印象就是芭蕾舞的線條。但是，像上半場聽到柴可夫斯基的小提琴協奏曲，我並不會特別想到芭蕾，而且說真的，聽到叮叮咚咚的Gamelan，我倒也不會只跟爪哇舞蹈的繁複手部動作聯想起來，甚至如果拿它來配上現代舞倒也不會覺得奇怪。但是，我會有上述最後一點的感受，究竟是因為Gamelan本身的語彙沒有指向特定的肢體語彙？還是只是因為我已經經過John Cage等人的薰陶了？

2. 布拉的舞怎麼都這麼累啊！光在台下看都覺得好累！

3. 舞者的生理時鐘，通常會是有利於午場演出，還是晚場演出？據我觀察，好像大部份音樂家的生理時鐘都調得比較晚，如果是下午表演恐怕會品質不良。

4. 那個......女生穿跳芭蕾穿緊身衣的時候，會覺得駱駝腳趾不雅嗎？

糖果是公的還是母的？我好像回答太認真了…

某：糖果是公的還是母的？

我：這要看你的糖果是哪個語言的。

某：啊？

我：比方說，法文裡的bonbon是陽性的，德文Bonbon可以是陽性或中性的，義大利文的caramella是陰性的…

某：啊？

我：喔，就是很多歐洲語言的名詞會分成陰性或陽性的，所以在使用的時候必須配合名詞的性別來使用正確的冠詞或是形容詞變化。比方說，法文的糖果是陽性的，所以如果說「我吃一顆糖果」就必須要用陽性的冠詞，je mange un bonbon。可是法文的蘋果是陰性的，所以「我吃一顆蘋果」就要用陰性的冠詞，je mange une pomme。而且，這種性別也不是放諸四海皆準的，比方說，中文裡會覺得太陽是陽性的，月亮是陰性的，法文也是這樣，可是德文就是相反過來的，太陽是「母」的，月亮是「公」的。或是比方說像貓，法文的chat是陽性的，德文是陰性的，西班牙文就要看是公貓gato或是母貓gata。而且這種分類方法也不只有歐洲語言才有，比方說同屬閃米語系的阿拉伯文和希伯來文也會把名詞分成陰性和陽性的，印度南方達羅毗荼語系大部份的語言也會這樣分，東非的班圖語系語言還會分出更多的「性別」，像史瓦希利語裡面的名詞就分成十多種類別，每種都要加上不同的字首…………


某：（大哭）糖果是母的因為糖果會生螞蟻啦！！！！！！（哭著跑開）


我：囧

近日二場觀舞心得：「我學錯東西了」

太久沒寫東西了！雖然我在年初第三度重新開始寫部落格是想要記錄中東革命的發展，但一路看下來我發現自己沒辦法發出什麼具體的意見（除了有一次BBC World Have Your Say節目唸到我的留言以外），漸漸就沒有動力再寫東西了。

最近不想一直在家裡發呆，又想說之前在舞蹈系工作卻對舞蹈不夠關心，所以一時興趣就去看了兩場表演：上星期五去景美人權文化園區看安娜琪舞蹈劇場的《第七感官》，今天去台北另一端（應該說是捷運淡水線的另一端）的竹圍工作室看舞蹈生態系的《結晶體》。看下來的結論：我學錯東西了——或說，我不知道我以前在封閉什麼。

景美人權文化園區在秀朗橋下，這麼偏僻的地方我以前竟然常來……一方面，拉絃樂器的人會知道高憶玫老師的工作室就在附近；另一方面，在國防部底下單位當過兵的人在分發到部隊前應該也在隔壁（不對，還不能說隔壁，因為門口的地方連牆都沒有）的保養場上過課。《第七感官》是一個「觀賞環境建置計畫」，不光是舞蹈而已，表演環境也會跟表演者互動，甚至還把觀眾帶進表演裡一起互動：


Seventh Sense - Excerpt 1 from Jeff Hsieh on Vimeo.


Seventh Sense - Excerpt 3 from Jeff Hsieh on Vimeo.


Seventh Sense - Excerpt 4 from Jeff Hsieh on Vimeo.

我索票的時候不知道為什麼刻意選了舞台上面的「搖滾區」，之後一直覺得怕怕的，還問杰樺老大坐搖滾區會不會很可怕。但是在表演的時候就覺得之前根本是在白擔心。表演正式開始之前，兩位舞者就已經在台上跟科技投影互動，搖滾區的觀眾也要一個個進去跟投影和舞者一起動；在剛剛踏進去的那一瞬間，覺得突然被很多人看好像怪怪的，但沒多久就融入情境，可以放得開在舞台上玩。唯一比較可惜的是，表演真正開始之後，舞者跟觀眾的互動反而還沒有那麼多。不過，這場表演確實是一種不一樣的體驗，甚至是以前我自己從來沒想過的。音樂表演是可以把環境當成演出的一部份，運用燈光和科技讓觀眾不只是在聽表演、看表演，而是直接「進入」表演；我覺得Terry Riley的《太陽光環》（Sun Rings）就是很成功的作品，今年前半年Kronos Quartet來台灣的時候就是表演這首曲子：


Kronos Quartet: Sun Rings from kq kq on Vimeo.

不過，觀眾就算能夠「進入」這種表演裡，基於音樂演奏本身的限制，無法讓觀眾「融入」表演中，成為演出的一部份；John Cage的4'33"雖然大部份是由觀眾的聲音構成的，但觀眾再怎麼樣都還是與台上的「表演者」隔開，兩方之間無法互動。《第七感官》裡觀眾參與表演的比例雖然不多，但已經讓我開始質疑以前為何那麼堅持表演的「正式」形式，為何非要是表演者／被看者與觀眾／看人者的二元對立。我後來在想，這種隔閡與距離是不是我後來那麼不喜歡音樂表演的另一個原因（最大的原因仍是薩伊德在Musical Elaborations裡所說的"Performance as an extreme occasion"），因為即使我不能算真正的表演者，我在台上跟舞者互動都覺得有在貼近「人」，反而比起音樂表演更有身而為人的「人性」。我甚至覺得，當初我學錯東西了，不應該學音樂，應該學跳舞才對！

（星期二我回去舞蹈系的時候跟某葉姓助教提到這件事，據說他後來有跟平老師說？）

如果上週的表演讓我重新思考我為什麼不喜歡表演，今天的《結晶體》反而讓我想要再投入表演裡！最大的原因是表演的配樂有現場大提琴演奏。我必須說，我看不太懂舞蹈生態系在這個作品裡想要透過肢體語言表達什麼，看了節目單上的文字仍然不懂（說真的，上回他們在跨藝的表演我也不知道他們在做什麼），但看到現場大提琴、預錄的音樂、現場音效sampling和舞者肢體動作之間的互動實在是太奇妙。表演後跟大提琴手聊了一下，她說她的音樂有一部份是表演時看舞者即興的，舞者的動作與音樂之間有某種不確性；這似乎與《第七感官》裡舞者與觀眾互動的不確定性有異曲同工之妙。另外，今天的表演似乎也引證我之前的想法：有些光聽音樂會覺得莫名其妙的現代音樂，在肢體動作的詮釋之下反而顯得有條理，或至少讓人可以接受。第一次有這種想法，是看到下面這個影片的時候；音樂是希臘作曲家Iannis Xenakis的Nomos Alpha：

我現在只希望以後也能夠參與這樣的表演，而且愈快有機會出現愈好，因為我又找到了對表演的熱情了！

Specialized musical education established by education authorities in Taiwan should be eradicated

In fact, this kind of primary and secondary education should have never been established in the first place.

Here's a series of hypothetical situations:
1. Suppose that we have a child whose innate talent (as opposed to educated or conditioned expertise) for music is equal to Srinivasa Ramanujan's mathematical genius. If s/he were born in a third-world country, to a family just as poor as Ramanujan's, what are the chances of this child's talent being discovered?

2. If the chances outlined in the previous situation are very low, does this merit the allocation of large amounts of national resources in the creation of a specialized parallel education system, which accepts thousands upon thousands of children who may not have that level of musical talent but are able to learn music due to their families' financial status, and who would be able to continue their musical studies even without a dedicated educational system and officially designated resources, just so that one Ramajuan-esque genius does not slip away unnoticed?

3. Following upon the above, if this parallel education system is nearly unreservedly abused by families who already have a better financial bearing to begin with, would a Ramanujan-esque genius with no money to buy an instrument and pay for music lessons (not to mention paying through the nose for lessons prior to exams with teachers who might be officiating those very exams, offering their bodies – or at least not objecting – to the carnal gratification of their teachers, and other such illicit means of bribery)  be able to enter this system to study music?

In short, if Mozart were born into a Taiwanese family as poor as Ramanujan's, would he be able to enter the parallel musical education system, and use that to his advantage to become an internationally-renowned musician?

Democracies learn from Mubarak's example - Opinion - Al Jazeera English

Democracies learn from Mubarak's example - Opinion - Al Jazeera English

I don't really have anything to add to this. It just seems ironic that as the US is developing "Internet in a suitcase" kits to circumvent oppressive Internet censorship in non-democratic regimes, countries widely regarded as democratic are actually doing the exact opposite, tightening the stranglehold on Internet speech. I think the recent sentencing of the two men who used Facebook to incite a riot that never happened has just gone too far: it's almost as if David Cameron has replicated Assad tactics in the UK for the sole purpose of locking people up.

Kodaly

今天練習錄影，可惜沒有錄完，而且一直不停在滑滑滑滑滑。
我還想到Bylsma說的一句話：It's like talking with your mouth open

TNUA Summer Concert

Sololos: I terribly regret having gone to the wrong classroom for rehearsals for this piece. This was an incredibly interesting piece, with patterns replaying themselves in different ways each time, and I only wish I had more opportunities to see how much chance can play in redefining and reshaping the structure of this work.

May: Somehow I found the use of a remix of Bach's St. John's Passion confusing, partly because I could understand the text being sung: suffering of Christ used to depict the blossoming May?

Just Do It:
I'm not going to gratify Hugo with any sort of in-depth comments in a public space. Suffice it to say that he could only pull it off in a school environment, where any (dare I say) shock value is superseded by cheap laughs from the audience in seeing their friends and classmates in (dare I say again) compromising positions.

Second half: I'm confused...


-- from NK Wang's iPad

Interlude: When shit happens...

... it comes by the truckload. Or in my case, by train and airplane.

Here's a breakdown of the past 16 hours:

1. 5/22 night. The City Night Line train should have left Heidelberg at 23:34. Instead it was 170 minutes late when I arrived at Heidelberg Hauptbahnhof. Sometime near 1:30 it briefly became a 120 minute delay, and I rushed to the platform, only to see it become 180 minutes just 10 minutes later. Someone else who was waiting for another ICE to Frankfurt said that this was one of the jokes of some famous German comedian: Deutsche Bahn is the most wonderful and considerate company in the world. You only need to pay for a 2 hour journey, and they will automatically give your 4 hours!

2. 5/23 morning. When the CNL arrived at Berlin, they somehow managed to shave off a good two hours off the delay, so it was less than one hour late coming into Berlin Hauptbahnhof. Because of this, I could only get a 25% refund... into a German bank account! Can someone lend me their account?

3. I still had quite an amount of time to kill before my flight, so I took my suitcase to the locker room. Turns out the locker I chose was broken, and I had to wait a good 20 minutes to get someone to help me get my €4 back. He said that when I retrieved my luggage in the afternoon, I should also let them know, since the locker still said that I owed €4. In hindsight I should have just paid another €4 when I retrieved my luggage at around 3 in the afternoon, because I had to wait for another half hour for someone to get a master key and open the lock.

4. 5/23 afternoon. I thought I fully deserved the €5 shower at the train station after all I had been through the previous night, but it turns out I was wrong. When I finally got to Tegel it was just after 4:30, and theoretically I had just enough time to complete all the check-in and boarding procedures. That is, unless you manage to run into the airline staff's coffee break... so even though there were only two people ahead of me in the line, I had to wait more than half an hour while the person in charge of the economy class check-in went off for her break, and the one in charge of business class just sat there chatting and laughing on the phone. I finally went and asked just how long it would be before I could check-in, and she then told me I had passed my check-in time 20 minutes ago. Of course, by this time (5:00, my flight was supposed to be 5:25) the economy class lady still hadn't come back. So I had to spend another €132 to reschedule my flight for tomorrow.

5. Right now I'm at the Grand Hostel Berlin again. The hostel is really excellent and clean, and all the staff speak excellent English; if anyone wants to come to Berlin I would highly recommend this place. But even so, I would much rather be on the plane right now, if only because of the €132 I had to spend. After breakfast tomorrow (and I am going to fully stuff my €5 worth of breakfast buffet!) I will head straight out to Tegel and wait out the five hours there.

I wish I could be like Douglas Adams and dream up the entire Hitchhiker's series while lying drunk on a road in Berlin. I just don't have that talent... nor the aptitude for getting drunk...

-- from NK Wang's iPad

Location:Tempelhofer Ufer,Berlin,Germany

Heidelberg, Eberbach, et cetera (Part 1)

Wednesday noon I took the ICE from Berlin Hauptbahnhof to Mannheim, and then a local train to Heidelberg. Unbelievably (at least at that time, although I knew later that this was quite normal), the ICE was 20 minutes late, and I missed my original connection at Mannheim.













Unbelievably, for the first leg of my ICE trip I shared a compartment with a baroque violist who was just returning to Hannover from a tour in London. We talked quite a lot about the baroque performance scene right now, and how groups like L'Arpeggiata are "corrupting" the HIP (historically-informed performance) concept with actual "hip" and populist elements.






After he got off at Braunschweig, the latter part of my journey was shared with two businessmen and an old grandmother, and it was only then did I start to feel just how bad my German is. Oh well, I still have time to learn.

My first night in Heidelberg was spent drinking with Gesa and a bunch of her friends from Heidelberg's Sinology department, after a brief tour of the department office and library and some falafels. I have absolutely no idea exactly how much I drunk — it was at least two beers, three shots of some kind of 44% herbal liqueur (out of these small bottles looking like single serving Tabasco, and we had to beat on the tables with them upside down before we threw the caps away and drank the whole goddamn thing in one mouthful — Tim said it was like 高粱 but I think it was a hundred times worse), maybe a half liter of red wine and about three or four cigarettes. I wasn't really stone drunk, but I was crazy enough to do this in the bathroom:







That's Tim coming in on the left and going like 啥洨. Naturally a massive hangover the next morning...

The next day Gesa and I followed her father to one of his field trips with his students to some Roman-era ruins in the Eberbach area. But we got off the train one station too late, and since the next train back was an hour later, we had to walk half an hour back. Nevertheless it was very pleasant, and even though it was hot, it was nothing like the sticky humidity of Taiwan at this season.




























The fields all along the way were filled with rapeseed plants. After about half an hour we arrived at Neckarburken, where the ruins of a Roman bath house (I think) were located. Prof. Stupperich of course spoke to his students in German, and although I could grasp quite a bit of it, I still couldn't catch the whole gist.



























That footbridge is, of course, Roman. We also visited a museum dedicated to the ruins of a military barracks and a fortress, located strangely halfway up a hill and not on the top.




























What is great with having an archaeology professor as a tour guide, is that you get to know the stories behind the buildings, how they were built, and what is actually "authentic" and what is only made to seem like it. A few snapshots from the villages we passed on our way back to Eberbach:







This is a particularly large house; typical of its time, the bottom is made from stone, to withstand floods, while the top is made of wood. Sometimes if the family was exceptionally rich, more than one story would be made out of stone.







The church in one of the village centers. This is the Protestant end (where both Lutheran and Calvinist denominations worship), but the church is split in the middle, with a wall dividing the Protestant and Catholic congregations. According to Prof. Stupperich, many churches in this area were divided in this manner upon orders from the local prince.













Medieval buildings in the town center.

Back onto the Philosopher's Path in Heidelberg!
-- from NK Wang's iPad

Location:Heidelberg, Eberbach

Day 2 in Berlin

Some things to consider:

1. This is a city I would definitely want to return to; no, I think I would NEED to return to.
2. U-Bahn and S-Bahn systems beat London's Underground hands down.
3. What the hell is the matter with my luggage? Just take a look:



No clothes! Or at least, everything that I actually NEED is buried under tea and instant coffee. There is a certain dance theory professor in Taipei who is going to pay through the nose for all that instant coffee!

I took the easy way out of the tourist's job and took a guided free (sic) walking tour through the city center. The tour only passed by the Wall, the faux Checkpoint Charlie, and ended on the Museum Island; the guide was actually quite good, very humorous, and I got to try out my German in translating a bit of Heine at a memorial.

All things aside, the Holocaust memorial near the Brandenburg Gate offers quite a lot of opportunities to play with lines and light:





































Our wonderful guide: (he said the tour was basically free and that he worked solely for tips, I gave him €10, but he really did such a fantastic job I really think he deserved more)




Later on I returned to the wall to see the Topography of Terror exhibit there, and also took a few more snapshots of the Wall and the fake Checkpoint:






















The east side of the Wall is almost bare, while the west side is covered with graffiti - don't know if the graffiti here is "authentic" though.

Also, the American Checkpoint Charlie now flanked by McDonalds, oh the irony; further down the road is a Starbucks:




Also, a free Ai Weiwei banner in front of one of the museums:




Just another testament to the significance of Berlin in the human pursuit of freedom.

-- from NK Wang's iPad

Location:Berlin

Maruzio Pollini plays Schubert and Chopin at Berlin Philharmonie

And the main highlight of my trip to Germany is over on the first day... Although hearing Pollini play in the great hall of the Berlin Philharmonie (as opposed to the smaller stage nearby) is an event in itself, I have to say that I sort of doubt whether today's performance was worth the €36 I paid for the ticket, much less to say the plane ticket all the way from Taiwan. The first half of the program consisted solely of Schubert's most celebrated B flat major sonata (could someone fill me in on which number it is?), and although Pollini's touch in the slow movement was absolutely flawless, he had a tendency to rush when playing in faster passages, to the point that one feels he's muddling his sentences. Somehow this all made a bit more sense in the second half of the concert: actually on the program were the C-sharp minor prelude, Ballade No.4, the Barcarole and Berceuse, and Scherzo No.2, plus a total of three encores: a nocturne in D-flat major, the Revolutionary Etude, and Ballad No.1. My companion said she thought Pollini was "slippery", particularly in the later half of the program after Ballade No.4; I'm more of the opinion that it was mostly because of the acoustics of the place (we were sitting at the back of section C, near the back wall and at a slant toward the stage), but quite possibly Pollini's tendency to rush today may have also played a part. In the end it was a mixed bag; but judging from the nearly 10 curtain calls the audience gave him, he still has his star power!

Oh, and even in a venue like the Berlin Philharmonie, and even with an arguably more "educated" German audience, there are still lots of people who clap in between movements, and even more people making an awful shhing sound. Frankly, I think the shhing is much more rude than clapping at the wrong time. So for those who say Taiwanese audiences are unsophisticated idiots who have no idea of how to attend a classical concert and follow its rituals, I'd say their argument is to a degree moot.


-- from NK Wang's iPad

Location:Berlin

輔大成績單

考試科目	分數	最低錄取標準
A: 國文測驗	72
B: 英文測驗	86
C: 中英翻譯	70
D: 術科測驗暨口試	89
總成績	317.00	245.00
1.      總成績公式：(A×25%+B×25%+C×25%+D×25%)×4 2.      備註：＊表違規扣分 ＃表缺考 Ｎ表初試不合格

囧 這樣只有探花  好爛啊啊啊

Ben Laden est mort - Bin Laden ist tot - Bin Laden is dead

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/05/02/osama-bin-laden-dead

The way Obama handled this was considerably better than how Dubyah Bush's administration proclaimed the capture of Saddam Hussein:

If there is to be mass celebration of the death or capture of a figure loathed by the American administration, the White House should in no way condone it by letting it happen inside the White House itself! 

A rational voice from the BBC's live feed:

 0531: Justin King in New York, US writes: "Good news, bad reaction. While I am very pleased to hear that Bin Laden is no longer living and I understand that many may feel that this symbolises a sort of closure to 9/11 and the war in Afghanistan, I can't help but feel a little disgusted by the cheering mob jumping around outside the White House. As the world celebrates this occasion let's not forget that even killing a killer is an ugly business and we could be recognising Bin Laden's demise in a more dignified way." Have Your Say

Officials have also been quoted that Bin Laden's body will be buried according to Islamic tradition, which is at the very least a better attempt that Saddam Hussein's horrendously botched execution.

But what I immediately started wondering when I saw this piece of news was: 1. If Bin Laden was merely a figurehead since 2009, with Ayman al-Zawahiri really in charge, what is the significance of this kill? 2. If he was indeed (forgive my terrible comparison) al-Qaeda's Dalai Lama or Pope, what kind of revenge attacks will be awaiting, assuming that there are still others in the chain of command (eg. al-Zawahiri) who are active and have access to the outside world?

大提琴備用絃統計

	Larsen	Pirastro Permanent Tungsten	Helicore	Jargar	Pirastro  Aricore	André’s  Gut  strings	Unopened Piastro  Aricore	Unopened Gamut Gut Heavy Gauge	Sum
C	0	1	2	0	1	1	0	0	5
G	0	1	1	0	0	0	0	0	2
D	2	0	0	2	1	1	1	1	8
A	2	0	0	0	1	1	2	1	7

這是怎樣  我是跟G絃有仇嗎？

師大分數

筆譯組：

考試科目	原始成績	計算後成績
中文寫作與英譯中測驗	65.00	22.75
英文寫作與中譯英測驗	86.00	30.10
複試：口試	92.00	27.60
總分	80.45
評定結果	正取
不錄取原因
本系所初試及格分數（計算後）	35.35
本系所正取標準	65.95
本系所備取標準	65.55

口譯組：

考試科目	原始成績	計算後成績
中文寫作與英譯中測驗	65.00	9.75
英文寫作與中譯英測驗	86.00	12.90
複試：口試	92.00	61.60
總分	84.25
評定結果	不錄取
不錄取原因	原報考組別已錄取
本系所初試及格分數（計算後）	35.35
本系所正取標準	75.90
本系所備取標準	—

所以我當時應該直接報考口譯嗎？