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FINDING YOUR WAY
LABYRINTH often gets confused with a maze. But the latter is usually
a bewildering arrangement of walls or hedges or rows of corn where
it is difficult, and sometimes almost impossible, to find your way
out.
In a labyrinth you can't get lost. Indeed,
navigating through it can calm anxiety and give vent to powerful and
often disturbing emotions.
Writing in the Financial Times of
London, a hospice chaplain named Lizzie Hopthrow recounted
how she came upon a labyrinth on the floor of Canterbury Cathedral
some years ago and was impressed by the power of the space.
She writes that working one's way through
the spiral walk has a spiritual element. She has introduced the
practice to hospice patients who often find that the walk helps them
deal with anguish and dread.
Helen Curry at the Chartres Cathedral labyrinth near Paris,
built around 1200 |
It is not clear where the labyrinth
originated, but it appears in several religions. Chaplain Hopthrow
explains that a person enters into a spiral walk and goes from the
left side of the brain, which is always analyzing and fretting, into
the right side where imagination and creativity exist.
"You can take something that you need to
let go of into the labyrinth," she says, "and at the center you can
experience peace. For many it's a meditation and it makes them
calmer."
The labyrinth is an ancient pattern—a
spiral with one path that leads to the center and out again. In a
labyrinth, unlike a maze, you always know you will emerge and this
is especially comforting, allowing the stroller to let go and
experience relief and reassurance. It can be a spiritually and
emotionally liberating experience.
To find an accessible labyrinth in your
area, consult the Labyrinth Society online. Happy trails.
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Rafael Frühbeck de
Burgos
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James Levine conducts Leon Fleisher
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Summer ’10 At Tanglewood
Photos by Hilary Scott
HEY'RE
crossing their fingers and holding their breath at Tanglewood,
America's premier summer music festival at Lenox, Massachusetts. The
Boston Symphony Orchestra has lined up an ambitious agenda: three
major Mahler symphonies and a good deal of Mozart, including a
full-scale performance of his charming opera The Abduction From
the Seraglio.
Due to health problems James Levine
will not be making any appearance at Tanglewood this summer. The
66-year-old maestro is still recovering from lower-back surgery in
April.
The festival has already sustained a major
disappointment: Levine's predecessor at the helm of the BSO, Seji
Ozawa, announced that because of post-operative recuperation he
is withdrawing from an all-Brahms program featuring pianist Peter
Serkin (July 24) and the Tanglewood Music Center
Orchestra's performance of Ravel's Daphnis et Chloé
(July 25).
There is compensation in the person of
cellist Yo-Yo Ma and his Silk Road Ensemble who will mark
their 10th anniversary with a special program reflecting the
diversity of the group, combining Near and Far Eastern styles with
Western and non-Western instruments (August 8).
A powerful battalion of superstar
violinists is lined up to wow the famously appreciative Tanglewood
audiences: Pinchas Zukerman (July 11), Hilary Hahn
(August 7), Arabella Steinbacher (August 8),
Joshua Bell (August 21) and Gil Shaham
(August 22).
Among the leading guest maestros returning
this summer will be the perennial favorite, the esteemed Spanish
conductor Rafael Frühbeck de
Burgos, who
celebrated his 75th birthday here last year.
Over the Fourth of July weekend he will
conduct the youthful Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra in a program
featuring works by Falla, El amor brujo; Albéniz, Suite
española, Iberia; Rimsky-Korsakov, Capriccio espagnol,
and Debussy, La Mer.
Simon
and Garfunkel, who have
played only a handful of tours together since 1970, announced that
they will perform in the Shed on July 27. More information at
www.bso.org.
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Hurray For One-Acts
WISH there were more offerings of one-act plays. A well-conceived,
skillfully directed one-act is often a gem of theatrical magic,
offering a vivid apercu into another world of context and emotion.
Even if not rendered in the happiest way, a short work has the
advantage of being just that—short.
There are workshops at studios and acting
schools throughout the country and many of these are regularly
available to an appreciative public. But they are not well
publicized .
In Great Barrington, Massachusetts, I
chanced upon the estimable Berkshire Playwrights Lab and what a
treasure it is.
Founded by top-flight producers and
directors, the BPL usually invites the public to preview full-length
dramatic works in progress. As the gala opening event of the 2010
season, it decided to go the way of new one-act plays and what a
blissful decision this was.
The founders and artistic directors—Joe
Cacaci, Jim Frangione, Bob Jaffe and Matthew Penn—will
present six free readings by both emerging and established
playwrights followed by open discussions with the creators.
What is remarkable about this
off-off-Broadway venture is the quality of actors it attracts. At
the recent one-act gala such well known theatre, film and TV actors
as Treat Williams, Elizabeth Franz, Kristen Johnston and
Dan Lauria acquitted themselves admirably. It has to be a thrill
for any playwright—struggling, emerging or accomplished—to have a
pro of the highest order interpreting their works in progress.
I particularly enjoyed a wickedly funny
satire of 12-step rehabilitation programs by Kelly Masterson.
Directed by Joe Cacaci, Treat Williams plays a recovering alcoholic
subjected to the stringent and corrosive coaching of a soi-disant
therapist played by Elizabeth Franz. Without diminishing our
sympathy for authentically troubled addicts, the play points up a
good deal of the cant and psychobabble accompanying the path to
recovery and abstinence.
I also was pleased by Groundwork by
Tom Minter, a Becket-like exercise in social awkwardness and
difficult communication. As directed by Bob Jaffe and performed by
Dan Lauria and Jay Thomas,, the piece underscored the
vacuousness and uncertainty at the heart of so many human
encounters.
If you are anywhere near the area this
summer, make it a point to reserve well in advance.
www.Berkshireplaywrightslab.org.
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PRODUCT EVALUATION TEAM
PET Picks Prime
CDs
By Tim
Boxer
}82
is the second release by Kenya’s talented Just A Band. Talented
because the three members of collective—they live in the same
house—created this album despite power blackouts three days a week.
Blinky, Dan and Jim were born in 1982, hence the name of the album.
Akwaaba, 49 minutes, $9.99, at
http://itunes.apple.com/us/album/82/id353037040.
 }Sweet Electra
released its third album, When We Abandoned Earth, sung in English
and Spanish. The duo of Nardiz Cooke on vocals and Giovanni Escalera
on keyboards and guitar is backed by four musicians. They’re based
in New York and is just now making a name in the music world.
$11.99. See www.sweetelectra.net.
 }Utopia
is a new album from Lokesh, DJ from San Francisco. The album crosses
dimensions of electronic music and world music that grips you and
keeps you. "Music without boundaries in a world without borders,"
Lokesh asserts. He was into electronic music in his native India.
After settling in the Bay Area as a software engineer, he
rediscovered his passion for music. $11.99.
 }One Eskimo
is a Brit band that gives us a nice smooth pop sound. Their CD of
the same name is highly recommended and available right now at
Amazon.com for $7.98.
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