Monday, March 12, 2007

My Weekend

It involved 2 night outs and 3 'art enjoyment' activities. While the night outs were about the usual spirited activities, the 'art enjoyment' activities are more worthy of a mention here.

Activity No. 1 - 'A clever exchange of letters' or 'When Mr. Shaw and the Shah's came together'
The ever enthusiastic friend (one who watched Black Friday twice) had booked the tickets almost a couple of weeks in advance for Naseeruddin Shah & Ratna Pathak Shah's rendition of Jerome Kilty's 'Dear Liar', a play based on the letters between the great George Bernard Shaw and the actress Mrs Patrick Campbell.
Despite having married lives of their own, the two had an affair for a while but their letters extended beyond that 'for a while'...in fact, till Mrs Campbell's death. Mrs Campbell was the one who made Shaw's famous creation 'Eliza Doolittle' on the stage at the ripe age of 49 (Phew! Can you imagine?). The sophisticated and very clever English of Mr Shaw (most consider him as the greatest writer of the Queen's language after Shakespeare) and a mind blowing performance of the Shahs makes this play, one of the finest I have seen. One just has to observe the way Mr Shah grows old with the passage of time to realize his acting genius. Don't miss this one, even if you haven't read anything by GBS...I have just read one play.

Activity no. 2 - 'A Musical Puzzle' or 'When Bach meets Beatles'
My good friend was gifted this beautiful audio CD by his music teacher and thats how I got to hear it. Those acquainted with both the styles of music can only begin to imagine whats inside that CD. Performed by a contemporary American pianist, John Bayless, the beautiful melodies of 'The Beatles' starts to sound pretty much like the soft, quick and short flow of 'The Art of Fugue'. The most interesting aspect of this collection is the puzzle part of it....it's a while (even for a die-hard fan like me) before you get the drift of the song, Mr Bayless is playing. And when you get it, it's one of those little blissful moments. If you are interested in solving this puzzle, put up your mail IDs and I shall mail a few tracks after removing the track's name.

Activity No. 3 - 'Revisiting Water in the theater'
Deepa Mehta's finest effort so far was a delight on the big screen. Stunning visuals, a great soundtrack, tight performances from Sarla (plays the little Chuhiya) / often unsung Seema Biswas and the hope (and hence tears) inducing climax makes this one a must for anybody who digs movies. The ubiquitous yet subtle presence of Gandhi throughout the movie is beautifully executed. Thank you, Ms Mehta!

8 comments:

Brown Weed said...

..it's like, if I didn't know you, I'd have still read your blog anyway!

Pooja Nair said...

Enchanting!

blaiq said...

Hey, I don't mind trying out the puzzle. Do mail me a few tracks.

nkshirsa said...

me too !! send puzzles to nkshirsagar@gmail.com

alien said...

...when i am already waiting for my earlier track how can i ask for more i wont mind getting it...cheers!!!

Regards

Kaj said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Kaj said...

aaah.. i love puzzles.. too bad I'm not into Beatles enough to figure it out =) BTW I'm really looking forward to watching 'Water' and 'Namesake' as well.. hv u rd the book?

meraj said...

no, but am looking forward to Namesake too...should be goof!