Development of an aesthetic sense brings a lifetime of joy.
Denise Low-Wesa (Cherokee)
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Hello Val
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Years ago I had a friend, Della, who was one of the most ebullient, fun loving people I've ever known. When she laughed, which was often, there was nothing tentative about it. Della wasn't a giggler, she was a laugher. She enjoyed life and she let everyone know it.
I took her to a Broadway show, a comedy, and before the first act was over, she had the entire section of the audience laughing and the cast of six playing right to us. I know, because I'm an actor, those six performers had a great night.
I can remember many occasions when I was overcome with joy in the presence of some cultural achievement that was above expectations and which generated a special feeling of excitement in me.
I attended an exhibit of Van Gogh paintings at a large museum. At first there were a few rooms of his drawings. Then I stepped into a large, circular room of his paintings. It took me a moment to catch my breath. I was in a whirlwind of genius. The energy coming to me and grabbing me from all parts of the room was overwhelming. I was in heaven. I wanted to own all of those paintings.
Eventually I walked up to one of them and began the slow circle around the room giving the most time I could to each one of them. I don't remember how long I was there but I didn't want to leave.
The Los Angeles Philharmonic came to New York for a concert at Lincoln Center. The last piece on the program was the Brahms Sympnony number 1. All the pieces they played were excellent but about half way through the last movement of the Brahms I became aware that something very unusual was taking place. It was a performance beyond the reach of the ordinary. The music was playing itself. A grand, warm feeling of joy was slowly arising from deep inside of me. I was in the presence of something extraordinary. The musicians knew it and so did many people in the audience. Just as the last chords were playing people stood up. Not to put their coats on and leave but to cheer. And cheer we did.
I can't think or write about joy in any aesthetic experience without telling of my own career. After many years of working as an actor I began to realize my own talent, potential and value as an artist. The skill and confidence I gained made it so that I was completely at home and comfortable on the stage. To do a great play with a cast of good, professional actors is a joy that is hard to describe to anyone who hasn't experienced it.
I can only sum it up by saying there were moments when I came off the stage saying "I love this. I love this more than life itself." And that's the truth.
Dana Bate
Vagabond Journeys
Never Give Up
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Showing posts with label the stage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label the stage. Show all posts
Monday, June 25, 2012
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Demonstrated Daring 7/22/09
The person who makes a success of living is the one who sees his goal steadily and aims for it unswervingly.
Cecil B. DeMille
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Join the wagon train.
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I often write in this journal about limitations and the overcoming of them. That's because I have a lot of them and overcoming them seems to be the major issue of my life these days. My life is primarily taken up with negative pursuits, cleaning up messes, straightening out clumps, ironing our wrinkles, untying knots, dispelling daemons, chasing wolves, negotiating with monsters, staying alive. People whose names I don't even know are trying to nail down the lid on my future, my hopes and my happiness.
One may say all of my problems are in my own head. Maybe. But if so how did they get there. Ever since I was a little child I remember deprivation. lack and loss as the qualities that characterized my being. I DID NOT decide to be a poor person at the age of 6. When I had some money I was very generous with it and supported people and organizations I felt were valuable, helping people, children, animals and the planet. I did that until the money was gone. There has been no payback. That which went around has not come around. At the few times when someone came forth with a helping hand, though it was gratefully received, it was often inappropriate and useless. There were exceptions to that, such as my new monitor, which is the gift of a couple of solid gold blog spotters, and a very nice afternoon with another one who gave me some books. I love books.
The trouble is that one can become so involved in trying to get above the level of poverty that one forgets there may be something more to life. I try to think back to my youth to discover what it was I wanted to do, what my goal in life was, before I had to give up everything for the sake of getting by. I believe that if I latched on to that and went after it at high speed, most of the troubles I face would become less important. But so far my introspective fishing has not brought up anything. I know I had a goal, a dream, a desire once. What happened to it? Where did it go? It must be around here some place.
I was ridiculed out of being an astronaut in the 5th grade. I was called a liar in front of the class in 6th grade for my interest in politics. I listened to opera and classical music and read great literature because it had the ideas and ideals that were well above those that accompanied me in my squalid life. People said I listened to that music only because I was pretending, trying to show off a false erudition. Two brothers I knew came to visit me one Saturday afternoon and were baffled to learn that I actually listened to the opera when no one else was around. One day as a teenager I was publicly laughed at when it was discovered I had a book of poetry in my pocket. I was with the wrong people. But the right people were not around. My love of music didn't translate into talent so I became an actor, since that's where my talent was. To the day they died neither of my siblings could believe that that's how I made a living. The few times my mother saw me perform she had nothing but criticism for me.
But the stage was the only place I felt safe and secure because acting was something I could do and do well, and while I was on stage the deniers and suppressors couldn't get to me.
But now illness has struck down my acting career and without the money to get anything cured I'm left with little to do. One of the motives of my life has been to share what I have with people, even though sometimes it's resented. So now I write everyday in hopes that something I know and have experienced will be of benefit to someone. Even so, some people I know are saying "He's trying to be a writer." as if "being a writer" is naturally beyond my capabilities.
Now I struggle. I struggle with pain and illness, I struggle to get out of debt, to read from my books until my poor eyes get too tired and won't focus, to find food I can chew, to find my way out of this jungle of trouble, to have something to live for. I hope, at least, that my sense of humor doesn't abandoned me.
My vagabond journey is now a search for worth, value, purpose, the hopes and dreams for myself I had as a boy and that were knocked down and trampled on by circumstances. But I believe there is still a brightness somewhere I can't see, a light, a phoenix nest, a hidden naphtha waiting to burst into flame again. And I am searching for it. It's a search for the goal I left behind.
DB
_____________________________
Cecil B. DeMille
*******************
Join the wagon train.
---------------------------
I often write in this journal about limitations and the overcoming of them. That's because I have a lot of them and overcoming them seems to be the major issue of my life these days. My life is primarily taken up with negative pursuits, cleaning up messes, straightening out clumps, ironing our wrinkles, untying knots, dispelling daemons, chasing wolves, negotiating with monsters, staying alive. People whose names I don't even know are trying to nail down the lid on my future, my hopes and my happiness.
One may say all of my problems are in my own head. Maybe. But if so how did they get there. Ever since I was a little child I remember deprivation. lack and loss as the qualities that characterized my being. I DID NOT decide to be a poor person at the age of 6. When I had some money I was very generous with it and supported people and organizations I felt were valuable, helping people, children, animals and the planet. I did that until the money was gone. There has been no payback. That which went around has not come around. At the few times when someone came forth with a helping hand, though it was gratefully received, it was often inappropriate and useless. There were exceptions to that, such as my new monitor, which is the gift of a couple of solid gold blog spotters, and a very nice afternoon with another one who gave me some books. I love books.
The trouble is that one can become so involved in trying to get above the level of poverty that one forgets there may be something more to life. I try to think back to my youth to discover what it was I wanted to do, what my goal in life was, before I had to give up everything for the sake of getting by. I believe that if I latched on to that and went after it at high speed, most of the troubles I face would become less important. But so far my introspective fishing has not brought up anything. I know I had a goal, a dream, a desire once. What happened to it? Where did it go? It must be around here some place.
I was ridiculed out of being an astronaut in the 5th grade. I was called a liar in front of the class in 6th grade for my interest in politics. I listened to opera and classical music and read great literature because it had the ideas and ideals that were well above those that accompanied me in my squalid life. People said I listened to that music only because I was pretending, trying to show off a false erudition. Two brothers I knew came to visit me one Saturday afternoon and were baffled to learn that I actually listened to the opera when no one else was around. One day as a teenager I was publicly laughed at when it was discovered I had a book of poetry in my pocket. I was with the wrong people. But the right people were not around. My love of music didn't translate into talent so I became an actor, since that's where my talent was. To the day they died neither of my siblings could believe that that's how I made a living. The few times my mother saw me perform she had nothing but criticism for me.
But the stage was the only place I felt safe and secure because acting was something I could do and do well, and while I was on stage the deniers and suppressors couldn't get to me.
But now illness has struck down my acting career and without the money to get anything cured I'm left with little to do. One of the motives of my life has been to share what I have with people, even though sometimes it's resented. So now I write everyday in hopes that something I know and have experienced will be of benefit to someone. Even so, some people I know are saying "He's trying to be a writer." as if "being a writer" is naturally beyond my capabilities.
Now I struggle. I struggle with pain and illness, I struggle to get out of debt, to read from my books until my poor eyes get too tired and won't focus, to find food I can chew, to find my way out of this jungle of trouble, to have something to live for. I hope, at least, that my sense of humor doesn't abandoned me.
My vagabond journey is now a search for worth, value, purpose, the hopes and dreams for myself I had as a boy and that were knocked down and trampled on by circumstances. But I believe there is still a brightness somewhere I can't see, a light, a phoenix nest, a hidden naphtha waiting to burst into flame again. And I am searching for it. It's a search for the goal I left behind.
DB
_____________________________
Monday, December 29, 2008
Strategic Stepping 12/29/08
One man's ceiling is another man's floor.
Paul Simon
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The metaphorical meaning of this Paul Simon line was very important to me about 20 years ago. I had been, for two years, a staff announcer for one of the most important radio stations in the country. I had reached the apex of my career in my specialty. I worked with some of the most intelligent, cultured and entertaining personalities in the business. I was paid very well and, because I worked in the mornings, from 6 to noon, I had up towards a million listeners on any given week day.
For my colleagues it was a thrill to go on the air. And so it was for me, for a while.
But one day the thrill was gone. Nothing changed. I just began to realize that the work I had wasn't enough for me. I was bumping my head on the ceiling.
I used to say that if I ever wrote an autobiography I would add a chapter about my broadcasting career and title it "Talking to Myself in a Small Room."
The radio studio was a secure, comfortable and lucrative place to be. But it wasn't enough for me. I wanted the danger of the stage. So I gave my notice.
Almost immediately three things happened that told me I had made the right decision.
First, the manager of the station called me into his office for a final chat during which he said that he thought I wanted to do something more "noble" than radio announcing. Broadcasting can be and often is a very noble profession and if he didn't think so what was he doing being in the business himself. I've written about him before. He did not specialize in intelligence.
Second, the management didn't want me to work my last day. They gave me the day off, with pay, just as I was finishing my day's work. The only reason for that would be that they thought I would go on the air and make critical remarks about the place. That is not what a professional would do. I thought if they don't know what a professional is then I have no business working for them.
Third, within two weeks after I left I had an Off-Broadway show which ran for a long time.
Now I'm retired and I don't have the fancy 401K I might have had, the luscious pension or the constantly splitting stock of the company. And suffocating in a barrel of invoices is hardly noble. But, hey, they say, you've had an interesting life. I suppose that's true. But everyone's life is interesting if they take an interest in it.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
Paul Simon
**************************
The metaphorical meaning of this Paul Simon line was very important to me about 20 years ago. I had been, for two years, a staff announcer for one of the most important radio stations in the country. I had reached the apex of my career in my specialty. I worked with some of the most intelligent, cultured and entertaining personalities in the business. I was paid very well and, because I worked in the mornings, from 6 to noon, I had up towards a million listeners on any given week day.
For my colleagues it was a thrill to go on the air. And so it was for me, for a while.
But one day the thrill was gone. Nothing changed. I just began to realize that the work I had wasn't enough for me. I was bumping my head on the ceiling.
I used to say that if I ever wrote an autobiography I would add a chapter about my broadcasting career and title it "Talking to Myself in a Small Room."
The radio studio was a secure, comfortable and lucrative place to be. But it wasn't enough for me. I wanted the danger of the stage. So I gave my notice.
Almost immediately three things happened that told me I had made the right decision.
First, the manager of the station called me into his office for a final chat during which he said that he thought I wanted to do something more "noble" than radio announcing. Broadcasting can be and often is a very noble profession and if he didn't think so what was he doing being in the business himself. I've written about him before. He did not specialize in intelligence.
Second, the management didn't want me to work my last day. They gave me the day off, with pay, just as I was finishing my day's work. The only reason for that would be that they thought I would go on the air and make critical remarks about the place. That is not what a professional would do. I thought if they don't know what a professional is then I have no business working for them.
Third, within two weeks after I left I had an Off-Broadway show which ran for a long time.
Now I'm retired and I don't have the fancy 401K I might have had, the luscious pension or the constantly splitting stock of the company. And suffocating in a barrel of invoices is hardly noble. But, hey, they say, you've had an interesting life. I suppose that's true. But everyone's life is interesting if they take an interest in it.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
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