Next to Normal? What IS normal?

I attended Florida Southern College’s Theatre Department’s production of Next to Normal on November 14, 2013 at 1930.

Directed by James F. Beck, this play was one that drew you in emotionally and captured your attention within the first act. Tom Kitt wrote the music and Brian Yorkey wrote the lyrics. The play itself was about a suburban family and how they cope with crisis and mental illness. Using provocative language to address issues such as grief, performance definitely kept you on the edge of your seat.

I absolutely adored this play. Within the first act I had been drawn in and it was as if I had been a part of that family instead of someone just viewing a performance. The singing and the acting were phenomenal. Even through the sound board not cooperating and being stubborn, the actors and actresses never broke character, they just continued on as though nothing happened. Though, the audience did not necessarily continue as though nothing happened. Along with the technical difficulties, there were some other things that I disliked (even though I enjoyed the overall performance). For example, there were times in which you could here the actors and actresses whispering behind the set. Also, when she signed the consent form, I almost lost my cool. I know that you’re supposed to draw the line and sit back and realize it won’t always be how it is in the real world but that just blew my mind. In a real life setting, she would not have the permission to sign that consent form. Being diagnosed with a clinical mental illness, she lost her right to being competent enough to sign them, therefore the decision should have went to her power of attorney and if there wasn’t one, to her husband or oldest living child. It was hard for me to move past this to enjoy the rest of the show, but somewhere during her treatment, I forgot about it until after the show.

I would definitely like to listen to the soundtrack on YouTube.

A Night at the Museum (Except During the Day)

Header: A visit to Polk Museum of Art to view the ReGeneration2 exhibit on Friday October 24, 2013.

Facts: ReGeneration2 is an exhibit of 105 photographs from more than 70 young photographers from around 31 countries. It was produced by the Musée de l’Elysée, Lausanne, in collaboration with the Aperture Foundation in New York. It is the second in a series. It follows ReGeneration that was on display in 2005. Regeneration2 was on display at Polk Museum of Art from October 12, 2013 to December 7, 2013. I viewed the exhibit on Friday October 24, 2013.

Initial Response: I approached this visit with a sense of unease. As an ADHD kid, I don’t really like walking around looking at pictures as it tends to bore me quite quickly. That being said, I went because I had to assuming that I would hate every second of it; so I dragged my wonderful boyfriend with me. When we walked into the Museum, it smelled very strongly of paint. The receptionist was nowhere to be found so we just walked in. She found us about 15 minutes later and apologized saying that there was going to be a fundraiser that night so a lot of construction type things would be going on. She checked us in, gave us a map and a brief explanation of what could be found where, and sent us on our way. I felt that though unorganized, the chaos surrounding the preparation for said fundraiser, made it acceptable. Yay bunny trails!

On to the actual exhibit. I, surprisingly, loved it. One photograph made absolutely no sense to me. It was a photo of a ladybug on a chest. I could find no point in it nor could I see how it could be considered ‘art’. I guess that’s why I’m not an art major. However, I could not pick a favorite, but I had a top three. Of course, one is very obvious – the one of the dog. I love dogs. Seeing this photo made me feel just unexplainably happy because it made me think of my lab back home (picture to follow of course). I also fell in love with the photo of the cowboy with a puff of smoke hanging in the air in front of his face. I am such a sucker for a man in cowboy boots and wranglers. His blue plaid shirt accentuated his built chest and bicep muscles and I honestly couldn’t help but be attracted to him. Last, but absolutely not least, there was one photo that was completely light blue with a small hint of yellow at the bottom. This piece was just so boring that it was exciting. Is that even possible? Hmm.. it is now. I loved it. I’m not exactly sure why I loved it but I did. It just kind of made me think about life.

So, despite the quiet and the poor organization of the day, I thoroughly enjoyed myself. I also enjoyed seeing what else the Museum had on display. It seemed only appropriate since I was already there.

Points for Potential Research: I would like to see what kind of photographs were in the original ReGeneration exhibit.

 

Collateral Material:

 I had to share his adorable-ness with the world! (The first image is a map of the museum.)

 

Citations: http://polkmuseumofart.org/exhibitions/regeneration2-tomorrows-photographers-today/

Pushing the Boundaries or Just Inappropriate?

Header: Reader’s Theater play on October 31, 2013 at Fletcher Theatre on Florida Southern College’s Campus.

Facts: Reader’s Theatre is an Avant – Garde production of multiple one act plays. I attended this performance on October 31, 2013 at 10:00 pm or 2200 military time, which happens to be my preference. It was held in Fletcher Theater at Florida Southern College.

Initial Response: Where do I even begin? I hated so many things and liked so very few. So, I guess I’ll end on a positive note. I understand that the purpose of Avant – Garde theatre is to ‘push the boundaries’ so to speak. But in  my opinion, they flew past pushing boundaries into completely inappropriate. Now, I’ve been told that the second half of the performance was much less provocative and better, however, I did not get to see that because I was so disgusted with the performance that I left at intermission. I was raised with a soldier as my hero, my granddad. I love him to death and I hold on to every word that he tells me. Coming back and forth between drill, him and his buddies would always joke around like ‘Man you’re gonna get some finally!’ or other comments to that nature, but sex was something that was shared between a man and his wife. Not a man and hundreds of women and it surely wasn’t something that was publicized – it was something that you kept private. Now, maybe that’s old school and maybe that’s not how people approach sex anymore, and that’s fine with me. I don’t have to participate and I don’t have to like it. I simply have to accept that other people do and that is completely okay with me. I still hold to my opinion that this was completely inappropriate. On a positive note, however, I enjoyed the performers individually. They performed their parts very well and I was impressed. Through the laughing audience and comments from around them, they never broke character and laughed with the audience.

 

Points for Potential Research: I would like to see if anyone else has done this performance in a different order. For example, started with the less provocative material and put Dionysus at the end.

 

Collateral Material:

This is the ticket that I burned shortly after I scanned it. -insert mischievous laugh here-

Oh! Just thought I would share my wonderful granddad with the world. He’s awesome.

A Step Back In Time

Header: I visited St. Augustine in Florida on Monday, October 14, 2013. I went there on the back of a motorcycle.

Facts:

• St. Augustine was founded in 1565 by Don Pedro Menendez.
• It is the nation’s oldest city.
• Contains the oldest wooden schoolhouse.
• Ponce De Leon’s Fountain of Youth can be found here.
• Four centuries of history.
• There is a beach.
• Flagler College is located here.

Initial Response: I absolutely loved my trip. The bike ride was the best part. No not really. I loved the architecture there. I loved seeing how the fort was constructed and how it worked for what it was made for. The history behind everything made it that much more enjoyable. For example, the oldest wooden schoolhouse. Amazing! You can’t say that architecture isn’t art. (I mean seriously, look at Frank Lloyd Wright). ANYWAY, I was flabbergasted by the way that construction was done back in the days (this is cliché I know) and see that it was still jst as beautiful If not more so. However, it wasn’t ideal for rainy weather. A lot of the buildings has ‘covers’ for ceilings that weren’t really ceilings and sometimes even going inside, you could still get wet. I disliked this. I also disliked not being able to actually go into the fort due to government shut down. For me, I loved the sites the best. I loved seeing the old architecture, it really fascinated me and caught my attention and even though I couldn’t enter the fort, the design from the outside was quite spectacular.

Points for potential research: I would love to return and go inside the fort and see what was missed.

Collateral Material: 

Citations: http://www.visitflorida.com/en-us/cities/st-augustine.html

A Different Perspective

I not only attended Music Under the Stars at Florida Southern College’s Pimpkin Bandshell, I also performed in it. This performance took place on Thursday October 24, 2013.

Facts: Seven pieces were performed. There were four student conductors: Amanda Anderegg, Daniel Rigano, Kasey Skoll, and Danielle Brooks. The Symphonic Wind Ensemble was conducted by Dr. Jo Jossim and the jazz ensemble was conducted by Mr. Butcher.

Intial Response: Since I had the unique opportunity to perform in the performance, my opinions can, and probably will be, a bit biased. I honestly feel that Thursday night’s performance was one of the best we had done to date. It was not perfect, not at all, but it was a great performance. The flutes were slightly out of tune and it was a little windy. It was quite comical though, as we all had our music clothes pinned to our stands. Night on Fire, and Ignition, were my two favorite pieces while I didn’t particularly enjoy playing A Lark in the Clear Air. I absolutely loved the dissonance that was contained in that piece, though. Objectively, or as objectively as I can get, the performance could have been better. Intonation wasn’t ideal (partly due to being outside), and the balance was off during some pieces. This was exemplified in Night on Fire. As it is just about everyone’s favorite song to play, we all get excited and play just a little bit too loud sometimes.

Points for Potential Research: As a performer, it is very beneficial to listen to other performances to see how other bands play it – how they articulate certain parts or things that they implement to make it more musical.

Collateral Material: My favorite pieces, for your enjoyment of course 🙂

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpRaB4zS1j0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMzHHNns5So

Are you “On the Razzle”??

Basic Information: I attended the play On the Razzle in Buckner Theatre at Florida Southern College on Thursday September 26, 2013.

Facts: On the Razzle is a farce written by Tom Stoppard. A farce is a comic dramatic work that incorporates buffoonery, horseplay, and typically crude characterization and improbable situations. The story was originally a one act play by a british playwright, John Oxenford titled A Day Well Spent. Austrian playwright Johann Nestroy originally converted it into a full-length burlesque comedy.

Initial Response: I went into this play expecting something great. My sister used to be in plays and so I’ve seen my fair share of them. What I got was exactly what I hoped for. with the exception of a few minor details, I absolutely loved the performance. The stage set up was brilliant and the transitions smooth. I loved how they have four cubes with a different scene on each cube that they could turn and set the stage for a new scene. With the exception of Sanders’ costume at the beginning of the play, I felt that the costumes fit the time period and worked for the performance. I loved the horse. It was completely unrealistic and that’s what made it funny. I also was surprised at how well the actors improvised. There were times during the play when you could tell that something happened that wasn’t in the script but you would never know unless you were really paying attention because of how well they improvised. There were only two things about this performance that I did not enjoy. I have no idea what the waitress’ were doing but the way they walked and the horrible fake accents just weren’t doing it for me and it was next to impossible for me to focus on anything else. I also didn’t like that at the beginning of the play, they had the whole stage lit up. I didn’t understand why they had the whole stage lit up when it was supposed to be two different rooms. It kind of took away from the scene because I was too focused on trying to figure what the connection was. Overall, though, it was a great performance in my opinion.

Points for Potential Research: For future research I would love to go see this play again done by different actors as well as different plays by Tom Stoppard.

Collateral Material:

Citations:

https://www.google.com/#q=farce

Recital Boom or Recital Bust?

 

On Thursday September 19, 2013, I , along with my classmates, attended the recital, In Praise of Women in Branscomb Auditorium at Florida Southern College.

Facts: In Praise of Women was a vocal recital in which John Thomasson sang baritone to Therese Lindquist’s accompaniment on the piano. Mr. Thomasson has a doctorate in voice performance from the University of Iowa and attended Mozartum University of Music and Dramatic Arts in Austria. Ms. Lindquist also attended the Mozartum University of Music and Dramatic Arts through an invitation by Paul Schilhawsky, an Austrian pianist. The program was compromised of twenty-four songs. Fourteen of these songs were in English, four of them were in German, and six of them were in French.  The idea behind this particular type of program is to tell a story through song, using mainly facial expressions to do so. There is no acting, there is no play – just facial expressions and minimal hand gestures.

Initial Response: I went into this event completely dreading it. As an ADHD kid, I had no idea how I was going to manage to sit still for an hour and listen to the same guy sing twenty-four different songs. Needless to say, when the program was over and I hadn’t even realized that an hour had passed, I was shocked and pleasantly surprised that he was not only able to catch my attention, but also to keep my attention for that period of time. His facial expressions are what made the performance so enjoyable for me. I loved that he incorporated different languages and also that he did the same song in German and in English. There really wasn’t that much to critique for me as I thoroughly enjoyed the performance. However, there were times when the tempo was off and there were times when the piano could have been a little bit louder. I did not like the egotistical presence about him or that he seemed to use a lot more hand gestures than he implied would be used. Though it worked for this performance, there were times when it was a bit excessive. I also felt that the setting was off. Though Branscomb auditorium is great because it has amazing acoustics, I felt that because it is so large, it took away part of the intimacy that, in my opinion, was one of the only thing this performance lacked. Past all of the negative, I really enjoyed the accompaniment part and how well they fit together. As a trumpet player who has done solos with a piano accompaniment, I know how difficult it can be to get the two parts to flow together an be musical.  Some of my favorite songs were A Chloris, The Pretty Creature, Amabel, A Rhyme for Angela, and Epitaph on a Wife (some of which I have included links to under ‘collateral material’). However, my all time favorite was Der Kuss because Beethoven was the composer and it struck home with me. As a small child, I would listen to Beethoven and Mozart just about all the time. I would listen to them while I was picking up my room, playing inside, doing homework, or going to sleep. All in all, this performance left me with a fresh new outlook on the performing arts and a desire to attend, see, and learn more about them.

Points for Potential Research: I most definitely would research other songs by these same composers or the same songs sung by different vocalists. I would use Google to find out if any of these songs had been sung together at other performances. YouTube would also be a great resource for hearing other vocalists singing these songs. I would also venture to research Mr. Thomasson and Ms. Lindquist and see some of their other performances.

Collateral Material: 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBz802Oevfk

This is Ludwig Van Beethoven. He composed Der Kuss which was my favorite song just because he wrote it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHFStJeVAk0

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-7sZBsBoOA

Site:

http://www.google.com/imgres?um=1&sa=N&biw=1242&bih=565&hl=en&tbm=isch&tbnid=1ybPz0V23gCCnM:&imgrefurl=http://lucare.com/immortal/&docid=JCcxjYcghEMXyM&imgurl=http://lucare.com/immortal/media/composing1.gif&w=355&h=445&ei=LD9EUqufIKShiQKr6YDgAg&zoom=1&ved=1t:3588,r:4,s:0,i:96&iact=rc&page=1&tbnh=177&tbnw=136&start=0&ndsp=14&tx=69.8182373046875&ty=86.727294921875

Beethoven picture.

 

Take a Step into the World of Jenna

Hi! My name is Jenna Lanoue. I am a sophmore nursing student and I love it. A little bit about myself…

I am an ADHD kid. Even if you think I’m not paying nay attention to you or what you’re saying, I promise that I am. I don’t always sit still and I don’t always pay the closest attention, but I am always listening. Nursing is my passion. I love to help people in any way that I can. I am currently a Patient Care Assistant at Lakeland Regional Medical Center which means I change bed pans, help people get to the bathroom, give baths and all sorts of other cool things. I am definitely one of those students who lives her major and I love it. I want to join the military once I get my license. I know, crazy right? Who would want to work for Obama?? Well, if you want to know more about that, feel free to ask. While nursing is my passion, I also love the arts. I love to play my trumpet and I love to take pictures.  I also love architecture. (I seem to ‘love’ a lot of things, huh?) I’ve been playing the trumpet for 10 years now and have played anything from the Spongebob theme song to Lads of Wamphray. (If you’ve never heard it I strongly suggest listening to it). I love to take pictures. I  don’t do it professionally, just recreationally. I am a christian – meaning I believe in Heaven and Hell and I believe in God and Jesus. I’m not ashamed of it – nor will I pretend to be. He (God) is the reason that I’ve gotten through everything that I have been through and came out okay. I have a boyfriend. His name is Daniel. He’s pretty amazing and I am definitely one lucky girl to have him in my life.  He is my best friend and I know I can go to him about anything – good or bad.  I have a dog, he’s a two year old chocolate lab and he is my world. His name is Cooper and he was born on my birthday and I bottle fed him until he was old enough to eat puppy chow.

SO that’s a little bit about me. If you want to know more, ask. I like to make new friends, but I don’t do drama. I have some background in fine arts but not a wide variety of it. In this course I hope to accomplish gaining a deeper appreciation for the arts and an understanding of someone else’s opinion and thoughts.