Brahms' Requiem

We performed with First Presbyterian Church of Berkeley Chancel Choir on Palm Sunday evening. Since it was my first time performing with the Concert Choir, I was enthralled and had a wonderful time and felt every bit as cosmopolitan and erudite as the San Francisco Symphony. When I get my finances together, I am going to invest in a string of cheap pearls because that looks so elegant with our black dresses worn for the concert. I guess my favorite part of the Requiem is "For mortal flesh is as the grass," the second movement, the funeral march. That was the first part we rehearsed and I fell in love with the Requiem when I was introduced to it. Even though the performance took as long as the recording I'd been listening to, it seemed shorter. I think that is probably because when we rehearse, we start and stop, and it seems much longer.

Duel in the Sun

Today I watched Duel in the Sun, 1946 with Gregory Peck, Jennifer Jones, Joseph Cotten, Lillian Gish, Lionel Barrymore. It was my Netflix video pick. I would give this movie four stars. I had seen it once before and remembered that I had been impressed with it. I think Native Americans today would say it's racist. Jennifer Jones was a lusty half-breed, and the white women were virtuous women. Vashti, Butterfly McQueen, the black servant wanted to be married but didn't realize how complicated the white people were. The white women were virtuous, but Jennifer Jones could have married the nice Joseph Cotten if she had not been attracted against her will and better judgment to the handsome but devilish Gregory Peck. I was feeling down because black films seem to deal with the seamy side of life: incest, child molestation, drugs, rape. This is a movie about white people behaving badly, but they did make the dark Native American girl not be able to help herself being bad. This movie made me want to work on my screenplays and submit them to Sundance May 1. Let's see if I have the energy to work on that this April. Supposedly, I'm supposed to be enrolling in PhD school May 1 to study to save Haiti.

A New Day

Well, I'm finally back on-line after a year's hiatus. We'll see how this goes. I watched Lions for Lambs on satellite TV and will probably watch A Duel in the Sun on my Netflix video.

This painting is called Devotions, but I'm not happy with it and will work on fine-tuning the way I apply paint.