An Accidental Contrast

Sometimes I think it’s a sin, when I feel I’m Norwegian and I’m really a Finn.
Sundown, you’d better take care if I find you’ve been sweepin’ up the barbers’ hair.
Sometimes I think it’s a shame when I’m heading for Portugal but put down in Spain.
Porridger’s Almanack (Breakfast of Ganglions)

A painting is not a picture of an experience, it is an experience.

— Mark Rothko

I had forgotten that Alan Arkin was in the cast, so last night I started to watch Edward Scissorhands again. I could not help an aggravated sensation that Danny Elfman’s music is facile and saccharine. The saccharine character is perforce in support of the narrative, I get and grant that. I stopped roughly halfway through; I’ll probably finish up this evening. Arkin plays Dad straight, which (a) is why I later forgot that he was in the cast as he (suitably) calls no attention to himself, and also thus (b) is a bit contrarian to the cartoonishness. On one hand, Wiest is commonsense helpful to Edward, but sometimes annoyingly oblivious (why doesn’t anyone just help Edward eat his peas?!) So I’m remembering all over that this flick is an uneasy balance between witty and nuisance. Maybe my annoyance at Elfman was a spate of grumpiness, or maybe it was just the inevitable clarity of perception after my spending some of the day with Webern. Dianne Wiest entering the castle with “Avon calling!” is a nice moment, and of course it’s great to see Vincent Price in so apt a cameo.

I’ve always liked Webern’s music (if my recollection has not gone wildly astray, the first piece I heard was the Symphony, Op. 21.) Yet, over the years I have rarely listened to his music. At one point I must have fetched in Boulez’s recording on Sony of his complete œuvre, and probably made the freshman mistake of half-listening to the lot, straight through. This week, at last, the scales have fallen from my eyes. One of the errors I committed was a degree of subconscious wishing that the scale were larger than it is. Now I’m listening Opus number by Opus number, attentively, and (it ain’t Rocket Science!) what a difference. So what is illuming and mildly bemusing is, how substantial (in comparison) are, e.g. das Augenlicht, Op. 26, and the first movement, Mäßig, of the string quartet, Op. 28.