i-want-more

Arty Satie

Yesterday was grey and miserable, yet I felt up and cheerful. Today there is blue sky and conversely, I’m in a tedious mood. Some of the funk may have to do with a couple of small niggles in my working environment. I’m now six weeks in and there are some hair-line cracks appearing. I should stress that these are nothing serious and it’s probably to do with being new and not knowing my subject area(s) very well.

In general, I’m a fast learner. In the early days of any job I get frustrated at the obstacles that are, knowingly or otherwise*, put in the way of making a good fist of things. The usual scenario is that your new workmates are already over-burdened and don't really have time to think about training you. Happily, my experience at my current workplace has largely been positive in this area. My colleagues are busy, but they are also helpful and friendly.**

On the flip side, sometimes I'm a slow learner. This tends to happen when mathematics are put into the mix, or I come into contact with a procedure that is over-complicated. On both fronts, I am currently doing battle with the purchase ordering system from hell.

Too often in our working lives we find out something that we should have known after the event ('Did no-one tell you that picking up that red telephone would mean unilateral nuclear destruction? Oh dear.'). Without being Doris Stokes, we can't know if we are not told. Why get frustrated with things that you couldn't see coming? In relation to this, my pal Mr Osbourne says, ‘you don’t know what you don’t know’. He's right, you know. It's the simplest thing in the world, too often it's forgotten.

Having said all that (in a rather inelegant manner, B- at best) on the whole, things are positive – it's just today that I feel disgruntled.

So, last night we went to the RFH to see a Satie concert. It was OK, but overlong; there was also a multi-media aspect to the show which got right on my tits. There were films being projected onto the screen above the orchestra, mostly using black and white footage that was shot recently. It jarred horribly with the music. It was all modern dance/physical theatre or whatever, which has been done to bleedin' death. Two blokes who looked a bit like Satie featured heavily. Phhht. At one point, a girl who was done up to look like a 1920s flapper was dressed only in her undergarments and was cavorting about, while the two Saties looked on (later on, they in turn stripped down to their long johns). It was all unnecessary, in my opinion - why the flip couldn't the music speak for itself? Are we so stunted as an audience that we need to have visuals to accompany what we're hearing, like a turn-of-the-last-century VH1?

Anyway, I should have asked conductor Charles Hazlewood the reason why he was 'indisposed' that time a couple of years back when we should have seen the minimalists concert (see here). From my time at the theatre, indisposed was generally the polite phrase for drunk.



* You may think that people wouldn't be so cynical as to knowingly withhold information about the duties of a role. Feel free to ask me about the first few days of my previous job the next time you see me.
** Again, unlike some other relatively recent experiences.

posted by deafdisco @ 3:20 pm