JabbaWockeeZ

I've been a bit of a JabbaWockeeZ fiend for the last few weeks after a friend got me hooked on Randy Jackson's America's Best Dance Crew on MTV. They are one of the two finalists with the winner to be announced on Thursday, March 27.

JabbaWockeeZ are from San Diego and all season have really brought a higher level of crew dancing. You watch them and they are actually painting a scene. There are the individual dancers but they force you to see how their movements interrelate with each other. It's breathtaking! The crew wears masks and gloves which gives them that Blue Man Group kind of feel, a level of anonymity yet creating a sense of unity in their movements. There's a link on youtube that strings all of their routines together and it's clear that they weren't just looking to create one routine at a time, they were looking to build a full story arc. This is hip-hop dance at a whole other level!

I don't have cable, so I catch the episodes on MTV or on youtube. The other Asian heavy crew was Kaba Modern, that I hear is from UC Irvine. They had pretty tight choreography too, half women, half men. They're big on isolations and intricate hand movements, which has worn weary on me. They made it to third place.

There's some uproar from facebook to youtube arguing that MTV rigged the voting so there would be a east coast (Status Quo is from Boston) vs west coast final. My reply to that, is that reality tv isn't about being fair, it's about ratings and according to the legalese of many of these voting shows there's a disclaimer about the producers having a right to not count votes they think are deliberately skewing the tallies (like a script or something that keeps registering votes). But whatever.

Status Quo, the other finalist, is an African American street crew from Boston that has been up and down this season. A very athletic bunch, they do alot more freestyling more often than not, but they represent that kind of raw energy in hip-hop.

In any case, I'm glad that the west side got major representation on the show. And I really hope the top crews get more opportunities from being on this show.

I have to admit I'm an addict for any dancing/skating/gymnastic type show on tv. If there's music and movement, I'm there. I'm not too into American Idol, but I can't miss Dancing With the Stars (especially with Kristi Yamaguchi on it).

Noe Tio, graphic artist and drummer of Bagong Lumad

Noe Tio, former drummer of numerous groups including Joey Ayala at ang Bagong Lumad and graphic artist who brought his artwork to numerous album covers, t shirts and prints, passed away Feb 11.

His designs brought an indigenous sensibility to a modern era. His tshirts that depicted indigenous tribal scenes were drawn with a sense of joy, often of a celebration with music. They were completely different from the stern and serious look of what many Fil-Ams understood of Mindanao music and dance from PCN.

The following is a letter from Joey Ayala with information on how you can donate to Noe's family.


Mga Kaibigan,

If you have ever listened to the recordings or seen the performances of Joey Ayala at ang Bagong Lumad, or have worn tee shirts with woodcut-like designs of animals, indigenous art, and neo-ethnic takes on the UP logo, then you have been touched by Noe Tio, Bagong Lumad drummer and graphic artist.

Throughout the Philippines his influence on pop culture, albeit unsigned in most cases, has been felt. Note the proliferation of indigenous visual motifs and percussion-playing since we started producing recordings and prints in the mid-80s.

Noe is gone now, he crossed the bridge about 2:30 a.m., February 11, 2008 after suffering a massive stroke in Baguio, in the early morning of February 10. He was 46 years old.

His remains are at La Funeraria Paz, 79 Naguilian Rd., Baguio City (Feb. 12 to 16). He will be laid to rest at Heaven's Garden, Cuderao Rd, Loakan Airport (Feb. 17).

He is survived by his partner, Pearly dela Peña, and two sons: Bandoy (5) and Christian (3).

If you’d like to give back some of the creative energy that Noe channeled into our collective consciousness via his work and passion, please don’t hesitate to send your donations to:

Joey Ayala, SA # 3376 0414 39
BPI Visayas Avenue Branch

I’ll see to it that your kindness gets to the family, primarily for Noe’s kids’ education. Who knows. One or both of them may enrich our lives in one way or another, just as their father did.

Noe has returned to the light, long live Noe!

Peace,

Joey Ayala

P.S. We're also struggling with some 200k worth of medical and funereal expenses so, be generous! It'll all come back tenfold - that's cosmic accounting.

Beyond

My cousin who is in college wants to try out for the Pilipino Cultural Night Singkil Princess part. She was a fan woman last year and knows that to have what it takes to be princess, she was going to need help. She asked us if we knew anyone. Especially since the hubby had spent extensive years photographing numerous dance troupes, he knew quite a few people, so he emailed a friend from college we hadn't seen in years. Ten to be exact, since her oldest was now ten.

Sure enough, she emails right back saying that her cousin who dances with Kayamanan in LA was in town and they'd be happy enough to help my cousin with an audition routine.

It turned out to be a great day! Our friend and her cousin discussed the details of the dance, the body position, the footwork, the pose. And even though the angles seem like they would strain the body, they are indeed rather balanced.

Singkil, a Maranao dance, is, like many of the folk dances, a courtship dance, a series of flirtatious moves. The twirling of the fans to create illusions of the female form and to play tricks by hiding and uncovering. Though I have seen the dance performed with more overtly sexual outfits (a Western interpretation), when the movements are done just right, there is no need to exaggerate or excessively reveal too much. As J said, that's how she got her husband.

Our friend, J, hadn't danced in years and though she said she had forgotten, it was amazing how easily her body fit itself into the proper movement. Even without the spectacle of costume and lights, she was mesmerizing. I was happy to see our friend J reconnect to something that had been a large part of her life.

During the afternoon, we discussed the various Singkil performers we had seen over the years and what made those dances special. Certainly J's performance her freshman year at Cal was incredible. She knew how to hit the curves and the angles with her body and attitude. Another woman had incredibly flexible wrists, but what "sold" the dance with her eyes. I knew another woman who had the most captivating fingers.

But really the conversation we were really having were the aspects of a woman's beauty. Considering this dance comes from a predominantly Muslim region, that beauty is not overt or exposed, but rather revealed and enticed. The wave of the arms that lap you forward, the figure eight flow of the fans repeated over and over an unconscious signal of the curves of the body, the slight lean of the body that exudes confidence and self-awareness.

One of the tips that J's cousin gave mine was "you don't want to be bukaka to the audience" or you don't want to pick the stance that from the audience's view your legs are spread open. The dance is not only a courtship with the prince but to the audience as well. Put yourself out there, but don't give too much. Not everyone gets to see everything. To pull them in, you give enough to make them want to come to see the rest.

The attitude of the dance is probably the most difficult to get. It's not just turning up your nose or leaning back. It's about keeping your head high, and not standing at attention, but leaning back with ease. You are the princess, you are not the one to serve you are the one to lead. It's not what the fans do, the fans simply amplify what is already there, what is already within you. It's not so much about snootiness as it is about confidence and content. The prince is not getting just any girl, he's getting one of substance, he's getting a woman. She is not trying to be anyone, she already is.

It's a leap, to go beyond thought. To simply be. And it's in this "being" where the true beauty really is.

So you think?

While I hardly ever watch American Idol, I am completely addicted to the various dancing competitions like Dancing with the Stars and So You Think You Can Dance. This season of SYTYCD was especially packed with wonderful dancers in the top ten. I was enamored with Danny, but was still happy that Sabra, the pint sized powerhouse, won.

Many of the reality competition shows have some kind of post-season tour. I had thought about getting tickets to the Rockstar tours, but my favorites didn't win, so I passed.

Anyway, this season of dancers SYTYCD were simply enchanting, then I found out they're coming to Oakland. Since much of my family was into that show, we got tickets for the tour show at the end of November.

In the same way that Dancing With the Stars showed that just about anyone can learn to dance ballroom and that ballroom is a fun, hip, enjoyable pastime, I really appreciated how SYTYCD introduced so many forms of dance to a wider audience from krumpin' to contemporary to varying forms of hip-hop, to various ballroom forms. Not sure if that'll mean more people will want to buy tickets to an Alvin Ailey show or maybe check out the next contemporary dance show at Yerba Buena or maybe you'll find more people looking for krumpin' vids on youtube. Who knows? But for a person that loves dance, any kind of dance, SYTYCD is really satisfying.

Sweet as Hany

One of my clients is pursuing her dream of being a pastry chef. She's now set up a delectable blog of the cakes she's done called, Sweet as Hany (yes, you pronounce Hany like Honey).

Amused Muse

It's actually been a while since I've gone to an art event. They just haven't been in my calendar flow. So I was quite happy to have been a muse for Eileen's piece in the Cheers to Muses Anthology.

We of course ran into Mr. & Mrs. Bermeo. I was flipping through the book seeing who else was in it and was happy to see a poem by Lolan Sevilla. Since this anthology includes artwork along with writing, I noticed another familiar name, Lori Kay, a sculptor I had taken kulintang classes with years ago. Her piece, "Heir Rice," in the anthology is the picture above. Click on it to see more of her work. Some of which you may have seen around SF, including the broken wishbone piece that sat on the SF State campus.

Lori was one of the first sculptors I had ever met way back when my life was mostly filled with poets, not that there's anything wrong with writers, but artistically speaking, it's nice to have a variety. Plus I was fascinated at how she worked with large sculptures and metal. I remember thinking, it's one thing to write, I can write just about anywhere, but to do large sculpture, where do people do that? So it was good to run into her again. Maybe someday I'll ask her to commission something for me.

I also found out that Ms.Evelina Galang was also a muse for contributor Vanessa Merina.

giddy, it makes me giddy!

I've always loved books. In elementary school I volunteered in the school library and learned how to fix books: repair spines, save torn pages. I'm only now remembering that I used to do that.

And really what I love about being an Associate Editor for Meritage Press is being a part of creating books. Making books makes me giddy!

I'm currently making my way through a read of Jean Vengua's Prau, which will be on sale this Fall.

It's always one thing to read a book on the computer and always another to read it with the feel of paper in your hands.

Also right now, I'm printing out a draft for a friend's novel. I'm tempted to read it having had numerous discussions with him about plot and character development, and he said I could read it if I want to, but then I'm not sure if I want to wait until it's in book form. I'm almost sure my curiosity will get the better of me and I'll end up reading through it. It's a book, I just can't help myself!

Even though I didn't write the book, it's still just as exciting to be right in there, standing this close to the process. The triumph of subtle word changes, of font choices that glide across the page, the oh so wonderful book cover that creates the first allure.

As much as I enjoy writing, I realized just now that I also really love publishing and editing. Grant it, those parts are not as sexy as writing where your name gets to be on the cover, they're more like the down and dirty parts, all the things that have to happen behind the scenes to get us to that point where the books finds its way into your hands.

two buck chuck wins double golds!

Charles Shaw 2005 Chardonnay aka Two Buck Chuck for its $1.99/bottle price has won double gold at the California State Fair this year and named best California Chardonnay! We actually bought a couple of boxes for the hell of it and tried it out. We've bought single bottles that cost more than a case of Chuck. I was kind of skeptical, but it's actually a lovely wine. It's not the buttery oaky variety as it is more the crisp fruity chardonnay. The flavor does fill your mouth from front to back with a good weight to it. I found myself easily sipping through a glass of it.

Two buck chuck is a rather hit or miss wine even from year to year. And I've often skipped it as there are plenty of bargain wines of more reliable quality on the shelves. Grant it, it takes its licks as the cheap wine, about as close to the boxed variety as you can get, it does serve a purpose of selling a wine at a price range that everyone just has to try at least once. There will always be the people who drink Bud Light, but then there are the people who try Bud Light then ask themselves, there has to be something better.

I've come to realize everyone has a level in which they like to be at. How can I complain about Charles Shaw for filling that niche of people that want a Bud Light priced wine? That's just business. And while I have to fight the bias of wanting to avoid drinking two buck chuck because it's not "real" wine, I do always have to keep myself open to the possibility that hey anyone can get lucky.

Lately I've been doing alot of comparing and contrasting of photographers/photography, wines and wineries, martial arts and artists, and what often makes one better than the other is the ability to increase their odds of being successful at what they are executing. That no matter the field one is in, less is more. Like the master chess players, what separates them from beginners is that beginners waste time exploring every single option, while the master chess players know which paths are worth exploring. So it's not to say that a beginner might get lucky and pick a good move, it's just that the master chess players have the experience and knowledge to improve their chances of picking a good move. The master photographer who understands lighting, positioning and their equipment need only click a few times to get the right shot, but still spontaneously takes photos just in case they get lucky while in the meantime they are constantly improving their skill so they can get lucky more often.

santa semana

Only managed to go to the Reine Sophia museum that houses Picasso´s Guernica and other modern work. They had a wonderful exhibit of Chuck Close´s work. Amazing control of contrast and color. His large format paintings of portraits that looked like photographs were exquisite. A brain aneurisym in 1986 made him a paraplegic and he relearned to paint. He continued with his portraits first the form of dots and later recreating his large portraits but from a series of concentric painted circles that gave the pieces this kind of abstract realism. His ability to note color and shading had not changed, only the mechanisms in which a master painter conveyed his work.

The new modern wing of the museum contained temporary exhibits, while the standard collection held Picasso´s cubist work as well as Dali. Dali´s Madonna is just haunting the way the face slowly emerges from the grey cloud. The Guernica is a lovely exhibit as it first starts with photographs of Picasso´s spain 1938 after the bombings during World War I. These would be the images that would possess Picasso to build Guernica. They also show his various sketches, photographs of Guernica´s evolution, and trial sketches as he mapped out the piece. Not only do you get to see a pivotal work from a great master, you get to get a glimpse of his possible thought processes.

While I enjoyed seeing the Venus de Milo and could appreciate the uniqueness of her styling, I have not quite figured out the facination of the Mona Lisa. But perhaps it´s because there are so many crowds you just don´t have time to sit and appreciate the work. One piece from the Art Paris exposition which I enjoyed was a large portrait of Marilyn Monroe, but without the blown out effects that always give her the perfect porcelin skin. This was a 5" photo of Marilyn with the small facial lines, the blood vessels criss crossing her cheeks, the crow lines that came from her eyes. This picture showed the face of a woman whose life was an up and down fame and fortune roller coaster. I hadn´t realized she was 36 when she died because all the iconic pictures of her showed her with the perfect complexion.

Another exhibit at the Reine Sophia covered motion and all the pieces either moved or created a sense of movement. There was a wonderful interactive piece which was a forrest of thin clear tubing hung like those room separators hung in doorways, but 20ft by 20ft. So much so, you could get lost in it. It was delightful! There was one parent that lost their 2 year old daughter in it a few times, she just kept running back in. hehe

Outside was another exhibit understanding contrasts in light color which people could run through and watch people run through. We took a few pictures of ourselves in this one.

As it was cold and a bit gloomy (5 degree C) we decided to opt out of going to the Prado. Goya will have to wait for another trip. We decided to come back to the hotel to rest before dinner at 10p. We picked up some treats from the Pasteleria, yummy, and some orange juice and drinks from the local Chino, what they call all of those local mini grocery stores regardless of who runs them, though the one we went to was indeed run by a Chinese guy.

Tonight it´s paella night. Yummy! Tomorrow procession for Good Friday in Toledo. Saturday a trip to Segovia to see the Roman Aqueduct. Sunday Madrid´s flea market. Monday home.

The trip is coming to and end yet it feels like there is so much time before then.

Oh yeah, and I´m completely hooked on Curling from watching it on the Eurosport channel.