Central Park: Six of The Best

As my time in New York winds down, I don’t have time for extended blog entries – I’m too intent on trying to pack as much into my last few days as possible. However, this blog nags at me and insists on the occasional update – no matter how occasional. So I’ve hit on the idea of a quick way to fill some space and still make entries of interest – hence, Six of The Best. Photographs, that is. Today, I’ve chosen six images taken on my rambles through Central Park.

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Image: Root Canal Treatment
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Image: Hans Christian Anderson statue
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Image: Would you like to dance? Two nuns watch as couples dance the Tango
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Image: Bethesda Fountain silhouette
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Image: Model Boat Pond
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Image: Bethesda Terrace ornamentation
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Image: Bethesda Terrace ornamentation detail
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Yes, yes, I know that's seven images, and not six. That's just the marketer in me trying to live up to the old marketing truism: Always deliver more than you promise.

Iris DeMent

~ One of things I made sure I did when planning this trip to New York was look for concerts that might coincide with my stay. To my delight, I’ve managed to see three of my favourite performers while I’ve been here: Steve Forbert, Pete Seeger (see Pete Seeger - Living Legend), and Iris DeMent.

I can't remember where or when I first heard the voice of the American singer songwriter, Iris DeMent, but when I did, I was immediately captivated by the high plaintive sound of her voice. You see, I have a 'thing' about singers with high plaintive voices. Antony Hegarty (Antony and The Johnsons), Salif Keita, and several others have a way of piercing my psyche with their voices and music that I can't rationally explain.

Iris DeMent is one such singer. Iris (the youngest of 14 children), grew up singing gospel songs at home and at the Pentecostal church her family attended . She didn't start writing and performing her own songs until she was 25, and released her first recording in her early 30s.

Today, she is generally categorized as a country singer, but her songs and stories transcend that label. Her song writing covers a wide range of topics including sexual abuse (Letter to Mom), Vietnam (There's a Wall in Washington), contemporary US politics (Wasteland of The Free), her family (numerous songs), and much more. Always honest, thoughtful and filled with insight, her songs are built around great melodies delivered in her trademark 'high lonesome' voice.

This was my second Iris DeMent concert. My first coincided with my New York visit in 2008. To see Iris on that trip I had to travel upstate to Lake Placid where she was performing at the local arts center. I must admit I was a little disappointed with that concert. Maybe it was the venue or the quality of the sound system. Maybe it was because I was too far back from the stage. Or maybe my excitement at seeing Iris for the first time raised my expectations for the performance to a point where Iris couldn’t possible meet them.

Thankfully, there were no such problems with the venue, Iris, or my own expectations at the B.B.King Blues Club & Grill last night where Iris was in fine form, and took time to introduce her songs and tell the stories behind many of them. Her songs are rooted in her past, in the daily life she lives today on the farm she shares with her husband and children in rural Iowa, and they are especially entrenched in her strong religious faith.

Her singing voice is filled with emotion, and every time I hear her sing I find myself deeply moved by that emotion and the feelings she evokes. I’m sure that more than one person was literally moved to tears during the 90 minute performance last night, and that is a rare and precious thing in today’s contemporary music scene.

Take another look at the photo above, and check out the other photographs on her website. She may appear somewhat plain and ordinary, but Iris is not selling youth or false images of beauty. Iris DeMent is the real deal. Her songs and her voice have the ability to move me in ways that most contemporary performers will never do. There are some full sound files on her website you can listen to, but personally, I recommend you just go out and buy (or order online) any -- or all -- of her four albums.

Happily there are numerous video clips of Iris DeMent on YouTube. Some feature her performing solo, but many show her singing with a host of other singer songwriters including James Taylor, Emmylou Harris, Nanci Griffith and John Prine. Here she is performing probably her best known song, Our Town on an unnamed television show. Hopefully, the uninitiated will get a sense of Iris DeMent's beautiful voice and fine songwriting style. Enjoy...

By the way, you may find you already have Iris DeMent in your record collection since she has appeared as a guest on many albums by some of the best contemporary singer songwriters recording today, including Tom Russell and the afore mentioned Emmylou Harris, Nanci Griffith, and again John Prine. Here she is sharing the stage with John Prine performing In Spite of Ourselves…

A special shout out to Pat and Neil who shared a table with me throughout the evening. It was lovely to be able to chat before the show over our meals and share something about ourselves and what it was that brought us together at an Iris DeMent concert in New York City. Cheers.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Image: Hundreds of visitors spill out onto the front steps of the Met at closing time

I haven’t done a lot of gallery or museum visits during this New York stay. In fact, after six weeks I have only managed to visit the Museum of the City of New York, and the Museum of Modern Art (both for about an hour each), and put in extended visits to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and The Cloisters (an off-shoot of the Met). It’s not that I have no interested in art or artifacts, I do, but I have been into other things this time around. However, I may yet squeeze in one or two more museums before I depart this great city.

So anyway, I did get to the Metropolitan Museum of Art (the ‘Met’ for short), where I spent four fruitful hours getting lost amongst several thousand years worth of sculptures, paintings and jewellery; iconography from all the major religions; Egyptian burial items, hieroglyphics and massive sarcophaguses (see image); medieval tapestries and great suits of armour; modern and contemporary art, as well as folk art from every continent; photographic exhibitions; and musical instruments – ancient and modern – including Ringo Starr’s gold plated snare drum!

Image: Massive sarcophagus. Better hope you are well and truly dead when that lid goes on!

I also headed up to the roof to take a look at the Doug and Mike Starn installation, Big Bambu, a massive structure built entirely of bamboo on which only a fortunate few get to explore via bamboo ramps that weave and climb over the whole edifice. Unfortunately, timed tickets for the guided climbs are in high demand and therefore hard to get. As interesting as Big Bambu looked, it was a bit of an anticlimax to only be able to walk under the installation rather than over it.

I couldn’t help thinking, as I wandered through room after room of priceless object d’art: at what point did ordinary objects begin to assume greater value and importance than their makers or original owners gave them? Presumably it is because certain objects have survived hundreds and in some cases, thousands of years that they acquire their worth.

For example, a modern $500 wedding ring, as sentimental as it might be to its owner in 2010, is still ‘just’ a reasonably priced wedding ring. However, if the ring was to survive 500 years – instead of say, 50 – it’s value skyrockets way beyond its initial price. Now it is not ‘just’ a wedding ring, it has been transformed into a rare and precious thing – an artifact from the 21st century, no less. But after 500 years, isn’t it really just an old worn and battered gold ring? Does it automatically become priceless, simply because it has survived 500 years?

Image: The Sphinx of Hapshetsut (circa 1473 – 1458 B.C.)

And another thing. It seems to me that every major museum in the world contains massive collections of Egyptian artifacts. Some are tiny ornaments, others are massive slabs of marble and granite that must have taken great effort to excavate, pack, and transport around the world. I couldn’t help thinking as I examined room after room of the Metropolitan’s Egyptian collection that there can’t be much left in Egypt itself for visitors to look at.

I mean, apart from the pyramids, are there any artifacts left in Egypt worth making the trip for? And what about the locals? What do Egyptians think of the massive plunder that took place during the 1800s especially? They can’t be too happy about the loss of antiquity they have suffered.

Ok. I’m rambling, I know, but these things played on my mind as I wandered through the Met. Besides, someone has to ask the questions.

Anyway, I feel much better now that I’ve shared them with you.

Really.

Image: “We are the knights that say, Ni!”
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P.S. The Metropolitan Museum of Art is well worth a visit, and the admission price of $20. Just make sure you allow plenty of time to explore its extensive treasures. Even after four hours I still missed out on vast areas of its collections.