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In R4 news: July 2014
Short Story Project
Back in May, a few of our readers met at the ICRT studio to record voice tracks for a few Great Western Short Stories .
I’ve been listening to those audio files and pairing them with some Great Western Music in preparation for the mixing process which will start in a few weeks..
The folks at ICRT are especially keen on our Sherlock Holmes story: A Scandal in Bohemia. They recommend creating a series and the Holmes/Watson stories of Arthur Conan Doyle could be a good choice.
Incidentally, Pat Woods and Charlie Storrar read our Ignatz Ratzywatzky’s adaptation of the SCANDAL aloud at the Taipei Literature Festival on August 2 at Huashan Park.
Promotional Video Project
Meanwhile, William Openshaw of the RR video-recording division has been working on a video of our WasteLand performed at the April Aside @ The Red Room. He and I will meet in August to take the next step towards a functional promotional video for R4.
The R4 Portfolio
Lastly but not leastly, with a deeply appreciative bow to Roma Mehta: the R4 portfolio has passed the design/development stage and gone to the Printers! Looking forward to putting that item to work making good connections with potential clients.
(c) Copyright 2014 Red Room. Material on this site is the property of contributing members of the Red Room Community. Please do not copy any part of this publication. Thank you.
Aside 5, a magical evening, March 2014
As I sat here contemplating about Aside 5, I realized that the definition of the title changed for me this time around. The last Aside event was simply to set “aside” the more free-spirited people and magnify my hopes in becoming one of them in the future. But in Aside 5, I felt as if the purpose of the event was, for me, to push “aside” all my expectations and stereotypes I had developed in my mind and be exposed, once more, to the necessary facets of life. It was as if I was to experience a rebirth and see the world for the first time again.
The mini-capsule of renaissance started with Josh Drye, a musician from North Carolina. When Drye came on to the stage, he simply took out his guitar and spoke a bit about the fundamentals of his music. He said that in his home region, they like to use one basic chord as the background chord. After this brief introduction, he quickly began to perform. He sang songs he composed and songs by other people—all of them were the songs of the Appalachians, best known as bluegrass. But even though they were all very pleasing to the ear, I still craved the sound of the banjo. In my mind, bluegrass just did not make sense without the sound of the banjo. It is no wonder why babies cry when they are pulled out of their mommy’s belly; the frustration at the unfamiliarity of their surroundings is so overwhelming that the only rational response is to lash out and cry.
I was already screaming like a maniac inside (“Where the heck is the banjo?!”) when comedian/storyteller, Charlie Storrar, confided in the audience, “I went through a process of rebirth myself.” It was as if Storrar’s message was directed at me. For a second, I saw a halo light up above Storrar’s head. But then, he said, “I am a Reborn Sinner.” And poof, there goes the halo. Before Storrar became the man he is today, he was Celibate Charlie. Storrar was trying to woo a girl with a box of cheap chocolates at fifteen. And to please her even more, he followed her into her Christian faith—but the moment he stepped foot inside the church, he decided to fall in love with Jesus instead.
Storrar loved being a Christian, but he also admitted that dedicating himself to God did not help him get over his need to “fill that void” and he constantly needed to patch it up “with his right hand.” And so at around the age of thirty, he decided to leave the Christian faith and finally will himself to sin again. Storrar’s story sounded too much like a bad joke to be true—“a British walks into a church with a box of cheap chocolates in attempt to seduce a girl, but was, instead, seduced by Jesus the man Himself.” All that is missing here is a rabbi.
I was having difficulty wrapping my head around the concept of being seduced by something abstract and conservative when Tina Ma, the Red Room Muse, walked in gracefully with a gu zheng and helped to demonstrate this seduction right away. The beginning of Ma’s music was very meditative. But as she began to pepper in a narrative about spring—“the mating season,” all one could think about was “sex.” It was as if Ma had grinded up all the Viagra she could find in the drug stores and just decided to sprinkle all the love dust onto the Red Roomers while casually playing her gu zheng.
Tina Ma’s performance was very creative, but I would have to say nothing could be more creative than what the Radio Redux group had to bring us that night at Aside 5. The Red Room Radio Redux group (R4) had always presented spectacular dramas in the past. But this time, the writer of R4 transformed T. S. Eliot’s poem “Wasteland” into drama form. Four actors—Marc Anthony, Adrianna Smela, Charlie Storrar, and Pat Woods—whispered, and shouted, and danced, and raged throughout the entire poem. R4’s mission is to introduce Western canon to its audience; not only have they done a great job this time, they have changed my perception about how a poem should be read. By having four people act out “Wasteland,” the R4 group had successfully portrayed the diverse themes of confusion and personas in the poem.
R4, Tina Ma, Charlie Storrar, and Josh Drye—seeing these four amazing artists at Aside 5 was like seeing a big yellow submarine in a bottle. And after this thought came to my head, I had one final revelation. I am very thankful that I had discovered the Red Room; because of the Red Room, I would not have to travel very far to see the world, the world would all be there with me in this one cozy space.
Wendy Wan Yi Chen
Class of 2014
Department of Foreign Languages and Literature National Taiwan University
(c) Copyright 2014 Red Room. Material on this site is the property of contributing members of the Red Room Community. Please do not copy any part of this publication. Thank you.
TS Eliot’s The Waste Land, a radio drama, March 2014
For Aside @The Red Room on March 29, 2014
Red Room Radio Redux (R 4) has been commissioned to present a reading of TS Eliot’s The Waste Land, widely regarded as one of the most important modern poems of the 20th century. For this special reading of the poem, The Waste Land has been adapted for four voices with live sound effects and accompanied by the music by influential contemporaries of the poet: Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Berlin, Ravel, and popular music in London at the time. Featuring the vocal talents of Marc Anthony, Andrianna Smela, Charlie Storrar, and Pat Woods. Directed by Ruth Landowne Giordano. Original concept and script by Ignatz Ratzkywatzky, The text is rich with dramatic situations, dialogs, lyrics, foreign languages and the inner workings of the poet’s mind during a time of rapid social changes. This will surely be a unique approach to this historic piece.
FROM THE DESK OF Ignatz Ratzkywatzky, dramaturge, writer, and originator:
T.S. Eliot’s Waste Land: A Radio Drama probes the mystery of existence, the angst of the human heart and the marvelous irony that our dread of death celebrates our elation and passion to live.
From Wikipedia:
“The Waste Land” is a long poem written by T.S. Eliot. It is widely regarded as “one of the most important poems of the 20th century” and a central text in Modernist poetry. Published in 1922, the 434-line poem first appeared in the U.K. in the October issue of The Criterion and in the U.S. in the November issue of The Dial. It was published in book form in December 1922. Among its famous phrases are “April is the cruellest month”, “I will show you fear in a handful of dust”, and the mantra in the Sanskrit language “Shantih shantih shantih“.]
Eliot’s poem loosely follows the legend of the Holy Grail and the Fisher King combined with vignettes of the contemporary social condition in British society. Eliot employs many literary and cultural allusions from the Western canon and from Buddhism and the Hindu Upanishads. The poem shifts between voices of satire and prophecy featuring abrupt and unannounced changes of speaker, location and time and conjuring of a vast and dissonant range of cultures and literatures.
The poem’s structure is divided into five sections. The first section, titled The Burial of the Dead introduces the diverse themes of disillusionment and despair. The second, titled A Game of Chess employs vignettes of several characters—alternating narrations—that address those themes experientially. The Fire Sermon, the third section, offers a philosophical meditation in relation to the imagery of death and views of self-denial in juxtaposition influenced by Augustine of Hippo and eastern religions. After a fourth section that includes a brief lyrical petition, the culminating fifth section, What the Thunder Said concludes with an image of judgment.
(c) Copyright 2014 Red Room. Material on this site is the property of contributing members of the Red Room Community. Please do not copy any part of this publication. Thank you.
Performers, Aside 5 @ the Red Room, March 29 2014
Saturday, March 29th, 2014 Time: 6:30pm – 10:00pm
Red Room’s fifth exclusive event, where five artists share their most imaginative, courageous and inspiring performances.
Featuring:
Bio:
David Gentile came to Taiwan years ago to study Chinese and Kung Fu, then ended up graduating from the Chinese Dept. at NTNU this past Summer. He traveled throughout the US before coming to Taiwan, and has always enjoyed coming up with little one-two line rhymes about the strange, beautiful, or troubling people, places, and things he encountered along the way.
“The poems started to become a way for me to impermanently document my experiences and even influenced the way I saw the world. Places became references to epic lines with names like “The Dog-Rocket House” or “The Dust Palace” that echoed the feeling of the abandoned hotel in the Lost Boys. People around me started to have nicknames so colorful and fitting that they sounded like the cast of Dick Tracy villains, and even the simplest of tasks were a mix between everyone’s own unique dog commands and rhyming slang. Basically, we got in there like swimwear, and now I have a whole new time zone…”
Bio:
Charlie Storrar is an editor and comedian based in Taipei. He spends his working hours thinking of puns for headlines and his evenings performing stand-up and improv. He is the host of the regular comedy quiz night Charlie Storrar’s Death Panel.
Content:
How I Became a Born-Again Sinner (shared at the recent Story Slam)
Charlie Storrar <charliestorrar@yahoo.co.uk>
Bio:
Josh Drye is a classically trained guitarist, composer, and songwriter that is putting most of his concentration now into the study of song form as it has evolved through the ages. He studied classical guitar and composition at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts and then moved to New York City where he worked as a side man for various ensembles in Brooklyn and Manhattan, composer of theater music for productions as diverse as Shakespeare to Pinter, rehearsal accompanist for musicals, and could be found most Thursday nights belting out Irish music at Paddy Reilly’s. He has lived in Taiwan for a little less than a year. He has great taste in sweaters and vintage antiques. He doesn’t like ceramic cats, though, or baseball, so kindly refrain from asking him about either. It’ll just be awkward.
Performance Statement:
I hope to present a few of my favorite songs. I want to pick them apart for you and show you how they work, then put them back together and spin ’em so you can see them in motion and understand what’s happening. Songs are one of the most ancient and instinctual forms of human expression. Each one carries with it a wealth of images, symbols, stories and emotions that all mean something different for each person but can still create a shared collective catharsis. I am going to play a few songs from different time periods, styles, and cultures to show that, no matter how large the gap is of time or space, we all have felt and hopefully always will feel the same big emotions about love, life, friendship, death and everything in between.
Josh Drye <joshbdrye@gmail.com>
Red Room Radio Redux (R 4) has been commissioned to present a reading of T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land, widely regarded as one of the most important modern poems of the 20th century. For this special reading of the poem, The Waste Land has been adapted for four voices with live sound effects and accompanied by the music by influential contemporaries of the poet: Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Berlin, Ravel, and popular music in London at the time. The readers feature Marc Anthony, Andrianna Smela, Charlie Storrar, and Pat Woods, and is directed by Ruth Landowne Giordano. The text is rich with dramatic situations, dialogs, lyrics, foreign languages and the inner workings of the poet’s mind during a time of rapid social changes. This will surely be a unique approach to this historic piece.
From the desk of IR
T.S. Eliot’s Waste Land : A Radio Drama probes the mystery of existence, the angst of the human heart and the marvelous irony that our dread of death celebrates our elation and passion to live.
Red Room Radio Redux <r4.radioredux@gmail.com>
Bio:
Like most artists, in younger days Tina was a Taiwanese hippy, rebelling against anything that interfered with her free will. She loved playing the guitar and learned American music while participating in all the social movements when Taiwan was seeking its identity in the early 80s.
After 30 years, she knows that the voice and sound must come from her own ground and soil now.
Having explored different art forms, she has finally chosen telling Taiwanese stories through songs from the ancient Chinese to current days, and to follow her bliss…
She likes to see herself as someone who uses this ancient musical instrument – moon guitar, to share shamanic spirits from nature and folklore of the mother earth. The instrument is two stringed, but says a lot in a simple ways, as most of life’s wisdom does.
长发披肩步轻盈，
身着彩衣特随性，
出行总会携月琴，
沉醉吟唱起共鸣，
最爱山林我独行，
花鸟鱼虫皆欢迎，
Tina 是她英文名，
中文名唤马丽英。
EMAIL: taiwanteama@gmail.com
Charlie Storrar, June 2013
A Letter to Nivea
The story of this poem dates back to 1997, when I returned home to my native Britain after a period of six months living and traveling in Austria, Switzerland and former Yugoslavia. While away I had used Nivea shampoo, mainly because it was inexpensive. I looked for it at home but Nivea in the UK seemed only to sell skincare products aimed at women. I decided to write to them to complain, and because I’ve found that a poem tends to brighten the day of often beleaguered customer service staff, I wrote them the following:
In recent times in Europe have I traveled,
Where many a fine adventure has unraveled.
I have sampled of the fare and dwelt among
Folks of the German, French and Slavic tongues.
Their culture and their customs are diverse,
Yet all agree that few things can be worse
Than the abuse, or the inadequate care
Of the strands that crown our heads – our hair!
O excellent mop! Thou glorious plume!
We all delight to wash and style and groom.
Though dead, you decorate and display.
I always wash you every other day.
Yet such is the fussy nature of today,
Confounded by the frightening array
Of haircare products – someone help!
I merely want clean hair and healthy scalp.
Not ‘Pantene protein penetrates profound’!
Wonderful! That on my travels then I found
Your Nivea brand! To my great delight,
Packaged in a stylish blue and white,
Classic yet simple, honest and demure,
And well-priced too – that instant I was sure
Here was a shampoo of a noble distraction,
Not just aloe, jojoba, or henna extraction.
And thus it proved – thereafter, months on end,
Nivea shampoo was my constant haircare friend.
Yet now to native climes do I return.
And now do native chemists cause concern.
Yea, though I seek and search the shopping strand,
Alas! No more, no more my favored brand!
Were I a lovely lady I would rub
Your lotions and your toners from a tub.
But no! Young man am I – as such
I cannot but spurn the glaze and silky touch
Of creams and salves and firm foundations.
It took no leave, yet vanished from this nation
Is your shampoo! Your products condition
But you have cast your head soap to perdition!
Please, kind sir, I feel I must insist:
Did you really feel that nobody would miss
Your fine shampoo? Am I doomed to delve
In dated crates or dig at backs of shelves
In hopeless quest that one day I might find
One bottle to ease my greasy hair and mind?
Dear sir, I find it hard to act my age
In the face of such a farce and gross outrage –
But to remove from sale your Nivea shampoo
Is more than just a sham – it’s poo!
(In response, Beiersdorf, which owns the Nivea brand, thanked me for my “charming” letter and confirmed my fears that Nivea shampoo was no longer available in the UK, though they were kind enough to enclose a bottle for my trouble.)
Charlie is from the UK and currently works as an editor in Taipei. He also hosts the comedy quiz show Charlie Storrar’s Death Panel. You can find him on Facebook or add him on Twitter @CharlieStorrar
(c) Copyright 2013 Red Room. Material on this site is the property of contributing members of the Red Room Community. Please do not copy any part of this publication. Thank you.