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Reality TV
The TV dance show thing is interesting, to say the least. In the first place, what's with the 'Strictly'? Obviously a reference to a crap 90's film called 'Strictly Ballroom' - but who cares? And now the whole silly TV phenomenon is known by practically everyone as "Strictly". It's silly because it manages to turn a very skilled and challenging activity - dancing - into a freak show cum peep show cum comedy show cum camp bitchfest.
Who watches? Every single age group, it seems. My 96 year old aunt thinks it's 'lovely'. For her it represents continuity and a link to the past. She has fond memories of years spent tuning in to the BBC to watch "Come Dancing" - a staple of my own family's viewing back in the monochrome years - when we had only one TV in the house, which we all huddled round in the winter, next to the coal fire. Impossible to escape to the bedroom in those days - too damned cold.
Aunt also has fond memories of our national treasure, the sainted Brucie, hosting popular 'family' shows such as 'Sunday Night at the London Palladium', with his stupid catch phrases and his dancing and his comedic schtick. How wonderful that Brucie is still with us, still doing his stuff. Not.
At the other end of the age spectrum there are teens and sub-teens who get off on the gorgeousness of the professional women dancers, the chance to check out the legs of popular celebs, and the attractiveness of certain of the male dancers. A family show indeed. There are saddoes all down the age range who love to letch at the participants, laugh at the bitchiness or nastiness of the judges, revel in the 'competition' aspect, and groan at Brucie.
And then there are the freaks. Thank you John Sergeant, Anne Widdicombe and others for providing such great entertainment. At least it's not the X Factor. At least they're not serious - they don't really believe they're amazingly talented and possess star quality. They aren't there to demonstrate their prowess as dancers. They do it simply to show that they can. Media whores will appear on anything - just as long as they're on the telly. Being famous and being a celebrity are serious occupations, it seems.
Thank goodness there are a few worthwhile 'reality' shows on TV. Gok Wan, Jamie Oliver and Gareth Malone have done some very interesting and worthwhile things. Jonathan Freedland wrote about them this week:
The success of The Choir's military wives suggests we're losing our taste for malice TV
No pantomime villain judges. And no losers. In the age of austerity we want shows that lift us up, not put us down
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/dec/20/the-choir-military-wives-reality-tv
We've been told endlessly how shallow and materialistic, trivial and celebrity-obsessed, our society has become. It's another source of gloom, along with everything else life has thrown at us this year: earthquakes, war and scandal – all under a darkening sky of economic crisis. But this is the season when we try to focus on . . . causes for optimism, among them some small signs that our culture does not only elevate consumerism, cheap fame and a lust for riches, but other values too. And those signs can be found in the unlikeliest places, including the heart of crassness itself – reality television.
The military wives whose record is selling so fast are themselves a product of reality TV, the BBC series The Choir. The programme could not be more different from The X Factor. It is slow and gentle in style, but that's not the key difference to be celebrated.
Choirmaster Gareth Malone transforms a few dozen women on a Devon military base into a group able to sing together in beautiful harmony.
The months of rehearsal together turned them into something else. They started meeting at each other's houses, having informal rehearsals. They became bound together by the shared pressure to perform, whether at the local town or, eventually, at the homecoming ceremony for their returning men. "We feel like sisters now, helping each other out," reported one.
Unlike The X Factor or its imitators, The Choir is not a competition: the only prize is a sense of camaraderie and communal connectedness, a prize everybody wins.
The choirmaster never tells anyone they cannot sing. The result is not just a sense of solidarity that was previously missing but a boost to individual self-esteem. One woman after another tells their young instructor that they have found a confidence through singing that they had lacked before – that at last they had done something in which they could take pride.
In an earlier programme, Malone . . . took a gaggle of young men, who previously thought they could do nothing with aplomb except drink, and turned them into a tenor section. There, as on the military base, he took what were fractured groups and turned them into a community – and gave them a voice.
Malone's earnest belief in music and its power to transform, his patience with volunteers who have never sung a note, and their clear, expressed gratitude to him for changing their lives, is impossible to fake.
In among the rough of reality TV and the like, it's good to know there are diamonds like Malone – but he's not the only one. Gok Wan with his how-to-dress shows is in a similar business, taking women who have lost all self-belief and pushing them to see themselves in a new, more generous light. There are no withering one-liners, no pantomime villain judges, no losers – and no prize but an injection of confidence.
The pioneer of this sub-genre of reality TV, aimed at lifting up rather than putting down, may well have been Jamie Oliver. The Jamie's Kitchen series in 2002 followed the chef as he trained 15 disadvantaged young people, with the lure of a job in his new restaurant. He followed it with similar ventures, persuading both school drop-outs and school dinner ladies that they could raise their sights.
It would be cheery to see a trend here, with Malone's chart victory over Cowell presaging an era in which nice prevails over nasty, when the joy of collective solidarity edges out the cult of the narcissistic individual. Such a trend might even be a function of the age of austerity: after all, when there's so much real pain all around, who wants to see fake malice on TV?
But even if it reveals no such wider phenomenon, the military wives – freed at last to express through music the pain and yearning they had long held within – and their success, along with the man who made it possible, are something to celebrate. And in these straitened times, we need all the causes for celebration we can find.
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Real Lives
The problem with all of this is that it's putting sticking plaster on people who are already injured and damaged. How did they get that way in the first place? Why do so many people in our society have such low self esteem? Why have they never before taken part in activities that promote solidarity and collaboration? Why do they have such low expectations, low skill levels, low self-confidence? Why have they never sung, danced, played an instrument in a band, cooked well, dressed with confidence, etc? How did they become so inhibited, so overweight, so withdrawn, so apathetic, so unhappy? Why is our society so bad at raising people who are self-actualised, who fulfil their potential?
The people who take part in Malone's programmes invariably thank him for 'changing their lives'. The point is - why do their lives need changing? Why does our society produce so many people whose lives are unfulfilled, unproductive and uncreative? What's wrong with our ways of bringing up children that produces such people? What's wrong with our system of education?
Check out the previous blog, and Mehdi Hasan's column. Start thinking about how we might educate our young people so that they grow up with a personal voice, the habit of creativity, and the habit of reading for pleasure and learning for its own sake. Start thinking about our need to have a national conversation about personal intelligence, emotional intelligence, social intelligence, physical intelligence, instinctual intelligence and spiritual intelligence. Start thinking about our worship of test and exam results and 'the intellect' - and the impact of such worship on underachievement in every other aspect of our lives and our learning.
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Showing posts with label The Choir. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Choir. Show all posts
Thursday, December 22, 2011
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Layer 202 . . . More Shock Doctrine, Asset Sales, Seratonin, Alcohol, Drunken Monkeys, Stalk-Eyed Flies, Flying Fish, and a Choir.
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It's been another kaleidoscopic week, starting with a dinner conversation at the weekend at which I was given the task of providing an instant summary of Naomi Klein's 'The Shock Doctrine' for a couple of people who let it be known where they stand on the political spectrum by saying they think we should bring back the death penalty.
It was quite amusing relating in some detail how the CIA carried out experiments back in the sixties on the most effective methods of torture, prior to training fascistic military types around the world on their application in real life situations, such as after a military coup (Chile, Argentina, Brazil, etc) or a war (Iraq) in order to gain information and track down everyone who could be considered an opponent of the new regime.
My audience were enthralled by Klein's narrative as to how the Chicago School economists trained dictators and the would-be oligarchs on the need to privatise all State assets by selling them off at knock down prices on the basis that the national emergency and the national interest were best addressed by such blatant robbery.
And then blow me down but the very next day we see it plastered all over the news that New Labour have decided to sell off huge chunks of our national assets at knock-down prices because of the national economic emergency. That's right folks – the very same fat cats who crashed the economy, and who then received huge State bail-outs, are now to be handed valuable assets that belong to you and me at ridiculously low prices - assets that can only gain enormously in value as the years go by.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/oct/13/gordon-brown-asset-sales
Brown's asset sale: Selling out
Editorial - The Guardian, Tuesday 13 October 2009
Cooked a big family roast on Sunday for people who really appreciate perfect crackling on their pork and perfect golden crunchy roast potatoes.
Had an interesting conversation with my son about the effects of alcohol when he came over for a pasta lunch yesterday, and that very evening watched an interesting (Horizon) documentary on the Beeb about alcohol! It's a complex drug, which mother nature produces of its own accord by combining sugar and yeast. It releases seratonin, and is thus a relaxant, and is likely to allow its consumers to lose their inhibitions. It's also a stimulant, and thirdly it has an anesthetic effect.
The documentary showed some superb footage of monkeys rushing into a hotel garden in the Caribbean in order to steal cocktails – or drink them on the spot – after which they literally staggered back into the surrounding trees. An experiment in which alcoholic drinks were left in a large monkey compound was fascinating, in that it revealed that when a group of monkeys have access to alcoholic drinks 25% of the monkeys didn't touch them, 50% drank them in moderation, and 25% couldn't stay away from them – exactly the same proportion as humans, apparently.
…...................................
More television treats last night.
1) Life – BBC4 – the new David Attenborough series, which has been 3 years in the making. This first episode included some amazing film of stalk-eyed flies – the most outrageous creatures ever, which have the ability to somehow pump their eyes out on enormous retractable stalks. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalk-eyed_fly
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/5795325/BBC-David-Attenborough-Life-series-goes-deeper-than-ever-into-world-of-the-wild.html
The programme also featured incredible shots of flying fish escaping predators, and killer whales that have learnt how to hunt stingrays and seals. One of their techniques is to turn the stingrays on to their backs, which induces immobility from an overdose of seratonin which immediately rushes to the brain.
2) Nature Shock (Channel 5) http://www.five.tv/programmes/documentaries/nature-shock
“This intriguing documentary series examines freak occurrences in the natural world. Whether it's animals behaving oddly or even the planet that perplexes, each episode sees scientists studying baffling phenomena in a bid to understand what Mother Nature's really up to. The reasons behind incidents will vary, but there's one conclusion that we always reach: the world isn't as predictable as we'd like to think.”
This first episode showed evidence of killer whales that have learnt how to hunt great white sharks – by grabbing them and turning them over on to their backs so that they go into a coma that's brought on by an overdose of seratonin . . .
3) The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Watch it every weekday at 8.30pm. The man is a genius.
4) The Choir Revisited – BBC2. I missed this series and thoroughly enjoyed this compilation of the best bits plus a reunion of the young choirmaster and the bunch of kids he taught to sing and took to China for the world choir championships. It was actually very moving, and yet another brilliant example of what music and singing can do for some very ordinary and fairly messed up teenagers when they're led to high levels of achievement by someone who's passionate about the power of music. http://www.unrealitytv.co.uk/reality-tv/the-choir-bbc2/
“What matters is that you do something well, you care about what you do, and you do it to the best of your ability.” The sense of collective joy in the kids and their parents was pure magic.
5) Black Wax: Gil Scott Heron (Sky Arts) A classic film from 1982, and “His political polemics still resonate today”. They sure do. “Outstanding profile of one of the key figures behind rap music. Gil Scott-Heron is the performance poet, jazzman and the recently-paroled mouthpiece for black America.” “With a seductive fusion of soul, funk, jazz, pop and Afro-ethnic roots, Gil Scott-Heron glows with passion and sincerity. Examine his long-standing influence on rap.”
Catch these on Spotify – Inner City Blues, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, We Beg Your Pardon, Whitey On The Moon, Is That Jazz?, Gun, B Movie, Storm Music, Washington DC, Johannesburg, Winter In America.
To think that with the exception of Sky Arts most of this brilliant stuff is available for free - or for just the cost of a TV license. Anyone who says there's nothing worth watching on TV is an idiot. To see the Attenborough on a big LCD screen is alone worth the investment in the HD TV.
.
It's been another kaleidoscopic week, starting with a dinner conversation at the weekend at which I was given the task of providing an instant summary of Naomi Klein's 'The Shock Doctrine' for a couple of people who let it be known where they stand on the political spectrum by saying they think we should bring back the death penalty.
It was quite amusing relating in some detail how the CIA carried out experiments back in the sixties on the most effective methods of torture, prior to training fascistic military types around the world on their application in real life situations, such as after a military coup (Chile, Argentina, Brazil, etc) or a war (Iraq) in order to gain information and track down everyone who could be considered an opponent of the new regime.
My audience were enthralled by Klein's narrative as to how the Chicago School economists trained dictators and the would-be oligarchs on the need to privatise all State assets by selling them off at knock down prices on the basis that the national emergency and the national interest were best addressed by such blatant robbery.
And then blow me down but the very next day we see it plastered all over the news that New Labour have decided to sell off huge chunks of our national assets at knock-down prices because of the national economic emergency. That's right folks – the very same fat cats who crashed the economy, and who then received huge State bail-outs, are now to be handed valuable assets that belong to you and me at ridiculously low prices - assets that can only gain enormously in value as the years go by.
Steve Bell
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/oct/13/gordon-brown-asset-sales
Brown's asset sale: Selling out
Editorial - The Guardian, Tuesday 13 October 2009
"Some date the "anything goes" brand of capitalism back to the City's big bang in 1986. Others trace it back further, to the 1973 oil shock. Either way, the idea that the economy works best when markets allowed to let rip deserved to die with Lehmans. Yet it somehow limps on – not least because Labour lacks the energy to promote any alternative. Even before Gordon Brown was hit by a demand to repay £12,415 in expenses yesterday, his intellectual fatigue was evident in his plans for a fresh sale of state assets.….............................................
Flogging assets will not in itself make the exchequer solvent. Sell the Dartford crossing to pay down debt, for instance, and you pay less interest, but also lose a handy line in tolls. The gains outweigh the losses only where, first, private managers can run the assets better and, second, where the state can organise a smart sale. The first condition sometimes applies, but is mostly just assumed; history suggests that the second condition is more often missed than met. In the 1980s, Mrs Thatcher's attitude was "everything must go", and everything easy did. The public ended up shortchanged . . .
As for the recently nationalised banks, although they were not part of yesterday's plan, their share price could soon be at a level where their sale returns to the agenda. After all that has happened, though, there should be no question of any denationalisation without open and vigorous debate. "Private good, public bad" was never a good rule – but it looks plain absurd when it comes to banking after the crunch."
Cooked a big family roast on Sunday for people who really appreciate perfect crackling on their pork and perfect golden crunchy roast potatoes.
Had an interesting conversation with my son about the effects of alcohol when he came over for a pasta lunch yesterday, and that very evening watched an interesting (Horizon) documentary on the Beeb about alcohol! It's a complex drug, which mother nature produces of its own accord by combining sugar and yeast. It releases seratonin, and is thus a relaxant, and is likely to allow its consumers to lose their inhibitions. It's also a stimulant, and thirdly it has an anesthetic effect.
The documentary showed some superb footage of monkeys rushing into a hotel garden in the Caribbean in order to steal cocktails – or drink them on the spot – after which they literally staggered back into the surrounding trees. An experiment in which alcoholic drinks were left in a large monkey compound was fascinating, in that it revealed that when a group of monkeys have access to alcoholic drinks 25% of the monkeys didn't touch them, 50% drank them in moderation, and 25% couldn't stay away from them – exactly the same proportion as humans, apparently.
…...................................
More television treats last night.
1) Life – BBC4 – the new David Attenborough series, which has been 3 years in the making. This first episode included some amazing film of stalk-eyed flies – the most outrageous creatures ever, which have the ability to somehow pump their eyes out on enormous retractable stalks. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalk-eyed_fly
The programme also featured incredible shots of flying fish escaping predators, and killer whales that have learnt how to hunt stingrays and seals. One of their techniques is to turn the stingrays on to their backs, which induces immobility from an overdose of seratonin which immediately rushes to the brain.
2) Nature Shock (Channel 5) http://www.five.tv/programmes/documentaries/nature-shock
“This intriguing documentary series examines freak occurrences in the natural world. Whether it's animals behaving oddly or even the planet that perplexes, each episode sees scientists studying baffling phenomena in a bid to understand what Mother Nature's really up to. The reasons behind incidents will vary, but there's one conclusion that we always reach: the world isn't as predictable as we'd like to think.”
This first episode showed evidence of killer whales that have learnt how to hunt great white sharks – by grabbing them and turning them over on to their backs so that they go into a coma that's brought on by an overdose of seratonin . . .
3) The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Watch it every weekday at 8.30pm. The man is a genius.
4) The Choir Revisited – BBC2. I missed this series and thoroughly enjoyed this compilation of the best bits plus a reunion of the young choirmaster and the bunch of kids he taught to sing and took to China for the world choir championships. It was actually very moving, and yet another brilliant example of what music and singing can do for some very ordinary and fairly messed up teenagers when they're led to high levels of achievement by someone who's passionate about the power of music. http://www.unrealitytv.co.uk/reality-tv/the-choir-bbc2/
“What matters is that you do something well, you care about what you do, and you do it to the best of your ability.” The sense of collective joy in the kids and their parents was pure magic.
5) Black Wax: Gil Scott Heron (Sky Arts) A classic film from 1982, and “His political polemics still resonate today”. They sure do. “Outstanding profile of one of the key figures behind rap music. Gil Scott-Heron is the performance poet, jazzman and the recently-paroled mouthpiece for black America.” “With a seductive fusion of soul, funk, jazz, pop and Afro-ethnic roots, Gil Scott-Heron glows with passion and sincerity. Examine his long-standing influence on rap.”
Catch these on Spotify – Inner City Blues, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, We Beg Your Pardon, Whitey On The Moon, Is That Jazz?, Gun, B Movie, Storm Music, Washington DC, Johannesburg, Winter In America.
To think that with the exception of Sky Arts most of this brilliant stuff is available for free - or for just the cost of a TV license. Anyone who says there's nothing worth watching on TV is an idiot. To see the Attenborough on a big LCD screen is alone worth the investment in the HD TV.
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