St. John's Passion

Seeing as how my living circumstances have changed this year I only went to one performance in the Living Music festival. I went to none last year but it was John Adams and after having to sit through the RTE Concert Orchestra while they dragged their lazy arses through a soporific rendition of short ride in a fast machine I didn't feel like putting myself through it. Part should have been different and I would have gone to lot more if Back of Head wasn't in my life. I chose to go to the Passio on Saturday night in Christchurch and brought my mother as a Christmas present. I am vaguely familiar with the piece - I have the Naxos rather than the Hilliard ensemble recording and the presence of the Hilliard Ensemble was part of the reason to choose this rather than one of the other performances.

Hmmm.... they play it considerably slower. Glacially paced. Sure nothing much goes on in the music anyway but the pace, for me, exposed it's thinness. I love devotional music but rarely pay attention to the words. I often find myself walking down the road singing "chant down Babylon" but when I think of Babylon I think of Gilgamesh and rather appreciate its impact on world culture (apart from chunks of the bible being nicked from old Babylonian poetry. That's not so cool.). I digress. I had much time to pay attention to the words of this passion. The text comes from the latin version of St. Paul. It's a rum choice for a passion. The authorial interventions by The Evangelist (in the role of Basil Exposition) are many. And frequently elongated and monotonic. Jesus in this version is not a sympathetic character: he is aloof, a grudging participant in fate. And a smart arse "are you the king of the jews?" asks Pilate, "you say I am" Jesus replies. No Jesus, he didn't, he asked you a question, now tell him the answer and get out of there. The only attractive character, and played by the tenor who gets the liveliest musical line, is Pilate. He doesn't want to kill Jesus. He is forced into doing so by "the jews". This passion is a deeply anti-jewish text written as an apologia for Roman imperialism. Jesus was doing his job, so was Pilate: it was the nasty jews who weren't. It's quite obviously written for a Roman audience.

Most of these flaws are within the text itself. It does not lend itself to a sympathetic narrative of the passion. Its racism is out of tune with the modern world (if it was anti-roman we wouldn't really mind...) Its Jesus is almost old testament in his aloof disregard for creation, with only an almost modern Bart Simpson smartarse personality lending him humanity.
Po faced and solemn rather than moving and contemplative. I shifted on my wooden chair for the duration.

I don't care what Giovanni says - Arvo really does look like a hunched up Salman Rushdie.

I also wasted two hours watching Atonement at the weekend. If it wins an award for best supporting actor or something it should be the house that does it. The house was the best dressed, most interesting character in the film. The film was a strange mix of difficult and facile. The child was a proxy for the author in a crass way - her atonement was anything but. The exposition was sometimes so subtle as to make you feel a scene had been cut. Which it probably had.