Rock With You

First, a tedious reminiscence: I remember my last spring in Japan. My craving for an A&W Teen burger was starting to manifest as a real physical pain, and only Krystel was capable of offering a possible remedy for my home-sickness: Filipino food. After assaulting her with much begging (broken up by intermittent tirades about her visiting Shirakawa without allowing me the courtesy of bothering her), I was invited for a wonderful dinner at her apartment in Takayama. To make the evening an embarrassment of riches, Justin and Marina were coming with some Brazilian food too. After spoiling me with a long overdue breakfast of longanisa and pan de sal, Krystel set me to work wrapping lumpia and to pass the time, we watched youtube videos. Long story short, Michael Jackson's video for "Rock with You" entered the rotation. As often happens to me recently, something that was old and familiar was suddenly becoming something that I was really seeing for the first time. Even though the majority of my rhythmic faculties were held in check by cold meaty filling clinging to my fingers, I was starting to lose my rolling discipline: Krystel's lumpia were appetizingly clone-like (a yummy quality conducive to binge-eating because it discourages counting), while mine were quickly looking misshapen and random as funk-induced spasms rippled through my frame. Consequently that video soaked into my subconscious.

Now, before I go on, I went to such lengths talking about food (as I often do), that I feel it is correct for me to conclude the thread regarding that evening's dinner by commenting that a) enjoying Krystel's adobo made me appreciate white vinegar and Japan's lack of it, b) Marina is herself a competent chef whose creamy stroganoff-looking dish allowed me to effect the greatest gut-density I have ever experienced, and c) Justin is an charming dinner companion even though he thinks Olivia aka thatssoraven was cuter than Rudy Huxtable. Phew, are you still with me? We'll get to the video in a second.

Now flash-forward a year: I'm back in Canada entering my third season as a volunteer complacency-expert. I cannot recall the exact date of my epiphany (because the days have been bleeding together for a while now), but I can say with certainty that like most mornings I broke fast alone with leftovers and worked through a crossword puzzle with Ellen and the Sopranos playing in the background (ps. that's not the name of another amywinehouse-esque soul nostalgia band; I hate commercials so I flip between both shows even though I'm not really watching either). Then at some point while vacuuming in my sweats, Mayer Hawthorne's "Maybe So Maybe No" gave way to "Rock With You," and what happened next is between myself and the hallway mirror haha...

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I think the following picture will resonate with a lot of people:

You and your friends are out for So-and-so's birthday. So-and-so hedges their bets, chooses one of those lowest common denominator clubs with no sense of character or identity, trying to please everybody and succeeding with no one. The first thing everyone does is throw a shot of sourjacks or tequila down their throats so they can get through the night, then two more, then three. If your now rosily flushed collective manages to tiptoe down to the dance floor, it's only because the lazy DJ trusted you all to fistpump while insinscreaming "tonight's gonna be a good night" at each other, and he was right! Now you are all just riding that initial momentum, only slightly modifying your standing drunk-wobble into a feeble two-step, until finally dundundun you are all standing in a huge circle smirking pathetically at each other.

That was a little dramatic but you just felt a cold shiver didn't you? If you didn't and that's not a bad night for you, you are lucky so go on and enjoy yourself. But for those of you who feel shame or self-alienation whenever music demands its natural response, I'm here to tell you that in '79 Michael Jackson gave you a special gift.

We often remember him for the bombastic, spectacular aspects of his star persona; with respect to the music this boils down to crotch-grabs, moonwalks, and the most iconic dance choreography in pop music. The key-word there being choreography: during an entire career spanning the smooth Motown stepping of the Jackson 5 to the "Thriller" zombie-shuffles, only the Off the Wall videos show you Michael Jackson, the person, actually dancing. Now before I have everyone up in arms, let me qualify my definitions for that word: in my opinion there are two types of dancing. One is performative, in the sense that it demands a spectator. Whatever feats of rhythmic kineticism you get to witness, as a viewer your responses will more often than not polarize you from the performer. Take for example the crowd watching a breakdancing competition: arms are crossed and heads are bobbing only to mark the timing of the dancer. Whether they're giving props or boo-ing, this is a posture of judging. And for the dancers awaiting their turn to ignite the hardwood, one could argue that there is a competitive, if friendly, colouring to their perception of their peers. Or consider that same quality on a different scale: the audience of a ballet sits quietly in darkness viewing the spectacle on stage. Or even consider how it is that eyes work in the first place: the retina is just a mirror reflecting light, and as spectators we don't exist where the colour comes from, we are by necessity removed from it; we don't get to shine. In other words, while this type of dancing definitely constitutes an important aesthetic experience, it doesn't necessarily make you want to dance yourself. The other type of dancing does however.

Does anyone think that if they were so blessed to share the dance floor of a wedding reception with the real Michael that he would be "on" the entire time, spinning and kicking and smoothcriminal-ing for hours? I like to think that if Michael ever had the opportunity to share that moment of simple human joy with us, he would be just like how he is in "Rock With You". He would listen to the music, whatever it was, and let his body tell him what to do. Of course, when you watch the video he is obviously "performing" in the sense that he knows that there is a camera there, just like when you are busting it out on the floor you know that somebody's watching. But look at his face, does it look like he cares, or that any kind of scrutiny could deter him? And if the lyrics weren't clear enough, after seeing him (or anybody else for that matter) move so freely and intuitively, don't you want to move too?

To be fair, the video for "Don't Stop 'til You Get Enough" laid the groundwork for "Rock With You". It is similarly sparse in choreography, with Michael dancing and singing in front of vivid psychedelic backdrops. However ironic it may sound though, there is something mannered and restrained about MJ in the fly tux compared to the emotional honesty of MJ in a bedazzled sparkle suit. Consider the ethereal green glow, the laser halo, and the spotlight: that's how we should feel when we're locked into a groove so tight that we have to close our eyes and let the syncopation flow through us.

The best DJ's are the ones engaged in conversations with their audiences. Granted not everyone goes out to boogie (I love when Kweli says that "we used to use a club to hit and drag her by the hair / still use a club to get her a martini or a beer") and when a DJ plays the right set, he or she catalyzes an entire range of reactions from the people who are listening. But I can say with confidence that the most gratifying response for a DJ is dancing, when an entire room of people is united by nothing more than the overwhelming urge to react in their own way to the Pulse.

So don't just look at Michael; he's not going to wait for you. Move. And if you're going to do that, do it like it's just you and the Man in the Mirror.

~dedicated to Uncle Jun and Sheldon.

J. J. Baylon

Impressions: “Orpheus and Eurydice” by Marie Chouinard

Near the beginning of Marie Chouinard’s “Orpheus and Eurydice,” a playful and slightly sinister nymph (?) swallows a golden bell; at the performance’s end the audience is delighted with a display of magical peristalsis that ends with her proudly producing another golden bell from her, well, you can guess. This is a rare ballet where rather than simply observing, the audience must reconcile themselves to the idea of dance itself. No doubt other works aspire to this, whether as an explicit aim or a peripheral goal, but I have never felt it so poignantly as in Chouinard’s production.

The ballet is constructed in every aspect to call the viewer to self-reflection, shocking them from passive observation to a visceral and yet riveting sense of participation. While watching I found myself being addressed; I felt that as a member of the audience I was validated as a necessary aspect of the performance. I was part of a circuit whereby information coded in sound and movement was passed through me and back to the dancers. Nowhere was this more powerful as when Eurydice herself climbed up into the audience in a vain attempt to escape hell. Or perhaps she was making her return? Such reflections are commonplace in a production that seeks to destroy the linear and keep us cognizant of being part of a dynamic cycle.

Take the sounds for example. Relentless and merciless are two words which come to mind, and they are not expressed in the negative sense. The score is a cacophony of horns and explosive percussions. Shrill notes are looped to build tension and when we are finally granted a moment’s calm we feel as if it is because we have reached our limit to withstand it, at which point the process is begun anew. And when there are quiet moments, the whisper of the music is like a cold bracing wind tracing our naked backs. I was reminded of the fury and majesty of the tide riding a cliff-face.

To this backing the dancers are constantly vocalizing in a manner that many critics have called “gibberish.” While it is true that there is no “grammar” that can be applied to it and nothing as trite as a “sentence” that can be gleaned from it, this “speaking” is not meaningless. In fact, it signifies nothing more and nothing less than “body music.” Or the sounds that flow from the dancers’ movements as they gyrate, pulse, spasm, leap, twist, mug, hump, and crawl from one moment to the next. One of the ballet’s central motifs has individuals gesture as if pulling words from their gaping mouths; first slowly and then building with a desperate rapidity, tones are produced that are at times like a single utterance deconstructed, and at others like the contents of an entire speech raging into one moment.

There are in fact words and sentences in the normal sense, including a bare exposition of the Orpheus myth and a statement of Chouinard’s guiding interpretation of it. The former seems obligatory because the latter, presented later and wilfully distorted by its vocalizer, is drowned out by the flurry of music and movement on stage, which ironically serve the same function. The only words to ring clear were “Don’t look back!” That this charge is significant is taken for granted given the subject matter, but it is how Chouinard reveals it to be significant that is the most interesting.

Orpheus is the tutor of the muses, and by extension, the father of all poetry in the Western Tradition. We are told that his inspired eloquence was sufficient for Hades to sanction Eurydice’s conditional salvation, and yet Orpheus is treated as merely a foil. The iconic scene of his escape happens at the early middle and is the only part of the ballet that has a deliberate sense of plot or even temporal progression. He makes his grave escape with elegant and deliberate strides, his arm offered back to Eurydice who follows in like-manner; they are both silent while all around them are figures enacting maelstroms of movement. Some prance across the stage with serpents undulating from their lips. Another references Sisyphus and his boulder by rolling a black ball to and fro. Still others have joined their bodies to form monsters of many limbs and heads. While we seek to apply these images to the traditional iconography of the myth, we are dissuaded from doing so by the lack of any overtures to capital T Tradition whatsoever, let alone linearity. While at other times we are treated with what seem like androgynous satyrs high-heel-hoofed and swinging prodigious phalli, or Dionysian orgies complete with gilded nipples, what overshadow these details is the spectacle of movement itself.

This is a world without Orpheus and his songs, a place of action without artifice or construction. The sounds here are not affected by symbolism or even the weight of thought; they are simply and profoundly the primal yawps of our bodies. Every muscular burst of vibration rushes forth like echolocation, colliding with the audience, returning to the dancer, and triggering more vibrations. The emotions of fear, lust, and exultation are presented to us raw, and they proceed from one another like atoms colliding.

Combining her sounds with the choreography of her dancers, Chouinard has created a palette of textures so forceful and engaging that we are forced to either resonate with them or reject them. Either way, we have to swallow and process every vibration thrown towards us and, having taken them in, we reciprocate by being riveted. We don’t have time for anything but feeling; thinking constitutes a halt in the process. So who can blame the audience when the beautiful Eurydice, savagely treading theatre seats in her ascent, climbs past us and we are told not to “look back”? We resist but ultimately we join Orpheus in his transgression, so undeniable are the vibrations and the sensations they elicit.

By the time that shiny bell is reproduced, we have undergone an odyssey of our own. Marie Chouinard has chosen to focus on the journey itself. In our travels hell is wherever we happen to be going; somewhere we walk towards and back away from again. Chouinard doesn’t give us any time to consider good or bad because we are meant to be moving. Nor do we have any time to consider our “liking” of the production until we have left the echoes and the flushed atmosphere of the theatre behind. Whatever reactions are produced by the re-assertion of our rationality, we are left thrilled and aching with every fibre of our bodies.



J. J. Baylon