Waking or Sleeping

I don't usually tend to remember my dreams unless they are scary or completely ridiculous. But, recently I've had this recurring dream that goes something like this. I am trying to put in a contact lens into my eye except that the lens is about the size of a giant party platter. It looks exactly like a normal contact lens in its curvature and bluish tint, except that it is way too huge for my eyeball. In the dream, I am always feeling flustered and extremely upset with myself because my eye is way too small for the lens. I am never frustrated that the lens is too big for my eyeball.

Well, I mentioned this dream to Paul the other day in passing, thinking we would get a good laugh about the fact that a dream that seems so ridiculous could have me worked up into a cold sweat in the middle of the night. But instead, he paused and thought very seriously about it. Then matter-of-factly, he concluded, "Do you think it has something to with the frustration you feel when you lose sight of the vision that God has for your life?"

Ok, prophetic husband has me here. I stopped open-mouthed, ready to shoot back a witty contradiction. But in my heart I knew there was something true about what he had just said. Often, Paul has a gift of speaking truth to me in a way where it smacks me in the face. And though I don't think I've had very many dreams which had spiritual meaning attached to it, this one definitely symbolized the thing that is most frustrating for me personally about being on a very amorphous career path. The lack of structure bothers me to some extent, but it's manageable. It's the fact that it is sometimes so hard to see the bigger picture and feel the driving force for what this is all about in the long run. Though I have plenty of ambition and a long list of personal goals, I'm not good at coming up with big picture, grand vision, lofty dreams. But I need big vision in order to face my every day. And losing sight of that vision is one of my biggest fears- the notion that I will have no purpose for every day when I wake up. Which is why I think this dream left me in a cold sweat every time I had it, as if it were some sort of nightmare.

Anyway, lately I've been stumbling for what to title the forthcoming album and I think that this loss of words has been somewhat symbolic of my life lately. Today, something hit me as I rifled through some hymns to put together in a medley for the last track. Thou my best thought, by day or by night. Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.

The Assads at Balboa Theater

Monday night was an exciting night for me and Paul, as we had tickets to see the world's best classical guitar duo- The Assad Brothers. This Brazilian duo has been a huge influence in the guitar world, inspiring many other new guitar duos, and popularizing/arranging/composing new music for the genre of the guitar duo. We were excited also because they were playing at the newly renovated Balboa Theater in downtown SD, which was built in the 1920's and used as a vaudeville house and movie theater for many years. It just opened this past December after many years of renovation and dispute over its very existence.

Well, the venue turned out to be slightly disappointing, at least for a classical music performance. We discovered that the lighting people really like using different colors as backdrop for the performers. Sometimes the Assad brothers were bathed in a purple light, sometimes red, sometimes blue or green, and this lighting would change color and intensity in the middle of nearly every piece at awkward moments. The house was pitch black and the stage bright, which to me made a greater distinction between performer-audience. Now this is completely natural since obviously they were on the stage and we were in the audience- but to me, making that line more distinct than necessary put more of a boundary between the two parties, making it easy for me to disengage as an audience member and feel more disconnected to the performance at hand. I personally like house lights at a medium level so that the performer can actually see the audience and engage in a more personal way, talking about the music, gauging reactions, and making the performer feel more accessible to the audience. Somehow being shrouded in darkness makes you feel like your presence as an audience member is negligible and that no one would really care if you fell asleep or got bored and walked out. Well, that's not the case at all. Speaking from a performer's perspective, every member of the audience is an essential part of that performance. Especially in intimate settings, even just one person can completely change the energy of a room and increase a performer's connection to both the music and the act of sharing that music with others. I really believe that this connection is essential in making a concert a personal, spiritual experience for both sides.

All that aside, the Balboa Theater is a really nice place. The ceiling is very intricately carved in a 1920's art deco sort of way, with unexpected carvings and flourishes of pink, red and blue everywhere. The most unusual thing is that there are two water fountains on the walls that sandwich the stage. They are running waterfalls that produce the sound of trickling water which were not turned off while the Assads were playing. It kind of made me feel like getting out of my seat to go to the bathroom. The other acts booked at the Balboa are totally different than the show that the Assads put on. They included the Shanghai Circus, the Vienna Choir Boys, and Frog and Toad (the play). The Assads definitely had to adjust to play in such a mainstream sort of venue. The concert was entitled "Brazilian Guitar Festival" and included Celso Machado, an amazing Brazilian folk guitarist/composer/percussionist, Romero Lupe, a Brazilian jazz guitarist, and their sister Badi Assad. She was by far the more outlandish. More than just a guitarist, she is an excellent singer and mouth percussionist. There was a whole piece in which she made rainforest sounds with her mouth, which the audience ate up. In fact the whole crowd started making rainforest noises and the sounds of monkeys, birds and rain filled the theater. It was pretty random.

Still a good show, but it made me a little sad to think that this performance was probably only picked up by the Balboa because it wasn't straight classical, which probably would not have drawn a large audience on a Monday evening. But what is needed in order to sell classical music? Does a classical musician only succeed in playing a venue like the Balboa through crossing over into the worlds of jazz, pop, and folk? And if so, does the concert need to be such an entertainment-focused, flashy event to appeal to the masses? Looking around, I was pleased to see a pretty heterogeneous crowd which definitely differed from some of the other concerts we've gone to places like La Jolla, which is a predominantly white, upper-class crowd. This was a mixed crowd of people of all ages and ethnicities, who were probably attracted not by the name of the Assad Brothers, whom the average person probably has not heard of, but who probably wanted to see a good show at the newly renovated theater and the words "Brazilian" and "guitar" sparked interest. So at the end of it, I'll take that- if it means more exposure for classical guitar to the public despite the flashing lights, running waterfall, and crossover additions, then fine. But it's just disappointing that these days, it doesn't seem like excellent artistry in its purest form is really enough.

If you've never heard of the Assads, check 'em out here!

Cooking Korean

Having my in-laws in town this week has proved to be a very delicious experience. My mother-in-law has been cooking Korean food nearly every evening and I've been learning a little bit in the process. Hopefully walking into a Korean grocery store won't feel so intimidating now that I have a handle on some of the basic ingredients. My favorite thing about Korean food is the variety in every meal, since the tradition is for everything to be served with an array of appetizers and always some sort of kim-chee.



A classic homey Korean miso-based stew with enoki mushrooms, tofu, potatoes, onions, anchovies, and scallions.



Fish cakes sauteed with garlic and scallions. Side dishes of boiled spinach with sesame oil, pickled spicy green vegetable which I don't know the name of.



In honor of Lunar New Year, the tradition is to eat a rice cake soup made from an anchovy stock with egg whites, yellows, kim-chee, ground beef, and seasoned seaweed. Side dishes of dried squid, seaweed, and pickled spicy vegetable.



Korean fried rice, usually served in a hot stone pot. This version has ground beef, carrots, spinach, shredded sesame leaves, fern root, and pickled cucumbers which are all stirred together with a spicy red pepper paste mixed with sesame oil. In the back you can see the egg-batter fried sirloin and halibut slices.