The Arthropologist

Confessions of a classical music newbie

Alecia Lawyer with the River Oaks Chamber Orchestra
David Brown
Alecia Lawyer, principal oboist for the River Oaks Chamber Orchestra

Last summer, sitting between my friends Jeff and Melissa watching James Levine rehearse the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood, I marveled at the level of intelligent banter between the two.

Why can't I say smart things about classical music?

Why, after all these years, do I still sound like a TV reality show judge and just say, “It's awesome?”

I may have commented on Levine's choice of golf shirt, but that hardly qualifies.

Part of getting over a problem is admitting I have one. Here goes: I am a classical music newbie.

And, what's worse, I have no excuse.

I was raised in a music-filled household, with opera and classical music blaring at such levels we were on a first name basis with the police. Sometimes my father would invite them in to listen.

The various conductors of the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, Lucas Foss, Michael Tilson Thomas, Julius Rudel and JoAnn Falletta, were heralded with the same respect as Buffalo Bills quarterbacks.

And then there was the matter of piano lessons and the steady stream of teachers who quit what would have been a good three-kid-in-a-row gig. Some never came back, others had to leave town suddenly. One just flat out told my mother her offspring were hopeless, and he feared for his own musical abilities by teaching us.

That hurt.

During college, I had BSO (Boston Symphony Orchestra) obstructed-view season's tickets and followed Seiji Ozawa's moves, well at least half of him. During my dancing and choreographing years I bypassed classical music for bland ambient music. Sorry about that.

In Houston, I sidestepped the whole issue by hiding out at dance and theater events. Don't suggest the dumbed-down pops approach. No amount of film music, Beatles plus strings or video game tunes are going to help me use the term “fifths” in a sentence.

I was ready to accept eternal newbie status when I came upon Alecia Lawyer, founder of the River Oaks Chamber Orchestra (ROCO). Lawyer is a flame-haired dynamo who makes classical music seem like the most fun thing on the planet. She possesses an odd combo of beauty pageant good looks, unbridled enthusiasm, and snazzy set of chops on the oboe.

If she can't get you fired up about music, nobody can.

Just about everything ROCO does is user-friendly, from helping people pronounce the names of the composers, charting the orchestra, to having the conductor introduce each piece.

Finally, I found an entire orchestra to hold my hand. Essays in the program give context, but if you are in hurry, there's a list of handy take-home points at the bottom.

I headed over to St. John the Divine to hear my first ROCO event. After Behzad Ranjbaran's riveting piece, the musicians slapped on name tags and wandered through the audience. No way was I going to miss this quality schmoozing opportunity.

“The piece sounded so fresh. Was it hard to play?” I asked one willing violinist.

Turns out Ranjbaran's "Awakening for String Orchestra" was hot out of the rehearsal studio and an edge-of- your-seat difficult piece.

Eureka! A moderately successful musical exchange. Nothing profound, but a start nonetheless.

In order to truly face my fears, Lawyer suggested I place myself smack in the middle of the orchestra.

In a quasi-George Plimpton move (he would have played the violin), I sat on stage, tucked in between the horns and the violins, staring straight into the intense eyes of conductor Joel Smirnoff for Haydn's Symphony No. 96, “Miracle.”

It's intoxicating to watch musicians of this caliber make music together.

Later in the week, I hung out with the ROCO gang again at The Tasting Room with cellist Richard Belcher.

So there you have it, a girl doesn't have to choose between her new love (music) and her old love (wine).

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Movie Review

Daniel Craig shines in Queer, an unapologetic tale of love and loss

Photo courtesy of A24

Drew Starkey and Daniel Craig in Queer.

As recently as the late 2010s, if a movie was made about an LGBTQ+ character, it was more than likely about their coming out experience. Romance, if it existed, was typically chaste, and actual sex was almost completely out of the question. Things have changed dramatically in the 2020s, to the point that a major movie star has no issue starring in a film called Queer.

Based on the 1985 novella by William S. Burroughs, the film features William Lee (Daniel Craig), whom everyone calls just Lee, a writer living in 1950s-era Mexico City who spends most of his time haunting local bars with friends like fellow writer Joe Guidry (Jason Schwartzman) and hitting on younger men. His early interactions in the film seem to indicate that Lee has a bad reputation within the local gay community, as multiple people avoid him or give him odd looks.

Lee senses an opportunity when he encounters a newcomer, Eugene Allerton (Drew Starkey). Despite some awkward interactions, the two of them start spending time together, although Lee has much more invested in the relationship than Eugene does. Their hit-and-miss bond continues until Lee, who’s starting to get into drugs in addition to the booze, convinces Eugene to accompany him on a trip to South America.

Directed by Luca Guadagnino and written by Justin Kuritzkes (making their second straight film together after Challengers), early on the film seems to be mostly about the divide between an older person who’s grown comfortable in his ways and a younger person who’s living a relatively carefree life. The introduction of drugs into the plot changes things, though, with Lee searching out more ways to open his eyes to what the world has to offer.

Guadagnino and his team use some interesting visual storytelling techniques to introduce ideas that may not be present in the actual script. The most successful, demonstrated in multiple scenes, is the superimposition of movements by Lee over what’s actually taking place in the scene. The subtle overlay gives the audience insight into Lee’s true feelings, showing what he can’t or won’t say out loud.

Music also plays a big part in how the plot is perceived, with the use of anachronistic songs from Nirvana and Prince serving to heighten certain moments. The score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross is not as in-your-face as the one they did for Challengers, but it complements the film well, especially when the plot starts to get trippy in its final half hour.

Craig, who appears sweaty and disheveled for much of the film, is about as far from the suaveness of James Bond as you can get in this role. He takes multiple risks with his performance and almost all of them pay off. Starkey’s character is subdued by comparison, but still comes off well. Schwartzman and Lesley Manville are given showy roles, with both using altered appearances that make them nearly unrecognizable to deliver memorable performances.

Queer is not as accessible as Challengers was storytelling-wise, but the fact that it tells a story about gay men living their lives as they see fit with no interference or questions shows how far the film world has come in a short period of time. It also continues Guadagnino’s streak of making audacious films in a way that few other filmmakers are willing or able to approach.

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Queer is now playing in theaters.

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