對我來說
旅行至此最棒的一件事莫過於可以看到世界級近乎完美的表演
Riverdance
J.推薦的,Irish dance.
無法形容的悸動
當一幕一幕豐富的音樂與舞蹈穿插
踢踏,月光之舞,狂放的小提琴,一個人的獨白琴聲,芭蕾,加上佛朗明哥獨舞者
還有搭配完美的舞台和燈光設計
讓我最讚嘆的還是舞者那些不斷的高難度又弧度完美的肢體表現
一種來自於對身體的尊重,享受與釋放
在有著歷史妝點的Wang theater
泛黃的扶梯與牆上
傳頌一齣一齣曾經在此上演不衰的劇情
在燈暗之後
仍然有服務人員引領著遲來的客人
一一安全到達他們的座位
非常細心地等待你坐定
才把手電筒移開
本來想說苦兒流浪記的我
只能買得起最便宜的票--(所謂最便宜也要$35)
座位應該很差
會在很高很後面
但是奧妙的是
這戲院最漂亮的就是在那個圓頂
原來越接近天空
所以越明亮動人
見識到一流水準的表演
和很不錯的場地
此行算是奢侈的了。
*參考網址:
http://www.riverdance.com
**可以在網路上聽音樂audio:
http://www.riverdance.com/accessallareas/video_sound/audio/index.htm
**甚至是...看表演Video:
http://www.riverdance.com/accessallareas/video_sound/video/index.htm
FYI
*the Story is:
Beyond Words -
The Story Of Riverdance
By Fintan O'Toole
When Riverdance first opened in Dublin, you could hear even above the pounding feet and the swirling music, the audience gasping for breath. And then an explosion of shouts and whoops as all that air burst out again in a wave of wonderment. It was of course, the sheer force and energy of the dancing, the rapture of the music, the fantastic sight of so many bodies in motion. But there was something else as well, some long-submerged emotion breaking the surface and gulping in the oxygen.
Overnight sensations seldom last. In the merciless world of show business, today's novelty becomes old news in the blink of an eye. No amount of hype or clever marketing can sustain a show beyond its immediate impact.
Unless, that is, it is fuelled by some deeper source of energy - and it can't just draw from that source. It also has to renew it, to give back at least as much as it has taken. Riverdance has continued to find and excite audiences all around the world because it does both of these things. Even as it grows and changes it stays in touch with the emotions that made the opening night audience gasp. Even as Riverdance touches people in distant places it continues to shape and refresh the culture from which it sprang.
Traditional dancing starts out as an expression of togetherness. It conveys a sense of belonging. Everyone knows the steps. Everyone can join in. The different generations and classes become, while the dance goes on, part of a community. It depends, therefore, on the existence of a stable culture. The moves, the rhythms and the patterns are passed down from generation to generation. However lively the movements, however wild the rhythms, there is behind them a quiet confidence that this community will always exist and that these rituals will always celebrate its survival.
But of course the communities don't just survive. They change. New influences come in. People move from the country to the city and, in the case of Ireland over the last two centuries, they move from their own country to foreign cities. They take their music, their dances and their stories with them. Those things no longer say what they used to, they no longer express a stable, familiar world. The ears have to tune in to new sounds. The feet have to move to new, and at first strange, rhythms. The stories have to connect with new experiences.
These things have happened to all traditional cultures in one form or another. As the world shrinks, as technology impinges on everything, as closed societies open up everything gets mixed up. All cultures face the same questions: How do we relate to the past? What does the culture we inherited from our ancestors mean now that the world that shaped it is slipping away?
People are faced with an unhappy choice - they can try to preserve their traditional culture by putting up barriers against the outside world and trying to resist change, or they can go with the flow, forget the past and melt into a bland, generic culture where everything is the same and nothing has much depth. One way leads to isolation and hostility. The other to a nagging sense of loss. But there is another possibility. It is to carry what you have taken from the past on an open-ended journey, showing it off, throwing it open, making it into a point of contact rather than a point of honour. This is what Riverdance has done.
It's not of course the first Irish show to reach out to international audiences. But it undertakes its journey with the great advantages of dance. Dancers are metaphorically as well as literally light on their feet. They carry less baggage than other performers do. Their language of steps and movements does not need translation. The materials they work with: feet, legs, arms and heads are pretty much the same in every part of the world. Their response to the infectious music may be more complex, more elegant and more athletic than the toes tapping in the audience, but it comes from the same timeless and natural urge.
What the first audiences saw in Dublin and what made them gasp was that the movement in Riverdance reflects the dynamic way in which Irish culture has actually evolved. It has always been about fusion and adaptation as new impulses are absorbed into the old frameworks, and old ideas that seemed to be buried suddenly re-emerge with a new meaning and a new urgency. It was always hard to capture this ebb and flow in performance. Things had to be either traditional or modern, either authentic or invented, either Irish or foreign, but then with one elegant, confident leap, Riverdance bounded over all those categories and expressed what Irish people have always felt - that you can have it both ways. You can best honour the past by giving it a future. You can preserve a tradition only by letting it live, breathe and change.
The real proof of all of this is that Riverdance has re-energised the tradition from which it springs. Bad commercial shows exploit the forms and feelings they make use of, finally sucking them dry. Riverdance, on the contrary, has watered the roots of Irish dancing. It has created a previously unimaginable excitement, drawing in a new generation, releasing new energies, opening up new possibilities. And in turn, these forces have fed back into the show itself. Young dancers enthused by Riverdance when it first appeared are now taking their places in the thunderous chorus. For them, Riverdance is already part of the best tradition of all - the tradition of making old things new.
