logo

Because I'm a Jew myself Moulay - I want to speak with my people

Posted by admin   ·     ·   Jump to comments

"Because I'm a Jew myself Moulay - I want to speak with my people. This city used to have a big Jewish community - I want to know what happened." To his credit Moulay found me a Jew, and a Jewish dentist to boot. We sat in his dusty surgery under a diorama of garish posters. He spoke in Arabic and Moulay interpreted: he was an elderly man, most of the Jews had left Morocco, they'd gone to Israel like one of his sons, or to the States like one of his other sons His wife was dead. The seconds ticked away in the wounded mouth of the surgery: the Jews of Marrakesh had been extracted.Back in the street Moulay seemed fully zoomed, and I left him standing there. We didn't see him for the last few days we spent in Marrakesh, but I've seen him since, oh yes indeed.

Whenever I feel uneasy or out of my depth in a foreign country, Moulay is always on hand to offer me his services. He appears in my dreams, his sunglasses opaque, his smile queasy, a relentless reminder of the truth that you should never zoom a Moroccan More from Miles Kington. The musical Les Mis?bles is known among theatre folk as "The Glums" And glum they certainly were backstage this week. The show's producer, Sir Cameron Mackintosh, said he was planning to have the music played in future by a semi-virtual orchestra (a computer replacing 12 of the 21 musicians). He is transferring the show from the Palace Theatre to the smaller Queen's; and there isn't enough room in the pit, apparently, for a full orchestra. No doubt that is why the Musicians' Union is threatening the first ever West End strike over the issue But "losing" the orchestra is not actually unprecedented. Last year I saw a performance of Matthew Bourne's Nutcracker! in Wycombe.

For that, the entire orchestra seemed to have been lost.The pit was empty and the dancers danced to music from a machine. I'm not sure why this was acceptable to the Musicians' Union. I wonder if it was loath to raise a fuss about Matthew Bourne's Nutcracker! tour because Bourne is a darling of the arts world, whereas Sir Cameron is a rich impresario. But whatever the reason, either "losing" the orchestra is artistically wrong or it isn't.

The objectors have to be consistent.And the artistic question is the key one. The loss of jobs is undeniably painful, and the break with tradition discomfiting, but for audiences the only question that matters is whether Les Miz and other musicals will be a worse experience with music from a machine. And I stress "other musicals"; for, if Sir Cameron's plan goes ahead, there is no way that his fellow producers won't be looking and learning from the cost-cutting. This may be a one-off for Sir Cameron, but not for theatre as a whole.Dance is, of course, different from musicals, but the changes experienced by the loss of a live orchestra are common to both art forms. Watching that performance of Bourne's Nutcracker! there was a feeling of loss, not huge but nevertheless palpable. On one level it was the loss of the spectacle of the orchestra in the pit, the animation of the conductor, the technique of the musicians.

readers comments

Comments are closed.

NBA

NBA

MLB

MLB

NFL

NFL

NHL

NHL

WWE

WWE

Your sideblock text goes here