Fran Magazine: Issue #52

Fran Magazine at the ballet

Thank you for reading Fran Magazine, a Substack based out of Brooklyn, New York, unlike other Substacks that are based out of “Queens” or “San Francisco.” This issue is for paying subscribers. Consider upgrading your subscription (or [Substack voice] “pledging your support”) to stay in the conversation.

Lately

The “lately” column is now the Sunday Dispatch — a feature for paid subscribers only. That means if you are a paying subscriber, you now get six emails from me a month. Some people would literally kill for that. Anyway, here you go.

Fran Magazine: Sunday Dispatch, Feb. 19-Feb. 25

One other thing

Okay, this will sound fake and not real or like I have been paid to say it but trust me when I say that I am not paid to say most things: are you still accessing Substack including Fran Magazine via email? Is your copy of Fran Magazine (or whatever else) going to Promotions, or Updates, or wherever? And it’s all so confusing and miserable that it makes you want to unsubscribe?

I beg, encourage, plead with you to consider the hackneyed but incredibly useful and ultimately stylish “substack.com” or even, dare I say, the Substack app, which I think is pretty great. Both remind me of the halcyon days of Google Reader!!! I am the world’s biggest email defender, but when I scroll through the Substack emails on Gmail I feel like I am in hell. When I am on the Substack app, I feel serene and normal.

Okay, my PSA is done. Isn’t it so funny that Dennis Kucinich has more subscribers than Fran Magazine?

Aaron Copland’s Americana

My introduction to Aaron Copland’s music was more than half my life ago, back in the summer of 2006 when my high school marching band announced their first season under their new director would be inspired by Copland’s “Appalachian Spring.” This is quite a famous piece of American music, one where I think even the most self-described classical music-ignorant will recognize at least part of it.

Initially composed for ballet dancer Martha Graham, “Appalachian Spring” premiered in 1944 and was recorded in 1945 with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Presumably I don’t have to tell you what was happening in American history during the years 1942 and 1945 that a winning, short composition about the beauty and wonder of agrarian life had a lasting impact on the culture. Though “Appalachian Spring” is an orchestral suite intended for ballet, most modern performances are for symphony orchestra or our most populist interpretation of ballet: marching band. I recall liking “Appalachian Spring” as a teenager. What’s not to like? It’s a lively, nostalgic piece of music full of keyboard percussion and addictive melodies. I played some for Phil the other night and he said he hadn’t expected it would be so literal. I suspect its literal nature is what appealed to me at that age, a time when I preferred the work of Fitzgerald and Steinbeck to Faulkner or Melville.

I have had Copland on my mind for a while now, maybe more than Bernstein. Copland is a central character in the Bernstein letters I have been reading off and on for the past four months. I wrote about their relationship in a past Fran Magazine issue.

Fran Magazine: Issue #36

Earlier this month, I went to see the New York City Ballet stage Copland’s “Appalachian Spring,” alongside other famous Copland pieces like “Fanfare the the Common Man,” four dance episodes from “Rodeo,”¹ and “Billy the Kid.” I don't see a lot of ballet, period, let alone modern ballet. I have been twice since moving to the east coast, once to see something modern for my friend Morgan‘s birthday and the other time to see Tchaikovsky's "Sleeping Beauty." A great time, no doubt, but I think I would almost always prefer to just see an orchestra.

I was compelled to see the Copland show, titled “Copland Episodes” (true) in part because Copland’s “Appalachian Spring” and co. are so rarely staged as actual ballet, and also because it was a new work by wunderkind choreographer Justin Peck, the subject of ballet documentary Ballet 422. Justin Peck is six years older than me, and he is one of the most successful and notable figures in the contemporary ballet scene alongside, I don’t know, Ansel Elgort’s ex-girlfriend Violetta Komyshan and the guy in Europe who smeared poop on that critic. Having seen Ballet 422 and being loosely familiar with Peck’s work, I have to say that prior to “Copland Episodes,” I had not considered myself a fan. I find a lot of what I’ve seen of Peck’s work to be self-serious and unplayful and profoundly — stay with me — geometric (insult). Though I was thrilled to see that he was adapting a handful of Copland pieces I loved, I was like, “okay, so he’s gonna suck all the fun out of them.” And this trailer put out by the NYC ballet did not inspire much confidence.

Like, watching this trailer, I think it is easy to believe that this would be awful!

To my surprise, I was actually quite moved by what Peck did with “Copland Episodes.” There’s none of the overwrought or neutral-colored Uniqlo U-inspired costuming to be seen. The whole thing looks at worst, like a Parade sponsored Instagram or at best, a Skittles commercial.

cred: nyc ballet