Tuesday, May 12, 2009

I consider myself to be both priviledged list and extremely lucky to get the occasional invitation to watch a choreographer's work in progress. It is interesting to see the beginning and intermediate steps (in some cases raw steps) that lead to a finished and polished choreographic work. These works in progress come with explanations, reasons and what inspired them. In the case below choreographer Simone Orlando's talk (she was elegantly dressed to kill!) was preceded by high praise from Ballet BC Artistic Director John Alleyne who also explained how the grant in question works. There was an additional surprise. Her name is Jocelyn Morlock.



Dear Ballet BC Supporter,

You are invited to attend a FREE, informal showing of a new work by Ballet BC member and choreographer Simone Orlando created through a Fellowship Initiative Grant from the New York Choreographic Institute.

The process, which began on April 20, culminates with this post-work presentation at the Scotiabank Dance Centre on Monday evening. This innovative new work features Ballet BC company dancers Makaila Wallace, Jones Henry, Connor Gnam, Maggie Forgeron, and Leon Feizo-Gas.

WHEN: MONDAY, MAY 11, 2009 @ 5:30pm

WHERE: SCOTIABANK DANCE CENTRE - THE FARIS STUDIO
677 Davie Street Vancouver

This is an open-invitation event, so please feel free to bring and invite friends.

"Ballet BC has been awarded a Fellowship Initiative grant from the New York Choreographic Institute, an affiliate of New York City Ballet, to support the development of new choreography in a studio setting. The choreographer will be Simone Orlando. Peter Martins, Founder and Artistic Director of the Institute states: 'The Fellowship is meant to help ballet companies to create an environment in which a choreographer can develop ideas without the pressure of stage production. The Institute is committed to classical choreographers who will be creating works for the future."

Lauren, Rebecca and I arrived early so that we could sit up front centre. At the Farris Studio this means that your feet are on the dance floor. Rebecca no longer has to explain to anybody, as I do, that we like to hear dancer's gasp for air and see the sweat on their bodies. We did manage to sit in that front row but not before I greeted young Vancouver new music composer Jocelyn Morlock. I could not figure out why she was there. Then I spotted trombonist and co-director of the Turning Point Ensemble, Jeremy Berkman and in another area of the studio composer Owen Underhill who is the musical director of the Turning Point Ensemble. I was intrigued. Lauren was dead serious staring at the five Ballet BC dancers who were warming up (one of the nice extras of being in a work-in-progress situation).




Simone Orlando, above centre, set us straight when she mentioned that her ballet was based on two pieces of music. One was Antonin Dvorak's Piano Trio in E Minor, Op 90 "Dumky" (1891) and the other (aha!) Jocelyn Morlock's I Conversed With You In A Dream. Morlock's work is inspired by Sappho's fragmentary poems. It is a duo for flute and piano. The version we heard was with pianist Rachel Iwaasa and flutist Mark McGregor, below right.



The Dvorak piece had lots of classical ballet which contrasted so nicely with Morlock's music as Orlando incorporated more modern ballet into her dancer's movements. Complicating matters rather nicely, Orlando could only use five dancers, so many of them (in a work full of Greek gods and godesses) played more than one god. Jones Henry seen here with Rebecca and Lauren played both Zeus and Hephaestus (god of fire and especially the blacksmith's fire).

My girls behaved. The afternoon was most pleasant. My only regret, while watching dancer Makaila Wallace, was to wonder why I have never had the opportunity to photograph her. She is Vancouver's epitome of the classical ballerina (but so sumptuously well shaped, nonetheless!) now that Andrea Hodge has retired from active dancing.

Monday, May 11, 2009



My godmother and first cousin, Inesita O'Reilly Kuker has been in my thoughts of late. I wrote most recently about her here.

She has been in my thoughts for several reasons. One of them is that she did get the audio book I sent her mentioned in the above link. She was delighted and it seems she has listened to the book twice.

The whole odyssey of trying to solve my godmother's reading problem began a few months ago when she went on a vacation to her apartment in Punta del Este, Uruguay. She returned and soon after her son Georgito arrived to pick her up to take her for a weekend family gathering. He was shocked. Her face was all black and blue and her eyes were bloodshot. The independent soul that Inesita (she is 85) is prevented her from telling anybody that she had fallen in Uruguay. Her son took her to see a doctor who confirmed that she had a blood spill in her eyes. He injected her eyes and told her it would take at least 6 months to regain her full vision.

Most of my other cousins told me I should mind my own business and that Inesita did not need to read. It would seem that even though they live in the same city with her (Buenos Aires) they don't know how important reading can be for someone, or how important it is to read in one's chosen language. One of my cousins told me to get her a subscription to a large print Reader's Digest. For once diplomacy ruled and I did not bother to tell her that Inesita would never read Reader's Digest in any form be it small or large print.

As I have often written here Inesita would have been categorized by my mother as "gente fina". It is as difficult to translate as the Spanish word educación. The primary meaning of this word is a combination of well-mannered/good upbringing and poise. Gente fina adds to the mix a bit of knowledge of the arts and the person would have to be well read. Inesita, as gente fina would never acknowledge liking or reading the Reader's Digest. And that was exactly the case when I told her, jokingly, that I might get her that subscription. "Don't even think of it."

In Vancouver I admire those in the modern and ballet dance community because I can say with almost no exception that the majority that I have met have this poise, this presence that my mother so often told me was a rare thing. I would have liked my mother to notice that I am trying to make Rebecca and Lauren, gente fina. So we go to dance and theatre and I coach them on table manners!

Today I went to the main post office and mailed Pride and Prejudice read by Jenny Agutter, Daphne Du Maurier's Jamaica Inn read by Samantha Bond (Pierce Brosnan's Miss Moneypenny) and Angela’s Ashes read by the author, Frank McCourt. I wish I could be there when they get to her.

The other reason that I have been thinking of Inesita is that this Friday I will have Willoughby Blew and his wife Chris for dinner. They live in Florida and they are going on an Alaska Cruise. Willoughby Blew is my first cousin. As a young man in the Argentine navy I had a crush on his sister Elizabeth. Rebecca has met my three Buenos Aires cousins, Inesita, Diane and Elizabeth. With Willoughby the list will be complete (there were four more but they died) and when she grows up she might remember enough to keep our family story going.

I told Willoughby I was going to make a cheese fondue. This was his reply:


Dear George,
As you can well imagine we are in your hands when it comes down to deciding where to eat in Vancouver. Either the restaurant (Next) you recommend or the fondue dinner at your home are fine with us and we will leave the final decision up to you. Whatever is easiest and best for all is OK with us.

I'm assuming your fondue is made with equal parts of Gruyere, Ementhaler and Appenzeller cheeses complemented with Neuchatel wine, kirsch, black pepper, nutmeg and garlic. I remember eating cheese fondue practically on a daily basis when I lived in Zurich back in 1969. I just could not get enough of it.

How on earth do you know it will be a rainy day in Vancouver on Friday, May 15? I know that the law of probabilities says it will probably rain but then "the exception makes the rule".

Willoughby

Rosemary is in a bit of a panic as she thinks Willoughby is some sort of perfectionist. Consider what he said of the wine I was planning to serve:

Dear George,

The Hayward "bug" is among us but has never deprived me from enjoying a good glass of wine. Moderation is the word.

The taste of "green grapes" you refer to when you drink a Torrontés is exactly what makes this wine similar to a Gewutztraminer from Alsace. Some people love this flavour and some hate it.

Bodegas Etchart, also from Cafayate, Salta makes a very good Torrontés called "Etchart Privado". I have not seen this wine in the US for some time now. This may be the "reserva Especial" you referred to.

Given that you will drink wine in moderation if it is a Torrontes and given that we have now settled on having your famed fondue would you like me to bring a couple of bottles of whatever Torrontés is available at your local Government store.? A simple yes or no will do.

Manzanilla of course is a sherry and therefore somewhat higher in alcohol than most still wines. I was rather shocked to read (three times) that you pour your half bottle of San Lucar de Barrameda Manzanilla into a soup bowl to drink. Most folks find that a small glass of this sherry makes for a good aperitif. I have never heard of anyone drinking it by the bowlful but then, cada loco con su tema. So much for the Hayward "bug".

Rosemary's Pavlova with dulce de leche sounds wonderful and dietetic to boot.

We are also looking forward to our reunion.

Willoughby

Because I insist in calling Willoughby by his middle name, James, he calls me by my first name, George. I look forward to our family dinner. One of the toasts will surely be to another "gente fina" and that's Inesita our first cousin.

Sunday, May 10, 2009


I have not always succeeded in maintaining a distance with my students but I try very hard. At a couple of schools where I teach photography I tell my students that if they want to communicate with me they can forward me e-mails through the school administrator. Only last week a female student asked me if she could address me as “Sir Alex”.

In years past phone numbers were either more difficult to get or easier. Most people were in the phone book unless the number was unlisted. Now, with many having cellular phones, that phone number is hard to get. But if one has a web page (and I have one) my students can find either my phone or a method of e-mail communication called contact submission.

I would further define our age of instant communication as an age of quick intimacy. I blog and in it I write personal stuff. Students call me Alex instead of Mr. Hayward. For years in Mexico I addressed my students as Mr. or Miss. This idea is pretty well gone unless you are in a Canadian Armed forces boot camp.

So I had to give it much thought when a part-time student (over 20) waited until the last class to ask me if I would photograph her. I run photography as a business and I cannot reject work simply because I might have an over-sensitive concept of what a teacher student relationship should be. Technically when she came to my studio she was no longer my student.


My James Bond girl was a European woman. She sat in the front row of my photography class and I don’t think she ever wore the same pair of exquisite shoes twice. In my mind she was a James Bond girl. She looked like a James Bond girl, she dressed to kill and seemed to live a jet-set life (I define here jet set in the old term when flying was exciting and sexy). To top it all she was a good photographer.

Saturday, May 09, 2009


When Rebecca arrived at noon today for her piano lesson (we have a Chickering baby grand in our living room so her classes are here) she said, “I want to go to Mayfair.” Mayfair in our neck of the woods is the annual fair held at the nearby Catholic private school Vancouver College. There was no way I was not going to please Rebecca and Lauren (she also wanted to go) on this wish. Sometimes I rent a movie but it seemed a shame to stay inside on a beautiful day like the day today was. So Rosemary and I took the kids to Mayfair. I strapped a couple of Nikon FM-2s around my desk. “You look like a tourist!” Rebecca said. I countered, “With these film cameras I don’t look like a tourist, I look like an old man.” I joked with Rebecca that the reason she wanted to go was to ogle the handsome private school boys. This did not seem to be the case. “I want to go on the bungee cord jump.” Lauren said, “And I want to go into the Pirate Ship.” It seemed harmless enough. We walked.

It was a bit of letdown as memories flashed in my head of fairs in the American or English schools in Buenos Aires and in Mexico. They had all kinds of treasures, Mickey Mouse comic books in English (can you imagine that!) and later in the 50s used Tom Corbett Space Cadet or Hardy Boys mystery books.

At the Mayfair they had boring games (the exception was the bungee cord for which Rebecca waited close to 40 minutes on a long queue) and lots of food. The gym was full of junk by the time we got there mid afternoon. But Rebecca enjoyed her three minutes on the bungee cord jump and while she made several back flips she refused to make any front ones. Not having a digital camera I have no idea what my pictures will look like.



Back home I instructed Rebecca to write in a notebook the location and state of every rose in the garden. If the rose was missing a tag, Rebecca printed out its name in her very neat writing. The purpose of the exercise was to prepare her for our joint appearance in the forthcoming World Rose Convention in Vancouver in late June. Our lecture is called A Rose Through a Child’s Eyes. Rebecca has to learn more about roses. During our work she said, “This is like studying except it is fun.” Part of her job was to assess the condition of the rose bush and to mention if it had scent, how powerful that scent was and if it was fruity or myrrh, not to mention the colour and shape of the flowers. We finished our day with barbecued chicken, white rice and sliced ripe tomatoes. After our meal Hilary surprised us with a DVD called Miss Potter which we all enjoyed. Taking them home I was again hit by waves of memories of those former fairs and of one in particular in 1951.



That year my mother was teaching at the American High School. I was going to the nearby (two blocks) American Grammar School. Only in recent years have I finally come to understand that I never ever went one day to a public school and that my mother always found ways of sending me to private schools. She must have had a deal that by teaching at the high school (she was loved and appreciated and the school annual for 1951, The Southern Star is dedicated to her) I did not pay to go to what must have been an expensive school.

As soon as I got home I went to the family album in search of a picture that I remember was taken that year at the school fair. In Spanish we called it a tombola. In back of the picture here (my mother is in the middle with the funny hat) it says barrel pull. I think it may have been filled with sand or saw dust and the little boys in the picture bought tickets to then take their chances of finding “valuable” prizes.



Perhaps they didn’t have the exciting games they had at Mayfair but through a child’s eyes it must have been every bit as exciting. At Mayfair I noticed lots of 14 year-old girls with great big fronts of metal in their mouths trying not to notice the boys that were trying not to notice them. At age 9 it must have all gone over my head in that fine afternoon at the American School in Buenos Aires.



I noticed that the Southern Star's editorial began like this:

The world today is challenged by two great powers, Democracy and Communism. The outcome of present and future conflicts will determine a new phase of history. Which of these is for the best is for each one of us to decide.

When you consider that the modest sized school annual had lots of ads as end pages including this one by General Motors you know in which direction the school was rooting for.

Friday, May 08, 2009

The Boys being composers (all living in 17th century Germany, Holland and Denmark) Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber, Christoph Bernhard, Johann Heinrich Schmelzer, Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck, Franz Tunder, Johann Caspar Kerll, John Jacob Froberger.

I am not ashamed to admit that I have only heard of three of the above men. And I have even listened to some of their music, in particular the pleasantly depressing Lamento sopra la morte Fedinandi III by Schmelzer (c.1620-80), courtesy of past concerts of the Pacific Baroque Orchestra and Early Music Vancouver. I am not ashamed as the Pacific Baroque Orchestra seems to have taken the mandate to boldly go. And this is refreshing. No more chestnuts, most of their concerts are surprises into uncharted territory.



Earlier this evening I atended a concert of the Pacific Baroque Orchestra at St James Anglican on Cordova. I could rant and rave of the surprising Canadian soprano Linda Tsatsanis whose volume filled the church before I could decide that her voice was beautiful and her diction in German flawless. I could rant and rave about our Vancuouver treasure, organist and harpsichordist Michael Jarvis who tackled Jan Pieterzoon Sweelinck’s Fantasia chromatica on the St James 1938 Casavant Frères de St-Hyacinthe pipe organ that was refurbished in 2003. I could rant and rave of enjoying the distinct pleasure of hearing Natalie Mackie play her six- string Violone and know that even though it looks like a double bass it is possibly a member of the guitar family and is sometimes played over handed and sometimes underhanded. I could rant and rave on listening to the violists Jenny Essers and Stephen Creswell and enjoying Ray Nurse’s Theorbo while praying he didn’t hit the long neck with the church’s ceiling.

I won’t rant and rave about the above. I don’t need to. You can see and hear for yourself the same concert tomorrow Saturday at St. Augustine’s in Kitsilano at 8pm or on Sunday at West Vancouver United Church at 2:30. For more info look here. Not mentioned there is the exciting fact that Organist Michael Jarvis says the organ (which he is going to play) at the West Vancouver United Church is one of the most exciting organs in town.

But I will rant and rave of the performance of guest leader and violinist (a Master’s degree in Harvard, no less!) Scott Metcalfe, violinist Paul Luchkow, and of Michael Jarvis (top photograph that's Luchkow and Jarvis) on his lovely scrolled harpsichord, of the Sonata in F for two violins and continuo by Johann Caspar Kerll (1627-93). It is obvious the Metcalfe was taught well on matters of historical performance practice at Harvard as I noticed this succint sentence in the program notes where he describes Bohemian violinist and composer von Biber:

His music imparts something perhaps distinctly Germanic, an earthy delight undergirded by intellectual rigor, conveyed not merely by pyrotechnical figerwork but by captivating virtuosity of rythm, counterpoint and sonority.


I have not had so many shivers going up my spine since I heard Andrew Manze (violin) and Richar Egarr (harpsichord) play the complete violin sonatas of Giovanni Antonio Pandolfi Mealli some years ago at the Metropolitan Tabernacle near City Hall. And it is no coincidence as both Pandolfi and Kerll composed and worked north of the Alps and both lived within the 17th century. The latter in the Italianate court of imperial Vienna and the former in the Hapsburg court at Innsbruck.

To the ears of this rank amateur I found similarities in style, I could hear those wonderful odd (so many centuries before Thelonius Monk was to continue with the tradition in the past 20th century) notes that sounded fresh in their oddness.

Without going into details that I cannot elaborate since I am not a musician, I can only mention that the music of the 17th century was sometimes described as of the “fantastic style”. These composers (many were Italians some in Naples composing under Spanish influence like Andrea Falconieri.) did away with many of the textual constraints and predetermined harmonies of earlier music and often called upon the performer to improvise on the written music. It is as if for a while, in that century, there were no tried and true formulas and experiment was the ruling force.

Going to these concerts of the Pacific Baroque Orchestra one has the excitement of listening to music that has been rarely performed or recorded before. It is like opening a time capsule from the past and listening to new music paradoxically from that past, yet so fresh and new that it is as avant garde today as it was the first time it was performed. I could easily go from one of these concerts to a Turning Point Ensemble concert of new music and the excitement would continue without any necessary rebooting of my brain.

And from my vantage point sitting in the front row I was having a schizophrenic moment trying to decide if I was a Hapsburg prince or a Holy Roman Emperor. These boys and three women were all performing just for me.

Thursday, May 07, 2009



There are many reasons why I am posting pictures of Sylvie Desroches today. There is even a good reason why I posting two similar pictures of Sylvie Desroches today.

I have photographed my daughters all these years with some regularity. But there was a period when I was uncertain. This was when Hilary was 12 and Ale was 15. I told Rosemary, “I think I am going to ask photographer James La Bounty to photograph our daughters.” “Why?” she asked me and continued, “He is going to be expensive and you are a photographer. What for?" I told her that as their father I would see them as little girls for some time to come, and La Bounty, not being related to the girls would be objective and see them as girls approaching womanhood. He would photograph them as such. Rosemary hated the pictures that La Bounty took. It would seem that she was not prepared, also, to see her girls grown up. After a couple of years Rosemary began to tolerate the pictures that were on our living room wall and a bit later she even told me she liked them. Since then the pictures have been put in storage. That moment of uncertainty between girl and woman is gone. Ale is 40 and Hilary is 37.

But now it is about to return as our Rebecca, Hilary's older daughter, will soon be 12. Next year she is going to Quebec on a school student exchange. And a year later a Quebec girl will stay with Rebecca.

It was when Hilary was 16 that her exchange student came to Vancouver to stay with us. Sylvie Desroches was a lively and sophisticated young girl. At the time I was crazy about classic Hollywood lighting so I asked her if she would pose for me on our living room sofa. I have never really made up my mind if exposure 7 or exposure 8 is the better portrait of a 16 year-old going on 20. So I am posting both here.


I wonder if Hilary has made any effort to find Sylvie. Perhaps she will become curious when Rebecca travels next year.

And when Rebecca is around 15 how will I photograph her? I am not her father. But as her grandfather will I still see her as a little girl? Or will I see the woman she is bound to become by then? Just another big reason to want to be alive.

Addendum: Rosemary reminded me of a few facts I had forgotten. Hilary and Rebecca, when Rebecca was 3, went to Quebec City to visit Sylvie. She was divorced and had a daughter called Margarite. Sylvie had a new boyfriend that she adored. Sylvie's mother was very kind to Rebecca but they could not communicate because they had no language in common. Rebecca called to inform me that Sylvie now lives in Alberta.

Wednesday, May 06, 2009





I first met Barbara Rycroft in 1983. It was at the cavernous convention room of the Sands Hotel in Las Vegas. The women dancing on stage were being judged by Tempest Storm. I was taking pictures for McLeans and the Vancouver Province. The women on stage weren’t wearing much. Offstage, Rycroft, dressed to kill, was wearing beautiful slacks, a top with décolletage that would have made the girls on stage blush, and high heel shoes. With kid gloves she was cradling the latest Nikon of the time. Not even all of the Three Graces could have surpassed her style and poise. I felt embarrassed holding my mundane Pentax Spotmatic Fs.



When Barbara Rycroft oozed femininity and sheer elegant sexuality, sexy cars were Pontiacs. Alas we will soon have no more Pontiacs and women like Barbara Hycroft are almost extinct. But the memories remain and somehow that’s comforting.