Note from Patricia Kirkpatrick
I saw the "America Will Be" concert last night and congratulate the Cantus ensemble for their musical artistry and their commitment to exploring contemporary American life, its bounties, joys, challenges, and tragedy. I was moved by their exquisite harmonies and choice of songs, as well as the juxtaposition of music with the voices of Americans and their performance with the Prairie Women's Choir of "America the Beautiful." Go see the show today if you haven't already, and see what you think.
As to the controversy provoked by criticism of the program for being "too political," Matthew Forster's essay below is an articulate response. Forster writes, " Messages extolling pluralism are uncomfortably ‘political’ only in eras when excluding whole classes of people from public life is viewed as a respectable political position.”
All art is political, from the moment an artist chooses which subjects to explore and remains silent about other subjects. I admire this statement from the great poet Adrienne Rich and would substitute here the words “artistic” and “art” for her words “poetic” and “poetry.”
“This impulse to enter, with other humans, through language , into the order and disorder of the world, is poetic at its root as surely as it is political at its root. Poetry and politics both have to do with description and with power. “
As a Cantus board member, a writer, and a citizen, I am proud to be associated with the Cantus ensemble’s “impulse to enter, with other humans… into the order and disorder of the world.”
"The shifting politics of criticism:" https://americancivicforum.org/ideas/cantus-criticsm/
[Patricia Kirkpatrick, posted on Facebook, April 9, 2017]
As to the controversy provoked by criticism of the program for being "too political," Matthew Forster's essay below is an articulate response. Forster writes, " Messages extolling pluralism are uncomfortably ‘political’ only in eras when excluding whole classes of people from public life is viewed as a respectable political position.”
All art is political, from the moment an artist chooses which subjects to explore and remains silent about other subjects. I admire this statement from the great poet Adrienne Rich and would substitute here the words “artistic” and “art” for her words “poetic” and “poetry.”
“This impulse to enter, with other humans, through language , into the order and disorder of the world, is poetic at its root as surely as it is political at its root. Poetry and politics both have to do with description and with power. “
As a Cantus board member, a writer, and a citizen, I am proud to be associated with the Cantus ensemble’s “impulse to enter, with other humans… into the order and disorder of the world.”
"The shifting politics of criticism:" https://americancivicforum.org/ideas/cantus-criticsm/
[Patricia Kirkpatrick, posted on Facebook, April 9, 2017]
