6/19/2009
May 06, 2009
Posted by Hiroko Narimatsu on Friday, June 19, 2009
Today is my very dear friend Annie Murphy's 22nd birthday. Annie and I became friends on the first day of classes as freshmen and lived on the same floor of Campion sophomore year; we will celebrate her birthday tonight after she finishes tech rehearsal for the upcoming “site-specific caberet” Frontier that premieres at the Lee Center for the Arts in the next two weekends. Frontier is a collection of six new one-act plays, three of which are written by SU students and faculty, and Annie is costume designing one written by a well-respected regional playwright. Costume designing, if you didn't already know, is hard work, and I'm really proud of one of my oldest SU friends who, even before we've walked across the stage with our diplomas in June, is exploring her passion for costume and theater on a professional level.
Speaking of the arts, things are going A-OK for me in my Audio Engineering class as I begin to gain confidence on Pro Tools (Pro Tools 8 is quite a beautiful program), attempt remixes (my first was a Death Cab for Cutie song... always paying tribute to Seattle music!) and arrange stereo microphones. I was tempted to not let this cat out of the bag, but the SU studio is going to get a major and totally awesome remodel this summer, and the result will be a state-of-the-art music lab, with individual work stations, keyboards, Macbooks... it's going to be a digital music student's dream, and when I come back for my “victory lap” fall quarter next year, I plan to take full advantage of the course offerings. Since I have so many credits going into registration, I should be able to get into the classes, knock on wood. Otherwise I totally would have kept mum for fear of other students beating me to the punch. So now you know, SU musicians: register for Audio Engineering! If you ever plan on playing and presenting music—ever—this course is enabling and indispensable.
Otherwise, I've been spending a lot of time at work with my awesome youth as we continue to develop FEEST (Food Education Empowerment and Sustainability Team), the best program ever. Our weekly dinners, almost a year old now, have 20 high schoolers regularly in attendance, cooking in the kitchen and discussing the obstacles to living healthy in our community. Yesterday we had a community potluck, and adults and youth that live in West Seattle (Delridge, Highpoint and White Center) and Burien had intentional conversations where we defined our top priorities for systemic change in food and fitness resources. I'm going to help write the Community Action Plan for those neighborhoods that will fund initiatives and policy building over the next ten years, and I couldn't ask for a better (and more delicious) program to co-facilitate, and a better group of youth than the ones I work with. We just launched a FEEST blog for the participants to post at; won't you read? Peep it here.
Listening to: Wale – Mixtape About Nothing
Reading: Michel Foucault – Discipline and Punish
6/19/2009
April 14, 2009
Posted by Hiroko Narimatsu on Friday, June 19, 2009
For two glorious days, the sun shone upon Seattle, and all tasted summer upon their skin. The grassy spaces on campus and adjacent parks were filled with delighted young people hungrily soaking up vitamin D, throwing impromptu picnics, and doing their school reading with big stupid grins on their faces. I was one such young person. But then the sun went away and it got grey again. My best friend (and other half of Canary Sing) Maddy is in Jamaica for the month visiting her relatives after graduating from UW last quarter (congratulations chica!) and I am soooo jealous as I stare out into the drabness. But Spring peeked out its head for a second, enough to remind me that sunnier days await.
In the meantime, I am preparing to leave to La Crosse, Wisconsin, to attend the National Conference of Undergraduate Research (lovingly known as NCUR) this weekend, where I will present my paper on Fela Kuti. Seattle University is sending about twenty students from all different disciplines—from computer science to psychology—to present their papers and posters, and I'll be representing the History Department. Last year, I went to NCUR in Maryland to present my paper on Margaret Cavendish, the first self-identified author of England... she was pretty cool, but I'm really excited to present on such a dynamic and politically significant figure as Fela. (For those who don't know, he's the pioneering figure of Afrobeat from Lagos, Nigeria—look him up!) Last year while I was working on this paper—which ended up being 35 pages—I got my first jolt of inspiration to want to go to graduate school to study musicians in a historical context. Fela as a political activist and musician is absolutely fascinating, and he continues to influence musicians (including myself) across genres. In fact, I was at The Roots concert on Thursday (who I've been waiting to see since I missed them in Seattle my freshman year) and they dedicated a good portion of their set to Fela and his eccentric, transcendent performance style. I'm also looking forward to scouting out the interesting presentations of students across the country; last year, I attended sessions on people of color in punk music, media coverage of the Black Panther Party, and existential phenomenology (yeah, that last one went a wee bit over my head.)
Other things I'm doing this quarter, going to class (duh!). I'm taking an Advanced Fiction class where I'm really pushing my personal boundaries to the limit in order to produce a daring, perhaps provocative, short story; I'm also enrolled in a History research seminar (the third I've taken in the last two years. I'm addicted to writing twenty page papers I guess), where I'll be using my interest in film studies that I cultivated last quarter to engage three French films with the theories of Barthes and Foucault. Yay! In Audio Engineering class, we're learning about remixing. As soon as I figure out how to properly identify a tempo, I'll let you know how that's progressing.
Besides school, I'm also trying my hand at independently producing events in Seattle with Hidmo Entertainment, something I do through work and have done in the Bay Area but have yet to try here. First up: a Rihanna-themed dance party benefiting two very important Seattle organizations—Home Alive and Communities Against Rape and Abuse—that have acutely suffered the effects of the economic recession. And who doesn't want to dance to Rihanna? Also, I am addicted to Twitter. Addicted. It perfectly suits my hyperactive craving for information and mass communication, and I love reading the “tweets” of not only my friends and fellow musicians but Erykah Badu, Questlove, and even P Diddy and Shaq. Some people say I'm on the Twitter Recruitment and Retention Team. I'm just very enthusiastic about a social networking program that works for me!
Finally, I SURVIVED MY TRIP TO SXSW. It was a glorious week—lots of driving and sprawling panoramas of the great untamed West, followed by three jam-packed days of Austin musical tomfoolery, soundbleed, sleeplessness, and networking. I got to hang out with my friends from the Bay Area, roamed punk and metal shows, saw my musical hero Janelle Monae in an intimate venue, and even perform a song on a set! My pictures are three scenes taken with my fabulous disposable camera. If you love music, crowds, loud noises, and sun, you should go to SXSW 2010. I'll be there.
Listening to: Kanye West – 808s and Heartbreak (I'm STILL trying to figure out how I feel about it)
Reading: Ngugi wa Thiong'o – The Wizard of the Crow
6/19/2009
March 17, 2009
Posted by Hiroko Narimatsu on Friday, June 19, 2009
In the dead of winter, there is life! I was just looking back on my pictures from my time in Guadalajara, Mexico, and reflecting on how much tanner and less busy I was a mere year ago. Seattle, of course, has had a ridiculously cold winter, so I guess I've been keeping extra active to stay warm.
Although this academic quarter is lighter than my last few, it's been very engaging. I've learned how to record and make digital music in my Audio Engineering class, and have already had sessions engineering my friends' songs and attempting beat making for the first time. This is very exciting for someone who's been frustrated in the past by not having access to studios—by taking the Audio Engineering class, I can get into the SU recording studio 24/7 just by signing up for space. I'm also working on an independent study: I've narrowed it down to examining Duke Ellington and Josephine Baker as agents of black cultural expression in European and American musical production and aesthetics, and I've stumbled upon a lot of great readings in the process. Finally, most people hate going to class on Fridays, but I have been loving my Buddhism in Film class. I recommend to everyone to take a film studies course sometime in his or her college experience. We are born and raised movie critics, and it's awesome to learn more about religion, social interactions and history through the medium of film. Movies really bring people together, and my roommate Ellen and I (who are both in the same class) find ourselves discussing each movie after class well into the night.
One AMAZING experience I have to briefly share was meeting the director and artists featured in the film Slingshot Hip-Hop, a Sundance-selected documentary about Palestinian hip-hop artists in Israel and Gaza who have truly defeated the odds to express themselves despite considerable oppression. Two of the artists in the film, Abeer and Mohammed, flew to Seattle to perform in Olympia and Seattle for the premiere of the film in the Northwest, and I have never been more inspired by the power of music and culture to make true grassroots change. I get so embroiled in my own business that I never think of the art that young people are making in the Middle East and around the globe; by performing and building with them, I remembered how profoundly we are all connected despite our vastly different experiences. It also reminded me to keep better tabs on the situation in Gaza. Although we have the New York Times for free in the student center, and despite being in an institution of learning, our college lives—keeping up with Facebook and the hottest Youtube video—can serve to distract us from what's happening beyond.
Well, here's something crazy: I'm going to be taking my first insane roadtrip with a couple of friends to Austin, TX, for the legendary South by Southwest Music Festival, the biggest in the country. I'm not performing, and I'm not even buying an official pass—they're like $600!—but Austin teems with artists and music industry people during the two weeks of the festival, and I can't wait to see free and spontaneous shows, meet artists, and learn more about this crazy maze of the music industry, all while checking out Austin for the first time. And yes, we're driving from Seattle to Austin. Do you see how desperate I am to get warm?! I'm planning to cover my trip extensively, so I'll have tons of things to talk about upon my return.
Reading: Assata! by Assata Shakur
Listening to: Hey Marseilles, a Seattle band that will be featuring at SXSW...