Eric Clapton in Las Vegas

Eric Clapton is arguably one of the greatest guitar players of all time so it is an absolute thrill to be able to see and hear him play live!  I've seen him a couple of times before but it has been a while.  When I found out that he would be in Las Vegas (for one of only three concerts leading up to the Crossroads Guitar Festival in Dallas) I got a ticket immediately!  I took the day off from school yesterday to drive to Vegas for the show last night and it was amazing.  He had a very minimal set and just played the blues all night.  I loved it!  He started the show with "Pretending" and the crowd went crazy!  I was unfamiliar with some of the other early songs (mostly covers) he played but it didn't matter because it was amazing to watch a legend jam.  One of the biggest highlights during this set was his version of "I Shot the Sheriff."  Then he played an acoustic set that included "Circus" from Pilgrim, an album that I absolutely love, "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out," and a beautiful version of "Tears in Heaven."  When he plugged back in he played the Cream song "Badge," which was absolutely epic, and "Holy Mother," which was incredibly emotional.  Next, he played covers of Robert Johnson's "Crossroads" and "Little Queen of Spades" which featured extended solos by his unbelievably talented band!  He ended this set with "Layla" which got everybody on their feet!  I basically waited all night for this song and it definitely did not disappoint.  For the encore, he brought Jimmie Vaughan, who opened for him, back to the stage to perform a cover of "Before You Accuse Me."  It was an incredible evening of music and I can't even describe how much I loved watching Slowhand play the guitar!  I will be on a high for days!

Note:  I was hoping that he would play "Cocaine" but I didn't mind too terribly that he didn't because he actually played it twice the first time I saw him in concert!  The crowd went crazy when he played it the first time so he said, "You like that one, huh?"  Then he played it again!

Official Secrets

I had the chance to see Official Secrets at Sundance this year and it was one of my favorites of the festival.  I decided to see it again last night now that it is in wide release and, once again, I thought it was a taut and suspenseful political thriller.  It tells the true story of Katharine Gun (Keira Knightley), a translator at GCHQ (a British intelligence gathering agency) who leaks a top-secret memo from Frank Koza of the NSA asking for intelligence which could be used to blackmail smaller countries into voting for a U.N. resolution supporting the invasion of Iraq to the press in 2003.  Once the story is published in The Observer, she confesses and is charged with violating the Official Secrets Act.  She pleads not guilty and her lawyers argue that she acted to prevent the imminent loss of life from an illegal war, a defense which could potentially be embarrassing for the British government.  I found the story to be both fascinating and compelling because it profiles an ordinary woman willing to face extraordinary consequences in order to follow her conscience.  Knightley gives an absolutely riveting performance, especially in a powerful interrogation scene where she tells investigators that she doesn't work for the British government but for the British people who are being lied to by the government.  The movie also features an impressive all-star cast including Matt Smith, Matthew Goode, and Rhys Ifans as the reporters who break the story, Ralph Fiennes as a defense lawyer, and Jeremy Northam as a Crown prosecutor.  The movie is fraught with tension (even on a second viewing), particularly during a sequence surrounding the deportation of Gun's husband in retaliation for her actions.  I enjoyed this movie (again) and I recommend it highly.

The Addams Family at HCT

Last night I got to see the musical The Addams Family on the Jewel Box Stage at Hale Centre Theatre.  I've seen this show several times before and it is a lot of fun so I have been anticipating it for quite a while. A nearly perfect cast and some amusing little additions make this one of the best productions of this particular show that I have seen.  The Addams family is not like other families because they are all obsessed with the macabre and rely on their dead ancestors to help them through life.  Things start to go wrong when Wednesday (MaKenna Tinney) falls in love with Lucas Beineke (Nathaneal Abbott), a normal Midwestern boy. She wants to introduce his uptight parents, Mal (Shawn Lynn) and Alice (Carolyn Hartvigsen), to her family which includes her father Gomez (Josh Richardson), her mother Morticia (Erin Royall Carlson), her brother Pugsley (Blake Walker), her uncle Fester (Jeff Thompson), her Grandma (Jayne Luke), and their manservant Lurch (Michael Von Forrell). She arranges a dinner and begs her family for just one normal night.  Of course, chaos ensues when a mishap involving a poisonous potion occurs and it is up to Uncle Fester, with the help of the ancestors, to convince everyone that love is the answer. The plot is quite silly but the message about the importance of families is very appealing. The songs in this show are not especially memorable but the cast is so outstanding that they made them very enjoyable, particularly "Just Around the Corner," "The Moon and Me" (a highlight), and "Tango de Amor."  The choreography is outstanding and I especially enjoyed all of the big song and dance numbers involving the ancestors (a Conquistador, Caesar, Cleopatra, Marie Antoinette, a Pirate, General Custer, Joan of Arc, and a Titanic passenger). The set is fantastic and features an ornate spiral staircase, a Medieval torture chamber, bedrooms with velvet draped canopy beds (Pugsley's bed is made out of a guillotine), and an imposing iron gate. The costumes are also quite spectacular, especially Morticia's slinky gowns and Gomez's elaborate smoking jackets. The entire cast is strong but Richardson and Carlson are absolutely perfect as Gomez and Morticia.  I laughed and laughed at just about everything they said and did!  Speaking of laughter, if you see this show pay very close attention to the antics of Lurch and Thing (Eden Tinney) because they provide many laugh out loud moments of physical comedy that are often hidden in the background.  The Addams Family is a lot of fun and I highly recommend it but act quickly (go here for tickets) because shows are selling out at a record pace.

Inland

For the past couple of months I have been thinking about joining another book club.  I missed being challenged to read books that I wouldn't necessarily choose for myself and I have recently made a goal to be a little bit more social (I really struggle in this area). I eventually decided to join a book club that is held monthly at a Barnes & Noble bookstore near me. I went for the first time last night and, even though I stressed about it all day yesterday, I had a lot of fun.  The selection for this month was Inland by Tea Obreht and, while I didn't love it, I found the writing to be incredibly beautiful. Set in the Arizona Territory in 1893, the narrative alternates between two complicated characters fighting for survival. Lurie is an outlaw who joins the Camel Corps of the U.S. Army in charge of surveying the Southwest. He is doggedly pursued by Marshall John Berger because he committed a murder as a young man so he eventually takes a camel named Burke and wanders aimlessly on his own. Nora lives on a homestead plagued by a severe drought. She is left to fend for herself after her husband leaves to find water and her two older sons leave after an argument. She also gets into a squabble with a few locals about moving the county seat to another town which will almost certainly mean the end of her homestead. There is an interesting juxtaposition between the two characters because Lurie is unable to stay in one place for long and Nora cannot seem to leave a place no matter how inhospitable. The connection that ties them together is their ability to speak to the dead.  Lurie is followed by the ghosts of people he knew as a child and acquires their negative characteristics (which gets him into trouble).  Nora speaks to the daughter who died as an infant as a way to assuage her guilt over her death. The two are also connected by the common theme of water and how the lack thereof affects them. However, I had a very difficult time getting through the story because it meanders so much and so many characters appear and disappear without resolution.  I kept picking it up and putting it down, impatient for the two narratives to converge which doesn't happen until the final pages.  If you can make it to the end, both characters do find some redemption and are left with hope for the future but I'm not entirely sure I understand the point Obreht is making.  As previously mentioned, the prose is quite stunning, especially in the vivid descriptions of the Southwest, and there were many times when I went back to read a particular passage again because it was so poignant.  While I can appreciate Obreht’s brilliant writing style, I wouldn't recommend this book.  I would, however, recommend the Barnes & Noble book club because the facilitator asked some interesting questions which stimulated a great discussion (I was not the only one to struggle with this selection) and who can resist the delicious cookies from the cafe!  Go here for information and to find a book club near you!

Note:  Next month's selection is The Testaments by Margaret Atwood (the long-awaited sequel to The Handmaid's Tale).  I can't wait to read and discuss this book!

The Empire Strikes Back in Concert

I am such a fan of the Utah Symphony Films in Concert so I try to attend every concert in the series each season.  Last night Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back was shown on the big screen while the orchestra played the amazing score by John Williams live.  This movie begins after the Rebels destroy the Death Star.  Darth Vader searches the galaxy for Luke Skywalker, who begins his Jedi training with Yoda, leading to an epic confrontation between the two of them.  I love this movie so much and the experience of watching it with a really rowdy crowd, many dressed in costume, was so much fun!  The score is iconic and the orchestra played it brilliantly.  I was positively giddy when the instantly recognizable "Star Wars (Main Theme)" played during the opening crawl and so was the crowd because the cheering was very enthusiastic!  I particularly loved all of the brass during "The Imperial March (Darth Vader's Theme)."  This gave me chills every time it was repeated because I was so terrified of Darth Vader when I saw this movie for the first time.  I also really enjoyed "Han Solo and the Princess," especially when Han and Leia kissed each other!  The crowd was amazing and there were massive cheers when Luke, Leia, Han Solo, Chewbacca, Darth Vader, C-3PO, R2-D2, and Lando Calrissian appeared on the screen for the first time but the character that got the loudest applause was Yoda!  My favorite scenes were during the Battle of Hoth when Luke brings down the AT-AT walkers, when Yoda lifts Luke's X-wing fighter out of the swamp using the Force, when Leia tells Han that she loves him before he is frozen in carbonite, and when Darth Vader tells Luke that he is his father after their lightsaber duel.  It has been a long time since I've seen this movie on the big screen and I certainly enjoyed it last night.  This concert will be repeated again tonight and I highly recommend getting a ticket (go here).

Note:  Abravanel Hall was visited by Emperor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid) and Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen) who were attending Fan-X next door!  It was quite exciting!