early Arrival

Through the courtesy of Anonymous, I was at an unknown movie theater in a forgotten locale for a preview showing of an upcoming SF movie, Arrival, based on Ted Chiang's "Story of Your Life." The Powers That Buzz have asked me not to review the movie before its release, so I'll just say that this is an intelligent person's SF movie, with only one small explosion. It's still interesting if you know Chiang's story, and is reportedly intelligible if you don't. It's being released in three weeks. That is all.

After that I drove in an undefinable direction for an indeterminate distance to exit Schrödinger's box at Stanford's Memorial Church, for the annual Daniel Pearl World Music Days Concert. Peaceful and contemplative music highlighted by Ubi Caritas for unaccompanied female choir by Ēriks Ešenvalds, the Requiem for three cellos and a piano - a most striking sound - by David Popper, and a mournful Elegy by Jaroslaw Kapuscinski, the last played by the St. Lawrence Quartet, who also closed things off with the healing Heiliger Dankgesang from Beethoven's Op. 132. This is the only concert I attend that eschews applause. We sit in silence, and come out richer for the experience.