Music Festival: A Darker Night

Yesterday I wrote about the joy at the annual music festival where I live.  Last night my husband and I attended again and it was not so joyful, I'm sad to say.  I was not feeling  very well and because my granddaughter's group was in the first class, we had decided that if the adjudications did not follow shortly after that, we were going to leave.  As it turned out, we did leave after her class.  I do not know how they placed, but there seemed to be a theme running through the class that made my husband and I very uncomfortable.

I always check out the music my granddaughter's groups are using if I am unfamiliar with it, and so I knew that their music came from a horror film.  I wondered why her teacher would choose that music.   Before the performance my daughter-in-law asked me if I knew abut the music and I said that yes, I did.  She said that there was a red balloon but then she added "I'll say no more."

The class  began with a group dancing to a very strange piece about sound.  It was sung in mostly a monotone voice, some of the lyrics were questionable.  But after that it grew worse.  The next group's piece was about violence, the group after that I think was about war because the dancers  wore camouflage and one of them was supposedly dead at the end.  The next next one was a piece about inner demons with the dancers half wearing white, half  red.   Then my granddaughter's group all dressed in yellow rain slickers with hoods, one carrying a red  balloon.  In the music, a child began singing and then the music became much more intense.  It was creepy.    The group after that had a song about someones cremation.  And with the class ended, my husband and I were quick to exit the building.  As Christians, we did not think that we should even have attended, and if it were not that I wanted to support my granddaughter, we would not have gone.

Was it coincidence that all these groups chose the same type of music?  Or is this the state of the world now that this music is popular?  That thought is unsettling to me.  And we wondered, does practicing the dance for a long time listening to this music have any effect on the young ladies that are practicing the dance?  I hope not.

Tonight the festival goes on with Musical Theatre. My granddaughter will be doing a solo from West Side Story, called "I Feel Pretty".  Her costume is an exact replica of the one the character wore in the movie.   It is a very happy song, and I am thankful for that.   I hope that the rest of the solos are happier pieces as well. 

Time will tell..

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vcg