I read a great article by Hsin-Yun Huang about the nature of the viola and I immediately thought about Donald Trump and footballers for some reason, as they seem most at odds with her exegesis.
She declares that the viola listens rather than talks, and contributes to a string quartet with a weight that is perfectly in balance, so making the whole bigger and rounder and complete. It assesses and feels and doesn’t command attention. It is sensitive and true and as she says, ‘a great violist knows exactly how much their line contributes to the group as a whole’
But how untrue of many footballers who are greedy and ego-centric, so often destroying the natural flow of the game.
And oh how the absolute antithesis of Donald Trump with his crony mob and his and their lies.
I watched the Capitol Hill riot and it reminded me of when I saw two Boeing jets fly into the Twin Towers. They are one and the same thing. It’s just that one was fomented by the sitting president of the United states of America on the back of a black-versus-white lie. Period. Fact.
I also saw some of the Impeachment debate in Congress but was very disappointed in the Democratic speakers and their rhetoric.
Very few took the opportunity to outrightly shame the ignorant and duplicitous Republicans on the other side of the aisle, who stood by this election lie, rather than coming clean to honour the oath they’d sworn in taking office and respect the democratic process. Their ultimate duty.
But they lied. To their electors and to themselves. Their oath were in vain and are a complete sham with blood on their hands. How can they look their children in the eye?
And they choose to carry on banging a brain-deadening drum. An insane and desperate and dangerous last-stand war cry.
But only declaring their utter ineptitude as democratic leaders and revealing the extent of their moral deprivation as human beings.
Certainly a world away from playing the violian voice of conscience and truth, this new wild west of American politics.