Play Bach

JC and I took the difficult decision to commit ourselves passionately to a production of Bach's St Matthew Passion (excerpts, liberally translated into French)  JC is narrating, I'm doing two solos, there will be no fudging at the back.

It isn't the passionate part that is difficult, this music is clearly labelled Made in Heaven and the passion comes with the package.    It is the commitment part which is difficult.    We did the responsable thing and calculated whether we could realistically put in the time required, realised we couldn't, and went ahead anyway.  Consequently we have in our home a washing crisis which has reached international proportions, and most of the time JC looks like a tired shrivelled overworked and very tired worm which is particularly tired.

I say a production of Bach's Matthew Passion because I disover that it is musical theatre.  You can 'understand' the text of the story and the sequence in which it appears, and it is easy to have an emotional reaction to the music without knowing or understanding the story at all, but added to all that, once you really get into it and sing it and live it, there is the musical story;  a glorious musical light show, a musical understanding which passeth all understanding. Just how did Bach do it?

I have become seized with the desire to sing;  a desire as precise as a point of light and as loud as a thunderous roar.

Computer Rebuild

"Great, look Mum, your new computer's arrived" said B as he walked through the door.  "I'm going to build it!"

"What, now?" I said faintly (see photos for explantion).

B ripped open the box and began distributing bits all over my office/the room where R sleeps which already looks like a tart's boudoir/council tip.

"You want me to build it upstairs?"

"YES"

But he couldn't hold out that long and is building it as I write on the landing outside my bedroom.  He comes in and shows me the mother board, the newest fastest B ports, the really good RAM.  I try to look enthusiastic.

"Here is the box - um you could paint it..." he tailed off as he saw my face "we got it in a brocante"

"Only that shade of grey fails to show the dust...but does it have to be so BIG?"

"It's so you can have a really cool computer which you can upgrade whenever you want".

  

He whistles happily.  He starting whistling at 4 years old, it was the one area in which he excelled from an early age.

Latest Mark Debacle

R opened Pronote, the Mark-Obsessed Website, to gloat over his latest augmentations, when SHOCK HORROR

1
out
of
20

R paled, whimpered and scrambled for his school bag to check for all the things which he could possibly have been marked on - could he have undergone a test without his knowledge, had he filled in the wrong form, was it a score for having a crumb-free bag (fair)?

"I don't understand it, I don't understand it" he quavered.

"How will you check if it is a mistake if the teachers don't listen to you?" I asked.

"I WILL ask the history/geography teacher, I will go and see her after class"

"Ah, so that IS possible!"

The very next day R asked the history/geography teacher, and she did not apologize but blamed a bug in her computer for the score appearing as 1 out of 20 instead of 13.    She also blamed a bug in her computer for the poor soul whose score was published on Pronote, the Mark Tracking Software, as 20 out of 20 when, alas, it was 2 out of 20.  Then she used her computer to show them a film about the Middle Ages - and a First World War film appeared, at which point the history/geography teacher got a bit hot under the collar and said her computer was totally crapped out.

FAMILIES OF THE " PRONOTE VICTIMS"  SUE FOR MENTAL AND PHYSICAL DISTRESS CAUSED BY DISASTROUS MARKING DEBACLE!

French Bac in English

I'm English, my son is bilingual, but this does not mean he will be able to pass the French bac in English with ease.  He will need to understand what the examiners want, and to practice how to produce it;  so I've been looking through some past papers   (bac is the equivalent of A-levels, taken at 17 or 18 years old).    

All candidates for the bac have to perform in a wide range of subjects (philosophy, language, sciences, maths geography history and more).  French students are not free, as British students are,  to drop subjects (including foreign language) when they take the bac and specialise in 3 or 4 preferred subjects.

You can pass your bac with or without 'mention'.  Mention can mean:

Mention assez bien (literally good enough, or quite good)
Mention bien (good)
Mention très bien (very good).

I feel I should get a 'mention tres bien' very good in English for the following reasons

• I am English
• I am old and wise
• I am gifted in English and once won the school prize for English Achievement
• The level of English can't be that hard given the wide range of subjects, surely?

I set myself the challenge of doing the English bac for the students who choose to specialise in language (rather than say, maths or the technical bac) and started with 'comprehension'- English comprehension, surely this at least is in the bag! 

I read the text which was two pages of a novel by Kate Atkinson.     I didn't understand much of what was going on, so I read the questions, and I didn't understand the questions, and as for the answers, don't even ask.

I went to find my reading glasses and tried again, but it wasn't any better.  The text was devoid of context,  and littered with obscure vocabulary, subtle psychology and irretrievable cross-references.

Luckily JC enlightened me on the logical and staged French technique.

1. Read the text
2. Read the questions
3. Re-read the text like a detective looking for clues to answering the questions.

After I did this I had some idea what was going on and set out to give a Mention Très Bien answer.

Here is the question, B's answer (the first time he has ever tried such an exercise with no teaching preparation, and in a short time -  I'm impressed).    Then my answer, and a standard answer from the book which would earn the candidate a 'mention très bien'.  

Question;  explain why Frank found himself unexpectedly tongue-tied (50 words).

B's answer:  He found himself tongue-tied because of all the prettiness of the bread and cups, which prevented him from talking about death and the different ways of dying.  He understood that 'the smell of death clearly had no place in the parlour of Lowther Street'. (line reference).

My answer:  Frank felt tongue-tied because the reality of war ('the smell of death', 'trench foot' and 'rats') was so different from his civilised surroundings, so unsuited to polite conversation, that he struggled to find something he could talk about.  Even the mention of the bad tea in the trenches shocked the sisters, so he knew he could not talk about his life as a soldier.

Model answer:  There is such a sharp contrast between the horror of what he has experienced and the softeness and cosiness of this environment, that he cannot find words to express himself and he remains speechless.  His world is far from this one, and he understands that there's no way for the women to grasp his everday life.  Moreover, the warm welcome makes him feel even more ill-at ease and embarassed.

REMARKS

Although my answer was well-written, logical and justifiable, I think I would just miss the mention très bien by not referring explicitly to the contrast between the soft and warm welcome and the cold and hard realities of war.

Another remark:  Sapristi Knuckoes (Goon Shows circa 1950)