Friday, May 7, 2010
Nissanka Dharmathilake - BMR 2008
“Kandak Vilila Kendak Veduwa Wage” is the only way I can describe the quality of the BMR 2008 (Sandakada Asna). Despite experiencing a lot of obstacles and unnecessary workloads, the technical team did a wonderful job in delivering the show and finishing it 20 minutes before midnight. I take my hat off to the members of the Tech Team.
Although we witnessed some individual brilliance from a few artists (e.g. Gaja Manu, Beri Sil and dance routine for Ran Pokunen etc.), most of the presented items were quite inferior. I don’t want to do an item by item analysis of all the items because it won’t serve any purpose. But I would like to highlight the following issues for your consideration:
1. At the 1st production group meeting we all agreed that the primary objective of the BMR 2008 should be presenting a high quality show which won’t run more than 3 ½ hours. Within a couple of weeks this objective was ripped into pieces by the decision makers by accommodating 58 out of 60 expressions of interests. This was the primary reason (among the many other reasons) for ended up in staging a poor quality show.
2. Since 2005/06 period the SCF has been using certain guidelines for the selection of artists and participants. I’m 100% sure those guidelines were totally ignored by decision makers, causing a lot of practical problems in the items line-up.
3. There was an unwarranted attempt to copy the basic framework of the BMR 2006 (Demansala Abiyasa). It simply shows that we didn’t learn anything from last year’s experience.
4. As other people highlighted earlier, most of the dance routines and song items looked monotonous and lacked any depth. I believe it was result of using same old artists in a somewhat stale format.
5. There wasn’t enough room for new thinking, especially presenting items appealing to our younger audience.
6. Decision makers of the SCF should possess a bit of imagination to visualise the show from the audience’s point of view. Our loyal audience is the most important stakeholder in this endeavour. Further, we should be brave enough to take bold decisions. That is the only way to success. Trying to please everyone (mainly Sydney’s self appointed artists) will not lead to anything other that organised debacle. It was well proven beyond any doubt.
Lalith Mallawarachchi - BMR 2008
I cannot recall another performance, which bored me, than this years 'Bakmaha Rngana', the annual cultural event organised by the Cultural Forum of NSW. Never was an occasion I had to sit trough a series of mediocre and mostly predictive performances for nearly 5 hours within a packed but somewhat disgruntled audience.
President of the Cultural Forum in his message stressed that the event each year provide local 'Artists' the best opportunity to perform within a state of the art facility at the 'Hills Centre'. However every year it make one wonder if the community, as spectators, get their moneys worth as far as the quality of performances are concerned.
Firstly, it should be acknowledged that the organisers of this event, as seen over the years, have done their best to bring some aspects of Sri Lankan performing art forms together.
Among over 30 performances, most were essentially dance recitals reflecting upon the recent trends in Sri Lankan dancing/performance culture. With due respect to the our youngsters for their great efforts in embracing the so called traditional dances one could hardly differentiate one from the other despite obvious differences between the songs and music they were dancing to. The dances failed to enhance adequately, the quality and mood of the song/music or the vise versa as envisaged.
We as migrants still seem to hang on to our belief that the glory of Art & Culture we experienced back in Sri Lanka many years ago still exists and should remain so. We ignore the fact that the entire socio-cultural structure of the country has moved on since then, influenced by 'globalisation' and many other factors.
'Bakmaha Rangana' over the years has failed to accept this reality. Disregarding the opportunities we got to learn from similar events of other communities we still struggle to come to terms with our 'illusions'. As a result, what we perceive as Sri Lankan art unfortunately is becoming obsolete.
It cannot be disputed that artistic creations reflect the socio-cultural reality and any effort to alienate from this reality will be illusionary. What more proof we need for this than the commendable performance, in contrast to the majority of others, created and presented by our own youth group. Their act had the touch of novelty and cleverly grasped some aspects of the migrant social reality, with good sense of humour. It combined both audio visual and live performances moving rapidly between narrative and drama styles while creating a multi act/stage environment. I am sure there is a lot we can learn from their way of thinking and creative skills.
One other item that is noteworthy, albeit its controversial theme, is 'Beri Sil' a 'ballet' based on 'Kolam' tradition. It was well composed, presented and acted acquiring the essentials elements of the traditions with an eye to detail.
Finally, I am sure its time for our friends at the Cultural Forum to review the contents, structure and style of the past events and evolve a process to ensure the quality of future performances.
Nissanka Dharmathilake - BMR 2008
“Kandak Vilila Kendak Veduwa Wage” is the only way I can describe the quality of the BMR 2008 (Sandakada Asna). Despite experiencing a lot of obstacles and unnecessary workloads, the technical team did a wonderful job in delivering the show and finishing it 20 minutes before midnight. I take my hat off to the members of the Tech Team.
Although we witnessed some individual brilliance from a few artists (e.g. Gaja Manu, Beri Sil and dance routine for Ran Pokunen etc.), most of the presented items were quite inferior. I don’t want to do an item by item analysis of all the items because it won’t serve any purpose. But I would like to highlight the following issues for your consideration:
1. At the 1st production group meeting we all agreed that the primary objective of the BMR 2008 should be presenting a high quality show which won’t run more than 3 ½ hours. Within a couple of weeks this objective was ripped into pieces by the decision makers by accommodating 58 out of 60 expressions of interests. This was the primary reason (among the many other reasons) for ended up in staging a poor quality show.
2. Since 2005/06 period the SCF has been using certain guidelines for the selection of artists and participants. I’m 100% sure those guidelines were totally ignored by decision makers, causing a lot of practical problems in the items line-up.
3. There was an unwarranted attempt to copy the basic framework of the BMR 2006 (Demansala Abiyasa). It simply shows that we didn’t learn anything from last year’s experience.
4. As other people highlighted earlier, most of the dance routines and song items looked monotonous and lacked any depth. I believe it was result of using same old artists in a somewhat stale format.
5. There wasn’t enough room for new thinking, especially presenting items appealing to our younger audience.
6. Decision makers of the SCF should possess a bit of imagination to visualise the show from the audience’s point of view. Our loyal audience is the most important stakeholder in this endeavour. Further, we should be brave enough to take bold decisions. That is the only way to success. Trying to please everyone (mainly Sydney’s self appointed artists) will not lead to anything other that organised debacle. It was well proven beyond any doubt.
Vasantha Saparamadu - BMR 2008
Now onto some serious memories. BMR won't be complete if we don't talk about Simon. I'll first talk about bad things he did - because there was only one, as far as I was aware. I have already mentioned this incident to some of you. During rehearsals, for items that needed a CD-start cue in the middle, Simon asked me to start the CD by pressing SPACE on his laptop. Everything went well. During the show, I reminded Simon about the CD cue for 'muwanpelessa' item when the previous item finished. I also told him that when the MC says a particular phrase ('.....welawa 8.30 yi'), the CD has to be started. The MC said the phrase, I tried to press the SPACE on Simon's laptop. He brushed me aside and shouted, "Don't touch my computer, ever!". I just said, "Sorry" (No point in arguing with him at that time) and moved away, and there was a long pause there for the item, and eventually he started the CD.
Lesson learnt: As a result of this new practice of playing CDs from the hard disk, we no longer have control over when to start CDs. And items suffer. Perhaps, next time, we should take our own laptop to play CDs (like the visuals laptop. CD laptop has to be a dedicated one, and cannot share the visuals laptop) - so that the SCF sound guy can regain the control to play the CDs when he needs to play, without being at the mercy of Simon.
And, if we can, we should get rid of that pause when the BMR DVD is made.
Lesson learnt: As a result of this new practice of playing CDs from the hard disk, we no longer have control over when to start CDs. And items suffer. Perhaps, next time, we should take our own laptop to play CDs (like the visuals laptop. CD laptop has to be a dedicated one, and cannot share the visuals laptop) - so that the SCF sound guy can regain the control to play the CDs when he needs to play, without being at the mercy of Simon.
And, if we can, we should get rid of that pause when the BMR DVD is made.
Now, bad things we did to Simon. Well, where do I start?
1) The video man WHOM WE PAY. Sadly, I mentioned this at our very first meeting too. In my past experience, one thing that causes great annoyance to Simon is the VERY late arrival of the video man, causing great disruption to Simon's work. And that's exactly what happened this time too. Simon, Ananda and I were just about to try synchronising a late-arrived CD with a DVD that had a glitch in its sound. (To Simon's credit, he was willing to try it, though he had the right to say that he didn't want any new CDs at the last moment). And this had to be disrupted because videoman just arrived (hours late) and he needed Simon. That was only the start. Right throughout the afternoon, Simon was interrupted many times by the videoman's wrong connector, faulty cable, faulty camera, running cables along the floor without properly securing them, no power lead etc, etc, etc. Even when we called the lunch break, videoman wanted more attention from Simon. Pissing off Simon this way has very bad consequences for the rest of the day.
Because of the late arrival and all the issues, we didn't even get a single chance to test live projection during the rehearsals.
Lesson: This is not a one-off occurrence. We need to tackle this issue seriously. If a person we pay can't come on time, then we need to get someone who can. Contrast this with the true professionalism shown by all unpaid volunteers.
2) Lunch break. Although we called a lunch break, we didn't give Simon a lunch/toilet break at all, because he had to set up sounds for the band at that time. We shouldn't have scheduled it for that time. He ended up eating something kept under the sound desk while working. (I hope he didn't have a toilet break under the sound desk as well). Once or twice, at my real work, I had to go to a remote site to work with different vendors coming in at different times, and I ended up not having any break for 8 hours. In the end, I was real close to punching someone's nose in. So, I fully understand any great anger in Simon at that point in time (remember, this is still before the start of the show), and to his credit, he didn't behave violently!
Lesson: We have to schedule a real lunch break for Hills centre staff, so that they are free to leave the work.
3) Stupid fire act. In my opinion, this is when Simon exercised greatest restraint. Honestly, if I were Simon, I would have called a halt to proceedings at once. He had every right to stop the show, and as he had said, it was an illegal act. Full credit to Simon for the way he handled the situation.
Lesson: We have to do something to educate our artists as to what they can/can't do. Perhaps, we should get them to sign a document making them financially responsible for any deliberate OHS violations etc..
All in all, I think we need to lift our game before we can point the finger at Simon.
Regards,
Vasantha
P.S. I have put all my silly 'group photos' in one place http://nvsaparam.googlepages.
Maybe in 10 years' time (Hopefully, by then, I would be able to just come in the queue, sit down and watch BMR!) I'll look back at them with fond memories.
Mahinda Karunarathne - BMR 2007_2nd post
Dear All,
Thank you for your interest and making valuable comments about BMR. I think BMR BLOG is a great idea to keep all info at one place. I have added some more comments we have received to BMR BLOG today .
As Buddhi has rightly pointed out BMR is a huge project with over $200,000 direct and indirect expenses. We have many groups (Admin(SCF), Production, Technical, Marketing, Media, Ticketing, Venue Management, Logistics, Item Producers, performers Etc. totaling over 400 people ) and an audience of over 1000 people associated with this project. Dedication and commitment from all groups/teams are very important to run this project smoothly. When we implement a project of this magnitude in a short duration of time each group/team try their best to deliver tasks allocated to them and they have no time to communicate with other groups. Therefore, it is very important to get views/comments from all parties and analyse them to get the right balance regarding the views on BMR.
BMR is not just a show. It is a major cultural event with many objectives. So we also need to understand that there is a conflict of interest among groups contributing to BMR.
For example, if we look at from the audience view point, the best achievement for them is to watch a good quality show at a cheaper price without any interruption ,delays etc. This can easily be achieved by staging a show with few professional artists. However, if we do this, other BMR objectives such as providing a complete stage with modern facilities to our children, youth and artists in NSW with Sri Lankan origin, transfer of knowledge to locals from professional artists, promoting SCF etc. can not be achieved. (these objectives compromise the quality of the show).
Therefore SCF committee faces a real challenge when organising BMR to get the right balance to ensure all its objectives are met. But one thing is clear. During this balancing exercise things are compromised , measurement are subjective, and as a result one can always find something wrong unless he/she can understand the broader objectives of BMR.
Sam has rightly stated in his comments "The majority of people in SL community do not have the slightest idea about the mental and physical agonies of the people who work hard in these committees.". SCF committee members who have closely associated in organising BMR in this year as well as in the past know how true this is !!!
Regards.
Mahinda
Thank you for your interest and making valuable comments about BMR. I think BMR BLOG is a great idea to keep all info at one place. I have added some more comments we have received to BMR BLOG today .
As Buddhi has rightly pointed out BMR is a huge project with over $200,000 direct and indirect expenses. We have many groups (Admin(SCF), Production, Technical, Marketing, Media, Ticketing, Venue Management, Logistics, Item Producers, performers Etc. totaling over 400 people ) and an audience of over 1000 people associated with this project. Dedication and commitment from all groups/teams are very important to run this project smoothly. When we implement a project of this magnitude in a short duration of time each group/team try their best to deliver tasks allocated to them and they have no time to communicate with other groups. Therefore, it is very important to get views/comments from all parties and analyse them to get the right balance regarding the views on BMR.
BMR is not just a show. It is a major cultural event with many objectives. So we also need to understand that there is a conflict of interest among groups contributing to BMR.
For example, if we look at from the audience view point, the best achievement for them is to watch a good quality show at a cheaper price without any interruption ,delays etc. This can easily be achieved by staging a show with few professional artists. However, if we do this, other BMR objectives such as providing a complete stage with modern facilities to our children, youth and artists in NSW with Sri Lankan origin, transfer of knowledge to locals from professional artists, promoting SCF etc. can not be achieved. (these objectives compromise the quality of the show).
Therefore SCF committee faces a real challenge when organising BMR to get the right balance to ensure all its objectives are met. But one thing is clear. During this balancing exercise things are compromised , measurement are subjective, and as a result one can always find something wrong unless he/she can understand the broader objectives of BMR.
Sam has rightly stated in his comments "The majority of people in SL community do not have the slightest idea about the mental and physical agonies of the people who work hard in these committees.". SCF committee members who have closely associated in organising BMR in this year as well as in the past know how true this is !!!
Regards.
Mahinda
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