South Korean License Madness

Cha Sa-soon with her new license. Be afraid--be very afraid.

It’s one of those items that newspapers and the Web can’t resist: the human- interest story. From South Korea comes the news that Cha Sa-soon, 69, had just gotten her driver’s license. What made it newsworthy was that it took 960 tries to obtain it. Yep—that’s right—she flunked 959 times between April of 2005 and August 2010.

What’s really weird is that no one seems to be questioning whether such a person should be behind the wheel. The testing agency was happy when she passed, her driving school instructors burst into applause, and Hyundai gave her a new car, and she’s now starring in a TV commercial. Has South Korea gone collectively insane?

Shall I raise the obvious? Somebody needs to! The woman is 69, a time in which her reaction time will certainly have slowed. Don’t you think that someone who flunked 959 times might just need a tad more reaction time? And how does one flunk a friggin’ driver’s test 959 times? If you look to the highways and byways in your town you will quickly notice that there are motorists out there with IQs surpassed by the average potted plant. Let’s face it, the only test on the planet easier than a driver’s test is a urine test and if you flunk the first test 959 times it makes one wonder how Cha Sa-soon would fare on the latter. How does one even get to take the test that many times? Note to South Korea: Put a lifetime cap on how many times one can retest.

Second note: Shouldn’t one investigate the qualifications of the driving “school” that Cha Sa-soon attended? If an elementary school flunked a first-grader this many times, wouldn’t you shutter it? And a new car? Sheesh, this woman wouldn’t be safe in a Brinks truck. Suggestion for Cha Sa-soon: Sell the car and buy a water buffalo and cart. To my friend who lives in South Korea: Please don’t drive; it’s not safe.

The only virtue I find in this story is that it makes us realize that the United States doesn’t have the market cornered on bad ideas.--LV

Natalie in motion--the only way you'll ever see her!

Natalie MacMaster
August 20, 2010
Calvin Theater
Northampton, MA

It’s hard to believe that I’ve been following Natalie MacMaster’s career for almost a quarter of a century. It seems like only yesterday she was a corkscrew-haired teen prodigy. Now she’s a mature 38, has three kids, and is introducing wunderkind of her own, including Emily Jean Flack, a sixteen-year-old niece who’s a singing and step-dancing sensation, and Nathaniel Smith, an accomplished cellist who is also just sixteen. But make no mistake—Natalie is still the star and when she turns it on, nothing stands in her way—not rising talent, not slick band members, not even a fourth child just three months from its debut.

As for turning it on, that took MacMaster all of about ten seconds during her recent show at the Calvin Theater. She stepped on stage, waved, and hit the gas. I once described MacMaster as a “musical perpetual motion machine” and that remains accurate. Two things happen when MacMaster puts bow to fiddle—the music flows like crashing waves and her body surfs the notes. To say that she moves with the music is the understatement of the year—Natalie MacMaster becomes the notes that pour from her instrument. Most of us joke about not being able to walk and chew gum at the same time, but watch this gal for a few minutes and you will feel like the klutz in the bad joke. It’s not enough that she tears off jigs and reels with perfection and ease—she does so while step-dancing, clogging, moon-walking, and fancy dancing. You read that correctly—she plays and dances at the same time. When she wants to get really serious she puts down the bow and let’s her feet thunder to Thor-like cadences.

MacMaster enjoys the well-earned reputation of being the living exemplar of Cape Breton fiddling. It would, however, be a misrepresentation to hang an exclusive label on her current repertoire. To be sure, Cape Breton’s fast-paced reels, driving strathspeys, and energetic jigs continue to shape her set list, but MacMaster has expanded her horizons considerably. The Calvin show was shot full of jazz, Americana, pop, and experimental sounds. Her original tunes, once so identifiably Celtic, now use that core to create a global sound. And if your last experience seeing her on stage was as a shy and self-conscious twenty-something, you’ll be shocked to see how confident she’s become. She doesn’t merely play with the band, she orchestrates it and isn’t at all hesitant to fly across the stage to dual with her bass player, trade riffs with her pianist, make her cello player skedaddle up and down the strings, or challenge her drummer to match her clogging feet beat for beat. In short, Natalie MacMaster has become a spectacle to match her enormous musical prowess.

It makes sense in a way. Cape Breton music is fabulous fun, but it’s not known for being subtle. MacMaster threw out some astonishing runs, trills, and ornamentation, but her music always returned to its danceable roots. This was true even of the pieces that were clearly jazz-influenced. They began edgy and contemplative, but most of them finished with that full-bodied flourish that is MacMaster’s trademark. The audience clapped, swayed, tapped their feet, and cheered lustily. How not? MacMaster made it nearly impossible to sit still.

To be balanced, it was not a flawless performance. There were one or two transitions that seemed forced—as if the slower intro had to be overcome in order to get to the quicker-paced tunes. Paradoxically, there were also times in which the show appeared too slick—perfectly timed abrupt endings, dramatic poses, stagey interactions…. And though I think that Flack has an amazing voice for a sixteen-year-old, I just don’t think kids that young can really sing songs such as “When You’re Smiling” or “Somewhere over the Rainbow.” Like most young singers, Flack hit the notes but missed the essence. Put simply, one needs more experience to sing jazz effectively and more depth to impress with a show tune. Flack was at her best showcasing her agile dancing ability, an activity at which she appeared accomplished rather than apprenticed.

But here’s the deal—these were things I noticed because it’s a critic’s job to notice them. Most of the large audience in attendance surrendered to the spectacle, and who can blame them? Even though not everything gelled, I can’t imagine that too many people left feeling as they hadn’t gotten their money’s worth. Natalie MacMaster is, simply, one of the most electrifying performers you’ll ever see. If you get a chance to hear her before she takes time off to have her baby, by all means do so. Natalie MacMaster is an original talent—the sort best labeled a force of nature. As for nature, with all that jumping about I suspect the newest addition will dance its way out of the womb!

Eilen Jewell Butcher Holler Honors Loretta Lynn

EILEN JEWELL
Butcher Holler: A Tribute to Loretta Lynn

Signature Sounds
* * * *

In the 1960s Loretta Lynn was the biggest star in country music. Her glow was fading a bit by the time Sissy Spacek portrayed her in the 1980 biopic Coal Miner’s Daughter. Get ready for the next resurrection—Eilen Jewell’s stunning 2010 tribute to Lynn is sure to spark interest. Jewell covers a dozen Lynn classics, including “You’re Looking at Country,” “Whispering Sea,” and “I’m a Honky Tonk Girl,” but it’s the racier material that really stands the test of time. Lynn knew hard times; she was married at 13 and had four of her six kids by the time she was 19. She stayed married, though her husband cheated in her repeatedly and often told interviewers that he never hit her without getting hit back. She sang about all of this, with a plastered on smile framed by seriously big hair.

Jewell shines on Lynn’s tougher material. She offers a kick-butt “You Ain’t Woman Enough (To Take My Man),” some wink-wink naughtiness on “Deep as Your Pocket,” and hints at violence in “Fist City” and “Don’t Come Home a-Drinkin’ (with Lovin’ on Your Mind),” songs that remind us of how gutsy Lynn’s repertoire was for its time. Jewell is smooth and swingy where Lynn was twang and honky tonk but, if anything, Jewell—ably insisted by Johnny Sciascia’s walking bass lines, Jason Beck’s slap percussion, and Jerry Miller’s robust guitar—enhances Lynn’s do-me-wrong-and-I’ll-do-you-worse defiance. This is the kind of album that makes you look into his eyes and smile as throw a right hook to the bastard’s jaw.

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I knew civilization was lurking somewhere! Sign in Ottawa, Canada but apparently one must go to Gatineau, Quebec to escape savagery.