Joesitz said:
As for Wagner which I never thought could be skated, I was amazed at S&P. It was like they were involved in a love duet under drugs. And that's the way the composer wanted it.
Joe
LOL, Joe! I think you hit the nail.
Mathman,
I know you didn't ask me this, but you asked about Faulkner and Stryon re hypergraphia. Compared to writers such as Celine, Musil, and Delillo, to name just a few--and hey, what about many of the pulp and romance novelists!--Faulkner and Styron just seem to me like regular writers. However, it is interesting, IMO, that Styron had clinical depression. I'm not giving anything away, Styron wrote a book about it, "Darkness Visible." Now here I don't know, but I wonder if in his younger days he had bipolar disorder aka manic depression, and if his extensive writing might not have been related to the times when he might have been somewhat manic. Of course this is pure speculation on my part.
As for Faulkner, the number of novels, short stories, poetry, speeches, etc. that he did is incredibly extensive, but writers since the Greeks who were captured by "the muse" wrote a ton. Just look at Dickens. Practically died trying to finish "The Mystery of Edwin Drood." Yet there is no evidence that Dickens had anything like temporal lobe epilipsy or any other neurologic or mental problem. Dickens did, however, have a childhood of hell and an adulthood that was a near constant source of frustration and anguish. Scholars of Dickens have opined that his extraordinary output of writing was his way of excorsicing the demons of his childhood and frustrations of his adult life.
But then you have Shakespeare (assuming it was WS who was Shakespeare) who was apparently a happy family man.
I think when you look at artists from all disciplines since the Greeks, the great ones range from prolific to having produced just a few works (eg, Vermeer), from having happy healthy lives to tormented lives with chronic illness, and on and on with similar oppositions. Also, an visual artist can have a minimalist style and still be unbelievably prolific.
Anyway, I guess my point is that the way artists produce their work is as varied as people's personalities, whether it be music, writing, dance, or whatever.
Back to Fumie (trying to get back on topic), as I said before, there are many individual things I like about Fumie's skating and in interviews I find her personality is very charming. But in certain ways I agree with Nadine and Dizzy--although I disagree with Nadine that Fumie went through a period of trying to imitate Michelle. I think any similarity came from working with Lori Nichol and Fumie's natural style. Allthough as Lori and Fumie continue to work together, I see Lori choreographing programs that are more uniquely Fumie and Fumie finding her own unique style. From the blades down, I think Fumie is wonderful, perhaps best in the world. And her final scratch spin is just about the only ladies scratch spin that truly blurs. But coming from a dance background (I think it was in my DNA since I can remember being three years old and wearing out my "Tina the Ballerina" record by constantly dancing to it, lol), the dance ability makes a big difference to me as to how much I get into a skater. For example, I'll be loving Fumie's stroking--wonderful speed, edges, and flow--and then she'll do a combo spin, where I find the positions to be stiff and incomplete, and I'm out of love. And so it goes through her programs for me, love things like the stroking and her scratch spin, but there are more things that I don't love about her skating. It's not Fumie as a person, it's just my preferences re skating in general. However, I am happy for her when she skates well and wins.
I just saw Fumie skate her Mozart LP almost cleanly at NHK (landed four triples) and although I loved that she skated to Mozart, neither the choreography nor the performance grabbed me, and I thought it would. I love her SP to a string/piano transciption of the Stones' "Paint It Black," but Mozart didn't do it for me. At least at NHK, I felt Fumie's line on everything, her free leg on her jump landings, spirals, spin positions, everything except her beautiful edges, speed, and that killer great final scratch, did not reflect for me the crisp clean style of Mozart. Perhaps that's why I liked her so much in "Paint It Black." Even in the string/piano transcription, you can still feel that throbbing beat and wild Mick style of the original. For me, somehow the softer version of "Paint It Black" combined with Fumie's natural style and Lori's choreography was a perfect fit. I hope to see more like it.
Rgirl
) at the very crescendo of "I Vow To Thee, My Country", which literally traversed the entire length of the rink (no lie). That's the very moment I can pinpoint exactly where I got choked up with the rest of the crowd, which was was so silent you could hear a pin drop. And then I recall her ending the program with a blinding fast combo. spin, and I think the crowd gave her a good round of applause, but not very huge b/c she had a few minor mistakes near the end. I didn't care, I was clapping & cheering my head off in my livingroom (no lie) ~ felt real happy for her. 
), that "Paint It Black" could be the start of something big. On with the show, this is it!
looks so much like BOTH her parents. I bet I can guess at least one of the two pro skaters who could do Mozart.
