#25 — A Perfect Day
COMPOSED & PREMIERED BY PERCUSSIONIST SAE HASHIMOTO AND PIANIST CHIRSTOPHER GOODPASTURE, INSPIRED BY GUS REED’S SHORT FILM, “A PERFECT DAY”
“I made this short video after hearing about a song, "A Perfect Day," written by Carrie Jacobs-Bond in 1909, that my great-grandfather used to sing to my grandmother and her siblings when they were young. It was a popular parlor song at the time. Its lyrics are about coming home and having a moment alone to reflect at the end of a perfect day, a day that has been spent with friends and loved ones. There's this sense of melancholy and loneliness to it, sunset imagery that seems to reflect on the end of a life and not just the end of a day, a private reckoning. A few years ago, my grandmother visited a medium. She went in very skeptical, but the medium asked her: did your father used to sing you songs, maybe one about coming home at the end of the day? So it resonates a lot with me now, too. It feels a connection to my family and generations that were gone before I was born.
To make the video, I set a camera up on a tripod in my bedroom at the time, in late afternoon light, and just put the song on and tried a few different movement ideas. This is the one I liked the most, a very simple slow gesture of someone holding themself. I tried to have as much tension in my body throughout, a lot of resistance to this sort of closing in onto myself. You can see my whole body trembling with the effort.”
EXTENDED CONVERSATION
Join us for an extended conversation with Sae Hashimoto, Christopher Goodpasture and Gus Reed regarding their virtual collaboration for the "Stay-at-Home Symposium." Moderated by Musaics of the Bay Artistic Director Audrey Vardanega, Sae, Christopher and Gus discuss their artistic backgrounds and their collaborative process.
