Aurelia Butler

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    ‘Pedro Páramo’ Review: A Ghost Story Lacking in Spirit

    In this grave adaptation of Juan Rulfo’s surreal novel, the living pray for salvation and the dead murmur regrets, but the filmmaking is oddly orthodox.The Mexican writer Juan Rulfo’s mystifying 1955 novel “Pedro Páramo” is, at least in the English-speaking world, most often invoked for its influence on Gabriel García Márquez. But admirers of the book (Susan Sontag famously among them) have long cited it as a masterpiece of spare surrealism.It is odd, then, that Netflix’s new adaptation, directed by the cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto, is a rather orthodox work. Where this rich, metaphysical text might have come alive in dreamlike abstraction, Prieto and his screenwriter, Mateo Gil, instead content themselves with a prestige Western on terra firma — grave, good-looking and uninspiring.The story opens as Juan Preciado (Tenoch Huerta Mejía), our narrator, treks to the vale hamlet of Comala in search of its cacique, Pedro Páramo (Manuel García-Rulfo). He arrives to find Pedro dead and the village deserted, save for murmuring specters. From there, the movie becomes nonlinear, restlessly flitting around in time to chronicle how decades of yearning, anguish and the Páramo family’s sins eroded Comala’s spirit. What emerges is a lugubrious and at times frightening ghost saga in which the living fear hell and the dead bemoan past injustices.Yet for all its sprawling, “Pedro Páramo” also has a lot of talking. There are countless scenes of Pedro giving orders; only some of his stooges doing his bidding. The women, helpless and subordinate, mostly listen, except for Dorotea (Giovanna Zacarías), doomed to die penniless and then, from the grave, assist Juan in voice-over. A picture may be worth a thousand words, but at over two hours, this visual adaptation of Rulfo’s only novel rambles without much to say.Pedro PáramoRated R for violence and visions. Running time: 2 hours 10 minutes. Watch on Netflix. More

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    5 Minutes That Will Make You Love the Vibraphone

    Are the vibes good? These tracks by Milt Jackson, Lionel Hampton, Roy Ayers and others, chosen by 12 musicians and writers, should convince you.We’re living in the era of “vibes.” But before that word was everywhere — before elections had “vibe shifts” and before a first date could be breezily ended because the vibes were just off — there was the instrument that started it all: the vibraphone.If you aren’t quite sure what that sounds like — well, there’s only one way to describe it. It’s vibey.Invented in the 1920s as an electrified variation of the marimba, the vibraphone is made out of tuned metal bars, which the player strikes with mallets; a tubular resonator that carries the sound; and a set of electronically controlled fans affecting how much vibrato goes on the notes (that is, how much they warble). Out of this complex contraption wafts a sound that is mellow and ethereal, but starkly rhythmic. After all, the vibraphone is a percussion instrument: Most vibraphonists who double on something else play the drums.The vibraphone has been a feature of jazz bandstands since about 1930, when a young Lionel Hampton — one of the first improvisers to master it — impressed Louis Armstrong by playing along with the trumpeter’s solos note for note. At Armstrong’s encouragement, he switched from being a full-time drummer to a vibraphonist. As its popularity grew, jazz musicians gave the instrument a nickname: “the vibes,” a term that came to signify not just the instrument’s metal bars and their vibrations but also the hazy, moody feeling that its sound produced.It is little wonder that, amid the revolutionary grooves of the 1960s, that term made the leap from jazz (and from Black American vernacular) to the general population. In the process, it gave us a slightly more musical way of describing everyday life.In the nearly 100 years since Hampton’s innovation, the vibraphone has traveled through the many shifts and stages of jazz and Black American music. These days, it’s being played by a broad range of musicians — from straight-ahead swingers to avant-gardists — a number of whom are quoted below. Read on for an array of vibes-heavy tracks, selected by musicians and writers. You can find a playlist at the bottom of the article, and if you have a personal favorite that wasn’t on the list, go ahead and drop it in the comments.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Shenseea’s Dancehall Music Makes Women ‘Feel Free’

    While touring the Bob Marley Museum in Kingston, Jamaica, on a Saturday in late September, Shenseea, the dancehall pop singer, paused at a glass case. Inside was the Grammy lifetime achievement award that Mr. Marley received posthumously in 2001.“Haffi get one,” she said in Jamaican Patois of her desire to win a Grammy of her own.Shenseea, 28, who was wearing a cropped turquoise halter top, a matching flowy skirt and Louis Vuitton slides, has already come closer than many. In 2022, she was up for album of the year for her work as a collaborator on Ye’s album “Donda.”The museum occupies Mr. Marley’s former home in the Jamaican capital, where Shenseea also has a residence. Though she was raised mostly in Kingston and grew up listening to Mr. Marley’s reggae music, she had never been to the museum before.“He made it so cool to be a rasta,” Shenseea said, referring to Mr. Marley’s association with the Jamaican spiritual movement Rastafarianism. She had left the museum and was sitting in the back seat of a white Mercedes-Benz, playing a string of breezy new songs she has yet to release. Mr. Marley, Shenseea continued, “showed the people that it’s OK to live your life the way you want to, even though it’s different.”The same could be said for Shenseea. Dancehall, a musical genre known for its suggestive lyrics and provocative visual style, was not a feature of her upbringing in a Christian household. “I wasn’t allowed to listen to dancehall music when I was young,” Shenseea said. “When I was in high school, that’s when I fell in love with it.”She is now among the brightest young stars of the genre, which blossomed in the 1970s in Kingston and is named for the dance halls that held parties in the city.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Leni Riefenstahl’s Nazi Beliefs Seen in New Film

    Recent access to Leni Riefenstahl’s estate has prompted new discussions in Germany about her politics and a reconsideration of her photographs of the Nuba people in Sudan.Two decades after her death, the German director Leni Riefenstahl occupies an uneasy place in film history. She directed two influential movies that are still studied for their aesthetic ambitions despite being propaganda for the Third Reich: “Triumph of the Will,” a visually striking film about the Nazi party’s 1934 rally in Nuremberg, and “Olympia,” about the 1936 Berlin Olympics.After World War II, she was declared a Nazi follower, after four denazification proceedings. Later, Riefenstahl tried to recast herself as an apolitical artist. New access to the estate of the director, who died in 2003 at 101, has prompted a debate in Germany about how to manage her political legacy — and about whether her postwar rehabilitation was based on false premises.Last week, “Riefenstahl,” a documentary by the filmmaker Andres Veiel that uses recordings and letters from the estate to argue she had willfully concealed her support for Nazism, was released in German cinemas. And at a symposium in Berlin last month, researchers presented the results of a yearslong project investigating the impact of Riefenstahl’s photography of the Nuba people in Sudan.In a video interview, Veiel said that renewed scrutiny of Riefenstahl was justified by findings in her estate, which was donated in 2018 to the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation in Berlin and comprises 700 boxes filled with film rolls, photographs and audio recordings, among other items.Riefenstahl welcoming Adolf Hitler in her villa in the Dahlem neighborhood of Berlin in 1937, in a contact sheet of photos taken by Heinrich Hoffmann, Hitler’s official photographer.Bayerische Staatsbibliothek/BildarchivThe material “contradicts the basic perspective, her legend, that she had sold to the outside world,” he said. “Even in her old age, she believed in Nazi ideology.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Tyka Nelson, Sister of Prince Who Carved Her Own Path, Dies at 64

    Out from under an imposing shadow, she recorded four albums as a singer and had two R&B hits before turning her focus to her brother’s legacy.Tyka Nelson, who was once called “the most famous unknown singer” as she followed her brother, Prince, into a four-album recording career, and who helped promote his legacy after his death in 2016, died on Monday in Robbinsdale, Minn. She was 64.Her death, in a hospital, was announced in a statement by her son President Nelson. He did not cite a cause.Tyka Evene Nelson, the only full sibling of Prince Rogers Nelson — who assumed his mononymic persona and began his rapid rise to fame in the late 1970s — was born on May 18, 1960, in Minneapolis to John L. Nelson, a factory worker who performed as a jazz pianist under the name Prince Rogers, and Mattie (Shaw) Nelson, a jazz singer.With her first album, “Royal Blue” (1988), Ms. Nelson drew comparisons to Anita Baker, Sade and Laura Nyro.NoneBy the time Ms. Nelson embarked on a music career of her own, her brother had been turning pop music inside out with his kaleidoscopic fusion of funk, rock, R&B and the color purple for a decade. With the release in 1988 of her debut album, “Royal Blue,” an adult contemporary rumination on love and relationships, The Minneapolis Star Tribune compared Ms. Nelson to Anita Baker, Sade and Laura Nyro.But it was another inevitable comparison that she found impossible to shake. “I was praying one day, I said, ‘Please, God, why can’t I sound like CeCe Winans?’” Ms. Nelson recalled in a 2018 interview with Australian television, referring to the star gospel artist. “Then people said I sound like him, so it’s definitely not intentional.” Still, she added, “If there’s anyone you can compare me to, c’mon, you might as well compare me to the best, right?”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    9 Great Songs That Mention Baseball Stars

    The playlist to get you through Major League Baseball’s long offseason.Bad Bunny has frequently mentioned baseball players in his songs.Caroline Brehman/EPA, via ShutterstockDear listeners,I’m back! A big thank you to Jon Caramanica, Marc Tracy and Dave Renard, the three guest playlisters who filled in for me while I took a few weeks off. The Amplifier returns to its regular schedule today, though, just in time for … I don’t know, anything important going on this week?Ah, yes, of course! It’s the first official week of Major League Baseball’s off-season.The M.L.B. playoffs were particularly thrilling this year, and for a moment it looked like we might get a New York miracle: a Subway World Series. Alas, it wasn’t to be. Despite deep postseason runs from the Yankees and my beloved Mets, the Los Angeles Dodgers ultimately prevailed and won it all. At least we Mets fans got to see The Temptations serenade Citi Field with the shortstop Francisco Lindor’s beloved walk-up song, “My Girl.”Those two great American pastimes, baseball and pop music, have long gone hand in hand. (Or is it hand in glove?) In honor of another great season in the books, today’s playlist is a collection of just a few of the many songs that refer to great ballplayers, with era-spanning tunes from The Treniers’ novelty hit about Willie Mays up through Bad Bunny’s many recent shout-outs to modern superstars. You’ll also hear tracks from the Beastie Boys, Faye Webster and Belle and Sebastian, among others.You certainly don’t have to know anything about baseball to enjoy this playlist. If you’re a fan, though, I hope it helps you endure the long offseason drought. When times get difficult, just remember: Pitchers and catchers report in mid-February.Life outside the diamond is a wrench,LindsayListen along while you read.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    When Quincy Jones Worked With Michael Jackson, ‘We Had No Limitations’

    Their work on “Off the Wall,” “Thriller,” and “Bad” set records for commercial success and defined the sound of the 1980s.Quincy Jones first met Michael Jackson in the early 1970s at Sammy Davis Jr.’s house in Los Angeles, when the 12-year-old was still a bubble-gum soul singer leading his brothers in the Jackson 5.Jones and Jackson’s second meeting, at the end of that decade, proved the more pivotal, both for them and for the future of pop music. Jackson landed a role as Scarecrow in “The Wiz”; Jones had been hired as the music supervisor for the film.What came next cemented one of the most celebrated musical relationships of all time. The pairing of Jones, a noted composer, arranger and producer for jazz and R&B acts, and Jackson, the child star looking for a breakout sound, over three albums remains a career-defining arc that transformed pop music in the 1980s.Jones, who died Sunday at 91, spoke extensively about his working relationship with Jackson, telling The New York Times in a 2012 interview, “You’re looking at one of the most talented kids in the history of show business. Michael was very observant and detail-oriented. You put that together with my background of big-band arranging and composing, we had no limitations.”From left, Jackson, Diana Ross and Jones worked together on the 1978 film “The Wiz.”CBS, via Getty ImagesWith “Off the Wall,” Jackson’s solo debut released in 1979, Jones called on his wide-ranging network of studio musicians and collaborators, notably recruiting Rod Temperton from the band Heatwave to write songs for the album, including “Rock With You,” and “Burn This Disco Out.” “Don’t Stop ’Til You Get Enough,” the single that established the album’s polished disco grooves, won Jackson his first solo Grammy for best male R&B vocal performance.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    ‘Love Is Blind’ Resets, ‘Survivor’ Stalls: A Reality TV Check-in

    Subscribe to Popcast!Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon MusicLong-running reality-television franchises — with their familiar rhythms, tensions and resolutions — can provide a wonderful way to pass the time while, say, waiting for votes to be counted.The seventh season of “Love Is Blind” recently concluded with a pair of storybook weddings and a handful of collapsed connections. Following a stretch of public scrutiny that included lawsuits about labor conditions, it felt like an effort to underscore the show’s potential as a generator of true love.“Survivor,” now on its 47th season, has become a show about people who have previously been obsessed with “Survivor,” creating an echo chamber regarding the strategies deployed, and narrowing the casting to a certain kind of obsessive fan-turned-player.On this week’s Popcast, a palate-cleanse conversation about some of the year’s biggest reality-television shows, how legacy franchises develop a kind of self-awareness that can lead to change, and whether shows can ever benefit from full reboots that erase their history.Guests:Joe Coscarelli, The New York Times’s pop music reporterCaryn Ganz, The New York Times’s pop music editorConnect With Popcast. Become a part of the Popcast community: Join the show’s Facebook group and Discord channel. We want to hear from you! Tune in, and tell us what you think at popcast@nytimes.com. Follow our host, Jon Caramanica, on Twitter: @joncaramanica.Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. More