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These huge arts festivals can be overwhelming — how to figure out what's worth seeing? CP's sending someone to nearly every event PIFA's putting on over the next month to help you decide, so check back with Critical Mass all month long for comprehensive, ongoing reviews.
SHOW: 1096
GENRE: Dance
GROUP: Pasión y Arte/Fresh Blood
ATTENDED: Sat., April 6, 7:30 p.m., Fleischer Art Memorial
BRIEF SELF-DESCRIPTION: Two all-female-companies interweave women's stories through the layering of text, song and dance while investigating the dialogue between the distinct languages of its two artistic collaborators, flamenco and post-modern.
WE THINK: Flamenco, a centuries-old Spanish dance style featuring controlled structures and complex rhythms is an odd pairing with postmodern technique, built on release and rule-breaking. Plus, the piece is inspired by women's history from 1096 onward, and subtitled "The Birth of the First Female Gynecologist." Ay caramba, how's that gonna work?
Splendidly, it turns out. The divergent dance styles merge seamlessly, though Flamenco gets the upper hand. It's a treat to see the post modern aesthetic adapt flamenco's emotional fervor and expressive arm movements. The evocation of journey comes by way of the dancers moving about Fleisher Art Memorial's historic cathedral-style sanctuary, performing various flamenco forms and hybrids thereof. A live flamenco singer goes along, intoning poetic songs. The lyrics are Spanish, but even if you don't speak that language (like me), the passion and pathos ring through loud and clear. The audience is close to the action, making the performer's intensity all the more visceral. Powerfully expressive, this one worked on all fronts. Olé!
PREVIOUSLY IN PIFA: King's College does great justice to Britten.
These huge arts festivals can be overwhelming — how to figure out what's worth seeing? CP's sending someone to nearly every event PIFA's putting on over the next month to help you decide, so check back with Critical Mass all month long for comprehensive, ongoing reviews.
SHOW: Britten: A Boy Was Born
GENRE: Music
GROUP: The Choir of King’s College, Cambridge
ATTENDED: Sat., April 6, 7 p.m., Kimmel Center
BRIEF SELF-DESCRIPTION: Benjamin Britten was undoubtedly one of the greatest composers of the twentieth century, with a diverse catalogue of works still garnering international recognition. … On November 22, 1913, the Feast of St. Cecilia, a boy was born whose music we continue to celebrate in the centenary year of his birth.
WE THINK: The Choir of King’s College overcame any potential expectations of churchiness from a choral program of mostly sacred music with clear voices and a resonant organ. The range of voices expressed a range of human struggles, faults and joys through the spiritual experience. Higher voices encouraged optimism, as lower voices warned of doom. The intricate network of sounds from the choir caused the organ solo on “Prelude and Fugue on a Theme of Vittoria” to sound stark and plain.
The choir dispelled any idea of sweet, watery hymns met for pleasant and thoughtless listening. Even when singing the most life-affirming and love-focused lyrics, the deeper range of choristers had an authoritative and unnerving low spectrum that could make even the most confident atheist ponder the concept of an immortal soul. “Rejoice in the Lamb” in particular showcased the articulate force of the lower vocal ranges. Together with the organ, the choir created an unnerving but engaging sound.
—Elizabeth Gunto
These huge arts festivals can be overwhelming — how to figure out what's worth seeing? CP's sending someone to nearly every event PIFA's putting on over the next month to help you decide, so check back with Critical Mass all month long for comprehensive, ongoing reviews.
SHOW: The Arc of Curiosity
GENRE: Music
GROUP: Network for New Music
ATTENDED: 8 p.m. April 5, Rose Recital Hall
BRIEF SELF-DESCRIPTION: Follow that path of the arc of a composer’s curiosity, and discover the many ways that electronic sound can join traditional instruments to become part of our own musical landscape.
WE THINK: The full event description brings up ENIAC (the first all-purpose computer) and how combining electronic music with traditional instruments can lead to a "third space" that extends the human imagination, so you might expect electronics to have a central role in the music. However, with these works technology mostly plays second fiddle to standard chamber music instruments. The combined sounds are of studious process-oriented design, more intellectual than emotional; the exception being James Primosh's Chamber Concerto, which features expressive clarinet solos and hints of jazz swing music.
And what of the "third space" to extend our imagination? Well, that's in the ear of the beholder. I noticed lots of folks listening with their eyes closed to more clearly focus on the sonics: A sign of minds letting the music take you away to private places, though I found these works to be too punctilious to be so moved myself.
PREVIOUSLY IN PIFA: Lady history in books.
These huge arts festivals can be overwhelming — how to figure out what's worth seeing? CP's sending someone to nearly every event PIFA's putting on over the next month to help you decide, so check back with Critical Mass all month long for comprehensive, ongoing reviews.
SHOW: From Seneca Falls to Philadelphia: Fourth of July 1876 and the Women of the Centennial
GENRE: Lecture/exhibition
GROUP: Athenaeum of Philadelphia / Philadelphia Center for the Book
ATTENDED: Friday, April 5, 5 p.m., Athenaeum of Philadelphia
CLOSES: April 27
BRIEF SELF-DESCRIPTION: The Athenaeum’s extensive collections regarding the 1876 Centennial Exposition combine in this exhibition with the response of contemporary book artists to the themes of the Centennial, Susan B. Anthony and Women’s Suffrage, and the 1876 Fourth of July.
WE THINK: Even without this year’s PIFA theme for context, stepping into the Athenaeum of Philadelphia feels a bit like traveling backwards in time. A member-supported library designed and built in the mid 19th-century, it’s an obvious fit for an exhibition celebrating Philadelphia women of the centennial. “From Seneca Falls to Philadelphia” features work by ten contemporary book artists responding to themes of patriotism and women’s rights.
Several of the pieces are fictional accounts of Philadelphia women of the era—imaged facsimiles of what their personal journals or photo albums might have looked like. Others are more formally experimental, like Susan Bonthron’s Almost There, a scroll printed with the silhouettes of famous female suffragists and contained by four walls of translucent American flags. The exhibition’s standout piece is Carol Phillips To The Ladies Declaration. A two-dimensional work formed by two joined, light green pages, Phillips’ piece juxtaposes text from the Declaration of the Rights of Women of the United States with text and images from a corset pamphlet distributed by Alice C. Fletcher & Company. (We weren't allowed to take photos in the gallery, unfortunately.)
PREVIOUSLY IN PIFA: Dizzy Gillespie on Philly jazz.
These huge arts festivals can be overwhelming — how to figure out what's worth seeing? CP's sending someone to nearly every event PIFA's putting on over the next month to help you decide, so check back with Critical Mass all month long for comprehensive, ongoing reviews.
SHOW: Last Call at the Downbeat
GENRE: Theater/music
GROUP: Jazz Bridge
ATTENDED: Fri., April 5, 8 p.m.,, Society Hill Playhouse
CLOSES: April 13
BRIEF SELF-DESCRIPTION: In November, 1942, 25-year-old trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie is in Philadelphia leading his own quartet at the Downbeat Club… he’s anxious to play you a little and tell you a lot about Philadelphia jazz — back in the day.
WE THINK: The voice of Dizzy Gillespie is divided between two performers in Suzanne Cloud’s new play: the energetic actor Erin Fleming portrays the legendary trumpeter as a gregarious 25-year-old sharing his life story, while Duane Eubanks blows some pre-bop trumpet, fronting a quartet standing in for the one that Gillespie led seventy years earlier at Philly’s Downbeat Club.
As the director and co-founder of Jazz Bridge, Suzanne Cloud has long been a staunch advocate for Philly jazz as well as an educator and a performer in her own right. All of those aspects come together in her first play, which is equal parts biographical sketch, history lesson and musical demonstration.
Drawn from Gillespie’s memoir, To Be Or Not To Bop, the show captures the soon-to-be innovator at a key moment. He’s at a low point, just fired from the bands of Cab Calloway and Lucky Millinder, but on the verge of changing the direction of jazz forever with the “new way,” bebop.
A monologue with extensive musical interludes, Last Call at the Downbeat teeters between drama and lecture, at times overstuffed with names and dates. But despite some opening-night stumbles, Fleming is engaging enough to temper the show’s more didactic tendencies, and Eubanks’ band keeps the music center stage.
PREVIOUSLY IN PIFA: Evolution vs. …not.
We always get a ton of stuff that doesn't make it into the official agenda for one reason or another. Or sometimes it does! Anyway, this is some of the stuff that CP staffers are attempting to get to this weekend their own selves. You have no excuse for boredom.
FRIDAY 4/5
- The large-scale, walk-through art installation Song of the Silken Mermaid at 2424 Studios. Plastic-sheeting caves: not as creepy here as they are on Dexter! (Fishtown)
- On the verge of Fluid's closing, the final Sex Dwarf dance party will likely have end-of-the-world energy. (Queen Village)
- Allison Weiss plays an early show at the Barbary tonight. Starts at 5:30 p.m., but there are five acts on the bill, so. (No Libs)
- Some of us at CP have an illogical hatred of the new Dolphin (because we fear change!) but Juan MacLean is DJing there tonight. (Newbold)
- Local rock band Restorations plays the Church. (Rittenhouse)
- Tonight's the first night of the Empty Air project, in which you download an app and walk around Rittenhouse Square triggering different musical cues from the Mural and the Mint. (Rittenhouse)
- Nothing Is Rather Do looks like a typo but it's a show at Space 1026. (Chinatown)
- Two sister art events about copyright, the internet and piracy, TAKEN at Practice Gallery and REPEAT at Little Berlin. (Eraserhood, Kensington)
SATURDAY 4/6
- It's supposed to be at least vaguely spring-like for Pilam's Human BBQ. (University City)
- Yeah, it's really silly, but we have a soft spot for the really silly. Therefore: Giant Pillow Fight in Washington Square Park. (Society Hill)
- Ex-City Paper staffer and esteemed poet Daisy Fried will read from her new book at Arts Parlor in the afternoon. (South Broad)
- How about 24 straight hours of Indian music? Raga Samay is a rare occurance, people. (University City)
- If you were not aware that there is a Stoogeum dedicated to the Three Stooges out in the 'burbs, there is, and it is this morning the curator is giving a presentation on Larry Fine as part of Cinedelphia (which has a lot of other cool stuff going on for its opening weekend). (Ambler)
- Brother JT fronts the Original Sins at Johnny Brenda's. (No Libs)
- And of course we will go to basically anything involving Skeletor and karaoke, ever. (Chinatown)
The now 32 year old AIGA Philadelphia, the first local chapter of all the American Institute of Graphic Arts chapters, does a lot of good things. OK, they have a lot of meetings and lectures about doing good things in relation to Philly’s graphic design art and business scene. One thing that AIGA-P chapter president Allan Espiritu and ex-City Paper graphics guy Kevin Kernan and their dozens of members don’t do nicely by is their t-shirt collection, as this group paints over and wrecks them every spring for their annual T-Shirt Design Show and sale, “Off the Rack.” The start of the sale and exhibition is tonight, First Friday April 5 (starting at 6 p.m.) and all shirts, designed its membership, will be sold at $20.00 and 30% of the proceeds will go to benefit operations at AIGA SPACE (72 N. Second St.) These guys serve a lot of beer and a lot of wine, so whether you want to or not, you’ll find yourself with a bushel of new shirts by night’s end.
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These huge arts festivals can be overwhelming — how to figure out what's worth seeing? CP's sending someone to nearly every event PIFA's putting on over the next month to help you decide, so check back with Critical Mass all month long for comprehensive, ongoing reviews.
SHOW: Scopes Monkey Trial lecture
GENRE: Lecture
SPEAKER: Dr. Janet Monge
ATTENDED: Wed., April 3, 6 p.m., Penn Museum
BRIEF SELF-DESCRIPTION: The Scopes Monkey Trial was a landmark American legal case in 1925 in which high school science teacher, John Scopes, was accused of violating Tennessee's Butler Act, which made it unlawful to teach evolution. ... Join Dr. Janet Monge, Penn Museum Physical Anthropology Curator-in-Charge and Keeper of Collections, as she discusses this landmark event.
WE THINK: Any lecture on the topic of evolution and American scientific culture that involves a screenshot of Homer Simpson is bound for greatness. Using a combination of alarming facts and engaging humor, Dr. Janet Monge explored the culture that surrounded the trial in 1925, its effects on American education and scientific thought and the current views of evolution and science in the United States.
Knowledgeable and gregarious, Dr. Monge used a straightforward PowerPoint presentation to explain the devastating results of deep-pocketed Creationist pressure and lobbying to avoid teaching evolution in public high school, leading to generations misunderstanding the basic concepts of biology. Dr. Monge examined how more Americans become separated from scientific knowledge as religious fundamentalists write Biology textbooks and create museums based on the Young Earth theory. It's hard not to come away from this lecture frustrated with the current state of American scientific education.
—Elizabeth Gunto
PREVIOUSLY IN PIFA: She flies through the air with the greatest of ease… and gets a black eye on the flying trapeze.
Look in the sky — it’s a bird, it’s A Little Night Magic. That’s the name of the video display that Philly-based artist and photographer Jenny Lynn made for the rim of the PECO Building’s Crown Lights system. The 30-second video runs every five to 10 minutes every Friday night until April 26, as part of PECO’s Art in the Air program done in conjunction with the Phila-based Breadboard.
DJ Apt One, we salute you for taking those snippets of Random Access Memories — Daft Punk’s new album — that ran on SNL and making a loopy mix of the clips.
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