So I hung out for a couple of hours at the Reggae Block Dance on a night that turned surprisingly cool. It was a big crowd and seemed a happy one. Estimates from officials put attendance at about 2700 around 9:30 p.m. I was chatting with the staff of the Office of Cultural Affairs, who all were looking at a long day: From the Children’s Festival that started at 9 a.m. to the dance, which started at 7 p.m. and all the set-up and take-down that goes with it. There’s an awful lot that goes on behind the scenes to put on such massive events. Parks department personnel, according to Floyd “Ray” Swagerty, Jr., production manager of the city’s office of Cultural Affairs, worked almost around the clock to set up the opening ceremonies, Marion Square, the Sunset Serenade at the Custom House and then take most of it back down in two days.
Cultural affairs director Ellen Dressler Moryl stopped by with the latest logistical headache, trying to find a possible replacement for an ailing artist for a Sunday event. Warnell Berry the tenor/baritone slated to sing at Afternoon of Porgy and Bess was under the weather. “We’ll just start with ‘My Man is Gone,’ ” Moryl quipped. I was impressed that she still had a sense of humor. My guess is it’s a required survival skill in her position.
I had a wonderful, serendipitous meeting with members of Henry Turner Jr. and Flavor from Louisiana. The band drove up from Baton Rouge, a mere 17 hours by car. Apparently MapQuest made it look a lot easier than it turned out to be. They arrived about 4 a.m., says singer Nukie Miller. This was her first trip to Charleston, although the band played Piccolo a couple of years ago. The buzz on Miller is that she’s a rising star. 225BatonRouge.com calls her a “local soul tigress.” She’s no diva, though: down-to-earth and oozing soft-spoken charm. It’s a shame she won’t get to see the city, but here’s hoping she gets a chance to come back.
I’m just back from Marion Square, where a small army of roadies just broke down the Children’s Festival and put up the Reggae Block Party in about 2.5 hours (video later). If you’re wondering whether to go down for the free show, here’s my report: The Clouds of Pending Doom parted at about 6 p.m., the air is almost chilly after a hot day, and the block party has BEER. Somehow I missed that part on the event schedule, but I just saw it with my own eyes, folks.
People are already staking out spots with chairs, but I don’t think there’s a huge rush. This is a four-hour concert.
I’m heading down to the American Theater to see if I can get into the Fowler Family Radio Hour. Janet’s en route the block party. Let us know what you’re seeing — and tell us what you thought.
UPDATE: Tonight’s Piccolo Festival show “Fowler Family Radio Hour” at American Theater is sold out.
Adam Parker of The Post and Courier sends this along:
Perhaps the most eclectic and esoteric of performances during these two weeks celebrating the arts was presented Friday night outdoors at water’s edge.
“Aquae Mundi: A Poetic Journey Through the Waters of the World,” included dancers on stilts, the Grammy award-winning percussionist Glen Velez, poetry readings, bagpipes and a sailing ship that emerged from the dark to the famous tune from Wagner’s Flying Dutchman.
The performers were a motley crew of Americans and Italians, and the large audience, which formed a processional at one point during the evening, responded to the spectacle enthusiastically.
It’s a bit hard to describe this event, but I’ll try: William Anderson (my Mount Pleasant doctor), garbed in Scottish kilt, began the show with a gust from his bagpipes (a side of him I confess I’d not known).
I went to the meet up … by myself … at Marion Square and the Children’s Festival. Maybe next time I should tell people where to meet. But it was a beautiful day: quite warm, of course, but with a nice breeze every now and again, and I then bumped into Geoff shooting video …
There’s an energy about this year that I love. Music spilled out and crossed over; there was vibrant color every where you looked. It was that glorious slice-of-life chaos that I find personally very satisfying. Moms, dads, kids, dogs, couples, lone adventurers going about the business of enjoying a festival on a pleasant day. Or being tired and cranky and just needing a cup of coffee. Oh. Wait. That was me…
Seriously, it was great fun. I watched the crowd being drawn like magic to the main tent once the Irish fiddlers began to play. I talked with Piccolo Spoleto staff members Elease Amos-Goodwin and Francina Smalls-Joyner, whose memories of the past and ideas about the future of the now 30-year-old festival are a treasure. I realize that I am waxing poetic, but there is a depth to this place and a richness to the fabric of it that is powerful and seductive. I think it’s the difference between just residing somewhere and inhabiting it. So many people inhabit this place until there’s a mingling that makes it hard to separate one from the other.
I found Harriet and Vera, eventually, before I had to head out to the press luncheon (yes, yes, I know, la ti da!) And actually, it was. Very. Festival general manager Nigel Redden, cast members of “La Cenerentola,” Festival Music Director for Opera & Orchestra Emmanuel Villaume and “Amistad” Director Sam Helfrich, whom I immediately dissed by mistaking him for someone else. Oh, dear. Not that he wasn’t gracious about it … Hostess Judith Moore, the brains behind Charleston Cookie Company, was charming. The house was gorgeous and the garden made us all wish we had our own shady little hideaways. Frankly I’d like mine complete with an incredibly polite staff and a fabulous chef serving silver cups of sweet potato fries.
Tonight, who knows? There is so much this year, I feel like I’m a case of Stendhal Syndrome just waiting to happen.
“Monkey: Journey to the West,” this year’s Spoleto talker, is a visual feast. It gets the kitchen sink treatment in the numbers and kinds of Chinese performance arts thrown in. I saw Friday night’s performance. A few thoughts …
Supertitle translations show that Monkey is quite funny. The 500-year old folk story of a spiritual quest is full of natural and supernatural people and beasts.
It’s 2 hours with no intermission, the anime is great, costuming outrageous (and sometimes scary … plus, Monkey looked like he’d just played basketball), painted sets interesting, and physical performances … martial arts, sword fighting, gymnastic aerials, high wire flying, plate-spinning, silk panel aerials, bamboo pole acrobatics, body contortion, fire stick twirling, umbrella spinning … amazing. Your eye doesn’t know where to go, and if you drink any alchohol before the show you might get dizzy. For me, it was a preview of some of the things we will see in opening ceremonies for this summer’s Beijing Olympics … on a smaller scale of course. For the Olympics, there will be hundreds of acrobats, scores of plate-spinners, thousands of singers …
The orchestra is amplified and so are the singers, so if you have a sensitive ear, take earplugs. The performance is not that loud but Chinese music’s forms and some of the rock repetition of rhythms, plus the squeals the monkey makes (I wanted to wring his neck) and the whanging of sticks on the stage floor (amplified by the wireless mics) can be jarring to a Western ear. (My ear is so sensitive that those things made me feel like I was losing my mind.) Mandarin itself, in fact, can be jarring to a Western ear.
SpoJo Don D. Lewis got out and about yesterday and recorded this piece on Piccolo’s artist’s village at Marion Square. I should have posted it last night, but I’d gone to bed before it arrived. Enjoy!
We bring in a stunt interviewer for today’s podcast, with SpoJo Nick Smith (below, left), whom you can read about on our About page, talks with College of Charleston grad and New York comedian David Lee Nelson (below, right) who has two productions as part of the Stella di Domani series in Piccolo Spoleto.
“Lobby Hero” starts tonight and “Silence of Lucky” begins May 29. We want to see both and you will, too, after hearing Nelson talk about these two funny shows.
So I hung out for a couple of hours at the Reggae Block Dance on a night that turned surprisingly cool. It was a big crowd and seemed a happy one. Estimates from officials put attendance at about 2700 around 9:30 p.m. I was chatting with the staff of the Office of Cultural Affairs, who all were looking at a long day: From the Children’s Festival that started at 9 a.m. to the dance, which started at 7 p.m. and all the set-up and take-down that goes with it. There’s an awful lot that goes on behind the scenes to put on such massive events. Parks department personnel, according to Floyd “Ray” Swagerty, Jr., production manager of the city’s office of Cultural Affairs, worked almost around the clock to set up the opening ceremonies, Marion Square, the Sunset Serenade at the Custom House and then take most of it back down in two days.
Sunday May 25 Miss Wanda Johnson, Lowcountry Queen of the Blues, will entertain at A Dough Re Mi pizzeria, in Mt. Pleasant, starting at 8pm.
We bring in a stunt interviewer for 
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