Sundown Poetry Series–Paul Allen

Yesterday evening,  I attended an excellent Sundown Poetry Series reading by Paul Allen. His poems from his new collection, Ground Forces, were on target in describing the human condition as well as quite hilarious.  The new venue for the event, the City Gallery, provided a lovely backdrop of the series as well as air conditioning.

Allen also played guitar, and sang.  The line the stayed with me the most is, “In my mind, bi-polar is a bear with an interesting sex life.”

What a unique way to think of illness.

Ten Trees

After the reading, I went to check out the Ten Trees Exhibit and documentary by Sam Fleischner that was is in the back on the gallery. 

The exhibit is a theatre made of ten trees worth plywood, and the accompanying film, which was made in South Carolina–one of the largest producers of plywood–was shown in the structure. 

The film shows the entire process of the plywood manufacture from cutting the trees to finished product, on a truck, awaiting delivery.

The movie is very much like an episode of How It’s Made, except it doesn’t have narration or music.  The only sounds are the sounds of the production of the sheets (even with workers taking breaks and looking bored).

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Geoff’s back in the studio with Janet for Podcast number thirteen, discussing whe she’s bought Monkey tickets twice, how much it costs to run the Piccolo Fringe, and what we all got up to last night - performance wise, that is.

Hear today’s podcast direct by following this link, or why not subscribe permanently here throughout the duration of the festival and get it fed to your MP3 player automatically. There’s also our guide to podcasting here.

The talented stars of the Holy City Homecomin’ Tuesday night at The Footlight Players Theatre Tuesday evening were Gradual Lean and Clay Ross’ Matuto.

They played great and the packed room really felt the magic.

But the behind-the-scenes driving force is Jack McCray.

It was his evening, his day, his week and his 30th year of being Mr. Jazz in Charleston.

This year he led the creation of the Jazz Artists of Charleston. This is his third successful gathering of talent and businesses to make things happen.

I’ve known Jack for years as the hip music writer at The Post and Courier and editor of neighborhood editions of the paper. Jack is my go-to man when I have questions about music: the Blues, Jazz, you name it. The man knows his stuff.

My Day With McCray started in Philadelphia Alley, next to the Footlight Theatre on Queen Street, when we participated in the afternoon interactive rhythmic workshop presented by Clay Ross and members of his group. It was a moving experience. No, I mean it, we REALLY moved around.

Then we climbed the stairs and met in a room over the Theatre and Jack regaled us with a vivid recap of his 30-year musical odyssey in Charleston jazz awareness and growth.

He is a great storyteller and took questions from the rapt audience.

After a break for a bite to eat, I was back for the 7:30 performance of The Homecomin’. Naturally, Jack McCray was the Master of Ceremonies.

A beautiful day in our seaside city with a man who continues to turn his vision into reality.

More Chucker on Spoleto at Chuckography.

This evening I filed my assigned story on Laurie Anderson, whose musical piece Homeland has its Spoleto USA opening Wednesday night. Not an easy story to write, I told editor Stephanie Harvin, because interviewing an artist like Anderson doesn’t make you want to go write prose — it makes you want to respond to her enigmas with enigmas of your own.

Am I serious or bemused? Or just coy? Well, I’d say, you decide, and then I’d skate away on two blocks of melting ice.

I spent the morning reading about Anderson, watching Anderson’s videos and listening to Anderson’s music, and I have to say I enjoyed “Only an Expert,” a portion of Homeland, more than any of her better-known material from the 1980s. It’s clearly about some big ideas, the kinds of ideas you’d like to talk about if you’re interested in culture and society and politics and art. Very cool, very contemporary stuff.

Only here’s the rub: If you could have that conversation (and when you’re dealing with someone with the celebrity of Anderson, as a practical matter that’s a privilege you must to earn), would it take you any closer to the subject? Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s the latest list of Piccolo Spoleto shows that, according to the box office, are either sold out or have just a few seats left:

Remaining performance of Scheer and McBrayer is sold out.

Always Patsy Cline. Shows left: 6/5/2008 at 8:00pm; 6/6/2008 at 6:00pm ; 6/7/2008 at 2:30pm; and  6/8/2008 at 4:00pm. Footlight Players Theatre, 20 Queen Street.  Admission:  $29 adults, $27 seniors/students.

Mary Kay Has a Posse. Shows left: 6/1/2008 at 4:00pm; 6/2/2008 at 7:30pm; and  6/5/2008 at 5:00pm .  Theatre 99, 280 Meeting Street (Above The Bicycle Shoppe).  Admission:  $15

Louis Prima. The Wild One. Shows left: 6/1/2008 at 7:00pm; 6/4/2008 at 8:00pm; 6/7/2008 at 3:00pm.  Village Playhouse Theatre, 730 W. Coleman Blvd. Mt. Pleasant.  Admission:  $25.

God’s Trombones. Shows left: 6/1/2008 at 8:00pm and 6/7/2008 at 8:30pm. Footlight Players Theatre, 20 Queen Street.  Admission:  $25 adults, $20 seniors/students

A Complete History of Charleston For Morons. Only show with seats still available is 6/7/2008 at 3pm.  Theatre 99, 280 Meeting Street (Above The Bicycle Shoppe).  Admission:  $15.

St. Petersburg (Russia) String Quartet. Only show left is 6/2/2008 at 6:00pm. New Tabernacle Fourth Baptist Church, 22 Elizabeth Street.  Admission:  $10

Duda Lucena Quartet. Only show with seats still available is 6/2/2008 at 10:30pm. Upstairs at Mistral Restaurant, Festival Entrance at 180 Meeting Street.  Admission:  $15

Tommy Gill Trio. Only show with seats still available is 6/4/2008 at 10:30pm. Upstairs at Mistral Restaurant, Festival Entrance at 180 Meeting Street.  Admission:  $15

Piccolo Harbor Cruise. Rolling on the River Review. Only one with tickets still available is cruise featuring Rob Keiter and Friends on 6/5/2008 at 8pm.

Marc Bamuthi Joseph put on an impressive show over two dates at the Emmett Robinson last week. His poetic speech and movement was combined with hip-hop music, conversational “travel diary” monologues, video interviews shot by Eli Jacobs-Fantauzzi and a large moving lighting rig choreographed by James Clotfelter.

Yet for a really intense experience, I went to Bamuthi’s two hour workshop at the Avery Research Center, part of a free “Spoleto at the Avery” program” that ran last week.

At the Emmett Robinson Theatre, Bamuthi shared the stage with all those bells and whistles. In the workshop, there were no such distractions. The performer’s work was a lot more powerful in the intimate classroom environment, and he got to show another side to his work – he mentors teen writers through a “Youth Speaks” literary arts organization.

The workshop was part writing class, part dance-off. Bamuthi began with a demonstration of what he does, switching from hip-hop speech to regular talk about his partner’s pregnancy and a planned natural birth. As he spoke he moved, creating visual images with his physical being, his expressions and his breathing.

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Even though I am merely a poor young professional (heh), I have found that the greatest aspect of Piccolo has nothing to do with the various things one can do for free (although, yes an added plus). The greatest aspect is that Piccolo uses local venues for programs, in this case, City Gallery at Waterfront Park hosting the Sundown Poetry Series. Not only was I given an entrancing hour of “spoken word” poetry last night, but I was allowed to wander around afterwards and enjoy the present show in the gallery titled Vanishing Landscapes. How fantastic is it that the Arts always seems to flow into one another?

The poet last night was Barbara G.S. Hagerty. I would describe her work as being quite varied, covering a large spectrum of concepts and forms of poetry. Understanding this about herself, she gave the audience samples from each area of interest. Several of her works were based on Charleston, some so specific as being named after the streets themselves. We were also given poems based on word play (these were used as self explorations by Hagerty, such as the repetition of her initials forming words she associated with). She used her interest in the haiku to put together an entire stream of small poems describing her recent trip to Asia (appropriate…and also my favorite). What I most enjoyed about Hagerty was her use of the pause. Each word had its own meaning, like individuals holding hands to make up a circle, or as if after every word there had been placed a period.

Vanishing Landscapes had some very fine pieces in it. It was a juried art exhibition, so it was curious to see which pieces has been given ribbons and which ones had not…and whether or not I personally agreed. I recommend going to the gallery, and if you can manage to kill two birds with one stone, listen to some poetry as well. The next one is tonight, with Paul Allen at 6:30 pm.

I’ve been running caption contests online and in the print edition now since March 2007, but this is our first contest to be Spoleto-themed and cross-posted on two blogs. Vote for your favorite, and read the rest of the entries here.

Chuck Boyd, better known as SpoJo Chucker, and jazz man Jack McCray are in the studio with Janet for a great podcast about music around town, monkey shenanigans and more.

Hear today’s podcast direct by following this link, or why not subscribe permanently here throughout the duration of the festival and get it fed to your MP3 player automatically. There’s also our guide to podcasting here.

In case you haven’t heard, “Monkey: Journey to the West” has added another performance. This one is set for Sottile Theatre, Thursday, June 5 at 2pm. Tickets are on sale now!

A little insider information from SpoletoToday: If you go to the add-on performance, you might want to think about picking up your tickets a day earlier from the box office at the Gaillard, or plan to get to the show really early. Sources tell us the line at “will call” for Sunday’s noon add-on show was down George Street and up St. Philips. The show was delayed nearly 15 minutes to get everyone in, and even then, some poor souls had to wait until things got under way, then sneak in. The performers had another show at 6 p.m. that night and had to get going.