Ninth column

"Buyer Beware. Best Way to Show Your 'pride'? Skip Pride." - Just Out newsmag, May 30, 2008

Ah yes, c'est le weekend (almost)

Please please get me to this weekend. Like, immediately. It's been madness since Monday.

Instead of rehashing the traumas and dramas from the past few days, I'll focus instead on what I'm most looking forward to, starting at, oh, about 5 pm Friday:

*Hand2Mouth Theatre's new show, "From a Dream to a Dream," a collaborative project with a Polish ensemble theatre company on the writings of Bruno Schulz. I'm going to the big opening show and party Friday night, with new friend Eddie the lutenist.

*Saturday brunch with someone I've never, to be frank, spent much time alone with before but who also, again to be frank, I've admired and just generally liked a great deal from arm's length.

*Portland Farmer's Market at PSU, followed by rehearsal with a new musical collaborative colleague.

*Scrubbing the floors! Doing the laundry! Shopping for groceries!

*Watching the Democratic party drama play out on Saturday and Sunday and into next week. Let's wrap this thing up already, people!

*Jogging. Outside. More.

*Letting go of that which needs letting go of. And I'll leave it at that.

Get it together

Deadlines, deadlines.

Meanwhile, allow me to remind you that FourScore: a classical manband steps back into the ring tonight with a set on the ever-gorgeous Classical Revolution PDX series at the Someday Lounge (NW 5th and Davis, 9 pm onward). We're doing Poulenc, Schubert and some surprises (per usual).

"If I had Aladdin's lamp for only a day / I'd make a wish, and here's what I'd say..."

And I start Les Miserables rehearsals next week. And Pride is in 2.5 weeks. And my roommate woke me this morning, 6 am, by screaming "fuckin' jerk!" at the top of his lungs and pounding around the kitchen. (the error on my part? I'd forgotten to take out one bag of trash lurking in the back porch area. He duly left it on my favorite kitchen table chair with a sweet note full of misspellings. Mwah!)

And now I have a cover story to finish writing.

Those things really move me

I had an emotional response nearly to the point of tears today for probably the most ridiculous reason that can be thought of.

When needing a break from intense writing work - I'm in the midst of transcribing about ten hours of interviews for a big story - I have a long-held habit of googling who- or whatever happens to come to mind at that exact moment: Sibelius to sopapillas; an old college friend or colleague. Today, a long-ago ex surfaced in the mind. I duly brought up the google search.

And the top few dozen hits were all new to me, but all touched on the same thing - the ex had recently nabbed a major national award for his work in a particular faction of public service. I read, with interest, his interview in a national industry journal, where he discussed the award in the context of his work.

In the interview, he talks about the things which delight him in his job, the "mystery and surprise involved," and remembering "how he felt at the beginning of his career." He talks about specific moments where he sees his work making an impact, or traces the greater arc of his work and notes the points of intersection between him and the world-at-large, noting how those moments offer meaning, immediacy, import.

In the midst of continuing late-20's angst about my place in the world, and in light of my own continuing search for pulse-racing moments and life-stirring resonances, his words hit home; they offered, in their bright reflective manner, a mirror... oh forget it. It moved me, end of story.

With my carrot, and my celery

So the FourScore boys and I were rehearsing yesterday for a set we're doing as part of next week's Classical Revolution show (Wed, May 28, 9 pm onward, Someday Lounge): Poulenc, Schubert, some Barbershop tunes, an old Welsh song, etc etc. Good stuff good stuff.

We got to talking about needing something completely out of left field for our set... a TV commercial tune? No... How about a new pop tune arrangement, Antony and the Johnsons or Bjork or something? Yes, but...

Then it clicked. Muppets... Sesame Street...

Captain Vegetable.




"Who are you, some kinda bad dream?!?!"

REVIEW: "4 x 4" Shines on Schnitzer Stage

Just published on Crosscut, my review of White Bird Dance's "4 x 4: The Ballet Project" at Schnitzer Hall:

"Much... of "4x4" went wonderfully right; spectacularly so in the case of San Francisco Ballet’s deeply impressive showing in Helgi Tomasson’s Concerto Grosso. There were many other highlights. To cap their ambitious tenth season of presenting modern dance in Portland, the indefatigable White Bird founders Walter Jaffe and Paul King had the bright idea to bring together the West Coast’s four major classical dance companies to share a bill for two consecutive nights in Portland. The amazing thing was that nobody had thought of this sooner, but here it was: the first time all four companies had shared a stage, and a long overdue Portland homecoming for the three non-resident companies.

It might be easy to compare the companies, but it wouldn’t be fair. Each of them – Eugene Ballet Company, Seattle’s Pacific Northwest Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, and Portland’s Oregon Ballet Theatre – is at a different stage of maturity, and each has strengths and a unique signature.

... After seeing Christopher Wheeldon’s Rush I immediately longed to see it again. Wheeldon, perhaps contemporary American ballet’s "it" choreographer of the moment, loads so much detail into a small canvas that the effect is wild and explosive, like Kandinsky’s fragmented hypercolor Composition paintings bursting at the frame. In Wheeldon’s work, you don’t remember the lift, you remember the sly shoulder roll on the lift’s descent. You recognize the classical ballet vocabulary – arabesque, battement, grand jete – but Wheeldon has deconstructed the language. Put another way, he’s shattered it on the sidewalk and reassembled it as little shards of movement with plenty of cut and shine.

The music for the work is Bohuslav Martinu’s Sinfonietta La Jolla for chamber orchestra and piano, a little heard early-mid 20th century work full of bold colors and unique combinations of instruments. The choreographer moved against the grain of the music instead of merely mickey-mousing it: a lyrical leg set to a rumbling piano, or a spiraling series of arms interrupted by a battery of percussion. It is fresh, eye-popping stuff, and deeply musical, but not in that sometimes overslick Mark Morris manner.

Originally set on the members of the San Francisco Ballet, Portland’s Oregon Ballet Theatre, 16 company members strong, took up the dance and performed it with high gloss, secure technique, and obvious affection for the work. I wasn’t in Portland during James Canfield’s tenure as OBT founding director, but the word is that under Christopher Stowell’s direction the company has improved all out of recognition. They debut next month in a special Kennedy Center festival appearance."

And my dear, I'm still here

So that whole guest-blogging idea with BM was charming and well-intentioned, but ultimately unsustainable (said with a hug for BM). Here I am again, readers. Here being the clinical overbright hulk that is Concourse C at Chicago O'Hare International Airport.

Had a massively good time in Chicago, and still sorting through a set of emotions and resonances that the trip triggered. I was pleased to see John Adams' new "Flowering Tree," a flawed but interesting new opera from the maverick composer (and where I was surprised, but also not, to run into old Boston colleagues CC and GR from Opera Boston, a company I worked for); and to catch a quirky choral program, poke around the city (Lincoln Park, Lakeshore Drive, Univ. of Chicago, Boystown, etc), eat many good meals and have the type of meandering, life-and-career pondering conversations with a friend slash colleague that are best had over a couple late-night microbrews.

I need to locate vegetables. And then catch my flight...

Welcome guest blogger: BM in Chicago!

NB: For the next 48 hours, dearest of critic-friends BM in Chicago will be the From Every Corner guest blogger. Look for my guest posts also at his blog, Mysteries Abysmal. Now play nice while daddy's gone.


PDX, Y'ALL! Hi, I'm Bryant Manning and I'll be taking over for the weekend. I've been chauffuering SMB around during his second only visit to the city of broad shoulders. I met Beaudoin at the NEA Institute last fall in New York and as he aptly put it, "we became fast friends." Brief introduction: I’m the contributing classical & opera critic at Time Out Chicago magazine and I regularly write concert reviews for the Sun-Times.

Today was idyllic Spring weather (you guys were pushing 100 F ?!) so we walked around the 'hood in Lincoln Park and he took in the following sights: DePaul's churchy concert hall (the youngins were rehearsing Messaien's "Quartet...Time"), the elaborate set for a new Johnnie Depp movie constructed all the way down Lincoln Ave, the amazingly renovated Biograph Theater, and then a drive along the coast up to Evanston to tour Northwestern. Stephen’s shaving now and the bro can sing even when he isn't trying!!

We're off for some aloo mattar with crisp tandoori roti at Hema's Indian Restaurant. Then to a party with this guy.

Eighth column

"Money Where Your Mouth Is. Vote with Your Ballot, Your Feet and Your Cash" - Just Out newsmag, May 16, 2008

Away we go

Gay marriage is legalized in California.

And I leave in 3 hours for Chicago. Per usual, I've forgot to pack my Kiehl's products (this face doesn't come easy!) and cell phone charger.

NEA, CHI, HIF

... The National Endowment for the Arts, in a well-meaning but misguided move, announces the first annual "Opera Honors" awards. Four $25,000 checks go to James Levine, Leontyne Price, Carlisyle Floyd and Richard Gaddes.

NEA honcho Dana Gioia, who doesn't seem to get it, says: "If the N.E.A. opera award is going to have credibility, it has to recognize artists that work at the highest reaches of the art and to create, as it were, a hall of fame of American opera artists. It would be remiss, I think, not to start with the very best." Never mind that Levine makes $25k in an evening, Price is long retired from the opera stage and Floyd is hardly our country's best opera composer ("Susannah," pretty music, may not survive the century). Gaddes, though not a household name, seems most deserving, and likely most in need of the prize money.


... I head off Thursday evening for four days of fun in Chicago, hosted by dear friend and fellow critic BM. Among our planned activities: the Chicago Opera Theater Midwest premiere of John Adams' new opera, The Flowering Tree, Saturday night, with Adams as conductor and superwonderful baritone Sanford Sylvan, in a principal role.

NB: I used to serve espresso to Sylvan, summer of 2002, at the Brookline Village Starbucks in Brookline, MA. His drink of choice? A half-caf doppio espresso to go. Also met him backstage after the 2004 Boston production of Nixon in China in which I sang - he originated Chou En-Lai back in 1987, remember - what a gentle man and monster musician! Photo above: the 3 principals in COT's Flowering Tree rehearsal, L to R Noah Stewart, Natasha Jouhl, Sanford Sylvan, courtesy of COT General Director Brian Dickie's blog.


... Tenor Lawrence Brownlee stuns Seattle audiences last weekend in Seattle Opera's production of the Bellini rarity, I Puritani, by lofting an F above tenor high C and knocking it into the stratosphere. You've got to hear it to believe it.

Visitors

Thank you to my 20,491st visitor (as of five minutes ago), and to recent comers from interesting places like...

Amsterdam, The Netherlands; Chicago, Illinois; Cordova, Tennessee; Denver, Colorado; Farmersville, Ohio; Gaithersburg, Maryland; Honolulu, Hawaii; Las Vegas, Nevada; New York City, NY; Newnan, Georgia; Oakland, California; Reston, Virginia; Seattle, Washington; Sherwood, Oregon; Warsaw, Poland; Winter Haven, Florida

PICA Artistic Director search process gains steam

Just broke this on the Just Out blog, but it's of interest here, too: Portland Institute for Contemporary Art has narrowed their current Artistic Director search to three finalist candidates and the first, Lincoln Center's Boo Froebel, just left Portland after several days of interviews.

From the post:

Late last week, Lincoln Center Festival Associate Producer Boo Froebel arrived in Portland for some pretty important meetings: Froebel is the first of three finalist candidates for the soon to be vacant Artistic Director position at PICA, and she was in town to suss out the city and meet with PICA higher-ups as part of a rigorous interview and search process, according to sources familiar with the search.

So, who is Boo Froebel? She's a 39-year-old former Whitney Museum and Galapagos Art Space curator, and current Associate Producer of Lincoln Center's much-acclaimed annual summer "Lincoln Center Festival," a seminal contemporary arts fest which this summer will present choreographer William Forsythe, performance artist Laurie Anderson and a new production of the rarely-heard post-war opera "Die Soldaten."

In a 2002 feature interview with The Village Voice, Froebel had this to say about her approach to programming and curating: "It's not about me and my eye... It's about these interesting artists. I don't really want to be a power broker, telling audiences what they should be thinking about or looking at. I'm simply telling them what I'm thinking about, and who I find interesting."

Stabler with one foot out the door?

Many musicians in town are wondering what the heck is going on with David Stabler at The Oregonian.

Portland's only full-time classical music critic hasn't attended or reviewed his home team major orchestra in almost six months, hasn't written a substantive "think piece" for the paper in at least that long (by my estimate), and has gifted away most plum reviewing assignments to his freelance stringer, James McQuillen, for most of the winter and spring.

I've had a number of conversations with musicians and music administrators across the city, and while none of them will go on record with me (yet) about this, the general question is this: is Stabler staying or going? And if he's staying, why has his critical output slowed to a trickle? (Stabler says he's busy helping Barry Johnson with various arts editing tasks. I don't fully buy that)

Charles Noble weighs in this morning on his blog with some thoughts, writing:

I’d be tempted to say that it sounds like we might lose our classical music critic sooner rather than later, too... has Stabler just burned out on covering a growing music scene?... he has, until lately, done an excellent job of writing articles that keep the arts front and center in the consciousness of the city.

If his review today of Portland Opera's "Aida" is any indication, Stabler is indeed phoning it in. Or at least very tired.

He makes two big gaffes (the same one really, just twice) that are alarming: he credits the production to stage director Sandra Bernhard and the choreography to Penelope Freeh. Wrong.

Operagoers know how corny "Aida" can be. All those bare chests and clutching of swords overhead... But this time, stage director Sandra Bernhard kept the focus on character, not spectacle. The production, which opened Friday in Keller Auditorium, is one of the most pared-back "Aida's" you'll see.

... The steps focused the action nicely and gave the dancers vertical as well as horizontal space in Penelope Freeh's engaging choreography.

Surely in his long distinguished tenure as a music critic, Stabler has learned about the opera co-production model, and about the distinct and different roles that a stage director and choreographer play in re-mounting an old production (as opposed to creating a new production).

It's simply incorrect for Stabler to write, as he does, that "stage director Sandra Bernhard kept the focus on character, not specatcle." Why? Because it's not her production! Director Colin Graham created and directed this original production back in 1998 for Minnesota Opera, and it's been touring North America ever since. Bernhard merely stepped in to direct the action and movement and - if she's really doing her job well - to stay as faithful to Graham's intent as possible while injecting the moment-to-moment work with new energy.

Same with the choreographer - the movement does not, in fact, belong to Penelope Freeh, as Stabler writes. It was created, years ago, by James Sewell. Freeh is merely recreating Sewell's dances. I'd think this is pretty simple stuff to fact-check, yes?


...Meanwhile, over at the Portland Tribune (the what? exactly), one Randall Barton weighs in with an amusingly awful "Aida" review:

The unseen star of this production is the powerful orchestra led by Croatian conductor Vjekoslav Sutej of the Zagreb Academy of Music. With only his head and hands projecting above the orchestra pit, Sutej nonetheless projects terrific stage presence. The audience chuckles as he applauds with his baton an aria by Lisa Daltirus in the title role.

Does the audience chuckle, Randall? Really? I don't remember much chuckling at Friday night's performance (maybe YOU chuckled and thought that was worth noting). And why call Sutej out for this only once? He did it at least three times in the course of the performance by my count - and anyway it's standard practice for conductors to applaud star singers after a mega aria, so why is it special for Sutej and worth any ink on the page?

Moving ever onward...

Daltirus’ Aida is a stirring thing to witness. This soprano has star quality — she has been compared to Leontyne Price — and commands the stage, not a small feat with so many voices and so much movement.

... but WHO has compared Daltirus to La Price?, and btw are you kidding? There's simply no comparison from Daltirus to Price. None. Oh and PS, Daltirus has not appeared - even in minor roles - at the Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera or Lyric Opera of Chicago, arguably our country's three most important opera houses, so her star can't be that large.

Mezzo-soprano Luretta Bybee makes a delicious villain as Princess Amneris, the kind you love to hate. Bybee’s regal bearing and wonderful facial expressions hold your gaze. Her voice got stronger as the show progressed, and by curtain call, she might justifiably have shared bows, center stage, with Daltirus.

Oh but wait. Bybee got sick and dropped out of this production a week before it opened. Her name appeared no where in the physical program. Did she phone this special performance in from New York? Amazing. (yeah, Leann Sandel-Pantaleo was flown in on short notice and performed the role, fact-check!)

Opera, like the symphony, is one of the few remaining experiences that asks an audience to silence their cell phones and allow the brain cells hours of uninterrupted stimulation.

Oh sigh. So an opera or symphony performance are "one of the few remaining experiences that asks an audience to silence their cell phones and allow the brain cells hours of uninterrupted stimulation." (stumble of a sentence, my friend!) So that experience does not extend to, say, chamber music or chamber pop? What about choral programs or organ recitals? Films of any type? Live theatre?

OK, Barton, I get it. This isn't your beat, opera's not your "thing." And shouldn't we, in light of Stabler's critical reticence, be grateful for any classical music criticism, however average?

Portland Opera's "Aida" - A Retiring Ship's Final Voyage, Holes and All

(reprinted from the Just Out blog)

Iconoclastic stage director Peter Brook once wrote that opera was the “deadliest” of all stage art forms: stuffy, sleepy and doggedly old-school. He could have been writing then about much of what has become of today’s American regional opera movement.

Portland Opera’s “Aida,” playing now through May 17, is a perfect example. The idea, essentially, is this: Hire a director and design team to create a new production – something affordable, transportable and built to last a few seasons of cross-country touring. Opera Company A debuts said production, then trucks it around to Opera Companies B through Z until the sets and costumes wear our their welcome. Then scrap it, and repeat.

Sadly for Portland, this “Aida” – a full decade after its Minnesota Opera premiere – has reached Stumptown, after ten years of touring, on its last stump. The production, tacky and very tired, comes dead on arrival. It’s a shame because Friday night’s musical performance had much to recommend, not least of which was a richly sung portrayal of the title character by soprano Lisa Daltirus and superlative work from the Portland Opera chorus.

In fact, the musical end of the bargain was held up remarkably well by guest conductor Vjekoslav Sutej, who coaxed a lucid and well-paced performance from the orchestra (props especially to the winds) and chorus (Robert Ainsley, ever-reliable chorus master). The cast did variable work with Verdi: Philip Webb’s smartly sung Radames, Keith Miller’s booming Ramfis and Leann Sandel-Pantaleo’s impassioned Amneris were highlights. As Aida, Daltirus tends to flailing in the acting department, but she is a sensitive Verdian: her “O Patria Mia” offered dusky, supple tone with just a slight gleam on top, and plenty of spin.

But even a few well-sung hit arias can’t save this ship; there's a good reason this is the production's last stop before the junkyard. The production’s inanities begin with Aida’s entrance, when we wonder: why is this exotically beautiful Ethiopian slave decked out in a denim skirt with a bedsheet for a sash? The costumes pale, though, in comparison to the Act 3 ill-advised excesses of body paint and hair weave. There is also a 40-feet span golden eagle, much-touted in the opera’s advance publicity, that is indeed a menacing presence, but moves with more purpose than any of the singing actors onstage.

I’m not entirely convinced that stage director Sandra Bernhard ever entered the rehearsal hall (the original production belongs to director Colin Graham, recently passed), though I may be wrong: someone, after all, had to traffic direct in those stage-packed scenes with the chorus, dancers and supernumeraries.

It’s not until the third act that there’s a convincingly acted and sung scene among the principal characters – Aida and her father, Amonasro, finally look each other in the eye in a moment of conflict – and by then it’s too late. Verdi’s sweeping music drama had already passed Portland Opera by; or at least the drama had, if not the music

Verbosity

Words that, looking back on my writing these past few months, are likely ready for retirement (for now, at least):

Chops
Connectivity (awful!)
Dearth
Indefatigable
Old-school
Masterwork
Maverick
Provocateur
Slapdash
Superlative
Zenith


Words I plan to make better and more frequent use of in coming months:

Apotheosis
Brazen
Goad
Kingpin
Paucity
Prescient
Staunch
Tenor

A pound of Stumptown coffee, no lie, to the first person to create a cogent sentence using all eight words of that second list - post in the comments, please. Go!

Let's do it, dudes

The first time was just a tease.

After a dozen exceedingly hot (and single) guys braved the first ever Just Out/Q Center Single Guys Bunco Night last month, it's time to move to second base.

Come out and join me and other great guys for a night of gaming which requires zero brain cells and even less talent. Just flash your gleaming smile or impress with witty banter while you roll the dice and switch partners faster than a night at Steam Portland.


Single Guy's Bunco
hosted by SMB, sponsored by Just Out
Sunday, May 11
5:30 pm to 7:30 pm (ish)
Q Center, 69 SE Taylor, PDX

Questions? Call 503-236-1252, ex. 16, or e-mail SMB at stephen@justout.com

Classical crystal ball gazing

I've got a new piece up on Crosscut.com, where I offer some crystal ball gazing for Portland's art-music scene, by way of nominating four current major players as among the best poised to "grow into scene-shifting classical music leaders." Read on.

(that's PSU's Ken Selden, director of orchestral activities, above)

Let's do a bit of crystal ball gazing. Ten years from now, let's say.

Portland, Oregon has further transformed itself from a sleepy Seattle little sister to a fully cosmopolitan city offering the country's most efficient public transit system, the most green-collar jobs, and a robustly supported arts scene where institutional glamour and downtown grit rub friendly weekend shoulders. Can you see it?

It may be closer than you think. As Portland continues to scoop up national acclaim for its advances on the pop music, film, and food fronts, the classical or "art music" scene hums along with just the same ear-popping vibrancy. In addition to the regular roster of touring circuit appearances by the current A-list classical music stars — Lang Lang and Joshua Bell next season at the Oregon Symphony; Dawn Upshaw with Friends of Chamber Music — a number of class-act musicians are roosting in Stumptown, and happily so. Some come for institutional connections: as a section member in the Oregon Symphony or member of Portland Opera's Studio Artist program, for example. Others, scrappy self-starters, come because Portland's rep as an affable, affordable city for young creatives is well-deserved. The latter is what lured me here from Boston two years ago.

As for who's leading the charge, I'd like to nominate four Portland-based musicians — a music administrator, blogging Oregon Symphony member, young conductor, and ambitious educator — as having especially promising potential for growing into scene-shifting classical-music leaders. I asked each to talk about why they're committed to making art music work in a wonky "big town," where they feel they can make an impact, and who they consider to be important other folks making noise on the PDX classical circuit.

And then I go on to chat with/about those four top-shelf musicians/music administrators in the city, all worthy of attention: conductor Ryan Heller, Oregon Symphony violist and blogger Charles Noble, administrator slash singer Mark Powell and PSU orchestral director Ken Selden.

Each of those four, in turn, recommended four folks they felt would be major Portland art-music players in the years ahead. Some names that surfaced: Elaine Calder, Carlos Kalmar and Ron Blessinger (twice each); Gil Seeley, Scott Tuomi, Tuesday Rupp, Hamilton Cheifetz, and a few others.

Props to The Builders and The Butchers

Applause applause for The Builders and The Butchers, winners of Willamette Week's "Best New Band 2008" poll.

As you can see from the ballot I filed with WW's music section, I voted B & B as #2 in my top 5 choices. For the record, my top five were 1) The Lonely H, 2) The Builders and the Butchers, 3) Ethan Rose, 4) Holcombe Waller & The Healers, 5) Chris Robley & The Fear of Heights. (I was one of 129 music professionals voting in the poll)

The full WW Best New Band '08 issue is online here. Congrats to Amy, Casey and the whole gang at WW on a great assemblage of PDX up-and-comers!

Review: BodyVox in "Horizontal Leanings"

(cross-posted from the Just Out blog)

BodyVox is a Portland-based modern dance outfit slick as they come. Sexy high-art promo shots, YouTube videos and multimedia collaborations with film and live music are some of their signature appeals. Leave the groundbreaking dance-making and challenging material to other companies: BodyVox just wants to have a good time.

That can be gratifying. It can also be grating. The company’s new show, “Horizontal Leanings,” seen May 3 at the Newmark Theatre, is a bit of both.

Co-artistic directors Jamey Hampton and Ashley Roland have rounded up an especially big family of collaborators for this ambitious new work: a company of twelve dancers, new music by LA composers Vivek Maddala and John Smith performed mostly live by Third Angle New Music, film work by Hampton and Mitchell Rose, a parade of partially recycled costumes by Roland and inventive stage lighting by Mark LaPierre. Even Tad Savinar, that legendary Oregon artist, has signed on as a “dramaturgical consultant” to the project, whatever that means.

That’s a lot of talent to spend, and it makes the resulting evening - a slapdash and too frequently forgettable 90 minutes of dance theater - all the more frustrating.

The work, shaped as fourteen cutely titled self-contained vignettes, races through scenes like an idyllic meadow with the dancers as little lambs (“Urban Meadow”), a shape-shifting trio for three guys in their underwear (“Generator”) and two funky full-on dance off parties (“Green Rave 1” and the inevitable sequel, “Green Rave 2”) that look like ersatz “In Living Color” Fly Girl skits ten years too late. One audience member behind me described the music for those numbers as “a drumbeat from 1986 mixed with Yanni,” and he’s not far off. Third Angle New Music ensemble, augmented with pre-recorded percussion tracks, gave it their all.

Hampton and Roland’s movement vocabulary is safely accessible by any 21st century standard. Their dancers seem to have a good time, though the disagreement in style – is the elbow sharp or soft? Are the legs locked or loose? – detracts. There’s one bonafide bonfire of a dancer stashed in the company: that would be redheaded Laura Haney, a scorching presence. Let’s see more of her.

The house was full, the audience responded warmly, and the Third Angle musicians even joined the dancers for a butt-shaking onstage finale. Clearly BodyVox is just a company of dancers that want to have fun. And really, what’s so wrong with that?

Seventh column

"The Party's Over. Maybe It's Time to Dry Out... Again" - Just Out newsmag, May 2, 2008

What's a girl to do?

Where has the Brit-band Bat for Lashes been all my life?

A coworker just turned me on to them this week, and I was instantly taken with the feint-voiced alto of Natasha Khan and the spare electronic ostinato knocking around in a jumble of bass and drums in their best song so far, "What's a girl to do?"

Plus, the video's just all sorts of eerie.