Catching up, looking forward... (odds and ends)

Paradise: Love

Though I’ve seen Marc-Andre Hamelin perform a couple of times in the past two years I had yet to be swayed that he was really all that, as so many claim. My opinion changed after hearing him perform with the San Francisco Symphony last month in a terrific concert which featured the pianist soloing in Ravel’s Concerto For the Left Hand as well as Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. Hamelin performed with nuanced beauty and a heady authority during the Ravel and if the Rhapsody didn’t quite reach the same heights it was due to conductor David Robertson’s less than wholly convincing control over the jazz elements in the score, which resulted in a performance which sang but didn’t quite swing. The concert also featured a knockout opener of Elliot Carter’s Variations for Orchestra and closed with Ravel’s La Valse. I’ve said this before but I’ll say it again- it’s inexplicable to me that Ravel is not given more respect as a composer- he was as good and often better than any of his contemporaries. During the intermission Lisa Hirsch and I had fun trying to determine the identity of the timpanist, Michael Israelievitch, who was terrific and hopefully is being considered for the seat being vacated by what-his-name.

In the second of three concerts in their inaugural season, Curious Flights celebrated the Britten Centennial with a diverse program featuring the Valinor Winds performing the Movement for Wind Sextet, the Friction Quartet with violist Jason Pyzowski performing the Phantasy in F Minor for String Quintet, tenor Brian Thorsett in a stunningly gorgeous Canticle III¸and best of all, Movements for a Clarinet Concerto- a work cobbled together from an unfinished concerto originally intended for Benny Goodman. This was performed by what was essentially a 50-odd piece pick-up orchestra featuring Curious Flights founder and prime mover Brenden Guy as the soloist, and led by Marin Symphony Music Director Alasdair Neale. Hearing this orchestra one would have never guessed they were organized for this particular concert- they sounded well-rehearsed and played at an exceptional level all around. The next program by Curious Flights, Transatlantic Crossings, will take place on October 18^th and will feature collaborations between contemporary British and Bay Area composers, performed in the concert hall of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. Tickets ($15 GA, $10 for students) are available here. Program here.

Last weekend at The Lab in San Francisco’s Mission District, the Other Minds Festival brought Rhys Chatham to town as a warm-up of sorts for the November West Coast premiere of A Secret Rose (100 Guitars). Chatham was one six people playing electric guitars (with all amps seemingly turned up to “11”), and with a phenomenal drummer whose name a didn’t catch and a bassist who provided a booming Geezer Butler-ish bottom, they tore through an enthralling re-working of his Guitar Trio¸ renamed G3 to reflect the additional instruments. It was the most exhilarating 30 minutes of music I’ve heard all year, and I can’t wait to see what’s in store come November 17th. If you’re a local guitar player who wants to take part, contact the Other Minds Festival or apply online here- they are looking for people to participate ranging from talented amateurs to serious pros, and the rehearsal time will be minimal, but it promises to be a maximum pleasure, maybe even the event of the year.

This coming week has the SF Symphony performing lots of Stravinsky, and over at YBCA I'm really intrigued about the screenings of Ulrich Seidl's Paradise trilogy- three films under title Love, Faith, and Hope happening now through June 30th. Check their website for the full schedule, but the films are being screened sequentially so don't wait- Love only has screenings left on 06/15 & 06/16. It's not necessary to see them all, but if it turns out to be your kind of cinema it would be a shame to miss one. Note that the films are deemed provocative and controversial, raunchy and explicit- Seidl had been compared to Fassbinder by none other than John Waters. Works for me. And of course Ojai North is taking place this weekend- last night's performance was, in a word- sensational (more to come on that).

Nameless forest

Photo by Julieta Cervantes

Dean Moss' Nameless forest is better experienced than described- a success on multiple levels defying a single interpretation, touching the audience in so many places, it's a work that keeps expanding within the mind long after it's over.

Moss is the former curator of dance and performance at The Kitchen in New York, a guest lecturer at Harvard and Yale, and a guest professor at Hunter College and the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music. The inspiration for his most recent work comes from the sculptural self-portraits of Sungmyung Chun, a Korean artist whose work deals with alienation, identity, and violence. Working together, the two men have transformed Chun's solid and heavy works into a piece of living theater, which incorporates 12 members of the audience into its core of six dancers, ensuring no two performances are ever quite the same.

Taking place under and around an exploded figure based on Chun's work, with its pink neon guts dangling in mid-air at the center of it all, Nameless forest has three parts.

The first begins with a dark stage floor, the dancers and participants seated on opposite ends of the square space. Stephen Vitello's compelling score begins a snarling lion moving through a jungle (or forest), creating a sense of unease and impending violence. The lights come up revealing a man lying face-down at the edge of the floor. He begins to flop across the floor like a limbless creature emerging from the water to make land for the first time. It also looks like a birth, and as soon the initial struggle to emerge is over, others pile upon him like the dead weight and ghosts of ancestors and expectations, smothering and eclipsing him from view. The newly emerged being soon finds himself within recognizable societal situations- uncomfortable, awkward, confusing, ritualistic and soon no longer the center of the audience's attention.

Photo by Paula Court

The second part is an arresting visual and aural cacophony- the being is emerged in a world of alienation, violence and sex, enhanced by Michael Kamber's recordings and images reflecting his experience as a war correspondent.

The last part takes the audience inside the exploded being- the neon guts (by Gandalf  Gavàn) are illuminated, and the participants are revealed in new ways. Reflecting the audience back on itself, Kacie Chang leads them through one of our culture's most banal forms of self-expression (and self absorption) and turns it into something unexpectedly poignant (and in this performance quite funny). Now blurring the line between performance and reality, the fourth wall knocked down (or is it?), coupled with the knowledge that as a member of the audience it could have been you on that floor, Nameless forest concludes on a heady and engaging note.

Photo by Paula Court

The excellent performers at the core of the work are Kacie Chang, Eric Conroe, Aaron Hodges, Pedro Jiménez, DJ McDonald and Sari Nordman, all of whom possess unique identities and express a wide range of physical and dramatic abilities. Moss requires them to give a lot during the show and together they form a fearless and bold troupe.

During a Q & A with Moss and the performers which followed, one commented that after working on the piece for two years, there is now more left out of it than what is currently presented onstage. That leanness and refinement shows- there's nothing in the work that feels redundant or unnecessary, and its remarkable how the core ensemble integrates members from the audience so seamlessly into the performance. Provocative, intelligent and completely engaging, it's definitely worth seeing.

The final performance is tonight at YBCA, which once again has succeeded in presenting something quite extraordinary for Bay Area audiences. Check out their website for upcoming events featuring a broad spectrum of work from contemporary artists across the globe.