Arts & Culture
“The LEGS are the wheels of creativity” — Albert Einstein
In tribute to their strength and versatility, legs are used metaphorically in a variety of different cultures all over the world to indicate strength or mobility. Consisting of thousands of flexible muscle fibers grouped into numerous muscles, the legs are capable of impressive range of motion and are used for a wide array of different movements from walking to running to jumping to dancing. In any given performing arts season, local dance groups celebrate dances from cultures all over the world. In September, Madison’s Kanopy Dance Company hosts Riad Middle Eastern Dance Company to blend disparate movements from two sides of the world. From further south, Ko-Thi performs its annual African-styled harvest show at Alverno. The bite of December’s cold blows in the Russian heat of not one, but THREE productions of Tchaikovski’s The Nutcracker. The month opens up with The Minnesota Ballet at the Schauer Center. The next day, the Moscow Ballet comes to the Riverside Theatre while later on in the month The Milwaukee Ballet brings Michael Pink’s vision to the Marcus Center. Things continue to heat up in January as the fleet-footed and colorful Ballet Folklorico Mexico comes to the Waukesha Civic Theatre. In March, legends from Russia mix with puppets and contemporary choreography as Kanopy Dance presents Dark Nights: Baba Yaga and Other Dreams – a collaboration with mask and puppet artist Heidi Cooper. The range of motion broadens even further in February as Alverno Presents the return of David Nieman’s Advanced Beginner Group in a show featuring dance inspired by the rules and tactics of sports. In April, Alverno Presents also welcomes the work of highly accomplished choreographer Karole Armitage and her Armitage Gone! Dance Company. Also in April, Danceworks presents a fusion of dance and new musical compositions as it collaborates with fresh art music gurus Present Music in what should be an extremely refreshing evening of dance and music. Milwaukee Ballet also has a few premiers coming up, including its annual trip to the Pabst Theatre for a concert featuring new work and the season-closing La Bayadere, featuring new work by Artistic Director Michael Pink.
Sep 1st, 2007 by Russ Bickerstaff
“THE BRAIN is a commodity used to fertilize ideas.” — Elbert Hubbard
The mind is run by the brain through an extraordinarily complex series of bioelectric reactions. Much like local arts groups, the brain does remarkable things with profoundly few resources. The brain runs an individual’s body and arguably everything abstract going on in his/her mind on very little quantifiable physical energy. If, for instance, a waiter (who we’ll refer to here as Mark) decides to become the artistic director of a new theatre company, he can find a space in Bay View and start the Boulevard Theatre. The brain in its near-infinite complexity allows this individual to adjust to the new role. If, years later, this same individual and his theatre company are pushed out of a season-opening production of playwright David Mamet’s very modern and ridiculously acclaimed Glengarry Glen Ross by a larger theatre company, said individual will adapt to the situation (through a dizzying set of neurological interactions) by planning a production of David and Amy Sedaris’ irreverent comedy The Book Of Liz. Leaping from Mamet’s serious and deeply engaging glance into the heart of human motivation to a comedy that briefly involves a person in a Mr. Peanut costume by the side of the road seems a bit nonlinear, and as the process of adaptation took its course The Book of Liz was rescheduled. The new season-opening work finally rendered was Will Eno’s Thom Paine (Based on Nothing), which opened last month. While the Sedaris’ piece is no longer the Boulevard’s replacement for Mamet’s brilliant drama (it may have never, in fact, ever really been intended for this purpose), it remains on the Boulevard’s season schedule this September. The comedy tells the story of a woman living in a fictitious, secluded religious commune who makes the cheese balls for which the commune is so well known by the outside world. Featuring some pretty deft dialogue, Thom Paine is a brilliant fusion of the distinctive comedic voices of both writers. Thus, thanks to the process of adaptation, Milwaukee theatre is host to the comedy AND the drama of both Eno and Mamet. The adaptability offered through the constantly changing architecture of the human brain can produce astonishing versatility within a single individual as well. For instance: say a young man from New Jersey (we’ll call him Jim) gets a job on a fishing boat. He dreams of being a captain of his own boat, so he graduates from high school and goes to the local community college to perfect the math skills he will need for navigation. If, in the process of going to said college, he finds himself in a theatre watching someone onstage and thinks, “I want to do that,” neurological adaptation at a cellular level kicks in, allowing him to travel across the country to Wisconsin and attend UWM’s professional theater training program. Years later he’s a successful actor/playwright/author. This year, Jim DeVita has a tremendous amount going on, thanks to the basic fundamentals of neurologically-fueled human adaptation. The fall arrives as DeVita’s summer season as […]
Sep 1st, 2007 by Russ Bickerstaff
Ani DiFranco
By Allison Berndt Ani DiFranco is a true entertainer. Whether it’s in her racy, controversial lyrics, her man-handling of the guitar, her feminist and political ideals or even her own radical personal style, she’s certainly a woman who’s paved the way for female activist artists. Canon, DiFranco’s 17th studio album, is a two-disc compilation of the most memorable songs from her 17-year career. Included are such classics as “32 Flavors,” “Fire Door,” “Little Plastic Castle” and “78%H2O.” As an added bonus, five previously released tracks have been re-recorded for this release. The new recording of “Shameless” is most definitely worth a listen – it zones in on DiFranco’s intense guitar picking and rhythmic diversions. “Both Hands” is more percussive with a slight hint of island sound in this latest recording. “Your Next Bold Move” is revamped in a very slow, very dramatic, very beautiful way (if one can really sound beautiful when railing on politics), the lyrics a quintessential example of what defines DiFranco’s songwriting style – insightful and provocative words with a folk-guitar soundtrack. Canon is an album anyone who’s ever been interested in Ani DiFranco should own. It’s a sampling of her best work, a little bit of everything she’s done since 1990. Fast, slow, controversial, tame, it’s all entertaining and it’s all Ani.
Sep 1st, 2007 by Vital Archives
“Human salvation lies in the HANDS of the creatively maladjusted.” — Martin Luther King
Some of the oldest words in human language relate to the hands, suggesting a fundamental linguistic link between the human mind, the human hand and the world in which they exist. Hands, being the fundamental organ of corporeal interface between a human being and the outside world, have much to answer for in this respect. Throughout history hands have built monuments, started wars and saved and ended lives. Many scholars have elected to pin the blame for many of the hand’s indiscretions on the opposable thumb, thus freeing the rest of the hand from any guilt. Actually, any monkey (or chimpanzee for that matter) can oppose a thumb against an index finger. It’s the fact that the human thumb can oppose ANY of the other fingers including the small and ring fingers that make the human hand unique. Clearly, all the fingers can take both blame and credit for getting humanity to where it is today. And many hands have taken great pains to place performances all over greater Milwaukee this season. Hands have put together a new space for In Tandem to perform in as it opens its first comedy at the newly opened Tenth Street Theatre this season. Meanwhile, Milwaukee Shakespeare is still more or less without a central home as it stages a season featuring a couple of rarely performed pieces. It opens with 2 Henry IV (in September) and Cymbeline (in March) at the Broadway Theatre Center and Twelfth Night at the Wilson Center. Many hands have adapted Shakespeare’s work to other stage forms. The Milwaukee Ballet, for instance, performs dance adaptations of two plays by Shakespeare at the Marcus Center: Hamlet in November and A Midsummer Night’s Dream in February. Two months later, completely different hands place an adaptation of a completely different piece by Shakespeare as The Florentine Opera presents Bellini’s Romeo and Juliet.
Sep 1st, 2007 by Russ Bickerstaff
Danbert Nobacon
Danbert Nobacon has earned his place in the canon of well-known unknowns. Kicking around in Leeds since the late ‘70s, Nobacon was a founder and vocalist of Chumbawamba, which though they only had one international radio hit (1997’s “Tubthumping” ) managed to keep the royalties flowing and the tours rolling until the band’s demise in 2004. Now he’s back on Chicago’s Bloodshot Records with a debut solo outing that only a certified veteran could produce. Although the impact of Nobacon’s musical offering is felt upon first listen, it’s also one of those “creepers,” “sleepers” or “seepers” (however you want to word it) wherein the songs and the downright artistry involved only open up after repeated exposure. The rewards are great – almost revelatory – but the extra investment is required to fully appreciate the treasure within. Despite how one might be predisposed to view The Library Book of the World given Chumbawamba’s history, this is not one-hit wonder, get-rich quick, use-once-and-destroy pop music. It’s also not a bludgeon and impale, politicking musical manifesto. It’s artfully layered, full of lyrical twists and turns that include insidious declarations, wholesome ruminations, contemptuous wordplays and, perhaps most of all, damn good music. The arrangements are sparse for the most part, which gives the songs and their subject matter the wind to sail. All in all, it’s the work of a songwriter who is a journeyman at his craft, reaching what he’s after creatively. These are songs for the tavern, both the stage and the bar. And though Danbert’s voice is a bit of an acquired taste, his delivery is impeccable. It seethes with the integrity of conviction, sways with the power of knowledge and soothes with the empathy of experience. There’s an underlying vein of humor throughout the disc, but in the end, what else is there in the face of unrelenting, apathetic ignorance?
Sep 1st, 2007 by Troy Butero
“Music’s golden tongue Flatter’d to tears this aged man and poor”
By Barry Wightman If the tongue is a muscle of love, a notorious logo of leering lascivious brown-sugared rock & roll, the taste it produces in our mouths, the perception of flavor, is simultaneously a deeply personal perception of quality, an aesthetic discernment, a judgement we use to assign value in art, literature and music. Like a snake’s tongue testing the dry desert air, a tiny flickering antenna on some strange, primitive wavelength, each of us unfurls an antenna of taste, unique to ourselves, difficult to explain but critical to the art of being human. Extend your antenna, and taste new flavors. Like a bite of breakfast at Tiffany’s, Mancini at the Movies, a sumptuous spread of classics by Henry Mancini performed by his Grammy-nominated daughter Monica Mancini comes to the Wilson Center’s Kuttemperoor Auditorium this month. Mary Wilson, one of the original Supremes, brings her tasty, glittery Motown licks to Wisconsin Lutheran College in October. Taste the bittersweet of War and Remembrance: Music in the ‘40s, the still strong, fervent melodic flavors of Benjamin Britten and Ralph Vaughn Williams performed by the Waukesha Symphony Orchestra have aged well. From two or three dusty menus from old but familiar countries, the krazy klezmer kosher kings of souped-up Yiddish music, The Klezmatics, come to Alverno’s Pitman Theatre in December and stir Woody Guthrie’s corn-fed lyrics with matzoh and Manishevitz and come up with a blintz of Hanukkah cheer. Sugary and toothsome as a favorite Christmas cookie, the Milwaukee Symphony Pops can’t miss with its traditional Holiday Show at the Marcus Center. The Bel Canto Chorus sings Latin American holiday music by Ariel Ramirez at the Hamilton Fine Arts Center and Basilica of St. Josaphat. Then in the depths of winter, savor the classic kitchen table American fare of the imposing bluegrass artist Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder at the Schauer Center and Randy Newman, composer, performer and humorist at the Marcus Center in March. His voice is like a gumbo from Lake Charles, Louisiana by way of Southern California, a Tabasco’d taste of America.
Sep 1st, 2007 by Vital Archives
17 Hippies and Dobert Gnahore
By Blaine Schultz Dobert Gnahore Na Afriki Cumbancha There is a pulsating sense of energy just beneath the surface of Dobert Gnahore’s music. Her fluid vocals are gently propelled by musicians led by acoustic guitarist Colin Laroche de Feline. With roots in Africa’s Ivory Coast, it is no surprise that the English translations for Gnahore’s songs tackle some heavy issues – dipping into gender politics, economics and war. A percolating battery of percussionists and vocalists adds up to some intriguing music with a message in any language. Appearing Sunday 5:30 p.m. Global Union festival at Humboldt Park 17 Hippies Heimlich Hipster Records The title cut of 17 Hippies Heimlich “tells what happens when a strong feeling should be kept a secret, so as to keep that feeling alive and strong; whereas blaring it out would destroy it.” But there is nothing secretive about this tribe. While many kids went techno when the Berlin Wall fell these folks went the other route picking up ukulele, dulcimer, violins, accordion and various horns to form this moveable feast. Alternately rollicking and melancholy, they pick and choose influences from Morocco, Romania, France and Germany. This rag-tag bunch is hard to peg unless Cajun-Balkan-Indian is a new genre. One of the members even dated the Velvet Underground’s Nico. Appearing Saturday 1 p.m. Global Union festival at Humboldt Park
Sep 1st, 2007 by Vital Archives
Heavy Trash
In Heavy Trash’s latest adventure (which picks up from their last release in 2005), there’s more riff-burning, pompadour-bobbing and gum-smacking than you can shake a fried chicken leg at. Bringing back the days of curvy cars, pinup ladies and smoking without borders, Jon Spencer (Blues Explosion) and Matt Verta-Ray’s (Pussy Galore) “Heavy Trash” moniker is definitely cheeky. Think Chris Isaak gone bad – pretty, blue-eyed boy soul with a sharp, ugly edge. Heavy Trash’s self-titled debut was a welcome addition to Jon Spencer fanatics’ collections. Going Way Out With Heavy Trash stacks up to their first release and even delves into a more fleshed-out, swinging sound. Rolling into the first track, “Pure Gold” hits like a cyclone in Tornado Alley, Spencer channeling Presley more convincingly than many white-caped King wannabes. Strutting like a rooster through a dusty coop of hens, Spencer lolls into the pretty garage n’soul of “Outside Chance,” then greases it up in “Double Line,” pairing up gritty guitar solos, sticks tapping short, short, short as if on a hot tin roof, along with brass-balls bass lines whose rough and ready tones are reminiscent of the infamous relationship between The Sharks and The Jets in West Side Story. Going Way Out With Heavy Trash is a hot little album, full of swagger and strut. The only truly campy departure is “You Can’t Win,” which thankfully comes at the album’s close, with Spencer drawling about “Pepsi-Cola, Doritos and beans” and being “drunk on pomade.” This doesn’t play nicely with the rest of the album. Still, Heavy Trash has turned out another call to all rebel rousers, one which will satiate those with a hankering for some straight-up rockabilly flavor.
Sep 1st, 2007 by Erin Wolf
Ministry
Al Jourgenson isn’t about to be considered a politically-charged wordsmith on par with Bob Dylan. Still, this hasn’t stopped him from developing an antipathetic and personal relationship with Bush, Cheney and the Holy War on Terror. Starting with 2004’s Houses of the Mole, followed by 2006’s Rio Grande Blood, the Unholy Trinity concludes with The Last Sucker, a venom-drenched and decidedly non-poetic screed against the Decider and his entourage. Anyone who remembers Ministry’s brutal indictment of Bush Sr., Psalm 69’s “N.W.O.,” is as familiar with The Last Sucker’s formula as is needed. Song after song delivers the same jackhammer drum programming and machine-gun riffage that Ministry’s produced for years, delivered with pit-bull vocals and samples of government icons hypnotically chanting sound-bite mantras. Al doesn’t mince words – lyrics like “I got twins and a Stepford wife/I never had to work a day in my life” don’t leave room for interpretation. But where the Ministry of the Bush 41 era sounded fresh in its rage, the Bush 43 edition has gone stale. The repetitive, stock 16-note chug hammers the brain into a numb paste, perhaps so the listener understands how Jourgenson’s head felt after poring through hours and hours of Bush/Cheney sound bites. Maybe then we won’t notice how cliché it is to name a song about the Veep “The Dick Song,” to say nothing about spending six minutes coming up with new ways to say “Dick Cheney/Son of Satan.” The Last Sucker is Ministry’s final recording, allowing Jourgenson to ride off into the sunset along with lame duck Dubya. Judging by the content of this release (including a baffling cover of the Doors’ “Roadhouse Blues” ), it’s possible that, like Bush the Second, his exit is about eight years too late.
Sep 1st, 2007 by DJ Hostettler
Carolyn Mark
Victoria, B.C.’s most acclaimed Party Girl, Terrible Hostess and less lime-lighted half of the Corn Sisters, Carolyn Mark has removed the training wheels of collaboration (her last release was strictly duets) and is again riding solo. Nothing Is Free, whose liner notes devote the disc to “all the Cowboys, Vampires, Pirates, Poets, Scarecrows and Enablers,” is a reflection of the Can-country minx’s adorably kooky “Point o’ View.” In Mark’s universe, hopes are kept “where we can see ‘em,” those without investments can justify spending “thousands of dollars/keeping Friday alive” and aver that “it’s easier to love an idea/than it is a man.” Equally endearing are Mark’s auctioneer vocals on “1 Thing” and “Get Along,” tracks that could easily be caroused to under a state fair beer tent. Not to be pigeonholed to a do-se-do, Mark’s sound flutters from sunny surf rock (“Happy 2B Flying Away” ) to spacey daydream (“Destination: You” ) , pollinated by her husky Natalie Merchant purr and lyrics that pack a Loretta Lynn punch. “Poisoned With Hope” is uncharacteristically bulky and grating, but pardonable given Mark’s unmatched whimsy and otherwise fluid execution. Folksy, nobody’s-fool showstopper “The 1 That Got Away (With It ) ” will most likely earn the attention of femme rags like Venus and Bust, but until she flags down a more mainstream demographic, Mark will continue her notoriety as “the other Corn Sister.” If her liner tribute to the freaks and underdogs is any indication, though, she won’t be shooting off flares any time soon.
Sep 1st, 2007 by Amber Herzog
Rufus Wainwright at the Pabst – August 26, 2007
It’s always a little surprising that rock bands look and sound as good as they do at the Pabst, a gilded German theater full of red velvet, Italian marble, and busts of famous Austro-Hungarians (Beethoven, Wagner). But it never fails – dirty, dance-y, pounding shows are exalted by the baroquerie of the opera hall, not diminished by it. What a venue like the Pabst does for a performer like Rufus Wainwright, though, is something else entirely, something remarkable. For nearly ten years, the troubador has been crafting exquisite chamber-pop informed by opera, cabaret, lyricism, late-Victioriana, early modernism – melding every manner of anachronistic influence into something metropolitan, contemporary and very intelligent. We had gallery seats – eye-to-eye with the 2-ton Austrian crystal chandelier – but there is intimacy, maybe even privacy, in the vertigo of the second balcony. From way up high, with glasses of wine (actually, I had a glass of wine; my date had a PBR), we enjoyed the sonorous, humble sounds of opening act A Fine Frenzy, a pleasant piano/drum/synth trio that did not in any way overstay their opening act welcome. Not so for The Magic Numbers, a jumpy, bass-heavy band from England that started out fun and stayed on to the point of anxious tedium. Rufus took the stage elegantly late, attired in a patchwork suit, backed by a full band (including three horn players) dressed in stripes. The concert opened with the title track from his new album, Release the Stars; at each chorus, the disco ball over the stage – a grand foil to the crystal chandelier – showered us with hundreds of points of light. He is every inch a star, and probably always has been. His demeanor is classical, his presence hypnotizing. He played brassy, jangly songs with his acoustic guitar and wrought, rich songs on the grand piano: one from his new album, “Going to a Town,” aches with a weary refrain: “I’m so tired of you, America”. The concert was being taped, so some of the songs – notably “Art Teacher,” another sad little aria about a schoolgirl who falls in love on a field trip to a museum – had to be performed twice, which was no cause for complaint. It was almost like a salon, a parlor soiree – another welcome effect of the Pabst’s relative smallness – and Mr. Wainwright was the charming host, endearing us to him with fluttery banter and an uncanny command of the mood, from goofy (performing “Between My Legs” perched atop his boyfriend’s shoulders with a handful of giggly front-row fans dancing around him) to gorgeous (channeling Judy Garland in a lone spotlight) and exuding a certain tenderness for the audience (wearing liederhosen after his first set — this is, after all, German Athens). I felt like an honored guest, even up in the nosebleed seats. I left before the end of the concert, more than two hours into his performance. It was getting late, the dim lights were making me […]
Aug 31st, 2007 by Vital Archives
Moonlight and Magnolias
Milwaukee Chamber Theatre Watch the closing credits of any film and you’ll see a long list of people who lived, breathed and sweated a massive creative project for days, weeks, months or more. Every name on that list has a story behind it that might be just as interesting as the story the film tells. Milwaukee Chamber Theatre opens its 2007-2008 season with Ron Hutchinson’s Moonlight and Magnolias, a comedic tribute to the hard work and dedication of three men striving to finish the final script of what would become the single most commercially successful film of all time – Gone With The Wind. Actor, musician and high school teacher Tom Klubertanz stars as legendary film producer David O. Selznick. Selznick finds himself in the unenviable position of lacking a director on one of the most expensive films in history – a film eagerly anticipated by a legion of fans who have read the book and expect something good. Selznick pulls acclaimed director Victor Fleming (Dan Mooney) off his current project (The Wizard of Oz) to pick up where exiting director George Cukor left off. With a new director in place, Selznick decides to start over with a new script. Bringing in screenwriter Ben Hecht (Michael Herold), Selznick locks himself, Hecht and Fleming in his office to bang out a completely new script in five days. Selznick is aided by a seemingly endless flow of peanuts and bananas brought into the office by his secretary Miss Poppenghul (Marcella Kearns). Klubertanz doesn’t quite muster the emotional weight onstage to play the mighty film producer convincingly. The gravitas is hardly missed, however, as Klubertanz has a compelling nice-guy stage presence that makes the role work. Michael Herold gives a shrewd, intelligent turn as the last screenwriter to work on Gone With The Wind, performing with a deft comedic perspicacity that unleashes itself from some of the best lines in the script. Dan Mooney summons a great amount of arrogance for his initial appearance onstage as big-name film director Victor Fleming, which gradually erodes throughout play in a hugely entertaining performance. Kearns is perfectly conservative in the role of Selznick’s secretary until just the right moment at the end of the play. More than merely a comedy about the golden age of Hollywood, this is a play about three men working themselves to the brink of death. When everything else fades away, we’re watching three men nearly destroy themselves to build the foundations of what is destined to be an unparalleled success. As the characters’ sense of sanity and decorum start to deteriorate, we see the deeply affecting comedy of three men losing their minds, learning something about the nature of their business in the process. It’s a brilliant opening to what looks like a very promising season with Milwaukee Chamber Theatre. VS Milwaukee Chamber Theatre’s production of Moonlight and Magnolias runs now through August 26th at the Broadway Theatre Center’s Cabot Theatre. Tickets can be purchased in advance by calling the box […]
Aug 13th, 2007 by Russ Bickerstaff
