Meredith Monk, liberator of singers
Multimedia artist Meredith Monk, labeled avant-garde for her reducing of dance, music, and drama to their most basic and powerful elements, gave the great voices of the Los Angeles Master Chorale a remarkable gift: their bodies. Halfway through “Songs of Ascension,” the final work of Sunday evening’s Monk tribute, the singers circulated the stage of Disney ...
Herr Haselboeck’s precarious perch 1
Musica Angelica’s Palm Sunday performance of St. John Passion at Santa Monica’s First United Methodist Church had us afloat in the infinite beauty of Bach’s musical soundscape. But it also had us glued to our chairs as Martin Haselboeck, the orchestra’s music director, balanced backwards on the edge of the stage conducting Bach’s massive score ...
Bill T. Jones / Dance Theater Workshop merger 1
Apr
4
2010
A major merger in the New York dance world is in the works. The 25-year-old Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company is in final negotiations to merge with Dance Theater Workshop. The two groups will combine their boards and staff into one entity with a new name and mission, though the final details are still ...
Flamenco fury at Fountain Theater
The petite lady in the photo, a Frida Kahlo lookalike named Palomo Rios, is a spitfire dancer whose performance at the Fountain Theater’s “Forever Flamenco” series we had the great pleasure of viewing last Sunday evening . One suggestion: Do not get on Ms. Rios’s bad side. She’ll hurl her compact body through space, seizing ...
Our exigent film-viewing life in Los Angeles 2
Apr
1
2010
We are truly April fools! It’s a topsy-turvy world … because the laid-back capital of the universe is on fire with film events this month. We in Los Angeles are sweating bullets trying to attend all the film festivals on offer in our city. For film alone, the April line-up is quadruple-booked. arts•meme’s good friend, ...
“King of Comedy” at TCM Film Festival
Mar
30
2010
The role of the (stalked) talk-show host in Martin Scorsese’s brilliant black comedy, “The King of Comedy” (1982), was first envisaged for Johnny Carson. When Carson declined, Scorsese, in a stroke of genius, turned to Jerry Lewis. Lewis is so fantastic in this movie; he skates the narrow edge of powerful, scary, and vulnerable. Really ...
“Worse than War,” Adam Hyman, co-producer
Mar
28
2010
The benign landscape at left is a Rwandan work camp. The workers in the photo are Hutu tribesmen convicted of using machetes to hack to death Tutsi men, women and children in the murderous genocide of 1994. In the spring of 2008, renowned Holocaust scholar Daniel Jonah Goldhagen took a camera crew with him on ...
Jane Sherman remembers Martha Graham
In a prior post, we noted the passing of Jane Sherman, the last living Denishawn dancer. In an arts•meme exclusive, our friend Hugh Neely of Timeline Films of Culver City, California, provides us with footage of Jane reminiscing about fellow Denishawn alumni Martha Graham and Doris Humphrey. Graham danced with Denishawn from 1921- ...
Art, books, talk, music & life … @ ALOUD
It’s difficult to separate affection for the Library Foundation’s ALOUD series at Los Angeles Central Library from love of the library itself. The detailing in the original building’s grand rotonda, pictured at left, shows why. It’s gorgeous: where California Mission-style leaves off, art deco kicks in. ALOUD, the program of lectures, book talks, readings and performances ...
Denishawn’s last living dancer leaves us 3
Mar
18
2010
Norton Owen, Director of Preservation of Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, dispatched the following message: “Although I don’t believe you had the privilege of meeting her, I wanted to pass along the poignant news that the youngest and last of the Denishawn dancers, Jane Sherman (1908-2010), passed away last night at the age of 101.” The ...