If your musical tastes run parallel to mine, you’re likely to stop reading at the words “harmonica and slide guitar.” Please don’t; because aside from the familiar combination of instruments, the duo Gutpuppet have about as little to do with blues music as I usually do.
Blessed with killer improvisational chops and a freewheeling polyglot musical style, these two guys – Los Angeles-based harp-man Bill Barrett and Montana-based picker Scot Ray – explore the vast and mysterious oceans between klezmer, Latin, jazz, and blues, without ever lingering long in any one current.
I think a lot of folks rarely pause to ponder the state of arts criticism in this town. Probably because there’s not a lot of it around. When there’s a review of a play or a concert or a visual art show in the Missoulian, I usually write it (and I can’t cover everything). The Independent runs some criticism as well; this week, for example, they reviewed “To Kill a Mockingbird,” thus making it that rare week when one play gets two published reviews in this town (I ran a review yesterday in this blog, which will run Friday in the paper).
I could be blind or unaware, but I’ve not seen much in-depth online criticism elsewhere in town; and neither TV nor radio offers any that I’ve ever come across. Ditto New West and the Kaimin.
At the emotional climax of Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird,” a well-liked African-American laborer named Tom Robinson sits in a courtroom in Maycomb, Alabama, falsely and cynically accused of raping a white woman. Tom’s attorney, Atticus Finch, implores the jury to find Tom innocent of the crime. As he speaks of the racial prejudices that taint the minds of his fellow men “in this year of grace, 1935,” Finch reminds his jury of Thomas Jefferson’s words: “All men are created equal.”
In 1935, as Finch is soon reminded, those words remained hollow, even within the sacred forum of a court of law. Yet Jefferson’s words linger in our ears today, their compact expression of an ideal reverberating ever louder.
In 2004, in a speech at the Democratic National Convention that would put his name suddenly in the national spotlight, the junior senator from Illinois, Barack Obama, intoned Jefferson’s words. He cited them again in a pivotal speech last June in Independence, Missouri, addressing questions of patriotism that had threatened to swamp his campaign for president.
Now, we find ourselves living in a country where those words have taken on new prescience. Barack Obama sits in the White House as America’s first African-American president. For that reason alone, “To Kill a Mockingbird” is worth revisiting, if only to remind us how recently such blatant inequality was an ingrained part of our culture, how fresh some wounds remain — and yet how far we’ve come.
That much, and a good bit more, justifies an evening spent with Montana Repertory Theatre’s staged production of “To Kill a Mockingbird.” As adapted by playwright Christopher Sergel, this sprawling tale of morality and justice in a tiny, tight-knit southern town teeters at the balance between terrible tragedy and heartwarming hope.
Lest we all get too giddy about the ascent of Barack Obama to the presidency, San Francisco-based indie hip-hop artist Sole continues to travel the world and bleat about what he sees. “After two world tours as a band, and ten years of touring the globe, Sole has witnessed the decline of the west, from France to America,” Sole declares in a missive announcing his latest album release, “Sole & the Skyrider Band Remix Album.” “The first world is becoming the third world, one giant conflict zone where there are no innocent bystanders. The stupid things have indeed begun to implode on themselves, and this year has indeed turned out to be a ‘sad day for investors.’”
Okay, so that press release was written back in the olden days, in that nigh-forgotten era when there were still two wars going on and the economy was still in a shambles and…wait, maybe the dark prophet of political rap still has a point.
He certainly still has a way with glowering grooves that refract around the edges like shards of black flint. Don’t get too close, or they might cut you deep.
To call the Austin, Tx.-based Greencards a bluegrass band is to shortchange not only the band’s wide-ranging music, but also its diverse cultural roots. Made up of two Aussies and an Englishman, the band plays gorgeous ballads and peppy reels that pay little heed to the formulas that frame traditional bluegrass.
Last week I wrote a preview of Montana Actors’ Theatre’s production of Frank McGuinness’ “Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me.” I had hoped to review the production, but my schedule got crazy and it ain’t gonna happen. So instead I thought I would post up this series of reflections by the actors involved in the production. (Thanks to Chris Torma for sharing these essays.) [Read More...]
Pianist Robert Thies first captured worldwide attention in 1995 when he won the Gold Medal at the International Prokofiev Competition in St. Petersburg, Russia. In so doing, Thies became the first American pianist to win first prize in a Russian piano competition since Van Cliburn’s triumph at the Tchaikovsky Competition in 1958. As his solo career has subsequently blossomed, Thies has been hailed far and wide for his “unerring, warm-toned refinement, revealing judicious glimmers of power,” in the words of the Los Angeles Times. (Click here for a sample of Thies playing an excerpt from Claude Debussy’s “Reverie”)
Next Thursday, Jan. 22, Thies comes to Missoula to perform a recital with local soprano Gina Lapka.
Though I’m no fan of the screamo/hardcore/death metal genre, it’s important to give props where they’re due: Ontario-based metal band Protest the Hero boasts the sleekest Myspace site I’ve ever seen. I had long ago become convinced that it must be impossible to create a Myspace site that doesn’t suffer from overlapping images, text spread beyond the width of the screen, and so-on. These guys prove my presumption wrong with a media-rich site that features audio, video, tons of images and even more text – all arranged neatly on one vertically scrolling page. Tis a thing of elegance.
And actually, there’s much to recommend in the band’s music as well, provided the listener approaches it steeled for an onslaught.
With a human voice reminiscent of Warren Zevon and a guitar voice both powerful and restrained, Michael Charles could have chosen most any genre of music to play, and play well. The fact that he chose the mostly calcified genre of blues-rock might seem unfortunate; but give him a chance. [Read More...]
A certain relative gave this magnet set to our son when he was born, which was pretty awesome. Now, news has emerged that, coming soon, there’ll be a whole host of video games that’ll teach him how to sing along with the musicals of Andrew Lloyd Webber. Super!
If your musical tastes run parallel to mine, you’re likely to stop reading at the words “harmonica and slide guitar.” Please don’t; because aside from the familiar combination of instruments, the duo Gutpuppet have about as little to do with blues music as I usually do.
Lest we all get too giddy about the ascent of Barack Obama to the presidency, San Francisco-based indie hip-hop artist Sole continues to travel the world and bleat about what he sees. “After two world tours as a band, and ten years of touring the globe, Sole has witnessed the decline of the west, from France to America,” Sole declares in a missive announcing his latest album release, “Sole & the Skyrider Band Remix Album.” “The first world is becoming the third world, one giant conflict zone where there are no innocent bystanders. The stupid things have indeed begun to implode on themselves, and this year has indeed turned out to be a ‘sad day for investors.’”
Pianist
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