Crazy Weekend/Even Crazier Week
This weekend was jam packed with way to much stuff. Starting on Friday Kirstie and I saw The Chicago Tap Theater’s production called The Tell Tale Tap. This was a very ineteresting redition of 3 Edgar Allen Poe pieces told through tap. The first was “The Tell Tale Heart” and this was done using no words or music. The characters expressed their thoughts through their feet, the rhythm of the poem played out in the rhythm of their feet. The story revolves around clicks, the clock, the dead mans heart, and was therefor a perfect choice to start with. Next was “The Raven” which was a solo with Mark tapping and slam poetry creator Mark Kelley Smith reading, all with only a chair and one simple light as props. Smiths voice was great to hear, and Marks tapping accented different sections of the poem creating an overall tense and gripping rendition. After a short intermission the “Masque of the Red Death” would close out the evening. This was told in parts through contemporary (well mostly 80’s) music. Having not been familiar with that story I thought the songs, tap, and acting did a good job of framing the story. I found a copy of the story a few days later at a book store and read it. The chioces of songs and rewriting of characters (i.e the “prince” from the story was cast as one of the women in the club) was perfect. He mentioned some other performaces in the 2006 season that sound interesting, we will have to keep an eye out for them.
The evening was closed with a visit to Angels. We wanted to go one more time because rumor had it that their landlord was rasing the rent to unbelievable proportions and they might have to call it a day. During dinner we came to findout that the out pouring of community support helped and the landlord might change the rent to something more reasonable.
Saturday was a beautiful day to be out on our bikes. After a quick stop to Dr. Wax we went down to Lakeview and had lunch. Bumming around the neighborhood for a few hours before the film started with tried to find Evil Clown which has now moved to the lincoln sqaure area, so we got some coffee at Intelligensia and headed over to Landmark. The movie we saw was called Yes, and quickly I give it an 8/10. The dialog is all in iambic pentameter which added a sense of drama and poetry to the lines, but at times muddied up some of the scenes. To finish off the evening was Femi Kuti and his band of: 4 horns (2 trumpets, an alto and bass sax), 2 drumers (traditional kit and conga drums), 3 dancers/back-up singers, and a guitar/bass/kyeboards with Femi playing an occasional hammond or sax. Overall it was quite the show, somewhere close the the feeling I had the first Polyphonic spree show, this overwhelming sense of communal enjoyment. The show was 2+hrs, just amazing.
Sunday was really hot, but that didnt stop us from hanging out at the Folk and Roots Fest in Welles park. We went to support our friend Michelle who was in the old town school fiddle compition. She did well but only took 5th place. We stayed around for a bit to catch the Zincs, who were really good, and then we drove Michelle home. On the way we stoped at a gelato place in her neighborhood for some very creamy gelato. After some grocery shopping I was beat and we came home. I did a bit of recording, the fruits of which I hope to have out later this week.
Speaking of this week:
Mon: Zelienople @ empty bottle
Tues: movies in the park (citizen cane)
Weds: Pit Er Pat @ open end gallery
Thus: nothing
Fri: May Day/neva dinova/canasta @ schubas
SAT-SUN: intonation fest…
ahhh…summer in chicago