Kitten LaRue: Former New Orleans performer on Kitten N’ Lou’s “OVEREXPOSED!” show at One Eyed Jacks, Lady Gaga, and returning home

Posted on April 15, 2016 by davidleesimmons under burlesque

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INFO:
Kitten N’ Lou in “OVEREXPOSED!”
Sunday (April 17), 9 p.m.
One Eyed Jacks
Tickets $18 advance, $20 day of show (VIP table seating available)
Click here for tickets

Kitten LaRue has come a long way since her days in the Shim Sham Revue in the early 2000s as a part of the burlesque renaissance that emanated out of the Shim Sham Club on Toulouse Street. Moving to Seattle, she helped kick-start the burlesque scene there with the Atomic Bombshells. But the Ruston native has never lost her love of the Crescent City, so it shouldn’t come as that much of a surprise that her other project, Kitten N’ Lou — with her onstage/offstage partner, Lou Henry Hoover — actually was birthed on a dare at the Bourbon Pub in 2011.

“It was summertime,” she recalls over the phone at her home base in Seattle. “We were both living down there for a month or two, just because my sister is having her baby, and so I was spending the summer there. We weren’t married yet, and we just went and saw this drag show, and we met the Carnival Kings, who were performing, and we were like,‘Oh we’re performers, too.’ And they said, ‘You should do an act, and we just kind of threw together, a little fun, dance-y lip-synch act, and that’s kind of where it all started.”

The song? Big Sean’s “Dance A$$.”

And so began Kitten N’ Lou, which over the past five years has become one of the most original, funny and popular burlesque acts in the world. The couple was named Most Comedic Act at the 2014 Burlesque Hall of Fame festival in Las Vegas. Months later, they performed as showgirl dancers (along with burlesque star and friend, Angie Pontani and two others) backing up Lady Gaga and Tony Bennett in their “Cheek to Cheek“ concert as part of their appearance on PBS’s “Great Performances” series and from their duet album of the same name.

Kitten N’ Lou made a return to New Orleans in 2015, co-producing the “CREAM!” show with Bella Blue and held at One Eyed Jacks, the former Shim Sham Club, and hosted by their frequent collaborator, BenDeLaCreme.

“They’ve taken a combination of many elements of burlesque and then added their own flair to it,” said Bella Blue. “And they have also added an element of drag to it well with their makeup and costuming. Like if you watch their acts you’ll see dancing, tassel-twirling, striptease. Those are the basic elements. But, when you are dancing to ‘Last Dance’ in a 1970s-inspired costume with heavy choreography and camp and gender fuckery (Lou as a drag king), it makes it uniquely Kitten N’ Lou.”

And 2016 is off to an amazing start, considering that the duo was voted the most popular burlesque act in 21^st Century Burlesque’s poll of the top 50 performers.

Now they’re back, bringing their first-ever full-length show, “OVEREXPOSED!,” to One Eyed Jackson on Sunday (April 17) at One Eyed Jacks. LaRue discussed the concept for the show, which plays on their married life at home and onstage, as well as their long-term plan to make New Orleans their home base, among many other topics in this edited Q&A.

Let’s start with “OVEREXPOSED.” This is your first full-length show, but it also incorporates some of your previous acts, and you get to extend those, or simply draw out everything a little bit more, and there’s also a little bit of a more thematic approach at work here as well, correct?

Yeah, that definitely is, so this is our first evening work as a duet, and it does indeed include some of our more icon acts that we’ve created over the years, but it tells a story. It’s sort of a show within a show. It kind of follows the ups and downs of being the world’s show-busiest couple, so to speak, what that entails, and there are some acts that are also new material, and theater, and all kinds of stuff in there. The premises is essentially that we start the show with one of our bigger acts, and then we quickly discover that we are the only ones in the show, and we didn’t get that memo until just now, so there’s a narrator (BenDeLaCreme, pre-recorded) who interacts with us, and speaks to us, and kind of guides us through. And so it’s really funny, and it’s has some serious moments as well.

And a lot of it is meta thing, right? Where your show-biz people are talking about show biz, but also there’s a lot about being a couple as well. You can kind of expand on that a little bit.

Absolutely, yeah. I mean it’s kind of a we sort of talk about how we artist to reveal truth, and our drag, and in our work. It’s kind of about who are Kitten and Lou without Kitten and Lou. What happens when you strip that away? What happens when the goal of success on the stage interferes with your personal relationship? It explores some of those ideas.

Is it tough being a couple, and performing?

Yeah, I mean it definitely has its challenges. It’s also obviously it’s like we’re the luckiest people in the world to get to do this together, and do it all over the world, but it’s definitely not without its challenges. We’re together like 24 hours a day, and you have to make a real group effort to carve out non-work time with each other. Where we’re just us, and this show supports that. What the concept of just us means, and it’s also at levels of exploring what it’s like to be a queer couple in the world. What that sort of otherness means.

Kitten N’ Lou are… OVEREXPOSED! sizzler reel! from Kitten N’ Lou on Vimeo.

You said something in the Huffington Post, I’ll read the quotes it says, “It’s really thrilling to get to bring to the stage both our biggest show biz acts, along with the kind of theater that only works in longer perform. And we use the duration in a way that doesn’t really work in a five-minute act.” And you expand on that a little bit, but I really love the idea of talking about making it thematic, cabaret act of where the length matters, so to speak. Pardon any puns, but you really get to kind of stretch things. What is the beauty in this stretching?

Within this context of a burlesque act, we’re trying to tell a story within five minutes. And that story has a beginning, middle and end, and you have to really make a lot of very clear vast choices of how to do that. With an evening length work we’re able to play with this idea of duration in that we can have awkward silences if we want to.

So there’s this section where I essentially like eat my feelings with a bag of potato chips for three minutes, and people really responded to it. That’s exciting, and that’s not something I can just do in the context of an act. I mean I guess I could, but it would not kind of work. There’s a section where Lou and I have a very uncomfortable, awkward picnic. Where we cast a beer bottle back and forth. And that has within the context of our show has different layers of meaning, and metaphor that we get to play with, and explore.

One of the things that really struck me, just from a very zippy, snappy highlight reel is everyone talks, and you talk a lot about theater and drag, and burlesque and more. What I got was that this extended time kind of brings a mime-style theater into the act more.

We both draw heavily from mime, and clown, and we’re both like deeply interested in the different levels of meaning that it can be found in a gesture, and a real economy of theater in that way. I mean we love like bringing the over-the-top element with our burlesque acts. It’s just over the top, but we’re also interested within this kind of work this evening lengths work were we’re exploring that sort of economy of how much can we convey within a single gesture, or movement or eyebrow raise.

You’re blurring so many lines in there, whether it’s burlesque, boylesque, cabaret and drag. Do you see a kind of (audience) acceptance of your blurring these lines more now compared to five years ago? In other words, do audiences get it more than they did five years ago?

I think they do, and I feel like in our world it sort of depends on what they’re looking at, but this is what we have found to be true for ourselves, and we can only really speak for ourselves is that what we aimed to do with our work was give the spoonful-of-sugar approach. So we’re sort of like of delivering these subversive notions, or these subversive scenes of queerness, and drag, and there’s definitely like political under-curtain in what we’re doing because of that, but we wanted to do it in a way that was just pure eye candy, and pure 100 percent show-biz entertainment so that a broader audience would be open to receiving that message.

I guess when you say spoonful of sugar, you’re trying to make it as fun as possible to get this acceptance shot through your own filter a little bit.

Exactly, the things that we come from, we’re all like the different musical-theater world, and Lou actually before Lou got into burlesque kind of career as a contemporary dance choreographer and performer (as showgirl Ricki Mason), so Lou is coming from contemporary dance world. I’ve been in the theater and burlesque world for years, and we’re really just kind of interested for the two of us in creating this sort of new kind of performance that wasn’t just one thing, and then actually pulled from all of our influences, and both of our backgrounds, and could appeal to a really broad audience that also all the while delivering the inherent subversive message of us being clear performers.

The other part of your life that I’m curious about is, how you as a person and your sexuality evolved, was something that, one became more apparent before the other as a performer? Or was that something that was always you was aware of as a younger person?

Yeah, that’s a good question. I definitely have always been aware of my queerness since I was a teenager maybe, perhaps even before that, but I just didn’t have a word for that because I live in a small town in the Deep South (Ruston, La.), so there weren’t really like a lot of examples for me to look to, or a lot of people talking about it, but I definitely had been aware of it for a long time. But your question about its relationship to burlesque was really interesting, I think, because burlesque definitely helped me feel more comfortable with my sexuality in general, as I think it does for many burlesque performers, and it also really helped me kind of discover a way to express femininity and to perform femininity in a way that felt comfortable to me.

And here you are discovering things either about yourself or your performances, and both seem to have been playing also and maybe an emboldening the other. Whether creatively or emotionally. I’m not trying to dimestore psychoanalyze you, but it just sounds interesting that your creative side, and your sexual sides were kind of able to really meet in these really cool places.

Well, actually because as a queer person trying to figure that out about myself, burlesque kind of helps you reclaim your sexuality and reclaim performing femininity in a way that’s not strictly about the male gaze. So it’s like using drag — first of all bringing drag into my performance plays with that idea of femininity as a construct. And femininity can be a fun, playful thing. and it’s not exclusively for the purpose of attracting male attention.

Right, but most guys think that it still is (laughs).

Yeah, well, I think that’s one of the reasons why in the burlesque world a lot of people have responded to what Lou and I are doing, is because there’s kind of like no questions that what we’re doing is not exclusively for men to look at. It’s like we’re clowns, and we’re obviously like queer women who are together and Lou is his own weird character. It’s not like it’s not for men to enjoy. It’s for everyone to enjoy, but it’s very clear when we are onstage doing what we do that this was not created to attract male attention.

Was winning Most Comedic Act at the Burlesque Hall of Fame weekend in 2014 a flashpoint that started getting you more and more attention, or were you already in ascendance when that happened?

We already had a lot of people excited about us, but there’s something about performing at the Burlesque Hall of Fame, where so many of your peers get to see your work in one place. They’re all there like Mecca for burlesque, so everyone is there and so, so many of your peers, so many producers are there watching you, and so doing our act on that stage for the first time really like brought our public profile up to a different level, and after doing that and winning that award we then got Lou to perform at like 15 festivals that year or something as headliners. And before that we were kind of maybe still like not people were aware of us. They didn’t really know what we did, but then after that event we started getting calls to headline festivals, which is really great, and then from that point on you have people from other countries or all over the world who become aware of your work.

The Internet obviously is a very useful tool as well. We now have people will go … We’ll be headlining a town we’ve never been to for example and we’ll have people say to us oh my God I’m your biggest fan. I watch all your videos on YouTube. They haven’t actually seen us even perform live, but they are aware of our work from what’s been posted on the Internet.

Was performing in “CREAM!” with Bella Blue at One Eyed Jacks over last year’s Southern Decadence kind of one of your bigger moments? Coming back to New Orleans to perform as Kitten and Lou?

For me, personally, it was so cool to come back to the stage that I started doing burlesque on. I have such a history with that stage. Just being on that stage, and being backstage, and there’s something really meaningful for me about producing my first big show in New Orleans on the stage that I got my start on. It felt really like a full-circle moment. It was really thrilling.

http://player.pbs.org/viralplayer/2365352892

How did your involvement in the PBS show “Cheek to Cheek” with Lady Gaga and Tony Bennett come about?

Lou and I were performing in Provincetown at the time, and we got a call from Angie Pontani, who’s a burlesque star …

And a pretty big one.

She was one of the originals, and we worked with her before, and she couldn’t even tell us what it was. She just said I have something really big on the horizon. She said send me all of your press stuff, and so we sent in our press stuff. Lady Gaga wanted five burlesque dancers, burlesque performers to be part of that show, and we were two of the ones chosen. We had just dropped everything, hightailed it to New York, and spent three very intense days learning like in the dance studio with Lady Gaga and her choreographer. Learning, like, three different dances, and then performing it to be taped.

And this was with Lou as a dancer …

A glamorous showgirl. It’s interesting they chose us out of all the people who submitted, because we submitted Kitten and Lou as we are — Lou, with the mustachioed character. But they still just picked us anyway.

So tell me about some of the meetings. What were the moments like?

The moments? They were very intense moments! Just a couple of highlights where in one of the rehearsals, the choreographer wanted Lou and I to be flanking Lady Gaga, to be on either side of her. So we were just standing next to her in rehearsal, and (the choreographer is) like, “Don’t stand so far away from her. Get in close like she’s your homegirl! So we kind of scooted up a little closer to her, and she just looked at us and was like, “Are you having fun?” I was like, “Yes, Lady Gaga, I’m having fun. Actually it’s like the most nervewracking job I’ve ever had in my life! (Laughs.) Another real highlight, which you can even see a little glimpse of on the TV special, is that it choreographed us to be doing a dance around Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga. And they had one of the pieces of choreography was for us to be backing up, like with our backs towards up stage, and Tony Bennett was supposed to head and move to the side of the stage when we did that, but during the filming he didn’t do that. So I basically just like crashed right into him, because he was directly behind me, so that was a special moment.

That’s one way to meet a star.

Mmm-hmm!

For Lydia Treats, heading for World of Wonders sideshow tour, “I was always the weirdo”

Posted on April 13, 2016 by davidleesimmons under circus sideshow

Sideshow performer Lydia Treats of Covington Cabaret.

Step right up, folks, and catch the daring Lydia Treats this weekend! Watch her eat fire! Watch her swallow swords! Watch her pound nails up her nose! All before she pulls a disappearing act and fulfills a childhood dream.

The performer will host her regular “Covington Cabaret” show Friday (April 15) at the Green Room in downtown Covington and then perform at the weekly “Talk to Nerdy to Me” show with The Society of Sin on Saturday (April 16) at the Dragon’s Den, and then she’s off to join the carnival.

Looking back, it was only a matter of time before she would run off to Ward Hall’s famed World of Wonders in Gibsonton, Fla., for a national sideshow tour. She remembers, as a kid growing up in New Orleans, watching old film reels of the legendary early 20th century sword swallower Edith Clifford. Her favorite “X-Files” episode is Season 2’s “Humbug” (1995), the one set in a carny town in Florida and featuring such real-life sideshow stars as Jim Rose and the Enigma.

“I was always the weirdo,” she recalled, adding that she was “even surrounded by other weirdos.” This was when, as a young woman, she’d hang out in Fat City at Cypress Hall or later in Metairie at Zeppelins. By the time she’d graduated at NOCCA back in 2000, New Orleans was becoming a popular tour stop for sideshow performers such as Jim Rose, Blockhead, Eric Odditorium and other performers.

“All of the old sideshow working acts fascinated me,” she said. “In fact, the ones that freaked me out the most were the ones I had to learn and pick apart and perform. Blockhead used to make me want to hork. Sword swallowing terrified me. It still does.

“I had a dream a few years ago where I performed it, and it was the same as dreaming of having a fountain Coke. I had to have it. The ‘fountain Coke’ thing happens to me a lot.”

It also happened with booze. Not long after graduating from NOCCA, as a growing desire to perform kicked in, she found herself pregnant, and working a dreary job at a corporate medical company while trying to be, in her mind, someone else’s version of herself. “I crawled into a bottle every night,” she recalled, and quickly graduated from beer to liquor, going into and out of treatment. This was in 2012.

Then, suddenly, something clicked. Even though she’d left Odyssey House due to a relapse, she started to focus on her recovery, and sought treatment at Townsend in Metairie. Within a month, she got up onstage, serving as a stage kitten for the Rev. Spooky LeStrange’s Billion Dollar Baby Dolls’ annual “Banned Books” burlesque show.

Around this same time, she recalls, she started taking classes at Bella Blue’s New Orleans School of Burlesque, and met performer Remy Dee at a club, which led to the “Banned Books” gig.

Getting into performing at any club became instantly problematic for a recovering alcoholic, as she learned soon after offering to help out on the Baby Dolls’ next show, “The Night Circus Burlesque Show” at Siberia. Glancing at all the beer taps and the bar against the wall, she panicked.

“I was like, ‘Oh my God, I am in a bar! What do I do?!” she recalled saying to herself. “Because the institutionalized side of me instantly went to ‘If you hang out in a barber shop long enough, you’re bound to get a haircut.’ So I freaked out and texted my sponsor. ‘I’m in a bar.’ ‘Are you drinking?’ ‘No. I am drinking a Monster (energy drink). At a bar!’ ‘Ok, just don’t pick up (a drink).’

“It was a simple program for complicated people,” she explained. “That’s when I learned it isn’t that guy or that girl or that non-binary person’s disease, much less the entire city of New Orleans. It it is my disease, and that if I refrain from picking up, I don’t get loaded.”

Soon after, Lydia Treats the sideshow performer evolved, especially after befriending local performer Sideshow Matt, who helped introduce her to classic sideshow acts including fire eating and sword swallowing — the latter of which, obviously, required intense concentration. Now more than ever, booze was out of the question, and after having been sober for several months, she felt ready to give it a try.

It didn’t “take” at first — it rarely does, she noted, given the often painstaking process of getting over a gag reflex.

“I’d started a couple years ago and was making no progress,” she said. “It wasn’t until after I moved to the Northshore that I found my coat hanger and said, ‘What the hell?’ and started trying again. It went down! Past my throat! For the first time ever! I think I made a little more progress each month — top of chest, cardiac sphincter, solar plexus, into stomach.” As late as last year, though, she still suffered the same potential pitfall of every performer when she had to visit the emergency room after suffering a perforated esophagus.

Her well-received debut sword-swallowing performance in The Society of Sin’s “Pulp Science Fiction” show, in front of 400 people, in 2015 further confirmed she was on the right track with her career. The itch to perform onstage that had emerged at NOCCA finally was getting just the right scratch for the weirdo, who along the way had her tongue split and often wears kooky contact lens for an added weirdo effect.

She can’t put a finger on one particular reason for the thrill of these performances — whether it’s the simple ability to do it, the ability to shock the audience, or simply for audience approval.

“All of that,” replied Treats, who was voted among the five most popular sideshow performers in New Orleans in my 2015 poll. “The fact that it can kill me at any time. The rapport I share with other sword swallowers. The long history it has. Being a sword swallower, I feel connected to the pioneers of the art as well as the rock stars who perform it today.”

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Lydia Treats performs. (Photo by Bob Moose Kustra)

Over the years she’s performed regularly in nerdlesque shows with The Society of Sin (including “Talk Nerdy to Me”) and with Remy Dee (“Nightmare Before Christmas Burlesque”) along with performances at BUKU Music + Art Project and House of Shock.

She’s cultivated her own act but also as that of a producer by starting up the “Covington Cabaret” show in 2015, which she says has played to standing-room-only crowds thirsty for something different on the Northshore. She’s invited several of her New Orleans burlesque friends to come perform, including Bella Blue, as well as Xena Zeit-Geist bringing the “Vice Is Right” burlesque game show to the Green Room.

“The Covington show has been going amazingly, much better than I anticipated before getting it started,” she said. “It has a great support network and a lot of locals in the community have become regulars, I’ve gone on the radio over there twice with a sort of open invitation to go over and do the radio spot whenever I wanted because it’s been fun.”

Friday’s show will feature comedian (and regular) Corey Mack, Lolly Gagger, Ri Dickulous and Tsarina Hellfire.

The 34-year-old has done all this while raising two children — a daughter, 14, and a son, 11 — both of whom have shown the kid of creative spirit their mom hopes to cultivate.

Performing alongside the World of Wonders sideshow artists will not only give her a chance to showcase her work with other peers, but will fulfill a childhood fantasy stoked early on by peeping at those early Edith Clifford videos.

“I have wanted to run away and join the carnival since I was a little kid,” she confessed. “This was a dream come true to be hired by them — to work with living legends of the sideshow, to actually travel, build the banner lines, the tents, sleep in the bunkhouse.”

After all these years, Lydia Treats feels comfortable in her own skin — onstage, as a weirdo, offering a little shock and awe to her audiences. Beats office work.

For The NOLA Project’s 12th season: Survival of the fittest

Posted on April 12, 2016 by davidleesimmons under theater

The NOLA Project recently announced its 2016-17 season, with the theme of “Survival.” Often topical, sometimes irreverent and almost always excellent, The NOLA Projects offers some of the most consistently compelling productions in New Orleans.

This season, according to a press release, will feature world and regional premieres along with a Broadway comedy. Here’s the rest of the release in full. I’ll have more thoughts later:

“We open the 2016-17 Season with the World Premiere of FLOOD CITY by Gabrielle Reisman.Award-winning director Mark Routhier (Marie Antoinette and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest)will bring to life Reisman’s striking and quirky story that examines the working class residents of Johnstown, Pennsylvania during both the famous Johnstown Flood of 1889 and in the midst of the steel mill closures of 1992. Traversing time and space, Reisman’s distinct magical realism infuses the words and stories of these distinctly American workers who, more and more it seems, are fading into total extinction. FLOOD CITY will run September 1-18, 2016 at NOCCA’s Nims Black Box Theatre.

Next is the Regional Premiere of the new Pulitzer Prize-nominated play 4000 MILES by Amy Herzog. This hilarious and heartbreaking new work tells the story of a young man seeking solace from his feisty 91-year-old grandmother in her West Village NYC apartment after a lengthy and painful cross-country trip on his bicycle. The New York Times called the original production, which starred New Orleans local Mary Louise Wilson, “a funny, moving, and altogether wonderful drama.” Stepping into the roles of grandmother Vera and grandson Leo are New Orleans stage luminaries Carol Sutton and James Bartelle. They will be directed by Big Easy Award-winning director Beau Bratcher. 4000 MILES will run October 20-November 6, 2016at a location to be announced.

In January, The NOLA Project will partner with Delgado Community College for the first time ever to present a massive co-production of John Steinbeck’s THE GRAPES OF WRATHadapted by Frank Galati. The play will be the first professional production to appear in the brand-new Delgado MainStage Theater and will feature a cast of over twenty actors, directed by NOLA Project Ensemble Member Jason Kirkpatrick. Through beautiful staging and story-theatre techniques, the ensemble will bring Steinbeck’s classic tale of the Joad family to life as they pile everything they own into a battered old truck and head west to California in the desperate hope for work and a living wage. Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre Company premiered the epic stage work in 1991 where it transferred to Broadway and won the Tony Award for Best Play. THE GRAPES OF WRATH will run January 26-February 12, 2017.

May 2017 brings the annual return to the New Orleans Museum of Art’s Besthoff Sculpture Garden with the World Premiere of THE SPIDER QUEEN by NOLA Project Ensemble Members James Bartelle and Alex Martinez Wallace. In this imaginative new play, two teenage siblings become lost in the woods and encounter a kingdom in peril, filled with fantastical creatures, nefarious villains, and the giant Spider Queen who has been frozen by a sorcerer’s curse. Like “The Goonies” meets “The Chronicles of Narnia”, THE SPIDER QUEENintends to awaken the adventurous spirit in us all as the audience travels through NOMA’s Sculpture Garden and the young heroes befriend elves and trolls, battle ogres, and learn lessons of courage, kindness, self-sacrifice, and finding direction without a smartphone. Big Easy Award-nominated director Jon Greene will helm the production.

And to end the season in a big way, we are teaming up on our first-ever co-production with Le Petit Theatre du Vieux Carre to present the hilarious love letter to theatre IT’S ONLY A PLAY by Terrence McNally. It’s the opening night of THE GOLDEN EGG on Broadway and the wealthy producer Julia Budder is throwing a posh party in her lavish Manhattan townhouse. Downstairs the celebrities are pouring in, but the real action is upstairs in the bedroom where a group of insiders have staked themselves out to await the reviews. Will it be the massive flop to end their careers or the greatest new American play of this century? Only The New York Times will tell. NOLA Project Artistic Director A.J. Allegra will direct a cast of New Orleans all-stars including Ricky Graham, Sean Patterson, Leslie Castay, Cecile Monteyne, James Bartelle, Keith Claverie, and Alex Ates. IT’S ONLY A PLAY will run June 8-25, 2017 at Le Petit Theatre.

“This season we’re exploring what it means to be an American,” says NOLA Project Artistic Director, A.J. Allegra. “We are in a fight for our national existence. In every facet of American culture, there are battles for agency and recognition from different races, genders, and other groups and we see this in the American Theatre just as strongly as we see it in our politics. For our 2016-17 Season we chose stories that reflect that sentiment and cause us to start meaningful dialogue with one another rather than divisive argument.”

“Let Them Talk” at French Quarter Festival: Freedom of speech, with a little action

Posted on April 8, 2016 by davidleesimmons under music

Roddie Romero with Michael Tisserand. (Screen shot from NOLA.com)

Too often moments like the “Let Them Talk” series at French Quarter Festival are pitched as a “break from the heat” to “get away from the madness” and relax while cooling off in air-conditioned rooms and relaxing to the jib-jab of Louisiana musicians. On the surface, it’s true, but as music festivals like FQF and Jazz Fest become increasingly crowded and often jammed with people who seem there more for the scene than the music, it’s also great to find a safe space for authentic music appreciation.

And yes, it’s a great place to be an egghead. Because in conversations hosted by WWNO’s Fred Kasten and others Saturday and Sunday (April 9-10) inside the Old U.S. Mint, musicians get a chance to offer the context behind their music, while giving these sweet little unplugged performances to keep the music flowing.

This experience is no better illustrated than when Roddie Romero of the Hub City All-Stars gave an interview to author Michael Tisserand (my former editor at Gambit Weekly) at the 2014 FQF — particularly when he explained his love of the Bobby Charles swamp-pop classic “I Hope.” Romero has an interesting life story, which includes a deep love of Charles’ music, and here performs and discusses an achingly beautiful song.

(Watch: Roddie Romero performs and discusses “I Hope”)

I had to rush away after the interview and was so mad I missed Romero’s subsequent performance with the Hub City All-Stars that I counted the days till their 2015 set, which was brilliant.

The same experience could be said for Kasten’s 2014 interview with cellist Helen Gillet, one of the best imports to the Crescent City over the past decade because of her unique blending of the cello into local music while exploring her Belgian roots, as she did in her interview:

Other important things learned in the talk: She’s a “huge” Prince fan and is looking forward to his Essence Music Festival set; her brother (a drummer) got her hooked on harder rock musicians, such as Faith No More, and she wound up digging everything from Poison and the Red Hot Chili Peppers to Whitney Houston, Madonna and of course the Beatles. On the classical music side, she loves Shostakovich and Baroque music in general. “Old, old-school, classical roll of the cello, which is just no vibrato,” she said. “Nothing fancy, just holding down the bass lines.”

(Watch: Helen Gillet performs and discusses “Le Petit Royaume”)

Check out this year’s “Let Them Talk” lineup below. My must-attend interviews: Mason Ruffner, Ellis Marsalis, Eric Falls and of course “From Southern Nights to Hall-of-Fame Heights: Remembering Allen Toussaint.”

2016 LET THEM TALK LINEUP

Saturday, April 9, 2016

11:30 am – Ronnie Kole: Reflections on a Vintage Life – Piano-man extraordinaire, bandleader, and wine connoisseur Ronnie Kole has – in his nearly 70 years as a professional musician – performed for the Pope, six U.S. Presidents, at major festivals around the world, and for select audiences of oenophiles at some of the most elegant chateaux in France. Ronnie Kole also helped get Jazz Fest and French Quarter Festival started – and has worked tirelessly for numerous civic and charitable organizations throughout his career. For Let Them Talk he’ll discuss this storied life with interviewer Fred Kasten.

12:30 pm – Bourbon Street Blues: Mason Ruffner and the Blues Rockers – Guitar-slinger Mason Ruffner rolled into New Orleans from his native Fort Worth in the late 70s. He set up shop on Bourbon Street at Club 544 where his band the Blues Rockers did hundreds of shows, backing such blues legends as John Lee Hooker, Lightnin’ Hopkins and Memphis Slim and winning praise from visiting musical superstars like Jimmy Page, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, and Carlos Santana. Today Mason Ruffner talks about a life of rockin’ the blues with interviewer Fred Kasten.

1:30 pm – The New Orleans Helsinki Connection: Katja Toivola – Trombonist Katja Toivola – a native of Helsinki, Finland – first visited New Orleans in 1995 and now splits time between her two “hometowns”. She leads bands in both cities, The Spirit of New Orleans in Helsinki, and the New Orleans Helsinki Connection in the Crescent City. Toivola also plays in husband Leroy Jones’ New Orleans’ Finest band, handles bass drum duties for the Hurricane Brass Band, and does acclaimed work as a graphic designer and photographer. She’ll talk about her multi-faceted career with interviewer Fred Kasten.

2:30 pm – NEA Jazz Master Ellis Marsalis – When the Dizzy Gillespie’s Big Band played New Orleans back in the late 1940s Ellis Marsalis, then a fledgling tenor saxophonist, was there and decided, “that’s what I want to do.” He went on to put the tenor sax away and concentrate on piano. He became one of the cornerstones of modern jazz in New Orleans as a pianist, composer, bandleader, and educator. Four of his and wife Delores’ six sons: Branford, Wynton, Delfeayo and Jason, also became innovative and accomplished contributors to modern music. For Let Them Talk, Ellis Marsalis will look back on his life in music and education – and ahead to his remaining musical ambitions – with interviewer Fred Kasten.

3:30 pm – From Radiators to Living Rumors: Camile Baudoin – For over 33 years powerhouse guitarist Camile Baudoin teamed with fellow guitar-slinger Dave Malone to deliver the legendary Radiators band’s trademark twin-guitar excursions. Since the Radiators essentially disbanded in 2011 (they still do a few reunion performances each year) Camile Baudoin has continued to work with Malone in Raw Oyster Cult and lead his own band, The Living Rumors. For Let Them Talk, Camile Baudoin looks back on nearly four decades on the New Orleans music scene with New Orleans Advocate music writer Keith Spera.

4:30 pm – Song for My Fathers and Beyond: Tommy Sancton – Novelist, journalist, memoirist, and clarinetist Tommy Sancton’s acclaimed 2006 memoir Song for My Fathers documented his apprenticeship with clarinet great George Lewis and other New Orleans jazz pioneers. Sancton returned to New Orleans in 2007 after many years abroad – mostly in Paris – and reestablished himself as a top-notch clarinetist and bandleader on the New Orleans scene. For Let Them Talk, Tommy Sancton discusses his parallel careers in writing and music with interviewer Fred Kasten.

Sunday, April 10, 2016

11:30 am – Miss River: Sarah Quintana – New Orleans singer, songwriter, and guitarist Sarah Quintana – has a background rich in jazz, folk, and popular music. She studied jazz at NOCCA with Kidd Jordan, Davey Mooney and Hank Mackie. In 2008 she began making trips to France (she also studied French at NOCCA) where she now spends considerable time working with saxophonist Raphael Imbert and his band. Quintana’s widely acclaimed 2015 release Miss River pays homage to the strength – and fragility – of Louisiana’s traditions and environment. For Let Them Talk she’ll discuss her twin careers in New Orleans and France with interviewer Fred Kasten.

12:30 pm – The Long and Winding Road: Bennie Pete and the Hot 8 Brass Band – In 1996 sousaphonist Bennie Pete brought together players from two former Fortier High School student bands – the High Steppers and Looney Tunes Brass Bands – to form the Hot 8 Brass Band. Over their 20 years together the Hot 8 has been hammered by tragedy, blessed by triumphs, and sustained by talent, resilience, and hard work. For Let Them Talk, Bennie Pete discusses the difficulties and rewards of leading a 21^st Century brass band in New Orleans with author and Tulane University Associate Professor of Music Matt Sakakeeny.

1:30 pm – Saxophones of Ascension – Louisiana’s Ascension Parish has provided the world with at least two outstanding jazz saxophonists: Donaldsonville’s Plas Johnson (who created that irresistible tenor solo on Henry Mancini’s Pink Panther Theme) and Gonzales’ Grammy-winning Derek Douget. Douget is a long-standing member of the Ellis Marsalis Quartet, leader of his own bands, and current program coordinator for the Don “Moose” Jamison Heritage School of Music programs operated by the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival and Foundation, Inc. For Let Them Talk he’ll discuss growing up in the “Jambalaya Capital of the World” (Gonzales) and his two decades plus on the jazz scene in New Orleans with interviewer Fred Kasten.

2:30 – From Southern Nights to Hall-of-Fame Heights: Remembering Allen Toussaint – When Allen Toussaint passed away in November 2015 while on tour in Spain, he left behind a Hall-of-Fame (Rock and Roll and Songwriters among others) legacy as a songwriter, producer, arranger, performer – and especially since Katrina – stalwart and effective advocate for New Orleans – as well as a man of infinite grace and style. For Let Them Talk, Grammy-winning record producer Scott Billington and an all-star panel – including another Grammy-winner – the great Irma Thomas; award-winning music journalist and biographer Ben Sandmel; bassist Roland Guerin – a long-time member of Allen Toussaint’s band; and Reginald Toussaint, who managed and performed with his father for over 25 yrs, will share Allen Toussaint stories and memories.

3:30 pm – Tighten Up: From Archie Bell to Astral Project – New Orleans Sax Ace Tony Dagradi – Saxophonist, composer and educator Tony Dagradi grew up in New Jersey, studied music at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, then hit the road with Archie Bell and the Drells. That tour came through New Orleans and ended in Houston. Dagradi doubled back to New Orleans and has been here ever since. He founded Astral Project in 1978, and 38 years later they are still performing at a very high level. For Let Them Talk Tony Dagradi talks about a wide range of his musical interests and pursuits with interviewer Fred Kasten.

4:30 – Big Time Talent, Big Time Voice: The Steady Rise of Erica Falls – New Orleans vocalist Erica Falls is comfortable performing a wide range of genres – including rhythm and blues, soul, funk and jazz. She’s invested the last 20 years in demonstrating that talent by performing with such great artists as Joe Sample, Dr. John, Sting, Irma Thomas, Joss Stone and Gatemouth Brown – and increasingly in recent years fronting her own band – as she’ll do on the Tropical Isle Hand Grenade Stage at FQF. For Let Them Talk Erica Falls discusses her life in music with interviewer Fred Kasten.

With an encore, LadyBEAST begins looking forward to a busy 2016 in circus productions

Posted on April 6, 2016 by davidleesimmons under circus

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UDPATE: “LadyBEAST Cabaret” premieres Saturday, May 7.

INFO:
“Vaude D’Gras: The Encore!”
Fri.-Sat., April 8-9, 8 p.m.
Tickets $20 general, $25 VIP
Click here for tickets

When asked whether an encore presentation of “Vaude D’Gras” came from either people telling her they’d missed the first production or wanted to see it again, circus-arts producer-performer basically answered “yes.”

The show’s popularity, combined with a busy and distracting Carnival season, necessitated a re-launching of the delightful circus show, held in February inside the dilapidated but soon-to-be-renovated Happyland Theater in Bywater. The new shows run Friday-Saturday (April 8-9) at Happyland (3126 Burgundy St.).

(Learn more: Read my “Vaude D’Gras review)

“For so many people every Mardi Gras, for some it’s become a part of their experience,” she said of the show, now in its third year after changing its name this year. “It’s gotten to a point where it’s their Lundi Gras, or their Friday before Mardi Gras. And I’m stoked about that because that’s how I want to do it. I want to put on a ridiculous circus show. Some complain that they miss it each time, and they’re bummed. I want to show it to them so they’ll, ‘I won’t miss this next time.’

“It’s a show that people go to for more than one night, also. (Burlesque producer-performer) Bella Blue sat in the audience two different nights and said, ‘I fucking loved it!’”

The same basic cast will reunite with LadyBEAST: Clay Mazing, GoGo McGregor, Guglielmo, Madame Daggers and Sarah Stardust.

In a sense, LadyBeast — an aerialist and fire and escape artist when not producing — is taking one look back before vaulting forward. The following weekend (April 15-17), she will finally bring back “The YardBaret,” a backyard-style circus show in a private Bywater location. The show will include some of the “Vaude D’Gras” performers but also featuring frequent collaborators including The Lady Satine, Penelope Little, Liza Rose as well as aerialist Laughing Sky Diamond and drag performer Golden Delicious. Also: Marlo Winter, a Washington-based aerialist who’s working in New Orleans now. (And giving lessons, too.) And formerly New Orleans-based contortionist Sam Aquatic will make an appearance.

Guests also can enjoy a dinner from pop-up chef Louie the Greek.

LadyBEAST loves this show “because it’s not a standard venue – performers can take their work anywhere. This setting gives artists the freedom to do what they want to do, Plus it’s ambient. You’re outdoors in this lovely garden.” She said one performer from last summer’s presentation “described it as if she was playing in a secret garden party in Europe.”

Next comes the show LadyBEAST has been working on for months, a continuation of sorts from the “Cirque Copine” show she has brought with Liza Rose to One Eyed Jacks. Her monthly “LadyBEAST Cabaret” will make its debut May 7 inside the French Quarter club. The performers include Guglielmo, Liza Rose, Sarah Stardust and LadyBEAST as well as touring artists. There’s Gretchen in Motion, a popular touring hand balancer.

(Learn more: See photos from the “Cirque Copine” show here)

The hope is to make the cabaret a monthly show with “Cirque Copine” filling in one of those months on a quarterly basis, though a second production inside One Eyed Jacks isn’t expected until after the summer — a popular touring season for performers. Still, these productions underscore a more consistent presence of circus-arts productions in New Orleans.

“It means that us circus people are here to stay in New Orleans and we’re just going to keep going,” LadyBEAST said. “We’re setting a standard of quality of circus entertainment in New Orleans.”

On “Spotlight,” newspapers, the church, and institutional control

Posted on April 5, 2016 by davidleesimmons under movies

The cast of “Spotlight.” (Photo by Kerry Hayes/Open Road Films)

In hindsight it felt like I’d been sitting by the phone and waiting for my former colleague Dave Gladow to call and invite me to join him on his new pop-culture podcast, “The Pursuit of Crappiness,” to discuss the recent Academy Award-winning movie “Spotlight.” After all, because both of us are newsroom veterans, and “Spotlight” focused on the Boston Globe’s award-winning investigation of the local archdiocese, it seemed like a natural fit.

Just as Hollywood loves making movies about Hollywood, journalists love discussing movies about journalism. Although I conceded rather late in the podcast that the deck might have been stacked in the favor of “Spotlight” to win Best Picture, as, Hollywood also loves making movies about most forms of media, and when you add its social relevance, the win probably was a slam dunk.

But the desire to discuss “Spotlight” had extra meaning for me. As soon as I left the theater after a screening, I could only think of one other thing besides the even-then-tenuous status of newspapers. (The movie is set way back in 2001, long before I’d been laid off, twice — three, counting the immediate aftermath Hurricane Katrina — by newspapers. What also struck me was the unspoken theme of institutional control, and how institutions wrestle with their role in the community and their responsibility to the people they serve.

At its core, “Spotlight” is about a newspaper trying to rise above the incremental reporting it had done on the pedophile priests — and, possibly, the extensive work already done by the rival alt-weekly the Boston Phoenix — and expose the conspiracy to cover up the priests’ illegal and immoral behavior being executed at the top levels of the archdiocese and possibly even the Vatican. As the new executive editor challenges them, why haven’t they “gotten” the big guy?

But “Spotlight” — a procedural on many levels — investigates the process of news gathering at a fragile time for a newspaper is doubly challenged to maintain its relationship with its ever-fickle readership as well as its seemingly cozy relationship with the archdiocese. There’s an early scene in which the new editor, Marty Baron (Liev Schreiber) — not just a non-Bostonian but also, a Jew — meets with the archbishop, Cardinal Bernard Law. It’s a formality, really, a ceremony, in which preaches to Baron of the need for the two institutions to work together to better serve the community. Baron politely and respectfully disagrees, arguing that a newspaper is at its best when serving independently of the church. Law smiles a tight smile, hands him a copy of the Catholic Catechism (another tradition!) and sends him on his way.

From there we see the Boston Globe wrestle with how to cover an institution deeply ingrained in the community, but one that clearly has lost its way in serving it. And we see a Boston Globe already suffering from ever-shrinking ad revenue, and with staffers who have their own relative relationships with the church. (Some are still devout, others not so much.) It’s also wrestling with how deep it needs to dig before getting the story to press before the competition does. (See above clip.)

I’ve probably already given away too much of the podcast, so I’ll stop here. As is once again evident, I could go on all day. I’ll just end by saying that, from this current perch, the institution of newspapers, 15 years since the setting of this movie, is more challenged and compromised than ever.

Thanks again to Dave Gladow for the invite, and I look forward to future chats. And for an early perspective, check out New Orleans author Jason Berry’s 1992 work, “Lead Us Not Into Temptation.”

With “Piety,” Michael Cerveris finds his way home to New Orleans

Posted on March 4, 2016 by davidleesimmons under music

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INFO:
Michael Cerveris and friends perform “Piety”
Friday, April 29, 8 p.m.
The Theatre at St. Claude
Tickets: $20

When Michael Cerveris went into the studio to create the 2004 album, “Dog Eared,” he did so with what felt like a who’s who of ’90s rockers, including members of Sleater-Kinney, Sonic Youth, Guided by Voices and Teenage Fanclub along for the ride. Twelve years on, Cerveris — once again taking a break from what has become a stellar Broadway career — is back with another moving collaborative effort.

But this time, the all-stars are from New Orleans, which Cerveris increasingly has embraced as his home even while continuing his Tony Award-winning work in “Fun Home.” The result is “Piety,” which features contributions from several of the New Orleans musicians who helped collaborate on the Katrina musical-in-progress “Nine Lives.”

When he made “Dog Eared,” he recalled, songs were recorded as musicians were available, “making this sonic house where all these people came to hang out.

“This is the New Orleans version of the same thing,” Cerveris said of the album, which includes such “Nine Lives” collaborators as Shamarr Allen, Paul Sanchez and Alex McMurray. “It’s true of how I like to work in theater, too. I sit and write songs in my apartment or house, and then record something, and my ideas only get me so far. I like handing it over to people and say, ‘Here’s the core, and respond to it in terms of what you hear. Play me what you hear when I play this for you.’

“I’m always excited to hear that (result), and that might spark an idea with me.”

Cerveris recently announced that he will reunite with many of the musicians for a live performance April 29 at The Theatre at St. Claude, co-owned by another “Nine Lives” collaborator, playwright Jim Fitzmorris. Expected to re-join Cerveris: Anders Osborne, Mia Borders, Paul Sanchez, Shamarr Allen, Alex McMurray, Rod Hodges (the Iguanas), Linzay Young (Red Stick Ramblers) and old friend Kimberly Kaye, who also performs with Cerveris in their Americana band Loose Cattle. (She also worked on the latest script for “Nine Lives.”)

“Piety” is an evocative, ruminative work that, not unlike “Dog Eared,” feels like a departure from the rock ’n’ roll creations that helped make Cerveris a rising musical-theater, whether in “Tommy” or “Hedwig and the Angry Inch.”

Instead, we hear echoes of Louisiana folklore in “Evangeline,” an eight-minute, acoustic opus flush with fiddle, banjo and even accordion that seem to float on air as Cerveris recalls Longfellow’s famed poem:

Knew so little when she learned of heartache /
Looking for him by another name /
All the ones that never were her Gabriel /
Making sure she never was the same

There’s also the restless spirit in “Crescent” and the closing “Phoenix,” a song of rebirth that can’t help but make one think of Hurricane Katrina even when it’s never explicitly mentioned, with former New Orleans Saints player Steve Gleason underscoring the closing words, “Wise up / Rise up / Rise and shine.”

The subtle stars of “Piety” might be the backing female vocals. With Cerveris content to underplay his own vocals, practically breathing his lines at times, a chorus rises underneath him, led by Kimberly Kaye and Kendall Meade and including “The Gospel Queens”: Edna M. Johnson, Bobbie Grant and Judy Gibbs.

Cerveris says he struggled at first to put a label on the musical style he was going for here, starting with the term chamber folk, “but that didn’t work.” Instead, he said, imagine “If Nick Drake and Elliott Smith made a record down South, this is what it would be.”

If anything, as the title might suggest, “Piety” feels like an elegy to Piety Street Recording and its owner, Mark Bingham — the album’s legendary producer.

It’s also where they recorded the music for “Nine Lives,” and where Bingham prodded him for original material that he might have for a solo record. From there, the collaboration, years in the making, progressed. At that point, Cerveris noted, there was no inkling that Piety might close, which it since has — leaving behind a legacy of great recordings.

“I’ve been in some other great studios, but there are very few studios that had the soul that Piety Street did,” Cerveris said. “It seemed like a magical place from the time I got there. Mark spent equal time making sure the food was proceeding well on the stove at the same time that stuff was going down on tape. I found that significant and meaningful.

“I just love the place so much and wanted the album to be a footnote in the history of the place.”

He expressed the same love for Bingham behind the sound board: “He’s pretty ego-less as a producer. He’s more interested in the music than putting his own stamp on it. He really listens. He’ll offer his opinion, but also will listen to yours.”

While it was years in the making, “Piety” in Cerveris’ mind seems to have arrived at the right time. When he started making the record, he noted, he wasn’t as invested in his new home like he is these days. Now he owns a home in Treme and practically commutes from New York City whenever he can find a break from “Fun Home.

“My commit to the place is more solid and evident to people,” he said. “It’s being received as the New Orleans record that it is even though it’s not a traditional New Orleans record, but it’s representative of a broad vision of the city and the music scene, and certainly includes so many people from the music scene.”

Tuesday’s Fly Movement Salon might be a student showcase, but proceeds benefit teacher, producer and performer Liza Rose

Posted on February 29, 2016 by davidleesimmons under circus

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INFO:
Fly Movement Salon
8 p.m. Tuesday (March 1)
Cafe Istanbul
Free admission

Each month, it seems, the Fly Movement Salon at Café Istanbul has become a showcase with a purpose. Previous showcases of circus-arts works in progress — always free and open to the public — have included opportunities to support related efforts. There was the solicitation for donations to help the folks behind “Vaude D’Gras” get their Mardi Gras-timed show off the ground inside Happyland Theater, and then came the push to help Clay Mazing’s Emergency Circus continue its work entertaining Syrian refugees in Europe.

And while this month’s show, on Tuesday (March 1) at 8 p.m., will showcase the works of salon students, the hat will be passed around to support Salon founder/producer, instructor and performer Liza Rose and her impressive springtime trip. Rose, who instructs at LA Motion in the Irish Channel and at the International School of Louisiana’s (ISL) West Bank campus, will compete in the U.S. Aerial Championships on May 13-15 at the Rose Nagelberg Theatre in the Baruch Performing Arts Center in New York City. (See the Facebook event page.) Rose is one of six finalists in the inaugural New and Innovative Apparatus division, where she will compete with her aerial umbrella, which she designed and created in 2009, with an act titled “Parapluie.” (Other categories are lyra, pole and silks.) Rose is among 42 finalists overall from a pool of more than 400 applicants.

“I created this act for the 2010 Seattle Erotic Art Festival for Roger Bennington’s show ‘Cabinet of Curiosities,’ which also starred burlesque star Dirty Martini and Dan Savage, the sex advice columnist of ‘Savage Love’ fame,” Rose said. “I was then invited to perform it (and did perform it) in the Moisture Festival, which is the largest vaudeville and variety Festival in the world. I have also performed this act in “Mezzo Lunatico,” the late-night show at Teatro Zin Zanni in Seattle, and here in New Orleans in the first “Storyville Rising” at One Eyed Jacks in 2013.”

(Watch: Liza Rose promo reel)

At stake is a $1,000 grant and an audition for “Le Reve,” a Cirque du Soleil show in Las Vegas. There also will be casting directors from several American and Canadian circuses, including Circus Flora from St. Louis and Cirque Eloise in Montreal.

The competition will be live streamed at upa.tv.

“I am hoping that my involvement in the competition will help draw national attention the New Orleans circus scene, and help establish it as a place for serious artists to create circus,” said Rose, who co-produces the all-female Cirque Copine troupe with LadyBEAST.

Rose’s exploits are further evidence of New Orleans’ growing circus-arts scene, the foundation of which often can be found in the classroom. Rose has been an instructor with ISL’s circus-arts program, which was founded several years ago by Meret Ryhiner in a collaboration with KIDsmART. Ryhiner, a native of Bern, Switzerland, is a longtime veteran of the circus world who was trained in Europe and has performed a variety of circus acts.

Under her tutelage, ISL students at all grade levels have the opportunity to learn everything from balancing and clowning to acrobatics, juggling and theater. Ryhiner has become such a strong influence that she will help Rose train for the aerial championships. The ISL circus-arts program has gained so much respect that it’s starting to get national attention, recently becoming a recognized Social Circus Program of the American Circus Educators Association. This means, among other things, that it can expand its offerings through the obtainment of more grant money.

(Read more: Check out the press release here.)

“Some of the many things we look for is that the organization or program serves a specific identified “at-risk” population (as opposed to the more common instance of offering general financial aid or community outreach),” said Amy Cohen, executive Director of the American Youth Circus Organization, which oversees social circus programs. “They also must show a dedication to measuring the outcomes of their program to reveal the impact that circus has on the populations they share it with. Measuring outcomes is especially important, as there is a lot of anecdotal evidence about how and why social circus works, but only a select group has been actively measuring the outcomes, something that is worth celebrating and supporting.

“Measured outcomes will serve the entirety of the social circus sector and beyond — those who are currently recognized, and those who are in the process of working towards recognition, as well as recreational programs that aspire to develop their programs to serve specific populations via social circus.”

Zoe Brookes, the lead consultant who worked on the project and recognized the first batch of programs, was impressed with ISL: “We recognize programs that identify a specific population with a specific need, and design circus-related curriculum to help meet that need. We also look for programs with a commitment to evaluating results. The circus program at ISL meets all those criteria.”

Indeed, the ISL program focuses on both diversity and community at a school where more than half the students are on free and reduced lunch programs. According to the school, it follows the National Arts Standards for dance and features circus arts skills. There’s more here:

Emphasis in K-1st grade is on practicing executive skills. Emphasis in 2nd and 3rd grade is on exploring core subjects with circus arts integrated curriculum units. Emphasis in 4th-8th grade on building the skills necessary to use the circus arts medium expressively and creatively, as well as to participate in community events performing and presenting workshops as circus arts ambassadors.

Ryhiner, the ISL’s circus-arts program coordinator, appreciates how as a part-time instructor Rose has been able to duplicate the school’s work at its West Bank location in just a year and a half on the job — all while excelling as an artist herself.

“Circus arts are extremely demanding, athletically. You have to perfect and maintain a high level of skills and mental acuity, and artistically, you have to be inventive with your apparatus, the composition of your act and your signature tricks,” Ryhiner said. “I am happy Liza has made New Orleans her home and brings this caliber of professionalism to the City, and to our community as a teaching artist for the circus arts program at the International School of Louisiana.”

“It’s not burlesque,” Ryhiner said. “It’s circus arts and it’s a wonderful artistic discipline, and New Orleans should have that as part of its palette of colors.”

Tuesday’s Fly Movement Salon’s student showcase will feature the new works by students Becca Chapman, Stephen Kernion, Dallas Alexander, Sean Maloney, Virginia Sibley, Laughing Sky Diamond and Cassie Palmer. Along with Liza Rose, Penelope Little, a fellow Cirque Copine troupe member, also serves as an instructor at the salon.

LPO’s “Louie the Buoy” family concert lifts all spirits

Posted on February 21, 2016 by davidleesimmons under music

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If you’ve got kids and haven’t yet attended one of the Louisiana Philharmonic’s Family Concerts, you owe to your family and yourself to go. Aimed at children but really a delight for everyone, the occasional series, held inside Loyola’s Roussel Hall, delivers themed concert programming under the vibrant direction of Carlos Miguel Prieto. He’s a performer unto himself, but more on that later.

This month’s concert (Sunday, Feb. 21) featured several familiar works wrapped around the world premiere of composer Tucker Fuller’s musical score set to children’s author Allain Andry’s popular book “Louie the Buoy: A Hurricane Story.” The score, vivid and inventive, worked over, under and around the words of the story, as read here by legendary New Orleans actress Carol Sutton.

There was a risk here: How can one narrate a children’s story set to music without one getting in the way of the other. Well, thanks to Fuller’s score, which captured the moods and rhythms of the story, and Prieto conducting Sutton like a seamstress threading a needle.

Fuller and Andry were in attendance, and all joined Sutton, Prieto and the LPO onstage for acknowledgments. This is where Prieto, who always takes breaks in the action to interact with the audience, really kicked into high gear. He missed his calling as a stand-up comic, and often keeps the crowd fully engaged with his explanations of the program. On an afternoon where kids are constantly brought into the mix — musicians (including LPO Associate Concertmaster Ben Hart) perform out in the halls before the show — Prieto loves to work the audience. He peppers kids in the audience with questions about the programming and the composers, and loves to keep it light and fun and funny.

But here he especially excited, as he recruited Andry’s two great-grandchildren to take turns conducting the orchestra for the final two pieces: Richard Strauss’ “Thunder and Lightning Polka” and “When the Saints Go Marching In.” The latter came with a command by Prieto for the audience to stand on their feet, clap to the beat, and belt out a round of “Who Dat?!”

The program opened with a rousing rendition of Rossini’s “Overture to William Tell” and Beethoven’s “Overture to Egmont.”

In the spirit of not missing this series, the next performance is “Adventures in Space!” on April 3.

“Black Angels Over Tuskegee” offers history lesson at WWII Museum this weekend

Posted on February 19, 2016 by davidleesimmons under theater

Photo by Grace Finlayson

INFO:
“Black Angels Over Tuskegee”
7:30 p.m. Fri.-Sat., 1 p.m. Sun.
Stage Door Canteen, National World War II Museum, 945 Magazine St.
$65 for dinner/brunch and show; call 504-528-1943 or visit the ticket link

Back when he was in his 30s, Alexandria native Layon Gray was channel-surfing on the couch of his Los Angeles home in 2007 when the actor and playwright ran across a C-SPAN airing of the aging Tuskegee Airmen receiving the Congressional Gold Medal from President George W. Bush.

“Wow,” he recalled thinking, “this is incredible!”

As an African-American actor struggling to find roles that spoke to his culture, Gray (now in his early 40s) became inspired to create a stage drama telling the story of the black aviators who overcame prejudice to become a vital part of the United States’ air campaign during World War II. After years of research, Gray developed “Black Angels Over Tuskegee,” a hour show that will enjoy a weekend run at The National World War II Museum’s Stage Door Canteen.

Debuting in Los Angeles in 2009 before a jump to off-Broadway in 2010, the show follows the story of six aviators who join the U.S. Air Force during both World War II and the height of the Jim Crow era of segregation.

Gray is quick to point out that this came at a time when mainstream America accepted research that suggested blacks were inherently inferior to whites — especially in terms of intellectual capacity. Basing his narrative on research but also interviews with several surviving airman, Gray hopes to present a story that not only inspires in showing how the airmen overcame these odds, but also the bonds they built while serving their country.

“When I interviewed one of the veterans, he didn’t talk about the medals he’d won but the friendships he made behind closed doors,” said Gray, who graduated from what is now the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. “I wanted to find a story that was organic and from the heart. We do this show for kids a lot, and I always stress that we as African Americans have no reason not to succeed. This was at a time when they were considered less than men.

“If they could take all that and still fight for their country, then we have no reason not to succeed today,” Gray continued. “I want to tell young men that everyone should be accountable for themselves and be responsible for their own success.”