Minnesota Mist

Two guys from St. Paul, singing dragons in Minneapolis, and a phoenix by the Cedar River

2012-02-02T20:02:00.001-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Erik and Joe in Toronto

Apollo's Journey, the blogged story of Joe and Erik, two guys from St. Paul, Minnesota, began on June 7, 2011. Since then, the journey has taken them to the East Coast of the United States, north into Canada, west to the Pacific, and then south through Mexico and their present stop in Guatemala. You can subscribe here to follow their journey, stories, and photos through North and South America.

It's the Year of the Dragon, and one of the most imaginative productions of the season is selling out 15 performances at the Southern Theater in Minneapolis. "The Dragons Are Singing Tonight," created by TigerLion Arts, is the story of an ordinary boy, a magical girl, and a nasty, nasty dragon.

Selling out 15 performances

The work is based on the dragon poems of Jack Prelutsky, U.S. Children's Poet Laureate, and brought to life with an original score by composer Laurie MacGregor, who spent part of her childhood in Wayzata, Minnesota.

The collaborative production, directed by Markell Kiefer, features actor Isabella Dawis and 30 singers from the Minnesota Boychoir, three aerialists from Circus Juventas, and puppets large and small from Puppet Farm Arts.

The show runs through February 12. Call for tickets (if any can be had): 612.343.3390.

Following performances at the Southern, more than 1,000 students in the Minneapolis and Robbinsdale school districts will participate in residency activities related to the production.

When the Cedar River crested at its highest flood level in history on June 13, 2008, its soggy destruction impacted 14% of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Its victims included the Legion Arts/CSPS Hall, located near the river in the city's New Bohemia neighborhood.

The Cedar River flooded 14% of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, in June 2008

Built by Czech immigrants in 1891, and listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the CSPS Hall had been the nerve center of a lively arts scene since 1991. In fact, the building had always been a multidisciplinary and multicultural center of activity long before the terms were invented, and before Legion Arts, led by John Herbert and Mel Andringa, dedicated the space to the creation and presentation of contemporary art.

Following an $8 million re-build, the CSPS Hall was re-opened in August 2011, representing a robust resurgence against daunting odds.

On February 2, 2012, more pieces of the comeback fell into place with the announcement of three new commercial tenants that will occupy the building's ground floor: StudioU Photography, the Brewed Awakenings Coffeehouse, and New Bo Books. Rent from these tenants will help support the building's overhead.

Herbert, Legion Arts' executive director, and a frequent visitor to Twin Cities performance venues, was quoted by the Cedar Rapids Gazette as saying "We've gone from being a pretty small arts organization and a tenants [sic] ourselves to a pretty small arts organization that owns the building, so we've gone to quite a bit more responsibility."

Stop by to say 'hello' and take in a show whenever you are in the neighborhood. Or, plan a special trip with Cedar Rapids and Legion Arts as your destination!

Dance theater at the intersection of artistic excellence and social justice

2012-02-01T11:34:00.000-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Theyear 2012 marks the eighth anniversary of Ananya Dance Theatre (ADT) asa creative and performing dance company based in Minneapolis. Led by itsfounder, Ananya Chatterjea, the ensemble’s 12 dancers employ the classicaleastern Indian dance form of Odissi, combined with Yoga and the martial art ofChhau, to create and stage original works rooted in the life experiences ofwomen of color.


Ananya Chatterjea

Chatterjea,a native of Kolkata (Calcutta), India, serves as ADT’s artistic director andchoreographer. She also holds the positions of professor, and head of the dance program in the University of Minnesota’s Department of Theatre Arts and Dance.

Herwork has been supported and recognized by the Asian Arts Initiative, theMcKnight, Jerome, and Bush foundations, Minnesota State Arts Board, City Pages,Minnesota Women’s Press, Black Indian Hispanic Asian Women In Action, and theMinnesota Women’s Political Caucus, among others.

About her company’s work,Chatterjea says, “We pursue excellence in our artistry to forge pathways thatgenerate forces of strength and beauty, galvanize strong communities, andembody a philosophy of possibility and liberation in a shared humanity.”

ADT’srepertoire consists of more than 24, abstract and evening-length dancenarratives built upon social justice themes. For example, the company examinedenvironmental issues and their impact on women’s daily lives in a trilogy ofworks created over the three years of 2006 to 2009: “Pipaashaa” (extremethirst), “DAAK” (call to action), and “Ashesh Barsha” (unending monsoon).

Morerecently, the dancers began a four-part examination of violence against womenin the exploitation of land (“Kshoy!,” 2010) and the mining and distribution ofgold (“Tushaanal,” 2011). It will complete this expressive study by addressingoil in 2012 (“Moreechika”) and water in 2013 (“Mohona“).

ADTpresents one major production in the Twin Cities each year during September,emphasizing excellence of performance over frequency. Its productions,presented since the company’s inception at the Southern Theater in Minneapolis,feature original music, often with live musicians, and original costume,lighting and set designs.

ADT: Dance at the intersection of artistic excellence and social justice

ADT’swork is informed by its dancers’ research about social justice issues thatarise from the lives and stories of women of color around the world. Their useof dance as a catalyst to engage audiences in a dialogue that poses questionsand re-imagines the world makes constituent response a valued and welcomecomponent of their creative process.

The year 2011 held numerous,accomplishments for this Twin Cities organization with a worldwide influence:

Artistic directorChatterjea received a Guggenheim Fellowship in choreography;
Performance onInternational Women’s Day at the College of St. Catherine, sponsored by Refugee and Immigrant Women for Change;
Performance at re-openingceremonies of the Weisman Art Museum;
Performance at apresentation by environmental activist Majora Carter at the Ted Mann ConcertHall;
Premiere of theevening-length “Tushaanal” at the Southern Theater;
Company’s open auditionattracted 20 aspiring dancers;
Chatterjea presentedlectures and solo demonstrations in Spain;
Company was represented byperformance and booth at the Midwest Arts Conference, a “trade show” for the arts, and Chatterjea was invited toaddress “Equity in the Cultural Landscape.”

Overthe years, ADT’s work also has been presented in 11 other U.S. cities(including Madison, Chicago, Detroit, Philadelphia, New York, and Los Angeles),nine other states (Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, NewYork, Massachusetts, Maine, and California), and nine other countries (Canada,United Kingdom, Germany, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Philippines,and Japan).

ADT’snext Twin Cities production, “Moreechika,” will be presented in September 2012.

Gary Peterson has been a member of the board of directors of Ananya Dance Theatre since 2009. Photos: V. Paul Virtucio.

Santa, baby!

2011-12-13T08:41:00.000-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

In a season long and rich in performances, the best holiday show happened Dec. 12, when 12 members of the touring cast of Les Misérables, led by Jason Forbach, presented "It Might Be Hope," a benefit concert for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, at The Lab Theater in Minneapolis.

The performers, who have toured together for a year, devoted their weekly night off to a performance of personable and engagingly-intimate, solo and ensemble renditions of tunes secular and religious, sublime and ridiculous.

Forbach, a native of Overland Park, Kansas, hosted the show which included a star turn by the Twin Cities Gay Men's Chorus singing three numbers from its just-completed holiday concert.

A believer in "the power of faith when following a dream," Forbach gifted each attendee with a copy of his holiday EP, "Remembering to Dream."

Since 1988, Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS has raised and granted more than $123 million.

Under the leadership of its entertainment empress, Mary Kelley Leer, the 350-seat Lab Theater continues to evolve into one of the most exciting and flexible performance spaces in the Twin Cities.

The Minneapolis run of Les Miz continues at the Orpheum Theatre, through Dec. 18.

The Vikings venue

2011-09-25T11:52:00.000-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Pondering while the Golden Gophers duked it with North Dakota State yesterday: Can anyone who understands the economics of pro football explain what is wrong with the Metrodome in Minneapolis as a venue for the game? What did we get wrong when building it 30 years ago – for football, with a roof in a snowy clime, with transit and other amenities adjacent – that cannot be fixed with $100 million of upgrades vs. $1 billion to construct a new facility?

I just don't get it.

Midwest Arts Conference and Cowles Center opening: Sparkling sprinklings of showcase samplings suffuse Minneapolis' scene

2011-09-15T14:49:00.000-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Like a suave dinner guest, regional arts conferences never come to visit empty-handed. They present and offer numerous culinary delights for their host communities in the form of performing arts morsels served in scores of showcase performances at venues all over town. When coupled with more than a dozen samplings at the opening of a new dance center, one has way too much good art on which to nosh.

Oh, the joy of such indulgent gluttony!

Downtown Minneapolis was the scene for this five-day feast, Sept. 7-11, with the arrival of the 24th annual Midwest Arts Conference and the grand opening of the Cowles Center for Dance and the Performing Arts. The concurrent events provided multiple stages where potential buyers could sample the wares of artists and ensembles from throughout the western hemisphere.

The Midwest Arts Conference: Trade Show for Arts and Culture

While the incarnations of artistic impulses may emerge with few financial requirements or impediments, their distribution and sale through systems of production and marketing place them, for better and worse, in the realms of commodities and commerce. Enter the regional trade shows of the arts, whose showcases serve as large-scale auditions for the curators who choose the programming that appears on the stages of colleges and universities, performing arts centers, and civic auditoria throughout the land.

To be selected for one of the adjudicated, or Spotlight, showcase slots represents a coveted opportunity for artists to perform in a quality-controlled setting, in prime time, to a captive audience. For those not selected, there are the equally competitive independent showcases.

Spotlight Showcases

Pantages Theatre, 710 Hennepin Avenue

The 2011 Spotlight showcases featured 18 acts (I attended 15), selected by a panel composed of presenters, managers, and agents, presented in 15-minute segments on Thursday and Friday evenings at the Pantages Theatre. By virtue of their selection, most of the ensembles have attained a robust level of artistic accomplishment. All merit the chance to find multiple performance havens where there is a match of interests and means.

ScrapArtsMusic, a five-member ensemble from Vancouver, Canada, first recycles industrial scrap material of all kinds (accordion parts to artillery shells) into good-looking-and-sounding wind, string, and percussion instruments. Then it proceeds to blow the roof off with a highly infectious and tightly choreographed performance of sensuous rhythm and energy – lots of both. The group has performed throughout Canada and the United States, and in Mexico, Australia, Ireland, and more. As I did, you may have caught their televised performance at the closing ceremonies of the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics.

The members of Project in Motion, a modern and aerial dance troupe based in New Mexico, perform in the air, on the ground, and on a variety of custom-built set pieces. At the Pantages, two dancers employed a column of two strands of fabric, hung just-right of center stage, and two pieces of sculpture that appeared to be made from thin, metal piping. The performance featured excerpts from two vignettes in "The Palace at Night," an evening-length work from 2010 inspired by the 20th century sculptor Alberto Giacometti. Although the dancers were pleasing to watch, a more intellectual eye than mine might appreciate the finer nuances of the dadaist and surrealist underpinnings of their work. As a pedestrian observer, I found the truncated selections neither interesting nor innovative.

Garner as Edison

More provocative was Patrick Garner's channeling of Thomas Alva Edison, the flagship of his several presentations for schools and corporate training sessions. Can you cut a hole in a 5" x 7" piece of paper that is large enough for a man to step through? Garner-as-Edison does so by looking at the problem from a different angle as he demonstrates Edison's four lessons and the value of hard work. A 20-year veteran of street fairs and Broadway productions, Garner also brings to life Harry Houdini, Benjamin Franklin, and others.

The Stuart Pimsler Dance and Theatre, based in Minnesota since 2000, blended movement, voice, and design with "Tales From the Book of Longing." First presented in 2009 at the Guthrie Theater's Dowling Studio, "Tales" was created by Artistic Co-Directors Stuart Pimsler and Suzanne Costello, inspired by the poetry of Leonard Cohen and music by Antony and the Johnsons. Excerpts, performed by seven dancers including Costello, featured dancer Brian Evans singing "Your Precious Love" a cappella.

Giordano Jazz Dance Chicago • Pedro Brenner

Representing all of its repertoire by multiple choreographers would require more than 15 minutes of performance by Giordano Jazz Dance Chicago. As an alternative, the globally-acclaimed troupe featured some of the jazz-infused styles of which its highly trained movers are capable. Jon Lehrer's "A Ritual Dynamic," from 2008, drives 10 dancers to the pulsing beats of White Derbakeh and DJ Disse with the look and feel of concert modern dance performed in a disco. A lovely, adagio duet offset both the earlier piece and the ensuing "Sabroso," Del Dominguez's jazzy and athletic tour of ballroom dance. The company will celebrate its 50th anniversary season in 2012/13. Its next major engagement will happen Oct. 21-22 at Chicago's Harris Theater.

TrenaBoldenFields,com

In a one-woman show, Trena Bolden Fields delivers monologues by five African American women, each a historical figure in the Civil Rights Movement who defied the social and economic injustices of her time. Among those included are Ida B. Wells, 1862-1931, an anti-lynching crusader, and Fannie Lou Hamer, 1917-1977, a voting rights activist. Fields studied theater arts and mass communication at Augsburg College and received her MA degree in psychology from the University of Minnesota. Her channeling of the women's lives, which collectively spanned more than a century, serves as compelling theater, social commentary, and history lesson.

Not long after performing the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with the Columbus Symphony Orchestra at age 16, Christian Howes set out to make his mark in jazz. His nomination this year as Violinist of the Year by the Jazz Journalists Association attests to his progress on that front. So does the showcase performance by the Christian Howes Group, a quartet inclusive of piano, bass, and drums. A set of classical and jazz cross-over music had the air of a late-night jazz club combo (it performed later both evenings at the Artists' Quarter in St. Paul), and closed with Paganini's Caprice No. 24 in A minor. Nice listening!

Equally engaging was the gig by Randy Sabien and the Fiddlehead Band, whose eponymous leader serves as the new Strings Department head at the McNally Smith College of Music in St. Paul. Sabien, a native of Rockford, Illinois, and veteran guest of Austin City Limits and A Prairie Home Companion, has pulled together seven, intergenerational performers – three violinists, pianist, drummer, bassist, and guitarist – who honor the history of American roots string playing.

Mark Masri • www.markmasri.com

Opening a first Minneapolis appearance by singing "Time to say goodbye" and meaning it?! I don't think so! Presenters and audiences will want to start saving their shekels to contract and attend performances by a most sonorous and soulful tenor, Mark Masri, a Toronto native who has performed since age 5. Accompanied by piano and guitar, his expansive vocal range and romantic, raven-haired beauty are melting hearts, dropping jaws, and burning up the world's stages. See if your travel agent can get you tickets to cruise Europe with him, Oct. 15-22.

According to The Four Bitchin' Babes, the word "bitchin'" is a California surfing term that means "tragically hip." As in, "Ain't middle age a blast?" These girlfriends are musician-comediennes who set women's lives to music with two, estrogen-fueled shows: "Hormonal Imbalance…A Mood Swinging Musical Revue" and "Diva Nation…Where Music, Laughter, and Girlfriends Reign."

"Any two idiots can have sex the first time. It takes two very special idiots to have it 1,000 times." So says Larry Miller in his one-man show, Cocktails with Larry Miller: Little League, Adultery, and Other Bad Ideas, in which he shares his comic perspective about marriage, children, and drinking – and how each one leads to the other two. Unless you live under a rock, you have seen him in "Pretty Woman," "The Princess Diaries," or more than 100 other films and television shows. Check him out on The Late Show with David Letterman, Sept. 23.

For a group that calls itself "a cello quartet gone mad," Break of Reality is totally grounded, and a very nice-and-lovely listen. Comprised of three cellists and a percussionist, the ensemble – all 20-something alums of The Eastman School of Music or the Cleveland Institute of Music – plays its own compositions, covers by Metallica and Radiohead, and others, and transcriptions of Bach. Following their Friday evening showcase, the musicians closed out the night's proceedings a few blocks away at the Dakota Jazz Club.

After nearly three hours of continuous performances, one's notes become more spare, spacey, and cryptic. About Sybarite5, I wrote "Fabulous!" and "Are they Argentinian?" While their fabulously performed closer by Astor Piazzolla probably put the question in my mind, bios for the three women and two men (two violins, viola, cello, bass), based in New York City, mention nothing about South America. They do include copious details about the commissioning of 20 new works and the paths that led to performances at the Aspen Music Festival, Lincoln Center, the Museum of Sex, and on American Public Media's Performance Today program. The group wants to be the first string quintet to perform in all 50 states, and has launched an online Kickstarter campaign to help them do it.

Those looking for classical music with a twist can look to Toronto, home of the accomplished accordionist Alexander Sevastian. The native of Minsk, Belarus, performs impeccably the works of Bach, Mozart, Scarlatti, Mendelssohn, Schubert, and more. In addition to his solo work he tours the U.S. and Canada with Quartetto Gelato. Hear a sample of his work here.

The voice of singer and songwriter Justin Hines has been compared to those of Jim Croce and James Taylor. He grew up singing in church, and realized his calling while a teenager 15 years ago when he won a vocal competition to sing the Canadian and American national anthems at a Toronto Raptors basketball game. He since has toured good chunks of the world, and performed at the Beijing and Vancouver Olympic Games. Accompanied by a guitarist and cellist, Hines performs from a wheel chair owing to a joint condition called Larsen's syndrome. He offers a gentle apology for the lack of choreography – "I'm working on it."

Independent Showcases

More than 100 independent showcase performances were presented at seven venues in downtown Minneapolis on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday nights, the majority of them at the Hilton Hotel and its ballrooms. I have never heard of anyone attending all of them; probably, it is not physically possible to do so. Time slots for independent performances can vary, usually lasting from 10 to 30 minutes. There are venues and audiences to bless all of the individuals and entities presented independently; it is a matter of mixing and matching the elements of interest, need, scale, and cost.

Ananya Dance Theatre • "Tushaanal" • V. Paul Virtucio

Following the conference's opening reception on Wednesday evening, the Ananya Dance Theatre, based in Minneapolis, opened a five-day run of "Tushaanal: Fires of Dry Grass" at the Southern Theater in the Seven Corners District. The 70-minute original work examined the conflicting dynamics that produce the beauty of and desire for gold along with the violence and adverse impacts on people that accompany its mining, production, and distribution. The performance by 11 women of color represents work at the nexus of artistic excellence and social justice. Ananya Chatterjea, artistic director, choreographer, and dancer, also serves as professor and Director of Dance in the Department of Theater Arts and Dance at the University of Minnesota. Her choreographic work, which she envisions as a "call to action," draws on the Indian dance form of Odissi, the martial art of Chhau, and yoga. Earlier this year, Chatterjea received a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship in choreography.

Hilton Hotel, 10th Street and Marquette Avenue

Later on Friday evening, I ventured among the second floor ballrooms of the Hilton Hotel, discovering there a mesmerizing world of magic and musical mayhem.

Mallory Lewis and Lamb Chop grew up as sisters, introduced to each other at an early age by their mother, Shari Lewis. When Shari's death in 1998 brought an end to her work with Lamb Chop, Mally stepped up to keep the puppet magic happening far and wide. Lamb Chop, whose wardrobe has expanded beyond the simple sock of her early days on television, has worn the years well and lost none of her innate charm and insecurity. Although the extended family members Charlie Horse and Wing Ding have not been seen for many years, Hush Puppy made a brief return to Minneapolis this evening from his home in Function Junction, Arkansas.

Five dudes from Presidio Brass, San Diego

Just down the hallway, the five guys from Presidio Brass in San Diego held court with their "Sounds of the Cinema" program, opening with the fanfare from "2001: A Space Odyssey," then moving on to excerpts from "Star Wars," "Wayne's World," "West Side Story," and "Peter Gun." For some reason, my notes reflect that at least one of the guys "should show some skin" during "I Feel Pretty." At any rate, I left feeling pretty sure that these two trumpets, horn, trombone, and tuba are a force to be reckoned with in American brass chamber music.

It was Joshua Kane's publicity that initially drew me to the Hilton with its promise of a psychic show that would allow me to discover my inner superhero and decide if Kane can really read minds. There was no hiding from this guy, who insisted that all the lights be turned up to full, and I somewhat regretted sitting in the front row. I left feeling a respectful admiration for an engaging performer whose shtick is based on old Victorian parlour games. You have to like a performer who says upfront that he doesn't care if you book him so long as you enjoy him in the moment.

The Second City Touring Company from Chicago looks and feels a lot like the Brave New Workshop in Minneapolis. The troupe has kept 'em laughing since 1959 with social and political satire presented via sketch comedy, improvisation, and music. It did my heart good to see young people with a current knowledge of the world and a facile ability to comment about it with wit and a razer sharp edge.

Last, but not least (because I stayed for a second-and-last, closing-down-the-Hilton-performance), MOJO and The Bayou Gypsies nearly removed my molars with the energetic vibrations of their Zydeco and Cajun music. Theirs is music you should dance to, and dance we did. Four guys and one gal – multiracial and intergenerational – retained cool control over an inexorable rise in frenzy with their vocals, accordion, rubboard, fiddle, drums, and bass guitar. On Saturday morning, I greeted Mr. Mojo at his booth in the exhibit hall with the question, "Where have you people been all my life? Have you had a good conference?" To which he replied, while offering me a praline, "When I hear greetings like that it's always a good conference!"

"David danced before the Lord." –2 Samuel 6:14

The Cowles Center for Dance • 5th and Hennepin, Minneapolis

Before the music of the spheres, humans experience in their bodies the rhythmic pulse of their hearts, laying the foundation for worship through dance. Dancers and choreographers, at work in the temples of their studios and stages, strive to touch on aspects of the sacred and the divine. When they make the connections, nothing else matters.

In our times, only a few cities or states have been called to erect temples – performing arts centers, if you will – designed and dedicated to celebrate the divine through dance. Such a calling was realized in Minneapolis, Sept. 8-12, with the opening weekend activities at the Cowles Center for Dance and the Performing Arts. The activities included Thursday and Friday evening dance morsels for Midwest Arts visitors, and Sunday open house samplings for the community.

I attended 19 of the 27 dance showcases presented on the mainstage of the 500-seat Goodale Theater and the presentation studio of the James Sewell Ballet. You can read about most of them on the calendar pages of the Cowles Center 's website.

You can read the observations of my friend, Linda Shapiro, about the Center's grand opening on the mnartists.org website.

9/11

2011-09-11T20:18:00.000-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Ten years ago today, the Minneapolis Star Tribune published an extra edition in the afternoon. The last time that had happened was Nov. 22, 1963. Disruptions in the space-time continuum of our national psyche provided the grist for the journalistic mill on those occasions.

However, for all the details reported 10 years ago and in the days since, it is not the journalism that echoes and haunts my memory. Rather, it is the real words and re-created imagery from a made-for-television-movie:

Honor Elizabeth Wainio

A young woman, Elizabeth Wainio, 27, a passenger on United Flight 93, phoned her stepmother, Esther Heymann, in Baltimore.

"Mom, we're being hijacked. I just called to say good bye," she said.

"Elizabeth, we don't know how this is going to turn out. I've got my arms around you," Heymann said.

Wainio told her stepmother she could feel them.

"Let's look out at that beautiful blue sky. Let's be here in the moment," Heymann told her. "Let's do some deep breathing together."

They passed a few quiet moments.

"It hurts me that it's going to be so much harder for you all than it is for me," Wainio said. Honor Wainio was still on the line with her stepmother.

"I need to go," she said. "They're getting ready to break into the cockpit. I love you. Goodbye."

http://letsrollforums.com/9-11-flight-attendants-t20794.html

Did Minnesota State Fair favor anti-gay folks?

2011-09-04T00:14:00.004-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

According to Minnesota Public Radio, both proponents and opponents of the 2012 marriage ballot amendment to the Minnesota Constitution – that would define marriage as between one man and one woman – missed the deadline to have booths at the Minnesota State Fair.

However, proponents for the amendment have a booth presence at the fair. I saw it on Underwood Avenue, when attending on Friday, Sept. 2.

According to MPR, the amendment's opponents were told in July that the Fair was sold out of concession space. A Fair spokesperson, Lara Hughes, told MPR that the proponents had submitted a registration request on Aug. 31 and that the Fair had found a location for them.

The Minnesota State Fair has some real explaining to do.

Is MPR's reporting on this matter complete and accurate?

Was concession space sold-out in July and, if so, was that fact communicated to both the proponents and opponents?

If both sides were told that space was not available, how did it happen that the proponents' late request was accomodated?

Republican legislators fervently invited a 15+month brawl when they voted to place this question before Minnesota's voters in November 2012. It appears that they will not be disappointed.

The empty promise of "freedom" and "simplicity"

2011-08-28T01:32:00.004-05:00

I here offer my deepest apologies and sincerest regrets to my fellow citizens for failing to properly shoulder the burden of maintaining our faltering economy. I offer no excuses other than my unwillingness to manage the paperwork.

This is about those endless offers from credit card companies that fill our mailboxes and keep the post office from going completely broke. In the 12 weeks since June 5, I received 24 of those suckers from outfits that promised in large print to guarantee freedom and simplicity in my life, plus another six mailings containing "convenience checks" for my existing credit card accounts.

I just spent 90 minutes tearing all of them into tiny pieces that fill a brown paper grocery sack.

However, with Michele and her fellow travelers running their mouths so much lately about all of our disappearing freedoms, I feel guilty, and really should do something with these offers besides shred them. In addition to gaining copious amounts of new credit that adds consumption capacity to the economy, I could transfer outstanding balances on existing cards for a low-percentage fee, pay no interest on transferred balances for generous lengths of time, and thereafter pay APRs ranging from 3.99% to 18.99% (the average for my 12 weeks of offers was 11.99%).

From four of the offers, I could obtain 30,000 free bonus miles each, 120,000 in total, to use on American Airlines, a company that serves Minnesota minimally and with which I have done only minor amounts of business over the years. Still, that's four times around the world.

I am pretty adept with a spreadsheet, and with a bit of concentration I could probably play this shell game for years without paying out any real money on either my principal or interest.

Hell, if I was half as smart as my ego would have it, I would take these offers, cash them out to the max, quit working, and use the remaining years on my passport and my life to remain free and simple outside the country. Makes sense. If Rick Perry and Texas can secede from the Union, why can't individuals separate themselves from the hard work of living and embrace the slick and easy promises of freedom and simplicity?

These proferred possibilities spell "freedom" with a capital "F" and "simplicity" with a capital "S." For sure!

Then, as these importunings are so rich for folks like me, one can only imagine how important they must be for the credit card companies themselves and for the compensation of their shareholders and corporate leaders.

By now, all of us should know – from the mouths of Boehner, Cantor, Mitchell, and our GOP brethren in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and elsewhere – what that kind of financial good fortune means to our economy, for these people, the shareholders and corporate leaders, are our job creators. They are the very lifeblood and hope for our nation's financial salvation. They count on people like me, and you, to choose freedom.

Thus, I take seriously my shirking of responsibility for insuring freedom and simplicity in this particular realm for myself and my fellows. Simply put, however, I choose to believe that life is too short for the paperwork, and even shorter for the rhetoric of the empty promises.

Feeding famine: "This could be their home for a long time"

2011-08-26T21:46:00.000-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Famine has afflicted the world at various times throughout recorded history, including the successive generations of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the Biblical book of Genesis. In modern day Somalia, however, there is no Joseph, ordained by God to save his people. Instead, the global community is called to act as the children of Israel and Ishmael.

Displaced Somalis pour daily into the Dadaab refugee camp – the world's largest – across the border in neighboring Kenya, fleeing two years of drought – East Africa's worst in 60 years – rising food prices, and armed conflict in food producing areas. Most immediately, they flee famine with its attendant malnutrition, starvation, epidemics, and mortality.

Eighty percent of those arriving at Dadaab are women and children. Their men are fighting, dead, tending herds, or giving their families all of their money to travel, on foot, across the border. In camps built to house 90,000 people, more than 400,000 now live in a space one third the size of Minneapolis.

Their hope lies primarily in the Somali Diaspora.

Minneapolis-St. Paul has become the de facto capital of Somalia in North America. This community of immigrants has taken up the frontline fight against famine in Somalia and other countries in the Horn of Africa. The American Refugee Committee, and its Neighbors for Nations–Uniting Communities to Help Somalia, are working with Minnesota's Somali community to raise money, buy food, and send it to the Horn of Africa.

The sons of Ishmael cannot do it by themselves. They need all of the children of Israel. Every financial gift of any size is generous and will save lives and provide relief in Somalia within days. There is no time to debate who, or what, is right or wrong.

From Minneapolis City Councilmember Gary Schiff:

Every single day I meet people in Minneapolis who are preparing for a trip to the Dadaab refugee camp or to Somalia to help with famine relief efforts. Abdi Phenomenal Farah is a student from Augsburg College who is leaving this week. Abdi is a spoken word artist, and he will have much more to say when he returns. Please watch this link of his amazing art and meet one of the upcoming leaders of our city.

Tour de force by MPR's 2011/12 artist-in-residence

2011-08-26T12:53:00.001-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Audience members for the inaugural event by

Chad Hoopes (photo by Donna Wheatley)

Minnesota Public Radio's artist-in-residence for 2011/12 shared a gemstone experience in the tour de force performance by violinist Chad Hoopes, 17.

From the outset of his two-hour program in Antonello Hall at the MacPhail Center for Music, August 25, Hoopes relinquished control of neither his virtuosity nor his concentrated passion, mesmerizing listeners with accomplished readings of a range of composers, including Brahms, Bach, Prokofiev, Tchaikovsky, Ravel, and Schubert.

Hoopes opened the 45-minute first half, accompanied by pianist Charles Kemper, with Brahm's Violin Sonata No. 2, Op. 100, in the only work not committed fully to memory. He followed with a snappy, solo rendition of J.S. Bach's Violin Sonata No. 1, BWV 1001.

Post-intermission, Hoopes and Kemper breezed beautifully through Prokofiev's Five Melodies for Violin and Piano, Op. 35bis, and Tchaikovsky's Three Pieces for Violin and Piano, Op. 42.

It was in Ravel's Tzigane, however, that Hoopes tore through both music and the stage with a controlled rip, at times waving his bow like a baseball bat and visibly relishing his mastery of the nuanced complexities. He said later that he had played Tzigane publicly for the first time, in Germany, only a few weeks earlier.

The program reached its exquisite end with the encore performance of Franz Schubert's Ave Maria. Hoopes heard the work for the first time only in 2010, but his inspired proficiency with the 1713 Antonio Stradivari Cooper; Hakkert; ex Ceci violin – coupled with Antonello's acoustics – gave the double-stops and overtones the effect of a full string section.

A first teacher, Nancy Lokken, might expect no less from a native Minnesotan who was but three years old when Santa Claus delivered his first violin. In a post-performance q-and-a, Lokken observed that Hoopes' facility of playing from the heart "was there at the beginning."

During his MPR residency, Hoopes will present concerts, educational sessions, public appearances, and interviews. In March 2012, he will visit elementary, middle, and high schools throughout Minnesota to talk about the importance of music and the arts and of doing one's best in any endeavor.

Hoopes is represented by IMG Artists.

Calm before September's storm

2011-08-25T12:16:00.002-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Opening weekend: Sept. 9-11

Following 13 years of preparation, The Cowles Center for Dance and the Performing Arts is primping for its close-up when the doors are thrown open for its opening weekend festivities, Sept. 9-11. A sold-out, black-tie gala on Friday, Sept. 9, will feature a dinner, performances, and reception. Tickets are available for Saturday's grand opening performances and reception for $150; phone 612.206.3621. The Cowles will provide 200 complimentary tickets for Saturday's festivities to local dancers and choreographers.

Performers on Friday and Saturday will include Savion Glover, Clifton Brown (Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater), James Sewell Ballet, Zenon Dance Company, Larry Yazzie (Native Pride Dancers), Minnesota Dance Theatre, Wendy Whelan (New York City Ballet), Jonah Bokaer (formerly with Merce Cunningham Dance Company), and The Singers (Minnesota choral artists).

A free, community open house from 11am to 5pm on Sunday, Sept. 11, will feature workshops and performances.

The Cowles Center is a three-building complex located on Hennepin Avenue, between 5th & 6th streets, in downtown Minneapolis: the refurbished, 505-seat Goodale Theater built in 1910; the eight-story Hennepin Center for the Arts built as a Masonic Temple in 1888; and the new Great Hall and Education Center.

As part of its full, 2011/12 season of dance and music presentations, The Cowles will host The Minnesota SAGE Awards for Dance, Tuesday, Oct. 11. The awards will recognize achievement in six categories during the past year. Tickets for the SAGE Awards are $15.

Prices for events in 2011/12 will range from $10 to $36. All tickets will carry an additional $4 facilities fee – $2 for the theater's maintenance and $2 for the ticketing system. A discount of 20% is available for purchases of four or more tickets. The Cowles box office number is 612.206.3600.

Minneapolis: Sept. 7-10

Leading up to the Cowles opening, Minneapolis will host the 24th Midwest Arts Conference, Sept. 7-10, under the aegis of Arts Midwest and the Mid-America Arts Alliance. The lineup of activities will include curated and independent showcase performances that will give Minnesota artists multiple opportunities to shine. More than 4,000 artists, managers, agents, and presenting venues will be represented during the four days. On-site and single-day registrations are available.

Southern Theater: Sept. 8-11

Ananya Dance Theatre will present the world premiere of Tushaanal: Fires of Dry Grass, September 8-11 at the Southern Theater in Minneapolis. "Tushaanal" – Bengali for "fires of dry grass" – revolves around stories of gold, an element mined and harnessed as capital, and a symbol of desire, beauty, and artistry. The full-length work is the second in a four-part, anti-violence series exploring how women in global communities of color experience and resist violence. Tickets are $22 ($16 students). Thu, 7:30pm; Fri, 8pm; Sat, 2pm, 8pm; Sun, 7pm. Artistic Director Ananya Chatterjea received a Guggenheim Fellowship for Choreography earlier this year from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.

State Theatre, Sept. 19, 7:30pm

The 2011 Ivey Awards, established to celebrate Twin Cities professional theater, will be held at the Historic State Theatre in Minneapolis, Monday, Sept. 19, at 7:30pm. Actors Seth and Charles Numrich will host the evening of entertainment that will feature an opening number honoring theater costumers; singing by Ryan McCartan, a graduate of Minnetonka High School and recipient of the U.S. Presidential Scholar in the Arts award; the 7-Shot Symphony by Live Action Set; and excerpts from The Rocky Horror Show (Cardinal Theatricals), The Buddy Holly Story (History Theatre), Little Shop of Horrors (Mu Performing Arts), and Ragtime (Park Square Theatre). Tickets for the performances and pre/post parties are available at IveyAwards.com.

Kathleen Spehar has been appointed Director of The O’Shaughnessy at St. Catherine University in St. Paul. Spehar has served previously as managing director of the History Theatre and of Mu Performing Arts, both in St. Paul. She holds a bachelor’s degree in music from Western Michigan University and a master’s of liberal studies from the University of Minnesota.

Sept. 7-23 in Maple Grove

The Platinum Theatre Company will present its inaugural play, "Flamingo Court," in nine performances, Sept. 7-23. The production features three short plays, two funny and one serious, set in condos in a senior living complex in South Florida. Themes address the uncertainties of dating past age 55, loneliness, coping with aging parents, and new interests. Platinum, founded in 2010, aspires to be "Minnesota's Senior Theater." All performances will take place at Pilgrims United Church of Christ, 8801 Rice Lake Road, Maple Grove MN, on Sept. 7, 8, 13, 14, 15, 20, and 22 at 1pm, and Sept. 9 and 23 at 7pm. Tickets: $18; call 612.819.5246.

Birchbark Books, Minneapolis, Sept. 15

Judith Brin Ingber, a Twin Cities-based choreographer, dancer, and dance scholar, has edited Seeing Israeli and Jewish Dance. The collection of essays and photographs, published by Wayne State University Press, explores the evolution of Jewish dance through two thousand years of Diaspora. Brin Ingber will discuss the book, show slides, and sign at Birchbark Books, 2115 East 21st Street, Minneapolis, Thursday, Sept. 15, 7-9pm. A pre-supper will happen beginning at 6pm at the Kenwood Cafe, adjacent to the bookstore. "A dance to Jewish Life," Mordecai Specktor's profile of Brin Ingber and the book's creation, written for the American Jewish World, is available here.

Midwest Arts Conference invades Minneapolis, Sept. 7-10

2011-08-24T20:18:00.000-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

The 24th Midwest Arts Conference will descend on downtown Minneapolis from Wednesday, Sept. 7, through Saturday, Sept. 10. Attendees will include 1,000 performing artists, their managers, and agents (representing 4,000 artists and ensembles), along with performing arts presenters, venues, and arts administrators from throughout the United States and beyond.

The Conference serves as convenor each September for the 15 states represented by Arts Midwest and the Mid-America Arts Alliance – an area stretching from the Dakotas to Michigan, Nebraska to Ohio, and Minnesota to Texas.

In addition to networking and professional development sessions, the Midwest Arts Conference provides a forum for live performances and a Marketplace exhibit hall. The 2011 gathering, centered at the Hilton Hotel, 1001 Marquette Avenue, is the first hosted by Minneapolis since 1992; St. Paul hosted the 2001 and 2009 conferences.

The Délégation du Québec from Chicago will sponsor Wednesday's opening reception at the Nicollet Island Pavilion, 6-8pm. IMG Artists will sponsor Saturday's closing party at the Dakota Jazz Club, 5-6:30pm.

This year's Marketplace exhibit hall will be staged at the Minneapolis Convention Center. Many Minnesota performing ensembles have paid for a booth presence: Ananya Dance Theatre, 701A; ARENA Dances, 121A; James Sewell Ballet, 901 and 929; Katha Dance Theatre, 128; Minneapolis Guitar Quartet, 839; Minnesota Sinfonia, 800B; Ragamala Dance, 901; Rose Ensemble, 106; Shapiro and Smith Dance, 921; Sossy Mechanics, 109; Stuart Pimsler Dance and Theater, 339A; Theater of Fools, 906; and TU Dance, 739.

The Conference will present 18 artists and ensembles in curated, showcase performances at the Pantages Theatre, 710 Hennepin Avenue, on Thursday and Friday evenings, including Minnesota's Stuart Pimsler Dance and Theater at 7:35pm on Thursday.

Numerous showcase performances will be produced independently throughout downtown on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday evenings, with a majority staged in the Hilton Hotel's ballrooms. All of these performances are free, and nearly all of them will welcome respectful audience members from the local community if space allows. All performances begin promptly at stated start times.

Independent showcases will be presented by Minnesota artists on this schedule:

Wednesday, Sept. 7 – 8:30pm: Ananya Dance Theater, full-length presentation of "Tushaanal: Fires of Dry Grass." ADT shuttle will pick up conferees at Nicollet Island Pavilion at 8pm with return to Hilton Hotel at 10pm. Venue: Southern Theater, 1420 Washington Avenue South.

Thursday-Friday, Sept. 8-9 – 9:30pm: Shapiro and Smith Dance; 9:45pm: Ragamala Dance; 10pm: Stuart Pimsler Dance and Theater; 10:15pm: James Sewell Ballet; 10:30pm: Zenon Dance Company; 10:45pm: TU Dance; 11pm: Sossy Mechanics. Venue: James Sewell Ballet's Studio 2A, Hennepin Center for the Arts, 528 Hennepin Avenue.

Thursday-Friday, Sept. 8-9 – 9:30pm, 10:15pm, 11pm: ARENA Dances. Venue: Studio 5B, Hennepin Center for the Arts, 528 Hennepin Avenue.

Friday, Sept. 9 – 9:30pm: Rose Ensemble. Venue: Wesley United Methodist Church, 101 East Grant Street.

All events are subject to change.

Bringing it on home in Wisconsin, Tue., Aug. 9

2011-08-08T13:12:00.000-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Six Wisconsin senate districts will hold recall elections on Tuesday, Aug. 9. Residents who care about the future of that state and the nation must turn out to vote.

The recalls have been prompted by the legislative agenda rammed through the GOP-controlled Assembly and Senate by GOP Gov. Scott Walker. The extremist and un-American agenda seeks to alter the state's political dynamic under the guise of financial stewardship. Republicans control the senate by a margin of 19-14; Democrats must pick up a net of three seats in the recalls in order to gain majority (17-16) control of that chamber and restore checks and balance to Wisconsin's political process.

The electoral stakes are high for both sides, as reported by Politico and articulated by Judson Phillips, CEO of Tea Party Nation. Speaking at an Aug. 6 rally in Thiensville, Wisconsin – sponsored by the Tea Party Express and promoted by the Republican Party of Milwaukee County – Phillips said "I detest and despise everything the left stands for. How anybody can endorse an ideology that has killed a billion people in the last century is beyond me." A day earlier, according to Politico, Phillips "likened protestors of Gov. Scott Walker to Nazi storm troopers."

Also according to Politico, another speaker at Saturday's rally, Vince Schmuki, said "Tuesday is going to be the beginning of our takeover. And we're going to follow it up the following week, and then we're going to polish off the enemy in November 2012."

In response to voter petitions in each district, recall elections were scheduled for nine incumbents – six Republicans and three Democrats – including the six Republicans up for vote on Aug. 9:

District 2 - incumbent Robert Cowles, R-Green Bay, challenged by Nancy Nusbaum, D-De Pere;
District 8 - incumbent Alberta Darling, R-River Hills, challenged by Rep. Sandy Pasch, D-Whitefish Bay;
District 10 - incumbent Sheila Harsdorf, R-River Falls, challenged by Shelly Moore, D-River Falls;
District 14 - incumbent Luther Olsen, R-Ripon, challenged by Rep. Fred Clark, D-Baraboo;
District 18 - incumbent Randy Hopper, R-Fond du Lac, challenged by Jessica King, D-Oshkosh;
District 32 - incumbent Dan Kapanke, R-LaCrosse, challenged by Rep. Jennifer Shilling, D-LaCrosse.

Two Democratic senators will face recall votes on Aug. 16: District 12 incumbent Jim Holperin, D-Conover, faces challenger Kim Simac, R-Eagle River, and District 22 incumbent Robert Wirch, D-Pleasant Prairie, faces challenger Jonathan Steitz, R-Pleasant Prairie.

District 30 incumbent Dave Hansen, D-Green Bay, defeated his Republican challenger, Dave VanderLeest, with 66% of the vote on July 19.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has tagged the recall efforts as "ugly, unnecessary, and expensive," and has declined to endorse any candidates on the principle that recalls should not be used to dispute policy differences.

Most other Wisconsin newspapers are playing it straight-down-the-middle, opting to encourage readers to vote without making endorsements. One exception: The Capital Times in Madison endorsed Democratic challenger Clark over Republican incumbent Olsen in District 14.

Walking Lake Calhoun

2011-07-03T23:26:00.000-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Early evening, 83º, clear skies, perfectly pleasant.… I cannot recall circling this lake during the past 18 months. In many ways, it feels as though those months never happened, but they certainly did. Many relationships changed in those months, some not for the better; but for the first time in my life, I am OK with that.… The lake's water level appears to be higher than it was two and three years ago.… A handful of large trees on the northwest side have toppled, roots and all, probably from Thursday's storm. Two more on the east side, including one that still blocks the bicycle path at the 32d Street Beach.

Gabriel "Gabe" Archangelus, July 4, 2009

Assimilation continues: a number of Somali women retain the long head scarves but show a fair amount of leg.… Not a duck or goose in sight anywhere – nor bald eagle(s).… The weed-cutter that rotates among the city's lakes is stationed in Calhoun right now. With acres of weeds breaking the surface, that machine has a full schedule next week.… A west-side bench provided a restful spot for a woman to surf the web on her phone.… Volleyball games in progress. Frisbees flying. Even a football sailing around.… Halfway round I recalled plans to attend vespers this evening, before realizing it is summer in Minnesota and vespers are on vacation.… I will never understand the logic of wearing saggy pants. If the object is to show off one's butt, just wear your underwear. It's summer in Minnesota and one can get away with that.… Thomas Beach full of swimmers and picnicking, extended families, tables decked in red, white, and blue.… The perfect setting reminded of summer tailgating parties at the old Met Stadium before Minnesota Kicks soccer games.

I do not agree with John Winters, the Minneapolis retiree who wants to change the name of Lake Calhoun. John C. Calhoun was a loud and effective proponent of slavery from South Carolina who served in the United States Senate and as vice president to two U.S. presidents. Calhoun also was Secretary of War when Fort Snelling was established at the confluence of the Mississippi and Minnesota rivers in 1823. First, I never think about Calhoun's politics and career when enjoying our lake. Second, we allowed South Carolina back into the Union following the Civil War (although, one might wonder at times why we did so) and, with malice toward none, as Lincoln suggested, we might choose to set some things aside. Third, if we start down this path of renaming things for reasons of political correctness, where to stop? Fourth, slavery and the war that ended it are painful parts of our history – but they are past. We still have unfinished business with racial relations in the present day. Let's tackle that. For starters, one need look no further than the rainbow of people enjoying together Lake Calhoun's environs on a perfect summer evening.

Unlike in my Stevens Square neighborhood this weekend, not a single firecracker sounds on the entire lakefront.… The sunset is an orange magenta.… Very few canines out tonight. Gabriel ("Gabe") Archangelus used to make these rounds with me. In 2004, we walked the lake together 3-4 mornings a week. However, he was six then and 13 now. His spirit remains willing but his flesh is weak.… Five eastern white pine trees were planted along the eastern shore this year. At six feet tall, each cost $217.50, according to their tags. Give them seven years and they will be soaring.… There seem to be more sailboats at anchor than in the past. In addition to the north side, moorings orient more to the east side this year.… The dispensary at the pavilion has long lines. However, the pricing of food and beverages at Calhoun – and at Lake Harriet two weeks ago – does not appear to my eye as being very family friendly. On the other hand, I would not purchase 10 pieces of shrimp for $12.95 anyway.… The canoe racks near North Beach show four vacancies. One wonders how many canoes are stolen each season with the snip of a chain in the dark of night.

Happy Independence Day.

Taking leave of Seven Corners

2011-06-11T19:33:00.003-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

For 18 months, I have been present for at least part of most days in the Seven Corners district of Minneapolis. With the conclusion of my employment by the Southern Theater, a district mainstay since 1910, my future visits will be infrequent.

As an amateur historian with an exaggerated sentimentality, I have allowed the historical Seven Corners to occupy a personal mindshare out of proportion to its present reduced circumstances. The ghosts who inhabit the area insist on being noticed and remembered.

Seven Corners, 1952.

For sure, the anomalous distinctions that gave rise to its name have been bulldozed and paved-over. To a casual eye, Seven Corners remains nothing more than an innocuous intersection that serves as the illogical meeting point of Washington Avenue, 15th Avenue South, 19th Avenue South, and Cedar Avenue.

For decades, Seven Corners served as a crossroads for the Swedish and other immigrants who flooded Minneapolis in the late 19th century and the early 20th. It provided single room housing for single men, who worked as laborers in construction and the nearby flour mills, and for single women who worked as domestics. While no original churches remain, many structures that housed saloons in the neighborhood still stand, and many still dispense a variety of spirits to ease the pursuit of social intercourse or of psychological survival.

During Seven Corners' history, it became one of two Minneapolis residential neighborhoods to which Jewish and African-American citizens were restricted through the use of land covenants, and in which the poorest of all citizens could find affordable housing. The other neighborhood was that of the near North Side, along 6th Avenue North, in which my paternal grandparents lived.

When the Southern Theater opened in 1910 at 1420 Washington Avenue South, it had been built primarily by the Swedish immigrant community, and named after its sister venue, the Southern Theater located in Stockholm, Sweden. Next door, at 1430, stood Gluek's saloon. Then, as now, Gluek's incorporated the six-pointed Star of David into its logo. Gluek's remains a mainstay of Minneapolis' Warehouse District on 6th Street, just north of Hennepin Avenue.

Today, the Town Hall Brewery occupies the former Gluek's building. The building is owned by Dudley Riggs, founding impresario of the long-running Brave New Workshop comedy venue in Minneapolis.

If not friends, I have become "business acquaintances" with most of Town Hall's personnel. I will dearly miss Matt, Andy, Mithab, Chris, Steve, Rachel, Marty, and others, along with their customers. The establishment insures that Seven Corners remains a crossroads for those who enjoy original, local brews.

One block away, construction is under way to build a new light rail line between downtown Minneapolis and downtown St. Paul. The train station, a block away, will carry the name "West Bank Station." Matt and I have pursued a campaign – so far fruitless – to convince the powers-that-be to name the station "Seven Corners/West Bank" for the simple reason that "before West Bank, Seven Corners was."

The bureaucrats of the Metropolitan Council, with their soulless, fancy-dancy notions of modern usage and lack of appreciation for historical perspective, have had none of it so far. Nonetheless, we planted the seed, and our hope springs eternal.

I will miss Seven Corners, its buildings, its people, its ghosts, and their stories. They will live in my heart as long as it beats.

Returning to the village

2011-06-09T19:54:00.003-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

In the summer of 1954, our family was the second to move into one of the newly-constructed houses on our block on Second Street N.E. in the panhandle of Fridley, Minnesota. The purchase price was $9,900.

I was two years old, my sister, Deb, a few months.

Located in Anoka County, Fridley is a first-tier suburb on the northeast border of Minneapolis. It was incorporated as a village in 1949 and became a city in 1957. In the "Fridley tornados" of May 6, 1965, a quarter of the city's homes were damaged or destroyed.

In short order in 1954 and 1955, other young families took up residence in the remaining abodes, most of them with one or two youngsters in-hand. No one of a certain age required clairvoyance to know what transpired in the bedrooms of young parents throughout the neighborhood. In no time at all, additional younglings arrived to provide playmates for each age cohort.

With no grass at the beginning, nor trees to climb, and no fenced yards, there was no end of open-range play areas. Also, there was "The Field," an expanse of sand and weeds across Main Street that stretched a mile north and south along Main, and a quarter mile west from the street to the massive railroad switching yard.

We learned to ride bicycles on the dirt alleys – which caused fewer injuries than did falls on paved roads, few as those were. (It was a big deal when curbs, gutters, and asphalt eventually replaced tar and crushed rock for street surfaces.)

As grass and a few trees were planted, fences were installed that restricted our range of free movement. Play then came to center on a few front and back yards, including ours. We knew everyone, and everyone knew us.

The Hansens, next door, were Methodists. The Willmans, across the alley, were the token Catholics. Next to them, the Sepples attended First Lutheran Church, which was somehow more conservative than our church, St. Timothy's English Evangelical Lutheran, affiliated with the United Lutheran Church in America. Mainly – owing something to my parents' evangelism – if you were Lutheran in our neighborhood, you joined or attended St. Tim's.

My family were charter members of St. Tim's, organized on Palm Sunday, 1959. My brother, born in April that year, was named after the church. At its peak, 10 years later, the church counted a membership of 1,200, operating on 10 acres of land on the shores of Sullivan Lake.

In those days, most of our mothers did not work outside the home. Also in those days, no 24/7 news cycles convinced our parents that we needed to be kept under lock-and-key or chaperoned. We could roam all day and most of the evening, and got in trouble only if we failed to show up for supper.

Friendships formed, all of them meaningful and some of them lasting.

One of the lasting ties was that between my brother and David William Wicklund. Dave was born in November 1958 and lived across Second street.

Dave died of natural causes on June 2, last week.

Over the years, many of the Second Street parent neighbors have died – Don and Elaine Archer, Harold and Audrey Sepple, Arvid and Fern Hansen, Tom and Tess Thompson, Gene Wicklund – while others have moved away.

Yesterday afternoon, I picked up my mother at her home in Monticello and drove to Dave's visitation and memorial service at St. Tim's. We were way early, so we spent time driving around the old 'hood.

The landscape had an alien feel, what with trees 50+ years old. Our old house has a basketball hoop on the garage. (We never had a garage.) Many of the houses sport bay windows, brickwork, decks, and other affectations.

It was mid-afternoon and no one was extant in yards or on the street.

We arrived at St. Tim's at the stroke of 3pm. Dave had been confirmed in his Christian faith there on May 5, 1974. The photo of his confirmation class is displayed permanently in the lobby, as are those of all of us who passed through from 1959 to the present.

Dave's mother greeted us at the entry and welcomed a long and silent embrace. There are no words that can comfort a grieving mother. Dave was the second son she had lost to natural causes.

It was a blessing to see Harvey and Sylvia at the church, along with their children, Neil, Donna, and Debra. I babysat those children after their parents moved from South Dakota.

Daniel Lloyd held court at the organ and piano keyboards, as he has done since he was a teenager in the 1960s.

Dave's younger sister, Susan, recalled her brother as a man who viewed life as a glass half-full, one who cultivated an encyclopedic and rabid knowledge of the Minnesota Twins baseball team (and, to a lesser extent, of the Minnesota Vikings and the old North Stars).

Friend Randy, who met Dave at Columbia Heights High School in 1975, recalled an intelligent and loyal friend who lived each moment in color.

Randy's sister and Dave's love, Renae, described a man who provided the color to her life and knew how to work an entire room at every high school reunion.

We listened to readings from the Book of Revelation ("the old world has passed away"), Psalm 91 (expressing confidence in God), and the Gospel of John (Jesus taking leave "to prepare a place").

We sang "On Eagle's Wings" and "Amazing Grace."

We adjourned to the church basement for fellowship and a light meal that, in Lutheran fashion, was anything but light.

As she has for more than 50 years, Eva, 88, continued her ministry and constant presence at the food table, assisting in the provision of nourishment to the nuanced ties that bind.

In the fullness of time, all boundaries of time and space pass away and collapse upon themselves. This was expressed best in the handwritten message that accompanied the bouquet placed in the worship chancel by Dave's mother:

"I will love you forever."

Southern Theater moves forward with sustainable plan

2011-06-03T14:15:00.000-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

The Southern Theater will move into the 2011/12 performance season with a renewed board of directors and reaffirmation of its mission, a sustainable business plan that reduces costs and increases access to performers, and a full-time staff of one.

The Southern’s 15-member board has taken urgent steps to stabilize the organization amidst its immediate financial crisis and adopted a “Plan for a Sustainable Southern” that projects 40-weeks of performance activity, a first-year budget of $165,600, and a revenue ratio of 2-to-1 earned-to-contributed income.

Since 2008, the theater had presented 28 to 47 annual engagements, with an annual budget of approximately $1.1 million.

“The plan will preserve the historic, 101-year-old theater as a unique venue for artists and the community while laying the groundwork for a viable business model,” said Anne Baker, chair of the board of directors.

“For at least seven years, the theater has shouldered too much of the financial risk of presenting and producing performances of dance, music, theater, and film, and has not effectively made the case to enough individuals, foundations, and corporations that donations, sponsorships, and underwriting will produce sufficient added value to merit full support,” said Baker.

“This plan allows us to stabilize and to focus on the chronic issue of negative cash flows caused by organizational, strategic, managerial, and operational problems,” she added.

Key elements of the plan may be summarized as (a) reducing annual expenses to a minimum in order to make the space accessible to more artists at a cost that is as low as possible, (b) “keeping it simple” by establishing a reliable platform of earned income on which to strategically build future programs, (c) adding fully underwritten programming when feasible, and (d) staffing by a knowledgeable professional who is accountable to an engaged and energized board.

The board of directors has named Damon Runnals to the new position of general manager. Runnals, 32, has served as the theater’s production and operations manager since September 2008. He received a BA degree in Theater Arts from Hartwick College in Oneonta, New York.

Runnals will assume his duties on June 10, when the position of executive director, held by Gary Peterson since January 2010, will be eliminated. Peterson has been elected to the Southern’s board of directors. Over the past six weeks, the theater has eliminated eight other positions due to adverse financial circumstances.

“On behalf of our board,” Baker added, “I want to offer our sincere gratitude to all of the Southern staff members whose commitment to the performing arts attracted critical acclaim to the theater and inspired us all.”

On April 21, the Southern announced that it needed to raise $400,000 by April 30 in order to provide one year’s working capital, pay vendors, and present a full season of curated work in 2011/12. That plan would have preserved the employed expertise of several people and a range of marketing, front of house, and back of house services for artists and audiences.

On May 3, the theater reported that it had raised $50,000 from its annual gala, held April 30, and an additional $45,000 from online gifts by nearly 300 donors.

Members of the board returned to the drawing board and considered various, alternative business scenarios before settling on the new “Plan for a Sustainable Southern” and its provision for a single employee.

The primary goals of the plan are to keep the theater open and available to artists and audiences, and to protect the basic presentation model supported by rental agreements. However, the Southern and the community will have the capacity to supplement the model further through underwriting opportunities for mission-aligned program activity. The Southern also will have office space available for rent to nonprofit organizations.

Since April 9, in response to its crisis of operational and financial distress, the Southern’s board of directors has taken ownership of past mistakes with an eagerness to restore institutional integrity; examined the financial behavior that led to the crisis and established the policies and procedures necessary to match the theater’s cash position and down-sized requirements; set in motion a process of forensic financial review by an outside party; and renewed efforts to enhance the composition of its membership.

With the Southern’s immediate crisis now under control, the board will re-double its efforts to turn its attention to pay creditors, raise operating and underwriting capital, and find additional ways to take advantage of the many offers of assistance that the theater has received from artists and others.

“As the arts ecosystem and climate continue to change, this plan gives us hope and vision for what the Southern can yet become for artists and audiences, and that it is worthy of support,” said Baker. “We hope to schedule one or more benefit concerts. We also will move forward with our online auction during August and, of course, we will continue to accept donations online” [http://givemn.razoo.com/story/The-Southern-Theater].

As a 501(c)(3) organization, all financial gifts to the Southern are tax-deductible to the full extent allowed by law. Southern Theater, 1420 Washington Ave., S., Minneapolis, MN 55454. www.southerntheater.org

Southern Theater mission

The Southern Theater, a 210-seat theater in Minneapolis, cultivates artistic exploration by providing a vibrant home for performance, fostering a multiplicity of voices, and catalyzing connections among artists and audiences.

String Theory Music Festival in Twin Cities, April 14-17

2011-01-13T21:35:00.001-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

The Southern Theater will co-present the String Theory Music Festival, showcasing the work of national and regional composers and musicians, at five Twin Cities venues, April 14-17, 2011. The festival is a joint project of the Southern, McNally Smith College of Music, New Amsterdam Records, History Theatre, Minnesota Public Radio, Invisible Button Entertainment and the Walker Art Center.

Designed to engage music novices and aficionados alike, the festival will shine a celebratory spotlight on the role of bowed-string instruments as a focal point and compositional centerpiece within modern popular, indie/alternative, new music, and classical ensembles.

The four-day event will include six public concerts, a youth recital, workshops, and master classes.

The festival will open at two Minneapolis venues on Thursday, April 14, when Missy Mazzoli and Nadia Sirota will present three, 20-minute sets in the Walker Art Center’s Gallery 2, an event that is part of Walker Free Thursdays.

Across town at the Southern on the same evening, Chris Koza and Adam Levy will host the third installment of the Southern’s 2010/11 Southern Songbook series. Guest musicians for “The Rites of String: Intersection of song, songwriter and strings” will include Dessa, Mississippi Peace, Martin Devaney, Eliza Blue, Chan Poling, music director DeVon Gray, and the instrumentalists of Heiruspecs as house band.

Moving to St. Paul on Friday evening, April 15, a triple bill at the History Theatre will feature Owen Pallett, Nat Baldwin (Dirty Projectors), and yMusic string players performing their own material with new arrangements by yMusic’s Rob Moose.

Events on Saturday, April 16, will get underway with a 2pm performance at the McNally Smith Recital Hall by winners of the Eclectic Strings Competition in three age categories, sponsored by the Minnesota String and Orchestra Teachers Association.

Action then shifts across the street to Minnesota Public Radio’s UBS Forum for a 5pm concert showcasing compositions and performances by artists of New Amsterdam Records. Members of ACME and yMusic will present a selection of works by William Brittelle, Caleb Burhans, Judd Greenstein, Nico Muhly, and Sarah Kirkland Snider, plus the world premiere of newly expanded arrangements by Rob Moose of his own solo works.

Following a post-performance reception at MPR, the focus will return to the History Theatre and an 8pm string sampler performance by Tom Hagerman of Devotchka (with full band), Anni Rossi trio, Robert Black of Bang on a Can All-Stars (world premiere by Mary Ellen Childs), and Mississippi Peace (Christopher Cunningham, Melissa Matthews, Michelle Kinney, Graham O’Brien, Gregory Reese and Nicholas Gaudette). Each ensemble will present approximately 30 minutes of material.

The festival’s sixth and final performance, Sunday, April 17, will feature the split bill of two of today’s most highly praised classical ensembles, JACK Quartet and Victoire, beginning at 7pm at the History Theatre.

A variety of workshops and master classes throughout the festival will be coordinated by Christopher Cunningham, head of the songwriting and composition department at McNally Smith.

The String Theory Music Festival is the brainchild of Southern music curator Kate Nordstrum and Cunningham, with planning and resource assistance from Judd Greenstein, a founder of New Amsterdam Records.

Nordstrum took the lead in assembling the roster and pairings of musicians and featured-composers from the classical and contemporary music worlds.

“This is an opportunity for classical and non-classical music lovers to converge, listen, and learn,” said Nordstrum. “My hope is that attendees will take a chance on music that is new to them.”

“While the sight of a stage full of violins, violas, cellos, and basses is five or six centuries old,” said Cunningham, “recent years have seen increased visibility of these instruments in popular music. And the use of computers, controllers, software, and artificial intelligence in general have pushed even further the boundaries of what is musically possible.”

Financial and tactical support for the String Theory Music Festival has been provided by McNally Smith College of Music.

Performances: April 14-17, 2011

Venues: Southern Theater; Walker Art Center Gallery 2; History Theatre; MPR’s UBS Forum; McNally Smith Recital Hall

Tickets: Single and package tickets available at Southern Theater box office. Save 15% on 3-5 performances, OR save 15% on first 3 performances purchased & 10% on later add-ons.

Southern Theater box office: 612.340.1725

1420 Washington Ave. S., Minneapolis, MN 55454

www.southerntheater.org/2011_04-14_string_theory_music_festival.htm

Schedule of events, April 14-17

Public concerts

THURSDAY, APRIL 14 6pm-8pm (3, 20-minute sets), Walker Art Center, Minneapolis: Gallery 2

“Sound Horizon” featuring Missy Mazzoli & Nadia Sirota

Non-ticketed event, part of Walker Free Thursdays

www.walkerart.org

THURSDAY, APRIL 14 7:30pm, Southern Theater, Minneapolis

“Southern Songbook” installment 3

The Rites of String: Intersection of song, songwriter and strings

Hosted by Chris Koza and Adam Levy

Guests musicians include Dessa, Mississippi Peace, Martin Devaney, Eliza Blue and Chan Poling

With music director dVRG and the instrumentalists of Heiruspecs as house band

Tickets: $25, $22, $12 student rush

Reserved Seating

www.southerntheater.org/2011_04-14_southern_songbook.htm

FRIDAY, APRIL 15 8pm, History Theatre, St. Paul

Owen Pallett, Nat Baldwin and yMusic strings

A triple bill featuring each artist/ensemble with backing by the others

New arrangements by Rob Moose (yMusic) for music of Owen Pallett and Nat Baldwin

Tickets: $22, $15 student (advance), $12 student rush

General Admission

SATURDAY, APRIL 16 5pm, UBS Forum (MPR), St. Paul

New Amsterdam Records showcase concert

Members of ACME and yMusic perform new works for New Amsterdam Records by William Brittelle, Caleb Burhans, Judd Greenstein, Nico Muhly, and Sarah Kirkland Snider, plus the world premiere of new expanded arrangements by Rob Moose of his own solo works.

Tickets: $15, $12 student rush

General Admission

Post-show reception at MPR

SATURDAY, APRIL 16 8pm, History Theatre, St. Paul

String Sampler

Tom Hagerman of Devotchka (with full band), Anni Rossi trio, Bang on a Can’s Robert Black (world premiere: new work by Mary Ellen Childs), and Mississippi Peace

Tickets: $24, $15 student (advance), $12 student rush

General Admission

SUNDAY, APRIL 17 7pm, History Theatre, St. Paul

JACK Quartet & Victoire

Split bill featuring two exciting, virtuosic and oft-praised classical ensembles

Victoire to perform works from their new release Cathedral City. Jack Quartet to perform Contritus by Caleb Burhans (MN Premiere), Dig Deep by Julia Wolfe and Tetras by Iannis Xenakis.

Tickets: $24, $15 student (advance), $12 student rush

General Admission

Recitals

SATURDAY, APRIL 16 2pm, McNally Smith Recital Hall

Minnesota String and Orchestra Teachers Association presents winners of the Eclectic Strings Competition, ages 10-25

Non-ticketed event

www.mnsota.org/events

Workshops/Master Classes

THURSDAY, April 14 1pm-5pm McNally Smith Auditorium and recording studios, St. Paul

McNally Smith College of Music presents an in-the-studio master class on string arranging and production with members of yMusic recording original works by two selected McNally Smith composition majors. Open to the public and participating high school music students, including Saint Paul Conservatory for Performing Artists. Event will be webcast live.

Other workshops and master classes will be announced soon on the Southern’s event page:

www.southerntheater.org/2011_04-14_string_theory_music_festival.htm

Venue information

History Theatre – Fri. Apr. 15, 8pm; Sat. Apr. 16, 8pm; Sun. Apr. 17, 7pm

30 East 10^th Street, St. Paul, MN

Parking: Free street parking after 4:30pm & all day Sunday; Allright Parking, Exchange Street

www.historytheatre.com

McNally Smith Recital Hall – Sat. Apr. 16, 2pm

19 East Exchange Street, St. Paul, MN

Parking: Free street parking after 4:30pm & all day Sunday; Allright Parking, Exchange Street

www.mcnallysmith.edu

UBS Forum at Minnesota Public Radio – Sat. Apr. 16, 5pm

480 Cedar Street, St. Paul, MN

Parking: Free street parking after 4:30pm & all day Sunday; Allright Parking, Exchange Street

www.mpr.org

Southern Theater – Thu. Apr. 14, 7:30pm

1420 Washington Ave. S., Minneapolis, MN

Parking: Seven Corners Ramp, 1504 Washington Ave. S.

www.southerntheater.org

Walker Art Center Gallery 2 – Thu. Apr. 14, 6pm-8pm

1750 Hennepin Avenue, Minneapolis, MN

Parking: City of Minneapolis garage, Vineland Place at Bryant Ave.

www.walkerart.org

6th Minnesota SAGE Awards for Dance: Special Citation

2010-09-22T12:56:00.001-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

The 6th Annual Minnesota SAGE Awards for Dance recognized 11 people connected to Minnesota's dance community at ceremonies held Tuesday, Sept. 14, 2010, at the Southern Theater. As one of 13 members of the panel that reviewed performances during 2009/10 and selected the awardees, I was given the privilege of presenting the Special Citation, with the comments below.

•••

The SAGE Awards Special Citation is presented at the discretion of each year's panel to one, living or dead, person or organization, connected to Minnesota dance.

Each of this year’s three nominees has inspired us with their creations, their performances, their teaching, and their leadership. If, in their leading, they ever felt fear or trepidation, they never let it show. I have known all of them for decades, and I encourage you to do yourself a favor by befriending them and receiving for yourself the blessings of their experience and wisdom. Their resumes are lengthy, and I provide only a few highlights of each.

Where is Susana di Palma?

Susana, stand up, dear, so that we can admire you and your jewels.

In the 1970s, a colleague invited me to a restaurant and club over by Saint Anthony Main. The Hauser brothers were playing flamenco guitar, and you were dancing solo. It was the first professional dance performance that I ever saw as an adult. I had never seen anything like it.

You founded Zorongo Flamenco Dance Theatre in 1982 as your vehicle to create traditional flamenco and full-length works of theater-flamenco. In doing that, you regularly brought a stable of international flamenco artists to America and Minnesota, and all of us have been richer for it.

You have known the slings and arrows of working in the nonprofit arts. Once, when we were working together and Zorongo was performing in this very theater, after two days no one was coming in the door. We called the radio station down the street and had them broadcast the message that anyone who turned up would be admitted for free.

A short time later, your work sold 97% of the seats a week of performances at the Joyce Theater in New York City. Reviewing that production of "Dona Flor & Her Two Husbands" for the New York Times, Jennifer Dunning observed that "This is possibly the most imaginative production that has ever appeared at the Joyce."

The Joyce Theater invited you and Zorongo back for the following year, but you said "no," showing us that one can pick and choose the opportunities that present themselves.

With the Zorongo school you have raised up a new generation of flamenco artists to engage and beguile us.

In the panel we talked about how you are a self-made artist and a self-made woman. You are a true, Minnesota original. We bless you, and look forward to your new work, later this fall, at the Ritz.

Olé, my dear!

Patrick Scully! Stand up, man, so we can look up to you as we have for these many years!

From 1976 until 1980, you were a member of the Contactworks Dance Company. Your performance of "A Personal Goodbye" at the Mixed Blood Theatre in 1981 was the second professional dance I attended as an adult. Like a good audience member, I signed your mailing list and, months later, joined your Wednesday night improvisation class held on Block E. But for stumbling upon that performance, someone else would be talking to you right now.

You have performed in Boston, New York, Washington, D. C., Germany, Ireland, Argentina, and all over Minnesota. The New York Times included your 1992 performance at Dance Theater Workshop as among that year's best!

You founded Patrick's Cabaret in 1986. The earliest years of cabaret performances took place in the gymnasium of St. Stephens' Church school. After a time, you moved the cabaret to "your living room" off of 5th Avenue South by the freeway wall, and later to its present location in the Longfellow neighborhood.

It was in your living room, while you were out of the country, that Ron Athey presented a performance that tempted Congress to abolish the National Endowment for the Arts, because the Walker Art Center had allocated $250 of taxpayers' money for a performance whose notoriety and legend far exceeded the reality of what actually took place.

The essence and meaning of Patrick's Cabaret is found in the permission it gives people - artists and audiences alike - to live their dreams. Patrick's Cabaret gives a hand out, a hand up, and 15 minutes of fame that empowers people to reach for and express the higher angels of their nature.

You are no longer involved in the day-to-day running of the cabaret, but you continue to share with it your wisdom, insight, and inspiration. Like these other two nominees, you are awesome, and we thank you as we look forward to your return to the stage at Patrick's Cabaret in October and November.

Where is Linda Shapiro? Please stand up so that everyone will know who that woman is that writes about them.

A performance by the New Dance Ensemble – the company that you founded with Leigh Dillard in 1981 – was the third professional dance event I attended as an adult. It was a free performance at the Nicollet Island Amphitheatre.

Your titles varied, but you served as the resident choreographer for New Dance, with your work presented on the same stages as those of the national and regional choreographers that you and Leigh commissioned. You also made time to create work on the dancers of Zenon Dance Company.

New Dance Ensemble performed in New York, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and in Paris. It was also – until this new season that is upon us – the only Minnesota ensemble to have appeared on the Northrop Dance Series.

You paid your company of dancers a decent, living wage. Some of us grumbled and actually found fault with the fact that you were trying to do the right thing – envious that we could not do the same with our dancers. Thankfully, no one complains anymore when companies pay their dancers something more than a stipend and sometimes offer them health insurance.

Times and finances changed, however, and you closed New Dance with grace in 1994.

As an affiliate faculty member with the University of Minnesota’s dance program, you encouraged and shaped the lives and prospects of countless young people.

For a younger generation, it is your renown as a writer with which most members of the SAGE panel are most familiar.

From January 2001 until last week, you have had 152 articles published by City Pages. I did not try to count your writings for the Star Tribune, Saint Paul Pioneer Press, and other print outlets.

You love writing about dance – and the diligent care that you bring to your writing shows. You have told me that you spend anywhere from 3 to 5 hours on a single review – worrying that you get it exactly right. We have noticed. And we care because you make permanent what is ephemeral on our stages.

Thank you, my dear, for caring. Thank you for writing. You may have come here in 1972 – as a mere child – but you have become a Minnesota original.

To each of our Special Citation nominees, let me say that you are appreciated, you are admired, you are respected, you are our friends, and we love you!

The 2010 SAGE Award for Dance Special Citation is given to Patrick Scully.

Sound Unseen 2010: Film+Music+Art: Oct. 7-9

2010-09-19T16:21:00.000-05:00

Six SOLO dances premiere at Southern Theater July 8-11

2010-07-03T09:18:00.000-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Review: "Renovate" choreographers' evening at the Ritz

2010-05-22T15:59:00.003-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

"Renovate," the 3rd Annual Choreographers' Evening presented by the Ritz Theater, May 20-22, held together as a cohesive and engaging entertainment, even as it showcased a variety of talents and dance forms ranging from ballet to post modern. As she did twice previously, North Dakota native Lisa Conlin, a member of the Ballet of the Dolls, curated the lineup of 12 dance works for 16 dancers, with advisory assistance this year from Mariusz Olszewski and Vanessa Voskuil. The major aim of "Renovate" is to introduce and highlight new choreography and new choreographers – or both – along with the dancers who perform their work, by giving them a stage, publicity, and an audience.

This year's effort was the best and most satisfying such presentation of multiple artists that I have seen in years. Collectively, the evening included some of the best dances I have seen all year.

The top of the program began with demonstrations of dance basics as choreographer and soloist Elizabeth Bergman, attired in black leotard with spaghetti straps, opened "I don't feel it is necessary to know exactly what I mean" while standing in ballet's first position enveloped in a pool of downward white light. From that humble beginning, Bergman moved through a series of balletic poses and phrases, accented by occasional distortions of limb and line. Her music mix from GoGoo and Aphex Twins sounded like a ticking toy clock accompanied by a drone-like background of distant, electronic church bells. Bergman is a Nebraska native who received an MFA degree in dance from the University of Iowa.

Cade Holmseth, a graduate in dance from the University of Minnesota, has performed with several Minnesota companies and was cast by a number of "Renovate" choreographers in 2009 and 2010. I do not recall seeing his choreography in the past. However, based on "Just One More," his solo work for Brian Evans, we should encourage Holmseth to continue developing what could be a promising dance voice. A barefoot Evans cut a distinctive figure with his springy mop of black hair, white shirt, and gray suit coat and slacks. Moving athletically against a musical background from Survivor's "Eye of the Tiger," Evans addressed the audience with personality-plus, offering to be any kind of friend that one of any persuasion might need or want: from cute, romantic, and sensitive to rugged and rough-around-the-edges.

One would not be entirely wrong in characterizing this year's "Renovate" as The Brian Evans Show. It was impossible to miss his charismatic presence in the five works in which he danced. A graduate of Gustavus Adolphus College in St. Peter, Minnesota, Evans is completing his third season as a member of the Stuart Pimsler Dance Theatre. As a performer who has come into his own, he also appeared in the 2009 "Renovate" dances by Jim Lieberthal, Marciano Silva dos Santos, and Julie Warder.

Terpsichore, the ancient Greek muse of dance, received a solid work-out in a duet choreographed by Taja Will for herself and Blake Nellis. The title, "Terpsichore Told Us to: 23 gestures, 11 poses, 2 solos, and 1 duet," provided an accurate description of the dance. Will, who was born in Chile, raised in Iowa, and attended Luther College, works with structured improvisation, and has performed with Body Cartography, Miguel Gutierrez, and Cathy Wright. Her instant work drew its theme from the neuroscience of dreams and served up an exceedingly fine and compelling improvisational performance by both dancers. Both performers wore basic black, she with red accents and he with yellow. From separate pools of downstage light, two soloists responded to irregular and staccato recorded directives to fall, jump, pose, point, stomp, lunge, sit, shimmy, stir, kneel, spiral, grasp, etc., before continuing the movements as a duet at center stage and again as soloists. As the movement accelerated, the voiced directives dissolved into an electronic score from which emerged a full-blown dance of sustained intensity. Nellis performed in April at Northeast Community Lutheran Church with Tracy Vacura, and has taught improvisation at Zenon Dance School.

Years ago, John Munger presented "An Evening of Classical Modern Dance." It remains highlighted in memory as a delightful and contemplative entertainment. While his dances always have been inhabited by idiosyncratic characters and personalities, each clearly drawn, his recent efforts, such as his "Nutbuster" solo at the Bryant-Lake Bowl last December, depict a darker element missing from his earlier work. So it is with "Wrath," accompanied by music from David Byrne. Munger moves with an enviable agility that belies his status as a sexagenarian. He described "Wrath" on a recent Facebook post as "watching somebody being dead serious about being angry about who knows what." Munger founded and directs the Third Rabbit Dance Ensemble, teaches at Zenon Dance School, and directs research for Dance/USA.

If one underlying factor allowed Denise Armstead to perform scores of choreographic styles and personalities during her 20 years as a member of the Zenon Dance Company, one might suspect it was release technique. It seems also to have played a role in her work as a choreographer since forming DAdance in 2007. I last saw Armstead dance in the visual arts gallery of the Burnsville Performing Arts Center in July 2009. Then, as now – in excerpts from "In Between-Between Places" – her angular vocabulary hints at the emergence of a distinctive style and voice. In this quartet for herself, Evans, Holmseth, and Sharon Picasso, Armstead displays a talent for choreographing whole movements or sections of dancing, but not necessarily for their ordering and grouping. The overall work felt disjointed. This was my first time seeing Picasso, who holds a dance and choreography degree from the Boston Conservatory.

Minnesotans have been lucky to have in their midst Alanna Morris, a graduate of the Juilliard School, as a two-year member of TU Dance. In "Dreams: A Solo," a work in progress, the Brooklyn native dances "for all who dream of something better" to sounds of So Percussion, Zaire school children, and excerpts from Martin Luther King speeches. A straw sun hat, red umbrella, and orange dress were perfect accessories. One looks forward to the completed work.

Just as time and effort often can shape the development of an artist's work, so it can influence the perspective of individual and collective members of an audience. The first time I encountered Jaime Carrera in November 2007, he was standing naked, center stage at the Walker Art Center, with waist-length hair that moved as his head tilted back-and-forth. I still don't know what that was about. I thought that "Frontera," his solo offering in the 2009 "Renovate" program, was coherent but weakened by its attempt to include too many ideas and elements. This time, to my eye, he has it together. "Madurez," using music of Final Fantasy, celebrated the resourcefulness and determination of artists who stay connected to the creativity of their childhoods. Carrera brought the house down in his lime green t-shirt, black denim shorts, black towel super hero cape, newspaper pirate's hat, and cardboard sword. Carrera hails from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, by way of Kansas City and Chicago.

When Jennifer Ilse and Paul Herwig, co-artistic directors of Off-Leash Area, presented "The Jury" at The Red Eye earlier this year, the buzz was incredible. So was the 75-minute show, based on a murder trial for which Ilse served as a juror. An excerpt, "Love Triangle," featured Ilse (red tank top, blue denim cutoffs), Evans (white t-shirt, green khakis), and Bryan Gerber (white tank top, blue Levis), all of whom appeared in the earlier, full production. Set to sound by Reid Kruger and text by Max Sparber, the dancing was, simply, hot. Compelling. Unnerving. Gerber, a dance graduate from Minnesota State University, Mankato, is a member of Ballet of the Dolls; he presented a solo work for "Renovate" in 2009, and appeared earlier this month as Wolf in the Actors Theater of Minnesota production of "Bent."

After the show, friends and I asked each other, "Who are these people, and where have they been all our lives?" These people would be the dancers Angharad Davies and Alex Grant, who performed "Security," the most cogent work of the evening, choreographed by Davies. Start with a quote from Cary Grant: "I get up in the morning, go to bed at night, and occupy myself as best I can in between." Add the dark, drop-dead gorgeous looks of both performers. Add for each the buttoned-down uniform of security guards: white shirts, black ties and slacks, brown shoes with laces, and, for him, a slight 5-o'clock shadow. Provide a backdrop of stacks of used, styrofoam coffee cups. Mix-in the mad and endless stirring of coffee in cups to raise walls of security and ward off reality. Infuse focused and committed pedestrian movement to get through a few hours of the day. Underlie it with charming, sublimated and unrequited passion that leads to one conclusion: if they won't jump each other out of their boredom, someone from the audience surely will. All I know about Davies is that she holds an MFA degree in dance from the Tisch School of the Arts in New York City and moved to Minneapolis from Berlin. Don't know anything about Grant. I want much more of both.

Julie Warder, who began dancing with Myron Johnson at the Children's Theatre Company School, has presented choreography in three rounds of "Renovate." In 2009, her "Jammin'" was awarded the evening's closing slot; but for the competitiveness of this year's program, so might have been "Abandon Me," her entry as choreographer/director for 2010. Her placement, once removed from penultimate, hurt not a bit, however. "Abandon Me," with its examination of paternal legacies among generations, set to Kirk Franklin's music, provided an emotional tour de force for Evans (proof positive of his ability at barrel turns) in front of Mark Hanson's haunting videography. The work of Kortland Jackson, who choreographed the Krump (U.S. street) dance, will be featured in the Hip Hop Choreographers' Evening at Patrick's Cabaret, June 18-20.

To my regret, I have little recollection of Erin Drummond and her solo performance, "Rebeca Eats Dust," set to music by Chuck Jonkey. Her placement before the closer, and following all that preceded, set her up for perceptual obscurity. After dancing for Ballet Arts Minnesota from the age of eight and attending Columbia University, she deserves another, better chance.

One word, "brilliant," describes the excerpt from "A Word With You Dear," choreographed by Kari Mosel. Performing to spoken text, Evans, Mosel, Holmseth, and Kathryn Jacobs portray two halves of the same couple – one communicating verbally, the other physically – at "the root moment in a relationship when it is discovered if you love enough to let go." Mosel comes originally from Eau Claire, Wisconsin, and holds a BFA from the University of Minnesota. She has danced with Shapiro and Smith Dance and Stuart Pimsler Dance Theatre.

-

281 metro arts grants approach $2 million

2010-05-04T19:23:00.004-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

With its April award of $433,556 to 51 organizations and projects in the Arts Learning grant program, the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council has increased to 281 the number of grants it has awarded during the fiscal year ending June 30. Grants awarded to-date total $1,925,155.

The Arts Learning grants will fund extended learning experiences that develop knowledge, skills, and understanding in a variety of arts disciplines. Earlier announcements named grantees in the Arts Activity Support, Capital Grants, Community Arts (1st and 2d rounds), Creative Intersections, and Organizational Development programs.

Arts Learning grants to 51 organizations or projects in April totaled $433,556, an average of $8,501 each:

Dakota County: Allegro Choral Academy, $4,864; Lifeworks Services, Inc., $10,000; Vecchione/Erdahl Duo, $7,816.

Hennepin County: ARENA Dances, Inc., $10,000; Copper Street Brass Quintet, $9,200; Franklin Art Works, $7,750; Indonesian Performing Arts Association of Minnesota, $8,000; Junior Composers, $10,000; Kairos Dance Theatre, $10,000; Struthers Parkinson's Center, Kaleidoscope Place, $10,000; Les Jolies Petites School of Dance, $9,550; Live Action Set, $8,500; Minneapolis Pops Orchestra Association, $8,163; Northstar Storytelling League, $10,000; Old Arizona Collaborative, Inc., $10,000; OverExposure, $10,000; Plymouth Christian Youth Center, $10,000; Red Eye Collaboration, $3,600; She Rock She Rock, $10,000; Stuart Pimsler Dance and Theater, $10,000; Twin Cities Jazz Workshops, $10,000; Walking Shadow Theatre Company, $2,577; Weaver's Guild of Minnesota, $10,000; West Bank School of Music, $8,915; Young Dance, Inc., $10,000.

Ramsey County: ArtStart, $10,000; Deborah Elias Danza Espanola, $3,116; East Side Arts Council, $10,000; Flying Forms, $10,000; Grace Minnesota, $7,472; Lex-Ham Community Arts, $1,200; Minnesota Chinese Dance Theater, $10,000; Nautilus Music-Theater, $8,800; Pan Asian Artists' Alliance, $10,000; Saint Paul Almanac, $10,000; Saint Paul Jaycee Foundation, $10,000; Sounds of Hope, Ltd., $4,300; Walker West Music Academy, $6,158; Zeitgeist, $10,000.

Scott County: Jordan Community Education, $10,000; New Prague Schools Community Education $9,830; Savage Arts Council, $4,720.

Suburban Hennepin County: Continental Ballet Company, $7,860; Harmony Theatre Company and School, $9,175; Minnesota Creative Arts and Aging Network, $10,000; Partnership Resources, Inc., $9,490; The Depot Coffee House, $4,500.

Suburban Ramsey County: Ashland Productions, $10,000; Lakeshore Players, Inc., $10,000; White Bear Center for the Arts, $10,000.

Washington County: FamilyMeans, $8,000.

In the 281 grants made through April, 38 organizations were awarded multiple grants (AA=Arts Access, AL=Arts Learning, C=Capital, CA=Community Arts, CR=Creative Intersections, OD=Organizational Development) as follows:

ARENA Dances, Inc. ($10,000 AA; $10,000 AL); ArtStart ($10,000 AL; $8,700 C); Ashland Productions ($10,000 AA; $10,000 AL; $10,000 C; $10,000 CA); Caponi Art Park ($10,000 C; $10,000 CA); Continental Ballet Company ($7,860 AL; $4,697 C; $5,000 CA); Copper Street Brass Quintet ($9,200 AL; $2,500 CA); Dakota Valley Symphony ($8,480 C; $5,000 CA); East Side Arts Council ($10,000 AA; $10,000 AL; $6,080 C; $10,000 CA; $10,000 CR);

Frank Theatre ($10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); Katha Dance Theatre ($10,000 C; $10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); Lakeshore Players, Inc. ($10,000 AL; $5,000 CA); Les Jolies Petites School of Dance ($9,550 AL; $5,000 CA); Lex-Ham Community Arts ($1,200 AL; $920 CA); Live Action Set ($10,000 AA; $8,500 AL); JazzMN, Inc. ($10,000 CA; $3,840 OD); Masquers Theatre Company ($8,905 C; $5,000 CA); Minneapolis Pops Orchestra ($10,000 AA; $8,163 AL; $6,480 OD); Minnesota Freedom Band ($9,038 C; $2,500 CA);

Music Saint Croix ($1,163 C; $5,000 CA); Nautilus Music-Theater ($8,800 AL; $10,000 OD); Off-Leash Area ($10,000 CA; $5,000 OD); Old Arizona Collaborative, Inc. ($10,000 AL; $8,120 C); Open Eye Figure Theatre ($10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); Plymouth Christian Youth Center ($10,000 AA; $10,000 AL; $10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); Rainbow Rumpus ($5,000 CA; $6,225 OD); Red Eye Collaboration ($10,000 AA; $3,600 AL; $8,700 C; $10,000 CA); Rosetown Playhouse ($5,000 CA; $10,000 OD); Saint Paul Almanac ($10,000 AL; $5,000 CA; $10,000 CR); Sample Night Live! ($5,000 CA; $10,000 OD);

Savage Arts Council ($4,720 AL; $4,000 CA); Sounds of Hope, Ltd. ($10,000 AA; $4,300 AL; $6,125 C); TU Dance ($10,000 C; $10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); Twin Cities Jazz Workshops ($10,000 AL; $5,000 CA); Walker West Music Academy ($6,158 AL; $5,000 CA); Walking Shadow Theatre Company ($10,000 AA; $2,577 AL; $6,813 C; $10,000 CA); Weaver's Guild of Minnesota ($10,000 AL; $5,000 CA); West Bank School of Music ($8,915 AL; $3,500 CA; $10,000 OD); Zeitgeist ($10,000 AA; $10,000 AL; $10,000 OD).

MRAC is one of 11 regional arts councils serving the state of Minnesota. It makes grants to organizations with budgets less than $300,000 located in the seven metropolitan counties of greater Minneapolis and St. Paul. MRAC operates on a fiscal year of July 1 to June 30, and receives its grant funds from the Minnesota State Legislature, the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, and the McKnight Foundation. In its 2009 fiscal year, MRAC received 384 applications and awarded 254 grants totaling $1,007,491.

Review panels will meet June 16-18 for second round applications for Arts Activities Support grants, and May 21 for second round applications for Creative Intersections grants. Applications for the 2011 year are posted on MRAC's website.

The Minnesota State Arts Board makes grants statewide to organizations with budgets exceeding $300,000.

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Playing to win: Why I support Paul Thissen for governor

2010-04-11T11:57:00.000-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

In 11 days, delegates of Minnesota's Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party will begin gathering in Duluth to endorse candidates for statewide office. My schedule and stamina will not permit me to join them on the convention sidelines to help seal the deal that makes Paul Thissen our candidate for governor. Thus, I offer these thoughts to the delegates, particularly to my GLBT friends and colleagues.

I met Paul several years ago through his wife, Karen Wilson Thissen, with whom I served on a nonprofit board of directors. They are good people.

As lifelong Minnesotans, Paul Thissen and I share a deep appreciation and affection for the land, the people, and the traditions that give color and meaning to our lives. Both of us have traveled extensively throughout our state and understand the inherent goodwill, sense of fair play, and yearning for integrity that characterizes our people. Paul embodies these traits with a fresh and enthusiastic optimism matched by a can-do spirit of pragmatism.

As the number of days behind me continues to outpace those ahead, I still want to "win" at life's various adventures and to follow my heart with as little compromise as possible. Paul is a solid candidate on the issues that voters and candidates of all stripes should care about. Nonetheless, our party is given to imposing a 100% purity test on issues and - especially - nuances, and then tries to take the safe route by endorsing the candidates who seem to have the greatest name recognition, money, and insider connections. I am old enough to recall the last time Minnesota elected a DFL governor, and I know how well our past patterns of endorsing behavior have not worked.

Given the temper of our times, the personality and character of the next governor will be prime in determining the outcome of legislation and policy. We need to play this election to win.

As a gay man who never could have imagined the possibility of marrying his high school boy friend, I have experienced personally and vicariously the profound changes of attitude, heart, and behavior within myself and others that have replaced shadows with sunshine, fear with strength, and despair with hope. Like the best of leaders, Paul calls forth the higher angels of our nature. He has done this in speeches to assembled throngs, in one-on-one conversations, and in the introduction and passage of legislation.

As the real deal, he also does it in the raising of his own kids, all of whom accompanied us in last year's Pride Parade through the streets of downtown Minneapolis. Would that our own parents ever would have placed in our hands signs that read "Our friend has two mothers, and we think it's great!"

As a one-time political candidate, I know about the ineffable campaign experience that Paul has undertaken. I am inspired by his work ethic, the competence and confidence of his campaign team, and the equanimity of his person. I will be proud to have him serve as governor of my state, and I ask you to join me and other Minnesotans for Thissen to help make that happen!

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A distinctive spring music marathon in Minneapolis

2010-04-09T23:58:00.002-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

For nearly two years, the Southern Theater in Minneapolis has raised its profile as a presenter of new music. A distinctive line-up of four engagements during April will provide the fixings for a spring music marathon, reflecting why some are calling the Seven Corners venue the most innovative for Twin Cities music programming.

Nico Muhly and Sam Amidon • Wed-Thu • Apr 14-15 • 7:30pm

While not yet 30, Nico Muhly is no stranger to name venues and institutions. A former boy chorister, the Vermont-native-raised-in-Rhode Island graduated from Columbia University with a degree in English literature in 2003, and received a Masters in Music the following year from The Juilliard School, where he studied composition with Christopher Rouse and John Corigliano.

He has worked extensively with Philip Glass as editor, keyboardist, and conductor. His compositions for choir include the commission of "Bright Mass with Canons" from New York's Saint Thomas Church Fifth Avenue, and he also has composed for orchestra, opera, and film. He has "done" Carnegie Hall (with commission), the Whitney Museum, and others.

In an interview for The Reykjavik Grapevine following last month's Icelandic Music Awards, Muhly observed that "the reasons I make music all stem to thinking about myself as an eleven year old singing in a choir, thinking about my very lonely pre-teen gay boy self....I address my music to that kid, always....I want my music always to be that rapturous, how I felt it then."

Muhly's 2007 Minneapolis debut occurred at the Southern Theater, where he returns for two performances in a double bill with pal and colleague Sam Amidon, Apr. 14-15. The very next day will find Muhly at New York City's Symphony Space for the world premiere of "Detailed Instructions," a commission from the New York Philharmonic, followed by a performance at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Apr. 17.

Neither does grass grow under Amidon's feet. On Apr. 10, he released his fourth solo album, "I See the Sign," including contributions from Muhly, Ben Frost, Beth Orton, and his brother, the percussionist Stefan Amidon. Earlier, in March, he attended the Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, Tennessee. Yet, as he recently told the Burlington Free Press in his native Vermont, "I've played very little in the U.S. outside of New York City."

A son of the folk artists Peter and Mary Alice Amidon, Sam sings, plays fiddle, banjo, and guitar. PopMatters.com, an international magazine of cultural criticism, described his 2008 solo album, "All is Well," for which Muhly did the arrangements, as "one of the best records of traditional Appalachian folk songs ever recorded."

According to press materials, Muhly and Amidon's Minneapolis gig at the Southern "will present an evening of old folk tunes re-imagined, new music for piano and viola, old standards for viola, upside-down music for electronics and voice, and, with any luck, some Schumann."

A post-show reception at The Red Stag Supperclub in Minneapolis, Apr. 15, will provide a moment's pause before the musicians continue racking up frequent flyer miles. After his two-day stop in New York, Muhly will catch up with Amidon in Berlin, Apr. 18. There, joined by Frost and Valgeir Sigurosson, they will embark on the Whale Watching Tour, playing stages in Belgium, the United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Spain, Switzerland, Latvia, and Iceland – all by May 16.

yMusic and Gabriel Kahane • Fri-Sat • Apr. 16-17 • 8pm

The Brooklyn-based Gabriel Kahane, 29, along with the six members of yMusic, also will make the post-performance scene at the Red Stag, Apr. 15, before opening their Southern Theater debut at Seven Corners, Apr. 16-17.

On the heels of his Lincoln Center "American Songbook" debut, the singer, pianist, and composer will bring to the stage “For the Union Dead,” a song cycle on poems by Robert Lowell, composed specifically for yMusic. The six members of that ensemble include Nadia Sirota, Mike Block, Rob Moose, CJ Camerieri, Alex Sopp, and Hideaki Aomori.

Kahane, who attended Boston's New England Conservatory and Brown University, recently completed a large-scale solo work for the pianist Natasha Paremski. A short piece for his father, the conductor and concert pianist Jeffrey Kahane, had its New York City premiere at Lincoln Center and was hailed by the New York Times as “most striking, if only for the virtuosity and varied stylistic sensibility it demanded.”

Upcoming compositions include a string quartet for the Kronos Quartet, a hybrid cello sonata/song cycle for the cellist Alisa Weilerstein and himself, and an evening-length work for piano, voice, and orchestra, exploring his family’s genealogy and journey from Germany to the United States. Kahane also is completing a new musical for The Public Theater, which recently named him Musical Theater Fellow, and was recently commissioned by the Signature Theatre in Arlington, Virginia, to write an evening-length work.

As a performer, Kahane has appeared in recital throughout Europe with Grammy Award-winning bass-baritone Thomas Quasthoff, toured the Schumann Piano Quintet with the Mark Morris Dance Group, and accompanied violinist Hilary Hahn in the slow movement of the Sibelius Violin Concerto in a dirty bar on the Lower East Side of Manhattan.

The conservatory-trained members of yMusic, created in 2008, perform as a chamber ensemble, composing and commissioning music that features varied and multiple instruments and musical perspectives. In addition to accompanying Kahane in “For the Union Dead,” the group will play new works by Son Lux and Judd Greenstein, and instrumental arrangements by Sufjan Stevens and Arvo Pärt, employing violin, electric guitar, viola, cello, flute, clarinet, bass clarinet, trumpet, and French horn.

Kahane offers a generous appraisal of his colleagues “whose members move with such ease and grace between the worlds of classical music and indie rock. It was with this knowledge that I wrote 'For the Union Dead,' and I am honored to play it with them at the Southern Theater, marking the Twin Cities premiere of this work.”

Kahane's performance at the Southern will mark the beginning of a North American tour that will take him to Vancouver, Orcas Island, Seattle, Portland, Eugene, San Francisco, and New York.

Accordo • Mon • Apr. 19 • 8pm

Fewer than three dozen tickets remain for the final, debut season performance by Accordo, Apr. 19. The program will include Beethoven's C-minor String Trio, the C-minor String Quartet by Brahms, and Tsontakis's Knickknacks for Violin and Viola.

"Those who attend Accordo's first season," wrote MinnPost.com, "could find themselves bragging about being there when a major new group was born. They have that potential."

Accordo includes Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra veterans Steven Copes, Ruggero Allifranchini, and Maiya Paach, and the Minnesota Orchestra's principal cellist, Tony Ross. The ensemble will return to the Southern in 2010-11 for a series of three engagements.

So Percussion • Thu-Fri • Apr. 29-30 • 7:30pm / 8pm

I first heard of So Percussion two months ago when the technical director at the Southern Theater, where I serve as executive director, asked whether – should it be necessary – he could drive roundtrip to Missouri, twice, to pick up, rent, and return, a marimba or two.

Who knew that the Marimba 2010 International Festival and Conference was coming to the University of Minnesota and Minneapolis and would scoop up every marimba within five states?! Fortunately, we think we have the challenge solved without the driving excursions out-of-state.

So Percussion's Southern Theater debut, Apr. 29-30, will feature the regional premiere of "Mallet Quartet," a work for two vibraphones and two marimbas, written for the group by Steve Reich, a 2009 winner of the Pulitzer Prize; the work will be presented at Carnegie Hall in 2011. The program also will include the world premiere of "And So," a work for four players on two marimbas, by Mary Ellen Childs, a Minneapolis-based composer; "String of Pearls" by David Lang; "It is Time" by Steve Mackey; and "Music for Pieces of Wood" by Reich.

The four principals of So Percussion, Eric Beach, Josh Quillen, Adam Sliwinski, and Jason Treuting, formed their ensemble in 1999 while attending the Yale School of Music. Their work has been performed at domestic and international venues, including the Lincoln Center Festival, Carnegie Hall, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Stanford Lively Arts, and the Cleveland Museum of Art.

Artists from more than 20 countries will attend the Marimba 2010 International Festival and Conference, Apr. 28-May 1, hosted by professor Fernando A. Meza of the University of Minnesota School of Music. In addition to the Southern Theater, the festival's artistic partners include the Minnesota Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, VocalEssence, the Schubert Club, Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum, and Minnesota Public Radio.

The festival will present 21 recitals and three lecture/demonstrations at the Ted Mann Concert Hall on the university's campus. The concerts on Apr. 28 at 7:30pm (Ted Mann) and Apr. 29 at 11am (Weisman Museum) are free and open to the public.

The Southern Theater is located at 1420 Washington Avenue South at Seven Corners, Minneapolis, Minnesota. Tickets may be ordered online at www.southerntheater.org or by calling the ticket office at 612.340.1725.

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230 metro area arts grants total $1.49 million for 2010

2010-03-29T20:18:00.001-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

The Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, based in St. Paul, announced the award in March of 65 grants totaling $293,780 in the second round of its 2010 Community Arts grant program. The announcement raised to 230 the number of grants made in fiscal year 2010, totaling $1,491,599. Earlier announcements named grantees in the Community Arts (1st round), Creative Intersection, Arts Activity Support, Organizational Development, and Capital Grants programs.

Year-to-date grants exceed the $1,007,491 total for all of fiscal year 2009. MRAC makes grants to organizations with budgets less than $300,000 located in the seven metropolitan counties of greater Minneapolis and St. Paul. MRAC operates on a fiscal year of July 1 to June 30, and receives its grant funds from the Minnesota State Legislature, the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, and the McKnight Foundation.

Community Arts grants to 65 organizations or programs in March totaled $293,780, an average of $4,520 each:

Anoka County: Banfill-Locke Center for the Arts, $3,500; Blaine Parks and Recreation, $3,000; Fridley Community Theatre, $5,000; Lee Carlson Center for Mental Health and Well Being, $4,798.

Carver County: Centre Stage Theatre and Arts, $5,000; ISD 108 Community Education, $5,000; Nordic Heritage Club, $1,930; Watertown Area Fine Arts Council, $5,000; Watertown-Mayer Community Education, $5,000.

Dakota County: Chameleon Theatre Circle, $5,000; Dakota County Sheriff's Office, $4,560; DanceWorks Repertory Ensemble, $5,000; Eagan Parks and Recreation, $5,000; Hastings Area Chamber of Commerce and Tourism Bureau, $5,000; Minnesota Brass, Inc., $5,000.

Hennepin County: Aldrich Arts Collaborative, $2,910; Brazen Theatre Company, $5,000; Carnaval Brasileiro, $5,000; Civic Orchestra of Minneapolis, $5,000; Copper Street Brass Quintet, $2,500; Eclectic Ensemble, $1,545; Flower Shop Project, $5,000; Hauser Dance, $5,000; Hope Community, Inc., $4,000; I'm Telling Productions, $5,000; Northside Arts Collective, $5,000; Obsidian Arts, $5,000; Peace Day Lantern Ceremony, $5,000; Rainbow Rumpus, $5,000; Redeemer Center for Life, $4,722; Refuge, $4,000; Screenwriters' Workshop, $3,000; Strange Capers, $5,000; Urban Spectrum Theatre, $3,550; Weaver's Guild of Minnesota, $5,000; West Bank School of Music, $3,500.

Ramsey County: Center for Irish Music, $5,000; Hmong Cultural Center, Inc., $5,000; Lidia Productions, $5,000; Maggie Bergeron and Company, $5,000; New Native Theatre, $4,000; North Star Chorus, $5,000; People, Inc., $5,000; Sample Night Live!, $5,000; StoryBlend, $5,000; The Minnesota Feis, Inc., $4,540; Walker West Music Academy, $5,000; West Side Theater Project, $5,000; Women's Initiative for Self-Empowerment, $5,000; Young Artists Initiative, $4,500.

Scott County: Hymnus, Incorporated, $5,000; Savage Arts Council, $4,000.

Suburban Hennepin County: 4 Community Theatre, $5,000; Discovery Arts Council, $2,725; Les Jolies Petites School of Dance, $5,000; Minnesota Sunshine Dance, $5,000; Westonka Community Education and Services, $3,000.

Suburban Ramsey County: Rosetown Playhouse, $5,000.

Washington County: Forest Lake Park Board, $5,000; Masquers Theatre Company, $5,000; Music Saint Croix, $5,000; St. Croix Valley Chamber Chorale, $5,000; Stillwater Area Public Schools Community Education, $5,000; Washington County 4-H Federation, $5,000; Washington County Agricultural Society, $3,500.

Within its guidelines, MRAC permits organizations to receive more than one project grant in a fiscal year. Of the 230 grants made through March, 19 organizations have been awarded grants for two projects and two organizations have been awarded grants for three.

Organizations receiving two project grants in 2010 include the following (C=Capital, CA=Community Arts, OD=Organizational Development):

Ashland Productions ($10,000 C; $10,000 CA); Caponi Art Park ($10,000 C; $10,000 CA); Continental Ballet Company ($4,697 C; $5,000 CA); Dakota Valley Symphony ($8,480 C; $5,000 CA); East Side Arts Council ($6,080 C; $10,000 CA); Frank Theatre ($10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); JazzMN, Inc. ($10,000 CA; $3,840 OD); Masquers Theatre Company ($8,905 C; $5,000 CA); Minnesota Freedom Band ($9,038 C; $2,500 CA); Music Saint Croix ($1,163 C; $5,000 CA); Off-Leash Area ($10,000 CA; $5,000 OD); Open Eye Figure Theatre ($10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); Plymouth Christian Youth Center ($10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); Rainbow Rumpus ($6,225 OD; $5,000 CA); Red Eye Collaboration ($8,700 C; $10,000 CA); Rosetown Playhouse ($10,000 OD; $5,000 CA); Sample Night Live! ($10,000 OD; $5,000 CA); Walking Shadow Theatre Company ($6,813 C; $10,000 CA); West Bank School of Music ($10,000 OD; $3,500 CA).

Organizations receiving three project grants in 2010 include the following:

Katha Dance Theatre ($10,000 C; $10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); TU Dance ($10,000 C; $10,000 CA; $10,000 OD).

MRAC is one of 11 regional arts councils serving the state of Minnesota. The Minnesota State Arts Board makes grants statewide to organizations with budgets exceeding $300,000.

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Spring performances by Shapiro and Smith Dance

2010-03-15T21:26:00.003-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

A shorthand description of "Women and Men," the spring performance program by Shapiro and Smith Dance, can be summed up by the numbers five, four, three, two, one – plus three.

Five women – Maggie Bergeron, Megan McClellan, Kari Mosel, Laura Selle-Virtucio, and Joanie Smith – four men – Bryan Godbout, Cade Holmseth, Andrew Lester, and Eddie Oroyon – and three guest performers – Ananya Chatterjea, Carl Flink, and Emilie Plauché Flink – will perform three repertory works and two world premieres staged in an evening of dance, Apr. 1-4, at the Southern Theater in Minneapolis.

After meeting in the New York dance companies of Murray Lewis and Alwin Nikolais, collaborators Joanie Smith and Danial Shapiro choreographed their first dance together during a 1985 Fulbright Lectureship in Helsinki, Finland. For more than 20 years, the dynamic duo then toured the world with a distinctive blend of contemporary dance and dramatic theater.

Since Shapiro's death from cancer in 2006, Smith has continued to lead their company's creative and administrative development, presenting a mix of new and old works in annual Twin Cities seasons. When not choreographing and performing, Smith serves as associate professor of dance at the University of Minnesota.

For the seven dancers in the world premiere of "Bolero" on the April program, Smith has re-imagined "The Art of War," an earlier work with Shapiro set to Ravel's classic. "'The Art of War,'" Smith says, "used to be Danny's piece. Under my hand, the new 'Bolero' has completely changed, to the point where all that is the same is the music!"

In "Betty's House," the other premiere, Smith has continued the narrative started 23 years ago in "George and Betty's House," the duet she danced with Shapiro. The new installment, set to a Scott Killian score, finds Betty surrounded by cats and still obsessed with fruitless housework.

Smith's colleague, Ananya Chatterjea, director of dance at the University of Minnesota, will perform as a guest in the reprise of "Medea Medea," while Carl Flink, chair of theatre arts and dance, will perform with his wife, Plauché Flink, in "The Gist."

The quartet of Bergeron, Godbout, Oroyan, and Selle-Virtucio promises to round out the program with romantic eye candy in Shapiro and Smith's "Moonlight," set to Beethoven.

Shapiro and Smith Dance will perform at the Southern Theater, Minneapolis, Apr. 1-4. The opening night, pre-show reception will be sponsored by City Pages. For tickets: 612.340.1725.

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Walking the streets of downtown Minneapolis, 1

2010-03-03T20:27:00.002-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

For 37 years, I have worked in or very near downtown Minneapolis. For 29 of those years, I have lived close enough to walk to work. That has been time enough to absorb, process, and take for granted the countless changes that have infiltrated the cityscape.

Ours is a city that tears things down and builds newer things back up with no regard for any value that might attach to historical or architectural significance. After 20-30 years, we start over again. Witness our unending dialogue about the need for a domed or open-air stadium. If I am still on the planet in 25 years, whatever I then use for newspapers will report on the latest debates to place a retractable roof on the new Target Field that opens for professional baseball next month.

I am not sure that we enjoy this repeating cycle; it just seems embedded in our civic DNA. Perhaps it reflects a collective, obsessive-compulsive personality of the people who built Minneapolis and were never satisfied that they got right anything they were building. In other words, we can't help ourselves.

My new place of employment for the past two months is situated near downtown, near the Mississippi River, and near the University of Minnesota, but at a somewhat further remove from my house than previous workday destinations. As temperatures and pavement conditions have improved with the waning winter, I have begun walking the nearly three miles at least once per day, usually at night.

Such is good for reducing my personal carbon footprint, containing the anxieties of modern life, and for retaining a figure of relative fighting trim.

Treading through downtown this evening, I passed the Accenture Tower on the city block bounded by 3rd and 4th avenues south, and 7th and 8th streets. When constructed in 1987, the 31-story office project was called Lincoln Centre. The "re" spelling of Centre aways struck me as an affectation. Many people have thought it a cold and uninviting structure and have had no hesitation about saying so. I always have regarded it as one of the more classy buildings that have gone up in the last four decades. The tower situates toward 4th Avenue, and has left room for development of a corporate looking park along 3rd Avenue. At the time of construction, there was an expressed intent to build an identical tower along 3rd to mirror that along 4th. Never happened. Now, if another structure rises on that block, it will, no doubt, serve the ego and vision of its designer. A pity.

Nonetheless, I enjoy the park's presence even if it does not invite pedestrians to approach and enter in. In this it is different from the nearly full-block park across 7th Street – also bounded by 3rd and 4th avenues – that serves as a pedestal for the Hennepin County Government Center. The grounds there boast berms and a variety of forestation among pink brick paths. Originally, the bricks were red, imported from someplace in Italy. However, they provided such slick surfaces during our Minnesota winters that, after any number of lawsuit settlements with people who slipped and fell, the bricks got sandblasted down to a dull shadow of their former selves, or were replaced outright.

Construction of the 24-story Government Center, completed in 1977, caused a bit of a scandal because of its cost. Although Hennepin County has been, far and away, the largest of Minnesota's 87 counties in population, prior to the new building few people were aware that county government existed. Previously, it shared space in Minneapolis City Hall.

Hennepin County Commissioner Richard O. Hanson's person and personality drove construction of the Government Center, just as they had earlier won civil service protections for county employees, built county highways, and built the welfare and library programs. First appointed to the county commission by Mayor Hubert Humphrey in 1948, Hanson became the longest-serving commissioner in county history, until his defeat at the hands of fellow Democrat Jeff Spartz in 1976. Construction of the government center was a key issue in that year's campaign.

Hanson was a true Renaissance man. In his 20s, he taught political science at the University of Minnesota. Later, he co-founded a Minneapolis investment firm, Craig Hallum, Inc., helped found the Citizens League, and served on the boards of the United Hospital Fund, Family & Children's Services, the Legal Aid Society, and others. He died at 79 in April 2000.

I first met Hanson in a professional capacity during his 50s, and my 20s, in the 1970s. Later, we came to know each other as closeted gay men who operated largely under the radar of the larger society. His was the first example to me, in those late-Carter and early-Reagan years, of a man who could accomplish worthwhile things in life and still be gay. I am grateful for his unconditional support during a crucial crucible of my life's journey. I think of him often as I pass by the building, plazas, and park that earned him such opprobrium at their creation.

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Commissions anchor spring TCGMC concert

2010-02-25T00:45:00.005-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

As a child attending Sunday services of the new St. Timothy's Lutheran Church, held in the Nelson Grade School gymnasium in Columbia Heights, Minnesota, I once heard our pastor make a point in his sermon about the weakness of the human voice. "If all the people in the city of Chicago started talking at one time," he said, "they would generate barely enough energy to illuminate a light bulb."

In those days that preceded the Stonewall Rebellion by 10 years, the pastor had never heard a gay men's chorus, the collective voices of which now have power to change and illuminate the world.

For Glenn Olson, such voices have provided at least one life changing experience. As a baritone singer with the Twin Cities Gay Men's Chorus since its second season in 1982, he has attended seven quadrennial choral festivals sponsored by GALA Choruses. The 1996 GALA gathering in Tampa, Florida, he says, had a special buzz about it.

Word had it that the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus had commissioned a hot new work, NakedMan, to close the festival and honor the memory of the 254 singers it had lost to AIDS. For everyone, like Olson, who shared the moment, the outside air crackled with electricity as they emerged afterward from the packed hall.

With its soaring melodies, "NakedMan" sings the story of all people who have felt different, and celebrates their courage to face the unknown. The song suite, by Philip Littell and Robert Seeley, grew out of interviews with gay men, and is set in 15 movements adding up to 53 minutes of music. The movements cover the range of human experience: coming out of every kind, getting married, serving in the military, wrestling with God, and experiencing loss.

At the debut of "NakedMan" in 1996, Dr. Stan Hill had served as artistic director of the San Francisco chorus for seven years. He continued there for four more years before assuming the same post with the Twin Cities Gay Men's Chorus in August 2000.

With the two organizations, Hill has commissioned some of the most successful repertoire in the gay and lesbian choral literature. In addition to "NakedMan," he has shepherded to creation "Exile," "ExtrABBAganza," "Metamorphosis," "Through A Glass, Darkly," and "Misbehavin'!"

Hill also has led the TCGMC on a number of remarkable, groundbreaking journeys, including its 25th anniversary season in 2006. That season culminated in the Great Southern Sing-Out Tour through four states and five cities in six July days.

The chorus launched the Southern tour at Nashville's Ryman Auditorium, becoming the first gay organization to perform on the historic stage of the Grand Ole Opry. From Tennessee, three buses of singers and supporters then traveled to performances in Birmingham and Mobile, Alabama, Jackson, Mississippi, and New Orleans, Louisiana. "Marry Us," one of the movements from "NakedMan," was featured at every stop.

Accompanied by the GLBT Minnesota Philharmonic Orchestra, "NakedMan" will open the first half of TCGMC's spring concert, LifeSongs: The Music of Living, Mar. 26-27, at the Ted Mann Concert Hall, Minneapolis. In its publicity, the MPO states that, speaking for itself, its members "will be fully clothed."

The world premiere of "The Kushner Trilogy" will highlight the program's second act. Lyrics for the three sections – "It is Very Simple," "There is a Little House in Heaven," and "I Want More Life" – are drawn from texts by the playwright Tony Kushner.

The TCGMC performed the third section on four occasions during the Guthrie Theater's Kushner Celebration in 2009. Its text comes from "Angels in America, Part II: Perestroika," a monologue by Prior, a man wracked by advancing AIDS, who pleads before a cosmic tribunal for more life despite the pain of his disease. The music transforms the repeated phrase, "I want more life," from plea to confident claim for the gay man's place at humanity's table.

Jeffrey Bores, TCGMC's board chair, and his partner, Michael Hawkins, underwrote the trilogy's choral setting by Michael Shaieb, who also composed "Through A Glass, Darkly" for the chorus in 2008. Meet the Composer's MetLife Creative Connections Program provided additional funding to support post-performance conversations with the composer.

The spring chorus program also will include "The Promise of Living" from Aaron Copland's "The Tender Land," "The Impossible Dream" from "Man of La Mancha," "This is the Moment" from "Jekyll and Hyde," and "Here's Where I Stand" from the film "Camp."

More than 750 men have served in the TCGMC's singing ranks since its first concert at the Heritage Hall of the Minneapolis Public Library. The group has recorded 10 CDs and performed with the Minnesota Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, VocalEssence, Ballet of the Dolls, James Sewell Ballet, composer Ned Rorem, Harvey Fierstein, Ann Hampton Calloway, Michael Feinstein, and Holly Near.

The Twin Cities Gay Men's Chorus will present its 2010 spring concert performances with the Minnesota Philharmonic Orchestra at the Ted Mann Concert Hall, University of Minnesota West Bank Arts Quarter, Minneapolis, Fri. & Sat., Mar. 26 & 27, 8pm. For tickets call 612.623.2345. Photos by Paul Nixdorf.

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The Vaudevillian: Spirit of the American Dream

2010-02-22T18:00:00.000-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Twins baseball fans amid the ghosts of Minneapolis history

2010-02-11T12:30:00.000-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

When fans of the Minnesota Twins baseball team swarm to opening day ceremonies at the new Target Field on the north edge of downtown Minneapolis, Apr. 12, few will have any notion of the area's complex connections to people and pivotal events in the city's history.

Mere steps from the stadium's northwest corner once stood the Oak Lake subdivision, platted in 1880 near Olson Highway (6th Avenue North) and Lyndale Avenue with curving streets and some cul-de-sacs. The lake and its genteel neighborhood are long gone, as are the Jewish, black, and working-class white families that took up residence in successive waves as the original cachet waned.

Larry Millett, in Lost Twin Cities (Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1992), described the neighborhood's evolution and how, by the 1930s, the city had cleared Oak Lake and re-located the farmers' market there.

In Minneapolis in the Twentieth Century: The Growth of an American City (242 pp, Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2010), author Iric Nathanson describes the role of land covenants and other implicit understandings that restricted minorities' residential choices to certain parts of the city. The experience and proximity of Jewish and black residents in the larger Oak Lake and Glenwood Avenue sector had important implications for the civil rights movement that unfolded in the second half of the 20th century in a city once known as the capital of anti-Semitism in the United States.

My affinity for the area's history has a personal basis. The families of both my parents resided there at various times, and I was born at Glenwood and Penn avenues.

Earlier, on Jan. 23, 1937, when my grandparents lived at 506 Girard Avenue, my grandfather, Harry Hayden Peterson, was shot and killed a few blocks away at the Fresno Cafe, 1007 Sixth Avenue North. Joseph Taylor, the man who shot him in self-defense, lived a block away at 506 Fremont Avenue. Taylor was properly acquitted on Mar. 2, following a speedy trial. The case was a sensation in the newspapers because Taylor was one of the city's few black entrepreneurs and served as a role model in his community. Life was never the same afterward for the Taylors or for my grandmother and her four children.

By the early 1950s, according to Millett, the city regarded the area as its worst slum and, in 1954, demolished more than 660 structures in a 180-acre area between Glenwood Avenue and Olson Highway.

The intersection of First Avenue North and 6th Street, one block south of Target Field, was the scene in May 1934 of a strikebreaking confrontation between members of a Teamsters union local and 1,000 police deputies backed by commercial interests of the Citizens Alliance. Nathanson recounted the event as "one skirmish in a summer-long strike that provoked full-scale class warfare." The strikers eventually won the sometimes bloody struggle, breaking the monopoly of business interests on the city's power structure and balancing it with the interests of organized labor.

Nathanson includes chapters on more than 100 years of controversy about the structure of Minneapolis' city government; periodic bouts of corruption and indictment of mayors, council members, and police officers; and efforts to redevelop downtown, the neighborhoods, and the riverfront.

Baseball fans who will arrive and depart Target Field via the light rail trains may appreciate Nathanson's last chapter with its mind-numbing detail of how light rail mass transit arrived in the Twin Cities. Folks who have followed or fretted over the 13-year saga of the Shubert Theater's salvation and rehabilitation two blocks from the stadium don't know from nothing about perseverance in pursuit of civic goals.

For decades, municipal and state planners tried to build a freeway along Highway 55/Hiawatha Avenue, following an old route south from downtown to Fort Snelling and the airport. For more than a decade in the 1970s and 80s, hundreds and thousands of residents in south Minneapolis fought those efforts at city hall, at the legislature, and in congress, arguing in favor of an at-grade parkway that allowed for the possibility of light rail transit.

One dramatic confrontation occurred in the lobby of the downtown Federal Building late on a January evening in 1975, when 200+ residents took Congressman Donald Fraser to task for his vote in favor of funding freeway construction along the route. I was there! What Nathanson did not relate about the incident was the fact that residents chartered buses to the event at their own expense after Fraser's office had refused to schedule a meeting at a more convenient time and place. Light rail began running on the non-freeway, Hiawatha Avenue on June 26, 2004 – 29 years later!

In all of "Minneapolis in the Twentieth Century," I found but one factual error. On page 196, Nathanson relates that Rudy Perpich was elected Minnesota's governor in 1976. In fact, as lieutenant governor, Perpich assumed the office of governor on Dec. 29, 1976, following the resignation of Governor Wendell Anderson. Perpich then appointed Anderson to fill the United States Senate vacancy created by the election of Walter Mondale as vice president. Both Perpich and Anderson were defeated for election in November 1978.

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A new gig, 30 days in

2010-02-03T20:22:00.001-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

When I assumed duties as executive director of the Southern Theater in Minneapolis 30 days ago, I added a new port of call to the harbors of arts management that I have called home. The time has passed in a whirlwind of 38 meetings and an avalanche of information that requires absorption on a daily basis. If asked six months ago – and I was – I would have said it was impossible to imagine myself in this job. Yet, it feels like what I should be doing right now.

Just today, a long-time friend asked if I was enjoying myself. The politically correct response would have been to say "yes." However, in this economic climate, anyone who purports to lead anything would be crazy to say that he or she welcomes the conundrums that visit every enterprise, whether non-profit or for. What we can say, honestly, is that we welcome the opportunities to solve major problems and wrestle with large challenges. None of us would consciously choose the environment in which most individuals and places of business find themselves.

The Southern Theater faces challenges similar to many, larger than some, and fewer than there could be. Some of the challenges got broadcast far and wide along with the news of my hiring (see: Star Tribune, MinnPost, and Minnesota Public Radio). This scrutiny places us under a magnifying glass in the public eye, but grants us a certain freedom that eludes other arts venues and organizations: because everyone knows we have problems, we can speak about them more openly and solicit solutions more broadly. Other venues and organizations have our same problems, some larger, and some more deadly. Many of our colleagues remain in willful denial or abject terror about their prospects.

All of us need to keep our heads and focus on the step-by-step basics before us. We must raise more money than we spend and spend less money than we have. To accomplish that, we must understand and control our true costs of doing business and price our products and services with that information in mind – balancing certainty with acceptable risk. Easy enough to say, but it will be hell to accomplish. The times present us with an array of undesirable options. Our survival depends upon our ability to choose.

We also need to engage with our community of users – artists and audiences – about the need for subsidy over-and-above the cost of tickets. At the end of a day, someone somewhere must pay the bills. This, too, is easy enough to say, but will be difficult to realize.

Many organizations that engage in the same or similar activities must set aside their competitive instincts and have the conversations that explore ways to share services and costs. Maybe even artistic products. (I know, I know the horror of all that – but if our largest, arts-friendly foundation can use that terminology, so can we!)

We can take heart from the month's-long uptick in the stock market: it has restored much, but not nearly all, of the portfolio value of our arts-centered grant-makers. We will not be out of the woods, however, until rates of unemployment and underemployment get reduced substantially. To the extent that the arts rely upon the discretionary income of individuals and households for most of their revenue, we will be under siege for some time to come.

Cyncis have – and will – lament our prospects and dismiss our progress. It is both a blessing and a curse of my life that I remain, in the face of much evidence to the contrary, an eternal optimist about what can be accomplished.

On March 1, 1910, the Southern Theater threw open its doors to the – largely – Swedish community that built it in the Snoose Boulevard/Seven Corners neighborhood of Minneapolis, overlooking the Bohemian Flats that border part of the Mississippi River. The founders of 100 years ago built their theater with faith in themselves and in a rich future. We have the opportunity to renew that faith today.

Join us on Saturday, Mar. 6, as we celebrate the beginning of the Southern's second century of embrace and engagement with the community that gives it life. The Southern Exposure 2010 gala promises a worthy evening of remembrance and re-commitment. If you can't make it that night, pick a performance from the schedule that appeals to you and resolve to attend it with a friend.

Look for me in the lobby. I want to see new and old friends in this new port of call!

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Notes from a precinct caucus

2010-02-02T21:36:00.000-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

The 34 most faithful of Democrats in Ward 6, Precinct 3, of Minneapolis, convened their biennial caucus tonight in the basement of the Plymouth Congregational Church, located eight blocks south of the downtown business and entertainment districts. Upstairs, the church choir rehearsed "The Battle Hymn of the Republic."

The Republicans may have thought about holding a caucus within the Minneapolis city limits, but we really have not encouraged them to do so for decades. Our liberal, Scandinavian tolerance has its limits and extends only to allowing them to cast ballots in November general elections.

Just like two years ago, when people lined up down the sidewalk and around the church to get in, the weather tonight was cold and snowy, the sidewalks icy. Unlike two years ago, there was no line of shivering people waiting to gain entry.

The proposed agenda for our precinct caucus said we would convene at 7pm. The convenor, however, opted to wait until all the stragglers had signed in, and we finally got underway at seven-past-seven.

After reading aloud the requirements for our eligibility to participate – sort of our nod, in its way, to the new political correctness of the right that seeks to cast out the aliens from our midst – the convenor read aloud the affirmative action statement – sort of our nod, in its way, to the old political correctness that seeks to affirm and embrace every form of diversity and nonnormativity known to man (and woman). He also read aloud something called a Platform Statement – a new thing, I believe, in the time-worn proceedings.

After stating his willingness to serve as the permanent caucus chair, we moved, seconded, and elected the convenor to serve in that position in spite of his unorthodox status as a self-identified Caucasian, heterosexual male. The now-permanent caucus chair then asked for a motion seeking authority for himself to appoint two tellers and a recording secretary for the proceedings. Suspecting that he hungered for this additional, less-than-burdensome and generally less-than-thankful task, I moved that he be allowed to do as he wished. After unanimous passage, he appointed his wife as the secretary, and two men – at least one of whom is known to be gay – as tellers.

We then adopted the rules for the conduct of our caucus business.

Then, after stating his willingness to serve as the precinct chair for the next two years, we moved, seconded, and elected the convenor – now-permanent caucus chair – to serve in that position in spite of his unorthodox status. (We residents of the Stevens Square/Loring Heights neighborhood pride ourselves on our open minded world view – whatever its relation to reality!)

After killing time for two minutes to permit the clock to reach 7:30pm, we elected delegates to the State Senate District 61 convention. Because the caucus turn-out two years ago had snaked down the sidewalk and around the church, our precinct had 55 delegate slots to fill. This meant that the 34 people in attendance – plus the four who had sent letters regretting their absence for more pressing matters – all could be delegates merely by signing their names to the form at the front table. To further our masochistic, if not somewhat sadistic tendencies as a political entity, in a similar fashion we determined who would be the 14 delegates to the Minneapolis City Convention (held in May for the purpose of endorsing up to five candidates for the Minneapolis School Board) and the six candidates to the Hennepin County District 3 Convention (held later in February to endorse a candidate for the county commission).

After killing a bit more time, the two appointed tellers – at least one of whom is known to be gay – were allowed to open the ballot box at 8pm to count the straw poll votes for who should carry the party's standard for the office of governor. When the votes were counted, it was revealed that two people had not voted. As for the rest, their results added up as follows: Tom Bakk - 0; Matt Entenza - 6; Susan Gaertner - 0; Steve Kelley - 2; Margaret Anderson Kelliher - 3; John Marty - 6; Felix Montez - 0; Tom Rukavina - 3; R. T. Rybak - 7; Ole Savior - 0; Paul Thissen - 4; Uncommitted - 1.

With that certification of consensus and unified vision, the excitement continued unabated as business then turned to the consideration of resolutions, meant to infect and inform the universal party platform to be adopted at the State Convention in Duluth. In short and perfunctory order, we voted in favor of single-payer health care at the federal and state levels (we insisted on voting separately about the federal and state status); in favor of marriage equality; in favor of an independent inquiry by Obama into the treatment of terrorist detainees following 9/11; in favor – rousingly so – of repealing the status of corporate personhood; in favor of promoting local and sustainable food sources; and in favor of a presidential primary in Minnesota.

Not to be pushed over by the special interests of our friends, neighbors, and nodding acquaintances, however, we did defeat a single motion following vigorous debate. That motion was to cut the size of our legislature by either 1/8 or 1/9 and to save millions of dollars. It was not clear whether we defeated this because we opposed reducing the number of lawmakers, or because we opposed the saving of millions of dollars. Perhaps both.

There being no further business to come before the body, the precinct caucus was adjourned at 8:08pm.

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Metro arts grants exceed $1 million, 2010 to-date

2010-01-31T19:43:00.002-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

The Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, based in St. Paul, announced the award in January of 21 Organizational Development grants totaling $190,405, and 24 Capital Grants totaling $190,139. MRAC guidelines require grantees to secure matching funds for their projects.

The January announcement raised to 165 the number of grants made in fiscal year 2010, totaling $1,197,819. Earlier announcements named grantees in the first rounds of the MRAC Community Arts, Creative Intersection, and Arts Activity Support programs.

Year-to-date grants exceed the $1,007,491 total for all of fiscal year 2009. MRAC makes grants to organizations with budgets less than $300,000 located in the seven metropolitan counties of greater Minneapolis and St. Paul. MRAC operates on a fiscal year of July 1 to June 30, and receives its grant funds from the Minnesota State Legislature, the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, and the McKnight Foundation.

Organizational Development grants to 21 organizations in January totaled $190,405, an average of $9,066 each.

Hennepin County: Art Shanty Projects, $10,000; Frank Theatre, $10,000; Fresh Air, Inc. (KFAI FM), $10,000; JazzMN, Inc., $3,840; Kulture Klub Collaborative, $9,640; Minneapolis Pops Orchestra Association, $6,480; Morris Park Players, $10,000; Off-Leash Area, $5,000; Open Eye Figure Theatre, $10,000; Plymouth Christian Youth Center, $10,000; Rainbow Rumpus, $6,225; Stuart Pimsler Dance and Theater, $10,000; West Bank School of Music, $10,000.

Ramsey County: Nautilus Music-Theater, $10,000; Sample Night Live!, $10,000; Skylark Opera, $9,220; TU Dance, $10,000; Zeitgeist, $10,000.

Suburban Hennepin County: Katha Dance Theatre, $10,000.

Suburban Ramsey County: Rosetown Playhouse, $10,000.

Washington County: ArtReach Alliance, $10,000.

Capital grants to 24 organizations in January totaled $190,139, an average of $7,922 each.

Carver County: Chaska Valley Family Theater, $3,312.

Dakota County: Caponi Art Park, $10,000; Dakota Valley Symphony, $8,480.

Hennepin County: Chicago Avenue Fire Arts Center, $10,000; Hollywood Studio of Dance, $7,738; Kairos Dance Theatre, $8,916; Minnesota Freedom Band, $9,038; Old Arizona Collaborative, Inc., $8,120; Rain Taxi, Inc., $8,000; Red Eye Collaboration, $8,700; Walking Shadow Theatre Company, $6,813.

Ramsey County: ArtStart, $8,700; East Side Arts Council, $6,080; Minnesota Brass, Inc., $10,000; Sounds of Hope, Ltd., $6,125; Irish Music and Dance Association, $10,000; Scott County River Valley Theatre Company, $8,500.

Suburban Hennepin County: Continental Ballet Company, $4,697; Discovery Arts Council, $7,552; Theater Or, $9,750..

Suburban Ramsey County: Ashland Productions, $10,000; Lakeshore Players, Inc., $9,550.

Washington County: Masquers Theatre Company, $8,905; Music St. Croix, $1,163.

Within its guidelines, MRAC permits organizations to receive more than one project grant in a fiscal year. Of the 165 grants made through January, 13 organizations have been awarded grants for two projects and two organizations have been awarded grants for three.

Organizations receiving two project grants in 2010 include the following (C=Capital, CA=Community Arts, OD=Organizational Development):

Ashland Productions ($10,000 C; $10,000 CA); Caponi Art Park ($10,000 C; $10,000 CA); Continental Ballet Company ($4,697 C; $5,000 CA); Dakota Valley Symphony ($8,480 C; $5,000 CA); East Side Arts Council ($6,080 C; $10,000 CA); Frank Theatre ($10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); JazzMN, Inc. ($10,000 CA; $3,840 OD); Minnesota Freedom Band ($9,038 C; $2,500 CA); Off-Leash Area ($10,000 CA; $5,000 OD); Open Eye Figure Theatre ($10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); Plymouth Christian Youth Center ($10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); Red Eye Collaboration ($8,700 C; $10,000 CA); Walking Shadow Theatre Company ($6,813 C; $10,000 CA).

Organizations receiving three project grants in 2010 include the following:

Katha Dance Theatre ($10,000 C; $10,000 CA; $10,000 OD); TU Dance ($10,000 C; $10,000 CA; $10,000 OD).

MRAC is one of 11 regional arts councils serving the state of Minnesota. The Minnesota State Arts Board makes grants statewide to organizations with budgets exceeding $300,000.

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Coming attractions in Twin Cities dance

2010-01-19T11:17:00.000-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Channeling music at the Liberace Museum

2010-01-11T00:01:00.002-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

As Philip Fortenberry tells the story, one day when he was four years old, while playing with his trucks under a tree in his yard in rural Hub, Mississippi, a sudden inspiration led him to drop everything, run into the house, sit down at the family piano, and begin playing all of the songs he had ever heard, and some that he had not. He had never played the piano before that day.

A prodigy, by age seven he played regularly at the Edna Baptist Church, a service he rendered, without pay, through high school, and continued at the Main Street Baptist Church in Hattiesburg while attending William Carey College. After moving to New York City, Fortenberry earned a Master of Music degree from New Jersey City University, and was an adjunct faculty member at New York University.

In his early career, Fortenberry became the musical director for Forbidden Broadway, the off-Broadway revue, and musical supervisor for the show's London production.

His later Broadway and touring performance credits include Cats, Jesus Christ Superstar, Saturday Night Fever, Ragtime, The Lion King, and many more. In 1990, Fortenberry and the mezzo-soprano Frederica Von Stade performed at the White House for two presidents, Mikhail Gorbachev of the Soviet Union and George H. W. Bush of the United States.

Since becoming a resident of Las Vegas, Fortenberry has played for several theater productions, including his current gig as a performer in Jersey Boys, the story of four kids from Newark, Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons. He also has worked with the Faith Community Lutheran Church and the St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Roman Catholic Church.

Three afternoons a week, Fortenberry takes the stage in the 75-seat Cabaret Showroom at the Liberace Museum. There, at the keyboard of a mirrored, Baldwin grand piano used by Liberace at the Las Vegas Hilton, Caesars Palace, and Radio City Music Hall, Fortenberry holds forth with "Liberace and Me," an acoustic, cabaret style performance. The program serves as a vehicle for telling his own story while preserving the legacy of Liberace's music and style of entertaining. Audience members array themselves around small tables where they can nosh from a selection of light items from the cafe nearby.

Opening his act with Liberace's signature arrangement of Chopsticks, Fortenberry then wends his way through a mix of Liberace classics and Broadway show tunes, channeling the former master in all his harmonic brilliance. Each performance includes an improvised "Portrait of Music" for a member of the audience to honor Liberace's spirit of spontaneity. On Dec. 16, this gift was bestowed on a visitor celebrating her 87th birthday. The set closes with the audience joining Fortenberry in a sung rendition of "I'll Be Seeing You."

The boyishly handsome musician lingers afterward to engage visitors with an affable, though somewhat guarded, Southern charm, closing an experience that provides visitors with a pleasing prelude to an evening in the clubs and showrooms on the Las Vegas Strip.

Philip Fortenberry plays The Cabaret Showroom at the Liberace Museum each Tue., Wed., and Sat., 1pm. 1775 East Tropicana Avenue (at Spencer), Las Vegas. 702.798.5595. Fortenberry on MySpace and YouTube.

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Travel and study grants for Minnesota and New York City artists

2010-01-04T22:15:00.000-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

The Jerome Foundation 2010 Travel and Study Grant Program will award grants to emerging creative artists (choreographers, film and video directors, poets, spoken word artists, fiction and creative nonfiction writers) for activities that lead to individual exploration and growth. Informational workshops will be held in February. More information is available at www.jeromefdn.org. Application deadline: March 8, 2010.

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Jottings as one ends, one begins

2010-01-03T14:16:00.001-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Saturday, Dec. 19, 3:04pm – The absence of open water matches that of geese, ducks, and gulls from Lake Calhoun today. 23º with low, dark-gray clouds portending snow. The snowed-over pedestrian path means that walkers, runners, skaters, and cyclists share the vehicular path in both directions – with signs telling all but walkers to yield. A lone, hatless fool skis Nordic style across the ice ("fool" being relative viz brisk walkers on solid ground). Rifle volleys somewhere west in St. Louis Park suggest military honors, but whoever heard of a 33-gun salute? If not a funeral, then an odd place to practice. A mind trick of Minnesota winters: bulky-attired runners retain allure and sex appeal. Some of them, anyway. Two, in particular. Wind bites only while rounding the southeast bend. Two women bundled as in burqas (with only eye slits), descend steps at the 32d Street Beach talking excitedly about prospects for some kind of Bush Foundation grant. North of the beach, two clumsy skaters collide, kiss, and continue out to where the ice does not yet support snow. One hopes not to reach Christmas Day news items of divers searching for bodies. A windboarder tows his sailboard toward two companions waiting just offshore from the boat launch. Frozen pavement amplifies the sound of Lake Street traffic between lakes Calhoun and Isles. Nonbermed areas sound like Daytona Speedway, relatively.

Sunday, Dec. 20, 12:09am – Spent a great evening with Chari, friend of 43 years, at Medina Entertainment Center to see and visit with Dennis, friend of 42 years and member of the Rockin' Hollywoods band!

Monday, Dec. 21, 4:35pm – Solstice. 17º. Two days' snowfall blankets all. Seven walkers, five runners, two cyclists, and no partridges in trees – nor other aviators. Optimists: nine canoes and kayaks still chained in place on north shore of lake. So very Calhoun quiet save for occasional vehicle on parkway or plane above clouds.

Wednesday, Dec. 23, 10:31pm – So, the new, late-20-something guy next door moved here from Texas with his family in October to assist his elderly uncle and manage the apartment building. He never saw snow before last week. As we completed our second shovel-out of today, he was horrified to hear that it could snow for four more months. Told him: "If this doesn't send you back to Texas, nothing will!"

Thursday, Dec. 24, 11:31am – Tonight: Christmas Eve Services at St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral - religious service, cultural ritual, artistic production. 10pm - Be seated to insure a place. 10:30pm - Congregation/audience caroling. 11pm-12:45am - Midnight Mass with choir, organ, brass.

Saturday, Dec. 26, 11:01am – The Young Victoria is a perfectly lovely film. The best line in a preview trailer was spoken by Chrisopher Plummer's character to Helen Mirren's, in The Last Station: "You don't need a husband, you need a Greek chorus!"

Tuesday, Dec. 29, 12:54pm – Back! The crash-and-burn by MinnesotaPlaylist.com, a primo-must-have for Minnesota theater, is fixed! Check 'em out!

Thursday, Dec. 31, 9:24am – Minnesota Public Radio reports that the mood is jubilant as fireworks welcomed the new year over the harbour and opera house in Sydney, Australia – folks happy to leave 2009 behind. My Facebook Live Feed reports that not everyone has cause for jubilation today. Nonetheless, as the bitter matches the sweet, a blessed 2010 to all!

Thursday, Dec. 31, 10:53am – The Nuclear Cowboyz present a motorcycle ballet – a motocross spectacle – in 15-city tour. http://tinyurl.com/ydoxy4v

Thursday, Dec. 31, 11:36am – Happy New Year wishes to the four fabulous artistic founders of Live Action Set!

Friday, Jan. 1, 1:50pm – The 189-seat Commonweal Theater in tiny Lanesboro, Minnesota, drew 20,283 in 2009. With great work, others can too! http://tinyurl.com/yjpbwr7

Friday, Jan. 1, 2:04pm – Where I-35W enters downtown Minneapolis, across from Central Lutheran Church and one block from Convention Center (and five blocks from home), Hilton Garden Inn offers neighborhood discounts on breakfast buffet, seven days a week (hours vary). Today, that discount was 32%. The discount for evenings is 25%. It's off the beaten track but appears to be a quiet wine hang-out for evening.

Friday, Jan. 1, 7:53pm – A waning full moon over Lake Calhoun. Last night, this was the Blue Moon. –1º and clear, with the mildest of breezes at the lake tonight. Two runners moving briskly on their rounds.

Friday, Jan. 1, 11:42pm – Deborah Howell, former editor at Star Tribune and Pioneer Press struck and killed by a car in New Zealand. Husband, C. Peter McGrath (former U of M president), with her at the time. http://tinyurl.com/ydom6wo

Saturday, Jan. 2, 2:20am – "With or without you!" Felt 28 again, closing up the 331 Club in NE Minneapolis, listening to Venus spin 95% real vinyl tunes. Just like 28, however, after thinking I was making eyes with the cute – but wasted – breakdancer, excitement at his approach died as he instead, in slurred manner, asked my partner if he had been his history professor at St. John's University four years ago! Had to laugh uproariously at all of us!

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Quintessential Minnesota jazz at Bennett's in St. Paul

2010-01-02T19:00:00.000-06:00

St. Paul, Minnesota

For three magical hours, Dec. 29, members of the Bill Evans New Orleans Jazz Band and their audience of dinner customers journeyed through the quintessence of Minnesota's jazz traditions. At its end, the cornetist Charlie DeVore observed "We haven't had such a wild evening here in years."

Exceptional music – and the occasional wild evening – happens whenever the group plays Bennett's Chop and Railhouse in St. Paul, providing the nondescript establishment with a cachet matching those of the Twin Cities' more visible jazz venues: the Dakota Jazz Club in Minneapolis, the Artists' Quarter in St. Paul, the Northrop Jazz series at the University of Minnesota, and Garrison Keillor's Prairie Home Companion broadcasts.

Situated where neighborhood-meets-city near an old railway on West 7th Street and Victoria Avenue, Bennett's features a weekly menu of American food specials, along with performances by some of Minnesota's best, home-grown jazz musicians on the second and last Tuesdays of each month.

The six members of the Evans ensemble enjoy prominent mindshares among Minnesota's jazz fans, while three have become living legends. DeVore can recount tales of playing at Brady's Pub in the 1960s on Block E in downtown Minneapolis. He, trombonist Evans, and pianist Mike Polad also are longtime veterans of the Emporium of Jazz in Mendota, across the Minnesota River south of the MSP airport. I saw and heard them there during forays with my law firm colleagues in the 1970s.

Members of a younger generation round out the ranks: clarinetist Tony Balluff, bassist Steve Puttell, and drummer Chuck DeVore, son of the cornetist. Balluff also plays with the Southside Aces, a jazz group he founded in south Minneapolis, and he annually pulls together the 34th Street Irregulars to march in the city's May Day Parade.

As a part-time sports bar, Bennett's best-of-both-worlds setup includes a flat screen television above the musicians. This allowed diners to bop along with the Evans band while watching Flomax commercials and the Wisconsin Badgers kick the Miami Hurricanes' collective backside, 20-14, in the Champ Sports Bowl. On days of Vikings home football games, Bennett's runs a shuttle bus to and from the Metrodome in Minneapolis.

The weekly menu specials include half-price apps and bottles of wine on Monday, walleye dinners on Tuesday, T-bones on Wednesday, half-price burgers on Thursday, all-you-can-eat crab on Friday, prime ribs on Saturday, and kids free on Sunday.

Jazz night clientele includes a man attired in a jacket from the American Legion Post in Inver Grove Heights; a couple who heard their first jazz music concert outdoors at the Lake Harriet Bandshell in Minneapolis, then attended the Emporium for many years, and soon will embark on their 15th annual jazz music cruise; and a man whose last cruise took place in 1945 when a 20mm gun was positioned above his bunk in the North Atlantic.

Bennett's eclectic ambience, decor, and patronage remind me of Jimmy Hegg's Restaurant, a former destination spot on Second Avenue South in downtown Minneapolis. For lunch and after work, lawyers and business people worshipped at St. Hegg's, ushered to their seats by Jimmy's wife, Jeannette, and officiated by Jimmy from his stool at the cash register. Late nights, the place became the town's central theater hangout, a place where the late Mike Steele, the theater critic, could appear in person to read aloud his review that would appear in the next morning's newspaper. Hegg's closed in 1982.

A similar feeling of communal ritual pervades the jazz night at Bennett's. On the 29th, the BENOJB offered three sets within three hours, separated by breaks not exceeding 10 minutes. The group performed many tunes from the 1930s, including "Algier's Street," "Honey Hush," "Bugle Boy March," and a rousing rendition of "Happy Birthday" for Tom Steele, a diehard fan of 83.

Throughout, the elder DeVore maintained a two-way conversation with the audience between numbers. "The music sounds great!" someone said.

"I don't know what happened," he replied.

In-town for the holidays, two guest musicians sat-in for the second and third sets: clarinetist and vocalist Andy Moore, and soprano saxophonist Henry Blackburn. Moore is a son of the late Dave Moore, the pioneering news anchor for WCCO Television in Minneapolis.

Blackburn's sax and Moore's voice sang sweetly and sonorously through Sidney Bechet's "Promenade Aux Champs-Élysées." Hearing it reminded me of another sweet experience with Bechet, that of seeing Danny Buraczeski's choreographed "Blue On The Moon," performed by Zenon Dance Company in 1989 at the Ordway in St. Paul and the Joyce Theater in New York.

Moore also vocalized Fats Waller's "If It Ain't Love" from music Polad found in a music store in Bayfield, Wisconsin. Other tunes included "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like New Year's," "All the Wrongs You've Done To Me," and "Just a Little While to Stay" – this last an audience sing-along.

Duke Ellington's "Creole Love Call" opened with three clarinets and later featured a sublimely sweet clarinet solo by Balluff. ("Tony: Call me!") For "Shake and Break," two women of a certain age danced among the restaurant tables, one spinning a lavender parasol as she moved. Charlie DeVore provided the vocals and scat from "Why Don't You Go Down to New Orleans." The audience provided vocals for the closer, "Auld Lang Syne."

Over the years, I have spent time at the Blue Note in New York City with Buraczeski, at Yoshi's in Oakland, California, with former ballet dancer and jazz musician John DeSerio, and numerous evenings at Twin Cities jazz venues.

The evening with the Bill Evans New Orleans Jazz Band at Bennett's in St. Paul ranks with the best of them. The group returns there Tuesday, Jan. 12, with Sonny Leland on the piano.

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First 2010 round: Metro arts grants total $817,275

2009-12-22T18:12:00.000-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

In the first round of grant making for three of its 2010 funding programs, the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, based in St. Paul, awarded 120 grants totaling $817,275. Contracts and checks will be issued to organizations with budgets less than $300,000 and located in the seven metropolitan counties of greater Minneapolis and St. Paul. MRAC operates on a fiscal year of July 1 to June 30, and receives its grant funds from the Minnesota State Legislature, the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, and the McKnight Foundation.

Earlier in December, MRAC announced its first round of Community Arts Grant Awards. Grants to 62 organizations totaled $265,265, an average of $4,278 each.

Anoka County: Mississippi Valley Orchestra, $4,000; North Artists Studio Crawl, $3,500; Northern Symphony Orchestra, $5,000.

Carver County: ISD 112 Community Education, $4,600; River City Theatre Company, $5,000; Watertown Film Festival, $5,000.

Dakota County: Burnsville Visual Art Society, $2,278; Chamber Music Lakeville, $5,000; City of South St. Paul, $5,000; Dakota County Public Health, $5,000; Dakota Valley Symphony, $5,000; International Festival of Burnsville, $5,000; South Metro Chorale, $5,000; The Play's the Thing Productions, $5,000; Velvet Tones, $4,430.

Hennepin County: Diverse Emerging Music Organization, $4,624; Eclectic Edge Ensemble, $5,000; Grassroots Culture, $4,315; HUGE Theater, $5,000; Lao Assistance Center of Minnesota, $5,000; Lao Women Association, $5,000; Lao Writers Summit, $5,000; Minneapolis Southside Singers, $5,000; Nimbus Theatre, $5,000; Northeast Minneapolis Arts Association, $5,000; Puppet Farm Art, $2,500; Southside Family Nurturing Center, $5,000; Twin Cities Jazz Workshops, $5,000; Works Progress, $4,945.

Ramsey County: Bridge Productions, $5,000; Lex-Ham Community Arts, $920; Magic Lantern Puppet Theater, $3,800; Metropolitan Symphony Orchestral Association, $2,500; Minnesota Freedom Band, $2,500; Minnesota State Band, $4,910; Music in the Park Series, $5,000; Saint Paul Almanac, $5,000; Savage Umbrella, $2,868; Twin Cities Housing and Development Corporation, Liberty Plaza, $4,500; Vietnamese Community of Minnesota, $2,800; What About Us, $2,100; Women's Drum Center, $5,000.

Scott County: Jordan Art Festival, $5,000; River Valley Theatre Company, $5,000.

Suburban Hennepin County: Allegro Orchestral Association, $5,000; Continental Ballet Company, $5,000; Cross Community Players, $5,000; Music Association of Minnetonka, $4,985; Orono Community Education, $2,525; Thursday Musical, $4,000; Twin Cities Youth Chorale, $1,900.

Suburban Ramsey County: Community Partners of Youth, $4,285; Encore Wind Ensemble, $2,000; Heritage Theatre Company, $5,000; Honeywell Concert Band, $3,000; Lakeshore Players, Inc., $5,000; North Suburban Chorus, $3,000; Twin Cities Housing and Development Corporation, Calibre Ridge, $4,000.

Washington County: FamilyMeans - Cimarron Youth Development Initiative, $5,000; FamilyMeans - Landfall Youth Development Initiative, $4,880; Summer Tuesdays, $3,600; White Pine Festival, $5,000.

In November, MRAC announced its first round of Creative Intersection Grant Awards: Rosemount Area Arts Council, $7,300, Dakota County; East Side Arts Council, $10,000, Ramsey County; St. Paul Almanac, $10,000, Ramsey County; New Prague Arts Council, $8,000, Scott County; St. Louis Park Friends of the Arts, $10,000, Suburban Hennepin County.

In September, 53 organizations received $506,710, an average of $9,560 each, in the first round of Arts Activity Support Grants.

Dakota County: Caponi Art Park, $10,000; International Friendship Through the Performing Arts, $10,000.

Hennepin County: 3-Minute Egg, $8,600; Ananya Dance Theater, $10,000; ARENA Dances, Inc., $10,000; Art Shanty Projects, $10,000; ArtiCulture, $5,950; Ascension Place, $4,000; Body Cartography Project, $10,000; Camden Music School, Dave DeGennars and Circus Minimus Puppetry, $10,000; Catalyst, $10,000; Deepashika, $10,000; Frank Theatre, $10,000; Global Site Performance, $4,600; Iraqi and American Reconciliation Project, $10,000; JazzMN, Inc., $10,000; Kairos Dance Theatre, $10,000; Live Action Set, $10,000; Minneapolis Pops Orchestral Association, $10,000; Minnesota Guitar Society, $9,000; Mizna, $10,000; Off-Leash Area, $10,000; Open Eye Figure Theater, $10,000; Orchestra, $10,000; Plymouth Christian Youth Center, $10,000; Red Eye Collaboration, $10,000; Sandbox Theatre, $10,000; Speaking of Home, $6,960; Theatre Unbound, $9,600; TVbyGirls, $10,000; Walking Shadow Theatre Company, $10,000; Workhaus Playwrights Collective, $10,000; Zorongo Flamenco Dance Theatre, $10,000.

Ramsey County: CAAM Chinese Dance Theater, $10,000; East Side Arts Countil, $10,000; Gremlin Theatre, $10,000; Hot Summer Jazz Festival, $10,000; Minnesota Chinese Dance Theater, $10,000; Minnesota Jewish Theatre Company, $10,000; One Voice Mixed Chorus, $10,000; Oratorio Society of Minnesota, $10,000; Riverview Economic Development Association, $10,000; Selby Area Community Development, $8,000; Sounds of Hope, Ltd., $10,000; St. Paul Art Collective, $10,000; Teatro del Pueblo, $10,000; TU Dance, $10,000; Twin Cities Women's Choir, $10,000; Wishes for the Sky, $10,000; Zeitgeist, $10,000.

Suburban Hennepin County: Katha Dance Theatre, $10,000.

Suburbay Ramsey County: Ashland Productions, $10,000.

Washington County: St. Croix Concert Series, $10,000.

MRAC received 384 grant requests in 2009 and awarded 254 grants totaling $1,007,491. First-time applicants received seven percent of the grants. According to MRAC's December newsletter, funded projects served 11,685 artists and reached approximately 395,000 audience members. MRAC also provided 38 skill-building workshops and networking activities for people from more than 270 organizations.

MRAC is one of 11 regional arts councils serving the state of Minnesota. The Minnesota State Arts Board makes grants statewide to organizations with budgets exceeding $300,000.
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Broadcast: Summit on Leading in Crisis

2009-12-12T10:35:00.008-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Bill George, professor of management practice at Harvard Business School, moderated a "Summit on Leading in Crisis: Personal stories from the trenches," Sept. 17, at the Ted Mann Concert Hall at the University of Minnesota-Minneapolis. The summit's four panel members included John Donahoe, chair and CEO, eBay; David Gergen, CNN commentator and Director, Center for Public Leadership, Harvard Kennedy School; Anne Mulcahy, chair and former CEO, Xerox; and Marilyn Carlson Nelson, chair and former CEO, Carlson Companies.

The panel members have dealt with crises radiating from the White House, offices and boardrooms of global companies, and their own personal lives. Their discussion touches on the causes behind many of the problems our country faces and the ways that courageous leaders can address them.

Twin Cities Public Television (tpt) will initially broadcast an hour-long recording of the panel's discussion three times: Sunday, Dec. 13, tpt2, 4pm; Sunday, Dec. 13, tptMN, 9pm; and Sunday, Dec. 20, tptLIFE, 1pm. Minnesota viewers should check local listings for stations.

A free DVD of the program, Leading in Crisis: Personal Stories, is available from the George Family Foundation, 612-377-3356.-

Lake Calhoun in November

2009-11-30T16:27:00.002-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Saturday, Nov. 7 – Hordes of humanity circling Minneapolis' Lake Calhoun on a glorious afternoon lend an illusion of strolling the streets of Manhattan or San Francisco! A bald eagle, large as a fire hydrant, held court above the south side of the lake, tieing up traffic.

Sunday, Nov. 8 – November in Minneapolis, and nightime runners circling Lake Calhoun are shirtless! Very warm out there, and very quiet.

Friday, Nov. 13 – I love that I can own exclusively for 75 minutes the luscious and quiet Minnesota mist that shrouds Lake Calhoun tonight! Gorgeous!

Tuesday, Nov. 17 – Kissed by another November day of sun!

Friday, Nov. 20 – A season suspended against itself! Yet another day of warm light, perfect for circling Lake Calhoun to frame up the structure of a performance review. Yet...1 in 10 Minnesota kids is hungry every day; 91,000 mortgage foreclosures in our state; sick people will be denied care at our county hospital; and people's fortunes, families, and souls are stressed. My task today: absorb the light and unleash compassion.

Saturday, Nov. 21 – Several times I have run into Dick Maw of Dick Maw Fine Art, Elk River, Minnesota, who holds court with his artwork on the west side of Lake Calhoun. He also keeps a place in Mineral Wells, Texas, just outside Ft. Worth.

Monday, Nov. 23 – Scenes of the day: The giant bald eagle held court on the north end of Lake Calhoun today. The IDS Crystal Court in downtown Minneapolis has its holiday decor in place. Given 51º temps, the ice-skating rink next to downtown St. Paul's Landmark Center is nowhere near frozen, but the Saint Paul Hotel has its holiday finery in place!

Wednesday, Nov. 25 – Steel-gray shadows and a brisk-brrr, northwest wind skimmed the surface of Lake Calhoun today. Scores of Canadian geese anchored in the southwest bay. Hordes of crows rested in the southern woods leading to Lake Harriet. The main dock, set loose two weeks ago to drift for the winter, rests several yards offshore at the northwest corner. Water level down noticeably in the last two weeks. No bald eagle today.

Thursday, Nov. 26 – Morning at Lake Calhoun. Intensely quiet. Small groupings of ducks replaced yesterday's geese. Stumps from trees removed yesterday. 7-foot emergency rescue boards at intervals, lashed to signs reading "Keep Off Dangerous Ice Not Safe." Dog walkers: some really do look like their dogs. Runners: some have trouble breathing in good air of life, others troubled exhaling used life, and some have perfect balance of both.

Saturday, Nov. 28 – White light to the west and south meets and mixes with blue light to the east and north over Lake Calhoun. So does warm sun and cool air. Busy! Proficient roller skater to one less so: "I am glad to see you again." Dick Maw and his artwork in residence on west side. Crows heard not seen in Lakewood Cemetery woods on southeast side. Seagulls maintain staked claim to floating dock. New puppies strain at leashes; old dogs amble with slow gait. Silent, stoic faces of an extended family unit surely belie their inner enthusiasm and excitement for each other and the day. Trees with golden leaves still shimmer with joy against the sky - all others bare. Wake of two lone ducks slices glass surface of north side where surrounding buildings reflect their full height. Distant smoke suggests large fire in north Minneapolis. This suspension of real winter is like the quilt of a Sunday afternoon before Monday morning.

Sunday, Nov. 29 – Rained last night. Dark, steel-gray and gentle waves on Lake Calhoun under quiet, heavy clouds. Cool, but not too. Could be snow clouds if temp drops.

Monday, Nov. 30 – Bright sun filtering through high layers of white clouds, layered with a bit of blue. Calm silver waves on western Lake Calhoun today. Dick Maw and artwork in residence on west side. 100+ geese at rest and chatting quietly in the southwest bay. Unusual clarity for the lines, settings, and landscaping of the manses lining the south side. Very unusual train whistle from somewhere in western Linden Hills to the southwest; cannot picture the location of those tracks. Snow fence and new lamp posts installed today around new parking bays on south side. Last evening, a stranger responded to my comment to a Facebook friend asking whether I had ever taken the ferry from Boston to Provincetown, as my name is familiar and she has a picture that looks like me. Replied that I have never been to Boston or P-Town but would like to, but did we meet in New Delhi in 1986 because her name also is familiar? She has never been to Delhi, but would like to. Golden leaves have all left the circle of the lake. Waves lapping in continuously on east side. Two ducks at the north side - same as made the wake two days ago? - approached within three feet, on land, totally unimpressed by the presence of humans. Chill, but not cold. November = 30 days x 3.1 miles = 93 miles.

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Review: Zenon Dance Company at the Ritz Theater

2009-11-24T18:57:00.000-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Given the depth and breadth of dance-making in the Twin Cities, one expects and takes for granted that dances choreographed here for the concert stage usually will be good, if not very good. So it has been since the start of the current performance season in September. What has been remarkable to my eye over the last three months, however, is the absence of truly compelling choreography: work that cannot – should not – be missed and might need to be seen to be believed.

The 27th fall concerts of Minnesota's Zenon Dance Company, which opened at the Ritz Theater, Nov. 19, crystallized this dawning realization but did not prompt it. The programs of Ananya Dance Theatre, Zorongo Flamenco Dance Theatre, Ballet of the Dolls, Minnesota Dance Theatre, James Sewell Ballet, Arena Dances, and Zenon certainly have displayed strong choreographic competence and generally strong dancing with much to like, particularly the dancing. All, however, left me wanting – je ne sais quoi.

That may simply reflect the cycle of the creative zeitgeist – or the current settings on my perceptual filters.

Zenon's show opened with the premiere of "The Laws of Falling Bodies," a contemporary work for seven dancers by Sydney Skybetter and his first commission for the company. I was anxious to see his work for the first time, even if the music for this dance was an electronic score by Jonny Greenwood instead of the more elegiac sounding selections (e.g., Dvorák, Schumann, Arvo Part) I had read about for some of Skybetter's earlier creations. The man can create visually and emotionally arresting dances (see his website), especially "Near Abroad" from 2008. Unfortunately, "Falling Bodies" is not one of them, particularly in its first four minutes. The work appears at first to be a study of people using each other and saving themselves from each other, all while trying to distance themselves from each other. Over time, it evolves into a picture of people holding up the most fragile or endangered among them, but one wonders why we should care and where the rest of the story went.

With a Master's Degree in dance performance and choreography from New York University, and performance credits with the likes of Christopher Williams, Larry Keigwin, Kun-Yang Lin, Gus Solomons jr, and others, Skybetter's is one of the most interesting emergent voices at work these days. Zenon's artistic director, Linda Andrews, would do very well to invite him back to secure another new work – perhaps a half-evening effort for the 2011 opening of the Minnesota Shubert Center.

Skybetter and his company will perform in January at Joyce SoHo and the Skirball Center during the APAP Conference in New York.

A second premiere, "Filament," is a solo work created by Emilie Plauché Flink, artistic associate of Minnesota's Black Label Movement. The dance begins in silence, then is joined by the electronic strings of "Luna" from the "Touch It" CD by the Minneapolis-based Jelloslave. Although the movement has a minimalist feel, the impact of its expression by Tamara Ober was anything but as she threw herself about the stage, at times appearing to pedal an invisible bicycle while supine. Mary Ann Bradley will dance the role Nov. 27-29.

Flink's artistic pedigree includes a BFA degree in dance from the Juilliard School, 11 years of performance with the Limón Dance Company, and performances for Annabelle Gamson and Martha Clark. She also worked briefly for the Minnesota Crafts Council, an undertaking that helped inspire her to create sculpture and furniture from found/cast-off objects.

This latter impulse no doubt provided a seed for the metallic-looking set piece for "Filament," designed by Annie Katsura Rollins. Part oversized beehive, and part cave lined with brass, Aztec dishware, the set lived in shadows and invested the proceedings with a cocoon-like refuge.

In Mitch Albom's 2004 book, "The Five People You Meet in Heaven," Eddie, the principal character, encounters five individuals after dying in an accident in his old age. One of these is Marguerite, his long-dead wife, who when he sees her is handing out chocolates at a wedding "for the bitter and the sweet." Eddie, who had loved her from the moment they met and never cared for anyone else as much, tells her how much he has missed her. "Lost love," she consoles him, "is still love."

A similar theme is at work in a third Zenon premiere, "Here, now that you are gone..." Set in three sections to music by Charlie Byrd, Toots Thielemans, and Stéphane Grappelli, the jazz duet, danced beautifully and buoyantly by Gregory Waletski and Bradley, recalls "his" love and the instances of their life together. According to program notes, as he is drawn into his memories he must decide either to remain in the past or to continue on.

The choreography by Judith James Ries, a former principal dancer for Danny Buraczeski's JAZZDANCE, acquaints us with the memory in the first segment, sands off any rough edges that may have informed the past relationship in the second, and leaves us to wonder in the third whether the memory or Waletski will let go first. Ultimately, Bradley, as the memory, exits stage right while Waletski remains in reverie stage left. My bet: he continues on but does not move on.

In addition to teaching at the Saint Paul Conservatory for Performing Arts, Hamline University, and Zenon Dance School, one of Ries's next projects will be creating choreography for Park Square Theatre's 2010 production of "Rock and Roll."

Two repertory works completed the Zenon program.

"Not From Texas," looking like three pieces of cotton candy at the Texas State Fair, entertains without audience effort. Amazingly for Zenon, however, on Nov. 20 the four men appeared to mark the opening quartet with little authentic personality in what should have been a raucous stemwinder to Lyle Lovett's "Long Tall Texan." The succeeding sections, also to Lovett, looked more taut and together, especially the middle duet by Bradley and Waletski. The wife-husband team of Megan McClellan and Brian Sostek provided the whimsical choreography that debuted earlier this year.

"Booba," an odd set of excerpts from a 2008 work by Andrea Miller, closed the show, first with a showcase for six dancers, followed by a duet of Bryan Godbout and Leslie O'Neill. Although the most structurally strong part of the evening, the group work lacked interest, particularly the pseudo-shimmying across the stage to the rhythmic music by Balkan Beat Box. Godbout and O'Neill provided a picture-pleasing finish to the most colorful (costume-wise) and brightly lit dance of the evening.

Zenon Dance Company's 27th fall concerts will continue, Fri-Sun, Nov. 27-29, at the Ritz Theater, 345 13th Avenue NE, Minneapolis. For tickets call 612.436.1129.

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Baseball's MVP

2009-11-24T06:39:00.000-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Congratulations to #7, Minnesota Twins catcher Joe Mauer! The Baseball Writers Association of America gave 27 of 28 first-place votes to Mauer, 26, in designating him the Most Valuable Player in baseball's American League.

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Park Square Theatre's next stage includes a second stage

2009-11-23T21:16:00.002-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Whatever damage the recession has visited upon nonprofit arts organizations, the effects appear to have passed over the Park Square Theatre, based in downtown St. Paul's Hamm Building, located at Seventh Place and St. Peter Street. With a current annual operating budget of approximately $1.8 million, Park Square claims to produce more shows than any theater in the Twin Cities except The Guthrie and Children's Theatre.

The company – which believes that "every year you're not growing you're shrinking" – has raised $1 million toward a Next Stage capital campaign goal of $4.2 million. Beginning in July 2010, these funds will result in new seats, carpeting, and wall coverings in the 340-seat mainstage auditorium, along with energy efficient lights and new production equipment.

Michael-jon Pease, Park Square's director of external relations, outlined the intents and purposes of the capital drive for 28 actors and others who attended a Nov. 23 reception and tour in the Hamm Building.

The campaign results from an 18-month planning process aimed at organizational transformation. In addition to renovating the mainstage facility, the campaign will provide $1.5 million for a new, second theater with 140 seats situated around three sides of a thrust stage on the lower level of the Hamm Building; $1 million to build organizational capacity over seven years; $500,000 for working capital; and $500,000 for an artistic capital fund that will underwrite the new productions made possible by the operation of two theaters.

The second theater is projected to open in November 2011, and will include an art gallery and lounge.

The Next Stage expansion seeks to increase the range of work presented, from nine to 18 annual productions, providing opportunities for larger, more diverse, and younger audiences to experience more diverse and challenging plays. Annual attendance is projected to grow from the current 53,000 people to 86,000. Much of that growth, 15,000 annually, will occur among student attendees, bringing the annual number of teens served to 40,000 – one of the largest student segments of any theater in the U.S.

The larger operation will allow Park Square to employ more than its current level of 100 artists annually with improved wages and a greater selection of roles. Half of the productions in the second theater will involve collaborations of two-to-three years' duration with other theater companies.

Staffing will increase from the present 11 positions to 14 or 15.

Of the theater's more than 3,000 subscribers, 42% have been with the company for five years or more. Ticket pricing will be the same for both theater spaces.

Park Square Theatre was founded in 1974 and moved into the Hamm Building in 1995. The building also is home to The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Artists Quarter jazz club, Great Waters Restaurant, and the Meritage Restaurant.

Park Square Theatre's production of "Jacob Marley's Christmas Carol," directed by Richard Cook, will run Dec. 3-20. For tickets call 651.291.7005 or visit parksquaretheatre.org. The theater's lobby gallery currently displays original, abstract landscape paintings by Kate Pearce.

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More "stimulus" funds on way to Minnesota arts groups

2009-11-12T00:45:00.001-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

The Minnesota State Arts Board and the Minneapolis-based Arts Midwest have re-granted $361,200 to twenty-one Minnesota arts organizations to help preserve jobs that are threatened by the current economic downturn. The grantees were selected from a pool of 153 eligible applicants.

The grants are part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act / Minnesota Arts Jobs grant program. Funding for the program was provided by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, through the National Endowment for the Arts.

That economic stimulus package, passed by Congress earlier this year, included $50 million for the arts. In April, the NEA awarded 63 grants from that package, totalling $19.8 million, to state and regional agencies. In that round, the MSAB received $316,000 and Arts Midwest received $514,400. Arts Midwest allocated its funds throughout its nine-state region, and pooled its Minnesota funds with those of the MSAB.

The 21 Minnesota organizations receiving stimulus grants include the Lake Region Arts Council, Fergus Falls, $3,000; Prairie Lakes Regional Arts Council, Waseca, $10,000; Cedar Cultural Center, Minneapolis, $15,000; Commonweal Theatre, Lanesboro, $11,600; Cornucopia Art Center, Lanesboro, $13,000; Dakota Valley Symphony, Burnsville, $25,000; FutureBuilders in Support of Trollwood, Morhead, $25,000; Holmes Center, Detroit Lakes, $25,000; Juxtaposition, Inc., Minneapolis, $25,000; Kulture Klub Collaborative, Minneapolis, $19,000; Minneapolis Pops Orchestra Association, Minneapolis, $12,000; Minnesota Ballet, Duluth, $18,000; Minnesota Chorale, Minneapolis, $16,000; Nautilus Music-Theater, St. Paul, $24,000; Nordic Culture Clubs, Moorhead, $18,000; One Voice Mixed Chorus, St. Paul, $24,000; Rochester Repertory Theatre, Rochester, $12,000; Saint Francis Music Center, Little Falls, $12,000; Sounds of Hope, Ltd., St. Paul, $12,600; Zenon Dance Company, Minneapolis, $16,000; and Zorongo Flamenco Dance Theatre, Minneapolis, $25,000.

Disclosure: Gary Peterson was a member of one of two panels convened by the MSAB to review 153 applications and to recommend grants for authorization by the MSAB.

In July, 26 other Minnesota arts organizations received stimulus grants directly from the NEA totalling $1,025,000. In total, Minnesota organizations received 2.8% of the $50 million arts stimulus package.

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Tell them how to spend the arts and cultural heritage money

2009-11-11T23:14:00.006-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

The Minnesota Historical Society, Minnesota State Arts Board, and Minnesota Humanities Center invite public input for a 10-year plan and 25-year framework for how to use money made available through the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund. Input will be solicited at November listening sessions in Rochester, Minneapolis, and Marshall, and via an online survey.

Listening sessions will take place Monday, Nov. 16, 5pm-7pm, at the Heinz Center on the campus of the Rochester Community and Technical College, 851 30th Avenue SE, Rochester; Tuesday, Nov. 17, 5pm-7pm, at East Side Neighborhood Services, 1700 2nd Street NE, Minneapolis; and Wednesday, Nov. 18, 5pm-7pm, at Charter Hall on the campus of Southwest Minnesota State University, 1501 State Street South, Marshall.

Earlier sessions were held in St. Paul, Chisholm and Fergus Falls.

Members of a planning committee, drawn from 13 history, arts, cultural, and library organizations, will develop a spending plan for the Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund. The committee met Nov. 10 in Little Falls, and will meet again on Dec. 9 in Minneapolis and on Jan. 5 at a location to be determined. Its plan will be reported to the legislature by Jan. 15.

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Twin Cities dance and performance notes for November

2009-11-11T17:29:00.001-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

For a 27th consecutive year, Zenon Dance Company will present a fall season of dance in the Twin Cities. New and existing work will be displayed over two weekends, Nov. 19-29, at the Ritz Theater in Minneapolis.

In his first commission for Zenon, New York dancemaker Sydney Skybetter provides one of the program's three premieres, "The Laws of Falling Bodies," a modern work for the full-company set to music by Jonny Greenwood.

Mary Ann Bradley and Greg Waletski will dance "Here, now that you are gone," a new jazz duet by Judith James Ries, a Minneapolis-based protégé of jazz master Danny Buraczeski. The duet is set to music by Charlie Byrd, Toots Thielemans, and Stéphane Grappelli.

Emilie Plauché Flink, co-artistic director of Black Label Movement in Minneapolis, offers a new, untitled solo set to cello music composed by Michelle Kinney and recorded by the ensemble Jello Slave. Tamara Ober and Bradley will perform the work on alternate weekends.

The program also will include two revivals. "Not From Texas," a light and entertaining hoedown by Megan McClellan and Brian Sostek set to music by Lyle Lovett, and "Booba (Doll)," an Andrea Miller work to Balkan Beat Box.

The Ritz Theater is located at 345 - 13th Avenue NE, Minneapolis. Performances: Nov. 19-21 and 27-28 at 8pm, Nov. 22 and 29 at 7pm. For tickets call: 612.436.1129.

• • • • •

Led by directors Uri Sands and Toni Pierce-Sands, TU Dance will open its sixth season with three performances of four contemporary works, Nov. 20-22, at The O'Shaughnessy in St. Paul. The program will feature the first full staging since 1992 of "Dance With Army Blankets," a work commissioned from Danial Shapiro and Joanie Smith by the Alvin Ailey Repertory Ensemble.

Uri Sands will offer up two premieres: "Sense(ability) Sketch III - Earth" and an untitled duet for himself and Marciano Silva dos Santos. An earlier work, "Tones of Adney," inspired by the shifting states of a Minnesota lake, will round out the bill.

The O'Shaughnessy is located on the campus of St. Catherine's University, Cleveland and Randolph Aves., St. Paul. Performances: Nov. 20-21 at 8pm and Nov. 22 at 2pm. For tickets call 651.690.6700.

• • • • •

The Walker Art Center's annual Choreographers' Evening, curated by Olive Bieringa and Otto Ramstad, will take place in Minneapolis at the Walker's McGuire Theater, Saturday, Nov. 28 at 7pm and 9:30pm. Follow the link for the program line-up. For tickets call 612.375.7600 or online at walkerart.org/tickets.

• • • • •

In something of a family affair, the Lakeville City Ballet will present its annual, full-length production of "The Nutcracker" on Thanksgiving weekend, Nov. 28-29, at the Lakeville South High School Theater.

Artistic Director Denise Vogt provides the choreography for the production that includes spouse Rick Vogt (returning from dance retirement) in the role of Drosselmeyer, daughter Tianna, and son Anthony in the role of the Nutcracker.

In addition to students from the Ballet Royale Minnesota academy, guest artists will include Leah Gallas and Ricardo Graziano from the Tulsa Ballet (Sugar Plum Fairy and Cavalier) and Eve Schulte and Nicolas Lincoln from the James Sewell Ballet (Snow Queen and King).

The Lakeville South High School Theater is located at 21135 Jacquard Avenue, Lakeville, east of I-35 on Highway 70. Performances: Nov. 28 at 2pm and 6pm, and Nov. 29 at 1:30pm. Tickets available at the door, or in advance online at www.lakeville-rapconnect.com (click the "Programs" tab).

• • • • •

After 10+ years of planning and fundraising, ground will be broken for construction of the Minnesota Shubert Center in Minneapolis, Thursday, Nov. 19. The public is invited for remarks and the groundbreaking ceremony in the parking lot between the Hennepin Center for the Arts and the Shubert Theater, 528 Hennepin Ave., 12:30pm-1:15pm. A reception will follow in the Hennepin Center, 1:15pm-2:30pm. RSVP for the reception to 612.465.0231.

• • • • •

One of the largest dance floors in Minnesota, the historic Withrow Ballroom & Event Center will re-open late this month in Hugo/Stillwater, under the ownership of Paul Bergman. The 15,000 sq ft facility, established in 1928, has been shut down for a year. The opening weekend entertainment will include the Rockin' Hollywoods (50s dancing music), Friday, Nov. 27, 8:30pm-12:30am; Raggs featuring Todd Olson on lead vocals/sax/flute (classic rock-n-roll), Saturday, Nov. 28, 8pm-Midnight; and the acoustic slide guitar duo of the Dough Bros: Paul Mayasich and Andy Dee (country, blues, R and B, rockabilly, rock-n-roll), Sunday, Nov. 29, 3pm-7pm.

The Withrow Ballroom is located at 12169 Keystone Avenue North, Hugo, just northwest of Stillwater, Minnesota. Tickets are available at the door or by calling 651.439.5123.

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Country's Phil Vassar singing at Burnsville PAC

2009-11-10T19:37:00.006-06:00

Burnsville, Minnesota

To promote the release of his fourth album, "Prayer Of A Common Man," Phil Vassar has been traveling the country to perform in Wilmington, Tampa, Nashville, Salt Lake City, Cleveland, and many more. The tour will bring him to the main stage of the Burnsville Performing Arts Center, Saturday, Nov. 21, at 7:30pm.

After growing up poor in his native Virginia and scoring a track scholarship to James Madison University, the country singer, songwriter, and pianist worked his way up in Nashville, beginning his career co-writing songs with country legends like Tim McGraw, Jo Dee Messina, Collin Raye, and Alan Jackson. Since releasing his debut album in 2000, he has charted 18 songs on the Billboard Hot Country Songs Charts, including two at number one.

The Burnsville Performing Arts Center is located at 12600 Nicollet Avenue, Burnsville, just off I-35W at the US-13 exit. Tickets available in-person at the BPAC box office, Tue-Fri, 11am-6pm & Sat, 10am-2pm. For more information: 952.895.4680.
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ARENA Dances at The Lab Theater

2009-11-10T18:10:00.001-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

ARENA Dances by Mathew Janczewski will present its Short Fall series of modern dance performances at The Lab Theater in Minneapolis, Nov. 12-15. The program will feature three premiere works: "Huddle," a quartet for men; "Everything Reflects," a duet; and a solo by Janczewski. Two repertory works also are on deck: "Short Fall" and "I need you now to abandon me."

In addition to Janczewski, the ARENA dancers include Gabriel Anderson, Julie Brant McBride, Heather Klopchin, Stephanie Laager, Stephen Schroeder, Duncan Schultz, Sarah Steichen, and Galen Treuer.

The Lab Theater is located at 700 North 1st Street in Minneapolis. Tickets online at www.thelabtheater.org. Performances: Nov. 12-13 & 14 at 8pm; Nov. 14 at 5pm; Nov. 15 at 7pm.

Taking five with Dave Brubeck at The Dakota

2009-11-10T17:18:00.001-06:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

While one expects that Dave Brubeck and his quartet would sell out multiple performances at The Dakota Jazz Club after performing for 58 years on the world's music stages, that the legendary pianist still has it going on musically may be assumed, subject to verification. Seeing, and hearing, confirmed the faith of Twin Cities fans gathered in Minneapolis, Nov. 4, for the last of six shows over three evenings.

Holding court at the Dakota's Steinway, the 89-year-old Brubeck made playing with one hand sound like three or four, as he did in a solo containing echoes of "Sweet Georgia Brown" that morphed into interludes for bassist Michael Moore and drummer Randy Jones. This followed an opening mix featuring solos for Moore and saxophonist Bobby Militello.

Each piece mesmerized more than the last in a set that continued without interruption for nearly 100 minutes. "Over the Rainbow" opened with Brubeck on keyboard, gave way to a transcendant flute rendition by Militello, and closed with piano and flute together. In Brubeck's "Dziekuje," composed during a 1958 tour of Poland, the opening homage to Chopin evolved into a wailing sax before resolving to a finish by the group.

For an aficianado of jazz music and dance, the quartet's concluding, 2009 version of "Take Five" missed only one element: the presence of the jazz choreographer Danny Buraczeski, who created the definitive dance expression of Brubeck's classic in his 1980 work "Fission."

A boisterous and affectionate applause brought Brubeck back for whimsical solo encores, beginning with "I'm tired and I wanna go home." The audience – whose members included the Minnesota Orchestra's Osmo Vänskä, the Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra's Bill Schrickel, and veteran arts administrator Jon Lewis – then joined in to sing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" and to hum along with "Lullabye."

In a verbal valedictory, Brubeck said, "I always enjoy our concerts here, and I hope to see you all again sometime."

Brubeck will be presented with a Kennedy Center Honors medallion at a Dec. 5 dinner hosted by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. The other honorees will include the soprano/mezzo-soprano Grace Bumbry and rock-and-roll artist Bruce Springsteen, both of whom have performed in the Twin Cities in recent years. President Obama will host a White House reception for the honorees on Dec. 6, before the telecast gala from the Kennedy Center.

Performers at The Dakota Jazz Club & Restaurant in coming months will include Herb Alpert and Lani Hall, Nov. 10-11; The Bad Plus, Dec. 25-27; Mark O'Connor, Jan. 20; and Ahmad Jamal, late Feb.
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What happens to dreams when they die?

2009-10-23T11:06:00.004-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Destiny lives in the choices we make that result in dreams realized, deferred, or denied. Regardless of the intention or merit of one's choices, they often substitute for what we originally wanted, whether for ourselves or others. Ten years ago, on Oct. 24, 1999, my niece Bernadette Lewis realized her destiny in a fatal choice at a railroad crossing in Baltimore.

A barren landscape of anguish, regret, and sorrow confronted her survivors with the loss of possibility and the futility of hope. Yet, while her dreams for herself had ended, 10 years on ours for her and for ourselves have continued, changed forever by the choices she had made.

In the climactic scene of Bright Star, Jane Campion's current film about the 19th century Romantic poet John Keats, Abbie Cornish as Fanny Brawne receives news in England that Keats, her betrothed, has died at 25 in his rooms overlooking the Spanish Steps in Rome. In her grief, Cornish is wracked by the suffocating spasms of angina pectoris and cries out that "I can't breathe."

Ten years ago, I could not breathe after hearing the news of Bernadette's death, and believed I would suffocate in the middle of the night on a hillside above a lake. The intensity of my emotional turmoil in the months that followed exceeded by many factors that of the multi-year mess that had marked my coming out as a gay man many years earlier. I discerned few choices and no dreams in the wake of Bernadette's demise.

Over coffee with my friend Florence, a retired dance educator, I asked when the pain would end. "It never stops," she answered. "The intensity may diminish and surrender to time, but it will keep coming back. When it does, you need to let it wash over and through you."

Every person experiences these dynamics from a different perspective. The members of my family have made new choices and adjusted their dreams in different ways. Bernadette's mother, my sister Debra S. Lewis, published a book in 2007, Song of Bernadette: A Mother's Memoir of a Daughter.

As I have done on other occasions before and since, I entered into the loss and gradually harnessed the power of its pain, bending it to new choices in pursuit of new and old dreams.

One of the choices led to the life-changing journey of a two-week tour of Kansas in 2000. My brother joined me for a few days from his home in Denver. We met new relatives who were more excited than anyone had been to see either of us for a long time. We found the lost roots of our paternal grandfather, and from there we found a story of family, country, and dreams stretching back nearly 400 years. The outcomes of those choices led to the launch of this blog and inspiration for a future book that ties the story together.

Three years ago, when I visited Baltimore and the place where she died, I told Bernadette all the news that had happened since, and told her that as long as we all lived, so would she.

Thwarted dreams can resurge and lure us to create new possibilities, testifying to the resilience of things we do not fully comprehend, and providing evidence that while people die, dreams never do.

Bernadette "Berni" C. Lewis passed away Oct. 24, 1999. She was 26 yrs old. Berni was born in Fridley, MN on March 15, 1973. She lived in Mpls until she was 11 and moved to Kenton, Ohio, where she graduated Valedictorian from Kenton High School in 1991. She graduated from Mt. Holyoke College in South Hadley, MA in 1995 with a Biology Major. Following graduation, Berni worked at Henry M. Jackson Foundation in Rockville, MD as an AIDS researcher until 1997 when she accepted a position at the University of Maryland. Berni loved her family, her soul mate, Su-hun, her friends, her dog "Lola" and the outdoors. Her future plans were to attend Medical School and become a rural family Physician. Berni is survived by her parents, Jeffrey & Debra Lewis of Ashland, WI; her grandparents, Kenneth & Millicent Vetsch of Monticello, MN and Dr. L. Clifford & Jacqueline Lewis of Mantoloking, NJ. She also leaves her sisters, Jenine N. Lewis of St. Paul, MN and Emily J. Lewis of Ashland, WI, along with her brother, Peter E. Lewis of Ashland, WI. A Memorial Service will be held in Washburn, Wisc., on Sat., Oct. 30, 11 AM at the Messiah Lutheran Church.

Never too late for the chance of a lifetime

2009-10-20T15:57:00.351-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Is one moment of exhilaration worth the risk of a lifetime? That's the question posed by "Exit Strategy," a two-act drama that weighs the risks of grabbing for the brass ring, discovering new dreams, and learning it is never too late to take a chance.

Romantics of both active and passive dispositions will appreciate this story by Twin Cities playwrights Bill Semans and Roy M. Close. Their characters, the unrelated elders Mae and James, live on fixed incomes with much time on their hands. They are 30-days-and-waiting from being evicted from the shabby rooming house they call home. Enter Alex, a man on a mission with an intriguing proposition, who jolts awake Mae and James' very existence.

The play receives its west coast premiere at the Falcon Theatre in Los Angeles, Oct. 23-Nov. 15, under the direction of Casey Stangl. Written originally for the actors Charles Nolte, Shirley Venard, and Semans, "Exit Strategy" was first presented in Minneapolis last year at the Mixed Blood Theatre. The current, all-star cast features Debra Mooney ('Mae'), John C. Moskoff ('Alex'), and James B. Sikking ('James').

"The great thing about 'Exit Strategy,'" wrote Mpls.St.Paul Magazine, "is that it strikes such an entertaining balance between tragedy and comedy, ultimately providing a sense of reassurance that life isn't over until it's over, and until the lights go out, interesting things can still happen."

Semans and Close will attend the final preview and opening night performances in Los Angeles, Oct. 22-23. Family members joining them for the festivities include sons Andrew and Macrae Semans of New York, spouse Linda Close of Minneapolis, and daughter Maggie Close of Denver.

Semans started acting in his native Minneapolis before moving to New York in the 1960s. He returned home to found the Cricket Theatre in 1968, where he produced nearly 100 new American plays over 12 years, including works by Sam Shepard, Lanford Wilson, and David Mamet. He has written and directed eight documentary films plus one feature film, "Herman, USA." which was "appallingly unsuccessful." He is presently working on a Civil War documentary series for HBO.

Close, a Twin Cities native and graduate of the University of Minnesota, covered theater, classical music, and dance for The Minneapolis Star from 1971 to 1981, and then served as a critic and editor for the Saint Paul Pioneer Press until 1992. The Brave New Workshop staged "Lies, Lies, Lies," his 1996 musical about the newspaper business. His portfolio of short plays includes "A Postcard from the Corn Palace," "Zambezi Blue," and "Your Call Is Very Important to Us." He is currently Director of Resource Development at Artspace Projects.

A veteran of theater, opera, and film, Stangl has worked with many producing entities, including the Guthrie Theater, Denver Center Theatre Company, Minnesota Opera, Portland Opera, and, most recently, the El Portal Theater in Los Angeles. She was recognized as 2004 Artist of the Year for her work at Eye of the Storm Theater, the company she founded in Minneapolis. Her short film "C U @ ED'S" has screened at 18 film festivals, won an Audience Award at DC Shorts, and was a finalist in the USA Film Festival National Short Film Competition.

Mooney ('Mae') has enjoyed an extensive career, with Broadway performances that include "The Price," "The Odd Couple" "Talley's Folley," "Death of a Salesman," "Getting and Spending," and "Chapter Two." She has appeared all over television screens in "Everwood," "Grey's Anatomy," "Private Practice," "The Closer," "Everybody Loves Raymond," "The Practice," "Murphy Brown," "Rosanne," and "ER." Film buffs have seen her in "Domestic Disturbance," "Anastasia," "Napoleon," "Dead Poets Society," and "Chapter Two."

If you missed Moskoff ('Alex') in more than 300 television commercials, you may have seen him on "Friends," "Golden Girls," "Mad About You," "Desperate Housewives," "ER," "Brothers & Sisters," and "Everybody Hates Chris." (Among others!) He has performed in films, and on the boards on Broadway and throughout the U.S., including the role of Oscar for several productions of "The Odd Couple."

Sikking ('James') was a series regular on "Hill Street Blues," for which he was nominated for an Emmy for his role as Lt. Howard Hunter. He also was a regular on "Doogie Howser, M.D." and "Brooklyn South." His visage graced the big screen in "American Primitive," "Fever Pitch," "The Pelican Brief," and "Ordinary People." He has appeared in "The Big Knife" on the London stage, toured in "Plaza Suite," and performed in "The Price" in Washington, D.C. and "Nobody Loves an Albatross" in Los Angeles.

"Exit Strategy" runs through Nov. 15 at the Falcon Theatre, 4252 Riverside Drive, Burbank, CA. Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 4pm. Tickets $27.50-$40. Call 818.955.8101.

James Sewell Ballet's 2009-2010 Minnesota season opens Oct. 22

2009-10-16T19:10:00.003-05:00

France bestows knighthood on Minnesota's Lucia Watson

2009-10-14T18:19:00.000-05:00

Minneapolis, Minnesota

The French Ministry of Agriculture bestowed the title of Chevalier d'Ordre du Mérite Agricole on Minnesota's Lucia Watson last Friday. The author and restauranteur of Lucia's Restaurant, Wine Bar, and Lucia's To Go received the honor from Alain Frécon, Honorary Consul of France in Minnesota, at a noon luncheon and ceremony at Windows on Minnesota.

Created in 1883 to acknowledge exemplary services to agriculture, the knighthood recognizes Watson for promoting bills of fare that use fresh, locally-produced foods based in sustainable agricultural practices.

Watson, whose love of French literature and life predates her 24 years in the business of preparing and presenting food, majored in French at the University of Minnesota and lives for parts of each year at her second home in Brittany. She also serves as a director for the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), and previously served on the Organic Advisory Task Force of the Minnesota Department of Agriculture.

As the co-author of two books, Watson contributed in 1994 to "Care and Preparation of Freshwater Fish from Field to Table" with Doug Stang and Bob Piper. This was followed 10 years later by "Savoring the Seasons of the Northern Heartland," written with Beth Dooley.

The French American Chamber of Commerce of Minneapolis/St. Paul sponsored Friday's program. Its president, Jérôme Chateau, presided as master of ceremonies.

In addition to Watson, program speakers included Jim Boerboom, deputy commissioner, Minnesota Department of Agriculture; Mark Ritchie, Minnesota Secretary of State and founder/past president of the IATP; Gunnar Liden, executive director, Youth Farm and Market Project; and Jim Harkness, president, IATP.

Executive Chef Thierry Penichot presided over the menu, which included roasted breast of chicken, provided by Callister Farms, West Concord MN; braised cabbage and root vegetables; local Camembert from Alemar Cheese Company, Mankato MN; a Minnesota apple tart; and red and white wines offered by Grand-Père Wines, Minneapolis.

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President Obama speaks at the annual Human Rights Campaign Dinner

2009-10-11T11:51:00.003-05:00

Washington, D. C., Oct. 10, 2009

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