10 Questions About…

Last weekend, April 30 – May 3, spring sprouted inside and out at the Minneapolis Institute of Art (MIA) 32nd annual Art in Bloom where florists create arrangements that match, balance, mirror or somehow bounce off 150 works of art around the museum. We visited twice and I still feel like we weren’t able to take it all in but we enjoyed trying!

The first treat were the flower arrangements by Steven Ward of Arts and Flowers Design Studio around the Chinese Guardian Lions that are as sentries for the 24th Street entrance. It was also part of the MIA 52 birthday surprises. The 24th Street entrance usually feels like the gorgeous forgotten sister but for one weekend it got all dressed up in bold red and orange colors making it both welcoming and majestic.

Majesty continued with the Ojibwe Cape “bloomed” by Edge Center for the Arts, another pairing of glory. The florists did a wonderful job replicating the original in color and pattern. The florists noted that they chose the piece because of on interest in the history of Native American artwork; the created a nice homage.

Other pairings were not replications but opportunities to highlight an aspect of the work; CJ Renner and Pam Clark bloomed Vicki – I Thought I Heard Your Voice! They took the idea of Lichtenstein’s comic book Ben-Day dots (or dot matrix pattern) and replicated it is hole-punched greenery and berries. And as my 10 year old date noted, te use of green emphasizes the lack of green in the art. We liked the work even more knowing that CJ Renner creates comic books and because we had seen the International Pop Art exhibit at the Walker earlier in the day.

The Epitaph of Prince Cheng Ching was bloomed by Muse Flora and Acanthus Floral; it’s a fanciful replication with delicate white flowers representing the Kanji in the work. It was very pretty and reflective of the piece on a very surface level. The florist explained, “In my interpretation, the piece, not the person becomes the focus… The written characters are then seen for their form and not for their meaning.”

Cartonnage of Lady Tashat was bloomed by Mickey O’Kane and Kristie Harrison looked more at what was inside the art – literally. The work is a tomb with two heads in it because the tombs that are the cartonnage contain two heads. What a great way to impart new information on an artwork!

Your Dog was bloomed by Wendy Lutter and Stephanie Ross; according to my 10 year old date is was the most memorable pairing. The flowers were a designed as a well-placed fire hydrant. Very cute.

Marc Chagall’s The Poet with the Birds was bloomed by Amy Chapman, Amy Able Gardens. Their interpretation focused more on the colors. Several of the pairings were similar in their focus. The blurs of mimicking colors and smells is what really makes the Art of Bloom feel like a healthy shot of spring.

A special bonus that extends through June 21 and will be of extra appeal to younger visitors is the Microsafari. Minneapolis College of Art and Design (MCAD) student Mercedes Knapp has created tiny fanciful animals and placed them throughout the gallery. A fun addition and a great way to keep kids engaged.

Gamelan is a collection of traditional Javanese musical instruments. They are as beautiful to watch as they are to hear. There are gold colored gongs, metallophones, drums and hybrid drum-cymbals and bowed instruments. They are set up with ornate frames.

The International Novelty Gamelan is a group of six musicians: Elaine Evans, Kevin Cosgrove, Chris Parker, David Morrison, Kathy Knight and Kristen Murray. Last night they celebrated their first vinyl release: MetallaphoniaI. (It also includes an audio download. So you can use one; save the other.) The crowd was impressive for a Monday night and were attentive and appreciative. I heard someone say, “It’s like listening to elves playing in the woods.”

I don’t know about elves but there’s something about the Gamelan that feels a little magical. Like any orchestra, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. All of the members play several instruments. Because most of the instruments are percussion, it’s a lot of hitting with a mallet but also controlling the sound by carefully tempering the instrument. Each move, each sounds seems simple but somehow it all comes together with easy complexity when they play together.

They started with a song called Adding Machine. It was bright and clanging and is featured on their new release. It’s a great name in part if you picture elves in the woods playing a song called Adding Machine. And that picture captures something of the experience. There is a hint of modernity to the songs but something deeply rooted and familiar like a playground rhyme or a lullaby.

The second song was a duet of sorts with the drone band that played after them. (The drone band doesn’t have a name yet; they were an interesting mostly-brass drone band.) It was brassy with a beat; interesting to see the mash up. It was something old and something new that created a new twist to local music.

International Novelty Gamelan could play anywhere, to any age but Tuesday night folks were there to see or learn about the innovation of the old and new. And the Icehouse is notoriously a place to see off-duty musicians so I think there’s potential for the word to spread and we just might see a unique Minnesota-twanged Javanese influence spreading.

Thursday, April 16 I heard a cover of Lorde’s Royals on the trombone and I’m not even sure if that’s the best thing I heard that night. On the Third Thursday of the month, Real Phonic Radio Hour presents music at the James J Hill Reference Library. Each month is something different; April was a month of instrumental wows!

The Charlie Hunter Trio brought us Jazz – really happy, very loud Jazz with a twist of upbeat blues. Charlie Hunter plays guitar. It’s not experimental, but it’s different. He did a series of four albums, each highlighting different artists including The Cars, Hank Williams, Core Porter and Duke Ellington. And that’s the kind of range you hear on stage – everything is different with an air of familiarity – including a brief interlude from White Christmas.

Hunter also serves as the glue between Bobby Previte on the drums and Carly Meyers on the trombone. Previte played the fastest cymbals I have ever heard then turned around to treat the cymbal like a Theremin, shaping the aura of the sound without touching the instrument. He played the drum rims like a pinball machine and proceeded to play the whole stage like a drum – literally jumping down from the drums and playing any surface in his path. Meyers played Lorde on the trombone – and it was really good. What else can I say? There were songs where she nailed the circus trombone or New Orleans processional march and even a little blues but really … Lorde.

Molly Maher played serious guitar with Gabriela Sweet accompanied by JT Bates and Chris Bates. I saw them play together at the Lowertown Guitar Festival last summer too. Both accomplished guitarists. The stage looked like a very high end guitar store! Sweet played an sang a Cuban dance song; it was beautiful. She and her music seem so elegant. Maher brings an energy and an Americana sensibility and it’s fun to watch how much she loves the music and feel the contagion of the songs. They played a song by Kevin Washington that sounds like a storm rolling in featuring everyone on stage playing claps and rolls of thunder to fill the room.

Thom Middlebrook read Spring by Edna St Millay, a good reminder that while we may be happy to have April visit us “babbling and strewing flowers” that we’re still on a “flight of uncarpeted stairs” on our way to having our brains “eaten by maggots” underground. Hearing poetry read aloud is always a luxury! Middlebrook’s choices always make my MA in Literature seem almost worth it.

Bookending the night as usual was Erik Koskinen and the Real Phonic Radio Band (Paul Bergen, Frankie Lee and JT Bates). This month we got a sneak preview of his latest album, which will be released on Record Store Day at the Electric Fetus. A highlight was Will You Feel my Love, which we’ve heard rehearsed or workshopped over many months at Real Phonic shows. In fact the new release was all recorded at Real Phonic shows. It will be fun to hear.

What could bring a parochial St Paulite to Anoka? Wine, Women and Song at the Lyric Arts, a one-night celebration of Minnesota women singers featuring Tina Schlieske, Molly Maher and Katy Vernon.

Although wine and beer are served, the Lyric Arts is a theater, not a bar. It seats about 230, creating an intimate atmosphere where the music is the singular focus for the audience. Each of the artists noted that it was a unique opportunity for them hear the music in such a concentrated mode –in front of a warm (but real) audience – say as compared to playing for a toddler and a dog as Vernon noted she had also done.

I had not seen Tina Schlieske live since she fronted Tina and the B-Sides. She shared through music and stories her life before, during and after life with the B-Sides. It was interesting to learn so much about her and the songs. She sang for an hour, including new and old songs, such as Barricade, which is a nice showcase for her voice, which is both raspy and clear and very controlled.

I especially enjoyed Hustlin’ Woman Blues, originally sung by Memphis Minnie, from Schlieske’s Evil Gal Blues album, an homage to blues women. It’s a down and dirty southern blues song and Schlieske belts it out as the song deserves. As an encore, she ended with Big Sky, which was a loudly and lovingly requested and enjoyed by the audience.

Molly Maher brought a country twang and herd of guitars to the show. I see Maher every month at Real Phonic Radio, but she rarely performs there. So this was a great treat. She played with Erik Koskinen. They obviously have an easy history that makes even the new songs feel comfortable to the audience. Maher has a nice, surprisingly low voice and she has a very entertaining stage presence but it’s really her guitar-playing that shines. She plays country songs like you listened to as a kid in the backseat of a road trip and like Keat’s negative capabilities, there’s a lot to understand in the heavy pauses in a song like On Your Way Out. Then there are also songs with no pauses like Monkey with a Tambourine that’s just a lot more pure story with dance potential.

Katy Vernon began the night with her ukulele, red party dress and London accent. Before I make this comparison, I feel like I have to say that I lived in London for years, so it’s not just the accent, but in just a few songs (like Five O’Clock) she was like a less poppy Lily Allen. But there was the same wit in a line like “five o’clock somewhere comes earlier every day” a line most mothers get. Vernon does seem to bridge a folksy country sound to pop sensibility.

The night was part of a Music in the ‘Burbs series, which continues next month (April 10) with Martin Zellar. Events like that might not be enough to get me to move to the suburbs, but it does show me another perk, which I’ll add to attached garages and proper stand-up showers.

My favorite regular gig went worldly this month as Real Phonic at the James J Hill Reference Library hosted a group of eclectic artists. Headlining was Corey Harris who seems to have toes in places around the globe. He was born in Denver, busked in New Orleans, lived in West Africa and soaked up sounds wherever he went.

Harris started with rock solid blues and a song called High Fever Blues. He has the voice of someone three times his girth. He sustains the low notes of yesterday’s dreams and hits the occasional imploring notes to strike a bluesy balance.

But the tone lightens considerably with songs that have West African roots, such as an instrumental by Ali Farka Toure, a musician from Mali about which Harris wrote a book. In that and a song called Mama Africa the tone is more that of a Rastafarian rebel song. There’s a comfortable repetition and lilt.

Also playing was Paul Metzger, a musician whose work I have enjoyed often. (Metzger organizes regular shows on Thursday nights at the Khyber Pass Café.) He plays a modified 12-string banjo, sometimes with a bow, sometimes plucking and sometimes strumming . As my 10 year old date said, it’s like Edward Scissorhands playing a harp.

It is the second time Real Phonic has featured an amazing banjo. Last time Michael Rossetto played classical music on the banjo while Metzger moves from classical to old world and out there and back again. It’s intense because of the nuance, the slight movement of the bow. But it’s also loud and melodic and screeching. It sounds like a group not a solo.

The poetic interlude was Amaris Coleman, a young woman from Twin Cities Academy, with an old soul that reared it’s expressive and beautiful head as she recited I’m a Fool to Love You by Cornelius Eady. Wow! A woman that young must be dipping into past lives to be able to recite with such expression!

Bookending the evening was Erik Koskinen and the Real Phonic Band (JT Bates, Paul Bergen and Frankie Lee). It’s a sign of something when your 10 year old remarks that JT Bates plays with everyone. But she’s right. The band was in great form and we got a sneak peek at songs that will be on the Koskinen’s upcoming album, which includes songs recorded live at Real Phonic shows over the years.

Mayor Chris Coleman welcomed the crowd to Real Phonic Radio at the James J Hill Reference Library Thursday, October 16. And I have to say, our Mayor is a good sport, reading in the usual iireverant appraoch of regular spokesman, Thom MIddlebrook. He astutely observed that while we had enough entertainment for three shows in Minneapolis, it was all hitting one stage in St Paul—as it does every third Thursday.

Headlining the night was Love Over Gold, which is the combined talents of Pieta Brown, from Iowa and Lucie Thorne, originally from Tasmania, Australia. Both are singers, song writers and guitar players. Upon quick brush they seem alike—both attractive women with pretty voices who sing with a folksy Americana twang. (Maybe the Americana genre has a different name in Australia?) But at closer inspection they have very different styles. Thome has a whispery, almost husky voice. She seems to dance with her guitar to increase the vibration of sound. (An observation made by my 10 year old date.) Brown has a more subdued style and clearer, higher voice. The voices complement each other so well, adding a seemingly thoughtful dimension to their sound.

Thome writes songs about exotic places, such as Bimbaya, South Wales (population 4); while Brown writes about local haunts, such as a song about St Paul written about the time the 35W Bridge went down. Again a nice juxtaposition of stories from places as different as their voices—and yet with a similar tone and tune. To be fair, Thome also had a song about a National Park in Illinois, but framed through an Australian lens as someplace exotic. That was our favorite song as it borrowed from a Violent Femmes song we both love.

Leading up to Love Over Gold, The Icicles played; the band includes Minnesota musical stalwarts and gems—Jake Hanson, Jeremy Hanson and Jimmy Anton. They play sultry surf music. It’s like Los Straightjackets played at half speed. They have the groovy, wavy strong and by the third song the drums started to take front seat with a faster beach beat. There was something frustratingly controlled (in a good way) about their playing. Too cool for someone like me who would let loose in full speed—but again in a good way and great fit for the time and place.

Like last month, the poetry interlude was brought to us by Thom Middlebrook who read a surprisingly sad short story about a the power of a pen, found by a daughter, shared with a father representing the voice of a lost mother. The interesting question raised by the story: how dead was the mother really if her voice was still accessible to/through the daughter in the form of a quill pen.

The night began as it always does with Erik Koskinen and the Real Phonic Band, consisting last night of Paul Bergen, Frankie Lee and Jeremy Johnson. Koskinen allowed that he had just returned from a 22-hour drive home from Texas. It made for some interesting remixes of songs such as slower, darker version of Devil’s Blues.