Slam Poetry: A History

March 12, 2014, 11:56 am

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When the Commonwealth Club's Inforum division hosted a town hall meeting to discuss race relations in the Bay Area, the lineup of speakers included various performances by Bay Area poets. Using words, voice intonations and sheer emotion, the poets delivered verse that examined issues of race, poverty, gun violence, food, health and equality. We brought you one of those performances last year. This week, we're bringing you another: a performance by Sojari Bradley on gun violence.

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Addressing issues of societal concern using the spoken word format is very appropriate considering San Francisco's history. Marc Smith founded the original International Poetry Slam movement in 1987 in Chicago. However, the first National Poetry Slam competition took place in San Francisco in 1990, featuring one team from San Francisco, one team from Chicago and an individual from New York. The 2013 National Poetry Slam competition was held in Boston last summer and the 2014 competition will be held in Oakland.

Slam poetry has been especially popular among youth as a means of expression, especially with the onset of organizations such as Youth Speaks. The organization aims to empower youth to share their thoughts using slam poetry and spoken word as a means of delivery. In an interview with The Off/Page Project, a collaboration between Youth Speaks and The Center for Investigative Reporting, Josh Healey, a poet, artist and writer who lives in Oakland said,

Creative storytelling -- whether it's spoken word, music or even your crazy little blog -- is so powerful because it flips that paradigm. By telling your own personal truth, you're able to break out of the boxes and stereotypes and show us, "Hey, this is who I really am. Take a good, hard look."

Slam poetry offers the ability for a performer to connect with his/her audience in a deeper way, and allows the performer to articulate a set of emotions and thoughts succinctly using the power of voice and words. It's also a platform that goes beyond creative expression. Just like any art form, slam poetry and spoken word allow the artist to talk about social issues and social change. As Healey noted,

...In terms of social change, storytelling can get us beyond the talking points of this or that "issue" to connect with people's deeper feelings and emotions. People don't want to hear about "health care," but they do want to hear about your aunt Stacy who had to sell her mom's wedding ring to pay for her cancer treatments. Use your story to change THE story. Boom.

Take a listen to Sojari Bradley's poetry in the video above and share your thoughts below.

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The New Mongrels: A Resurrection of an Old Idea

March 12, 2014, 12:04 pm

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The New Mongrels, a collective musical society, have a long history that goes back to the Civil War. As the story goes, a soldier named Henry Brooke who came back from the bloody war shell-shocked and deaf in one ear had an idea. The plan was to promote joy through song that unified all creatures -- men, women, as well as dogs. This might sound a bit quirky, but in 1866, Henry was granted a charter by Smythe County, Virginia and the members set out drinking and singing promoting the moral code of their founder intermittently until the early 1940s. Okay, so this was a long time ago, but what about now? It so happens that Henry's great-great grandson, Haynes Brooke decided to resurrect the collective energy and creative spirit of the organization established by his kin roughly 150 years ago.

Using the original by-laws from the 1866 Smythe County charter, Haynes set out to invite like-minded musicians to join this collective endeavor with him at the helm as coordinator at least on this latest effort. The trick was to keep its members committed and connected. With the help of technology, the New Mongrels have managed to draw-in an array of musicians from around the states with a focus on community, celebration and spontaneity. And although one must be invited into the organization, membership doesn't mean giving up solo work. Their current sound is folk; albeit, the group's goal is to remain diverse. After all, just like mongrels, music is a crossbreed. There are no strict performance standards, but Haynes recognizes that new blood is the best way to keep the sound aligned with the 21st century.

At present, the 13-member ensemble has put a new album together, Raised Incorruptible, which includes 14 tracks that deal with the interplay between the inevitable downfalls in life followed by heaven-sent upswings. Haynes is the songwriter/producer on this effort, but he admits that coordinating the motley of talent involved in this project would have seemed a bit unruly without the flexibility of Kubilay Uner as co-producer.

Although long, the vocal layering and multi-instrumental arrangements on this album show off the member's musicianship and scope of influences. Overall the tracks might trigger off a dash of déjà-vu since the soundscape can be linked to folk artists of the '60s and '70s like Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young as well as some Joni Mitchell or Joan Baez.

Raised Incorruptible starts off with the folksy, sweet voice of a female lead singer, complemented by violin, acoustic guitar and drums as she reminds us that we can't hold on to time. The track that follows "Love It Madly" opens with acoustic guitar and violin before the spiritual voice of Haynes comes in. Voice layering adds texture to this track before it tapers into some impressive horns. This song particularly touches the heart with its minimalistic message of the loving spirit we all have. But it's the next track "Raised Incorruptible" that makes this album shine with its abstract biblical impression which is spiritually awakening.

Another highlight on this album is the Dylan-esque track "Freedom" written as an ode to Haynes' late friend Thor Hesla who died in Afghanistan. This song is mournful in a celebratory way and reminds us of the group's initial mission seeded about 150 years ago -- the joyful promotion, through song and rhythmic utterance, of a unified moral code for all creatures.

Unfortunately, Raised Incorruptible was a little too ambitious. Past the mid-point of this album, the tracks begin to lose their spunk and ends with a very short instrumental piece that feels like an afterthought. Perhaps, if they had invited in more creatures, the momentum would have kept flowing in a joyful and unified way.

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You can stream The New Mongrel's Raised Incorruptible on Soundcloud and BandCamp.

The Art of Coming Out: "Nate & Me"

March 12, 2014, 12:04 pm

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Self portrait (Matthew Pillsbury) contemplating Wapiti, Museum of Natural History, 2004

As many of my gay brothers and sisters know, coming out is not an easy process. Some of us come out at a very young age, some during our early adulthood and then there are those who struggle with this process and come out much later in their journey. Artist and photographer Matthew Pillsbury didn't come out until the age of 30 -- and when he did, it was both painful and exciting. After years of marriage, Mr. Pillsbury met and fell in love with Nathan Roland and subsequently left his wife and came out as a gay man.

Through a beautiful and provocative exhibition of black and white photos entitled, "Nate & Me", currently on view at the Sasha Wolf Gallery through April 20, 2014, Mr. Pillsbury shares his journey and newfound sexuality with the world. Even though Matthew shares a great deal of his coming out process through these amazingly descriptive photos, I couldn't help but dig a little deeper.

1) Why did you feel it was important not only to document your coming out experience, but most importantly to share this process with the world?

I didn't set out to document my coming out experience. It was only now that looking back on it I see much of the work I made at the time was a reflection of what was going on in my personal life. I was married so my coming out caused a lot of pain and anguish to my wife, our families and our friends. I see that anguish in pictures like self portrait contemplating wapiti. The weight of the emotions are literally slumping my shoulders and I feel like the animal is calling out to give me courage. Simultaneously I was also experiencing the excitement and relief of finally being able to live my life openly. My excitement of meeting Nate is also visible in my work -- I started making pictures of him -- often naked or while having sex with him as a reflection of my own desires. In making these pictures I was also wanting to make the relationship permanent and assert to myself if no one else -- that this mattered and I was no longer ashamed. There's an obvious societal respect and power given to your married spouse that was certainly unimaginable for gay couples even as recently as 2004 when I came out. Besides assuaging my own desire to photograph him, making these pictures was away of establishing his role in my life and sharing it with the world.

2) Did you ever have second thoughts about this project either during or after?

If i had any fears it would be that in sharing this work being gay would become the defining attribute of my work. I think many gay people struggle with how important being gay is to their identity. We are seeing actors and now athletes who don't want to be known as "the gay athlete" or the "the gay actor" but merely as accomplished people in their field who also happen to be gay. I certainly don't think that being gay is the most important aspect of my work as an artist or even my identity as a person but it's a big part of both and I'm excited to share it more publicly.

3) Has your ex-wife seen these photos and if so what are her feelings?

I don't know... She was justifiably very hurt by my actions and we are no longer in contact.


Nathan Noland, Grand Hyatt Tokyo, CNNJ, Tuesday, February 7th, 2005 5:08-5:23AM

4) How does your partner Nate feel about your private life being made so public through your work?

Nate and I broke up five years ago. We remain very close friends and collaborators. While our relationship is no longer romantic or sexual in any way he continues to work with me. He was very comfortable with these pictures being shown and I think is flattered by the attention. The picture of him shaving is in the collection of the Guggenheim Museum while the one of him playing his game boy in the collection of the MFA Boston. He likes thinking of his pictures sitting amongst their treasures. I am very fortunate that my partner, Ferratti Valerio, has not only welcomed Nate's ongoing role in my life as a friend and collaborator but was also comfortable with me showcasing this work that documents our romantic and sexual history.

5) What do you hope the audience will take from their intimate experience of your work?

I'm often reluctant to talk openly about what my work means to me. I think that all good work is open to many interpretations and I'm more interested in hearing what other people have to say and what the work means to them. Much of my work has addressed the growing role that technology is playing in our daily lives. With this show I'm highlighting that many of the photographs are also a highly personal look at my life. Looking back on when I started making these pictures I was in the closet and had never had my work shown. Ten years later I have had many shows and am openly living my life as a gay artist. If anyone living the closet looks at this period of my life i hope they are inspired and see that it does get better when you start living openly.


Sitting on the High Line, 2011

6) As photography continues to claim it's rightful place in the art world - what kind of collector are you expecting to gravitate towards this work? Or is this even something you think about?

Over the past decade I am lucky enough to have gained some devoted collectors. Besides supporting my work they have shared ideas, appeared in photos themselves and propelled my work further by facilitating my projects in London, Venice, Paris and currently Tokyo, where I am beginning a new series of work in March. However, in making the photographs I only try to please myself. I'm often surprised by the pictures that have proven popular and confused that others have never found their audience. I don't think it would be productive to try and anticipate their reactions.

7) As this series "Nate & Me" only consist of 11 photos will this be a conversation you plan on expanding through your work??? Or is this the last time we will be seeing Nate?

The show is an edit of my work that showcases these 11 pictures but there are more photographs of him taken over the past decade. As we continue to be friends and work together, I anticipate that you will continue to see more pictures of Nate for years to come. And of course more pictures of Mr. Ferratti.

All photos courtesy of Matthew Pillsbury

Paparazzi: Was It Rape?

March 12, 2014, 12:13 pm

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Photo (c) Jean Pigozzi/Centre Pompidou-Metz


Was it rape?

Or was it art? And when?

A strange and strangely provocative spring exhibit on the century long history of Star Photography and photographers -- or Paparazzi as Frederico Fellinni named them -- has taken over the Pompidou Museum of Modern Art's Metz branch an hour and a quarter east of Paris.

Paparazzi? Why would I -- or you -- care about these scabrous scum who devote their lives to sleaze, tracking celebrities and publishing their images in, at best, People or Paris Match or more often in rags like National Enquirer? One answer, as the Pompidou exhibit points out, is that in a world of failing print journalism, the Paparazzi rags are among the few that still thrive. More important is how Paparazzi photography has changed how we all see and feel about ourselves, how their wide-angle and close-up photo-technology has changed the nature of visual art the globe over, how the subjects of the Paparazzi -- actors, princesses and politicians -- have increasingly adopted celebrity photography, and how contemporary visual artists have forced all of us, in the age of Facebook Pix, to question whether we still possess any interior soul or reality.



Start with rape and other sorts of violence, not least the death of Diana on August 31, 1997 in a Paris car crash when a flock of Paparazzi were trailing her in hot pursuit. As Pompidou curator Clément Chéroux notes, the Paparazzi have overwhelmingly been aggressive men and their targets have overwhelmingly been women. The blinding flashes, the aural clamor, the Paparazzi's blank checks to hire hovering helicopters and rent surveillance apartments, Clement says, constitute patent aggression if in a less lethal form than the one that ended Diana's life.

But the Paparazzi story doesn't stop there. The infamous series of images published by Playmen and Hustler of the nude Jackie Kennedy in her Scorpio retreat, presented in the show, were certainly shameless invasions of her privacy. But the photos of Liz Taylor and Richard Burton in their limousines? Of Britney Spears spreading her slipless legs bare to the shaved off bush as she leaves her limo? Of Paris Hilton displaying her bare nipple at the beach? Who, as cultural tides shifted, was using whom?


Death Photos of Elvis, John Lennon and François Mitterand

By the time we arrive at the tacky presidency of Silvio Berlusconi, the entire game has changed as the hair-transplanted commander of Forza Italia plainly invites the Paparazzi to trail him in his bathrobe -- just as the world's current autocrat-in-chief, Vladimir Putin, bares his breast and biceps on horseback and or with fishing pole for a pre-selected band of Paparazzi. Hundreds of images fill the walls of the Pompidou's third floor to document their histories and ours as the relentless spectators of life, sex and death -- even as we ordinary mortals take on the gestures of the stars placing hats and hands out, celebrity-style, to draw attention to ourselves. Doubtless many visitors will ask why a major museum would bother with such patently cheesy images -- to which curator Clément Chéroux answers simply that art museums can no longer pretend just to lecture their public about what is a masterwork: "I wanted to open up the idea of what photography is and what it can do and not leave photographic art solely in the terrain of what Diane Arbus does. We should not lecture. We should provoke our visitors to question what they see."


Image (c) Alisson Jackson/Pompidou-Metz

Photography, declared Honoré de Balzac toward the end of his life, risks nothing less than the destruction of the soul, as image by image it peels away our surfaces as like an onion, until we are left with nothing inside, graveyard ghosts who have been sucked dry by the machinery of modern marketing. The Paparazzi, this show argues, are simply our hirelings in this desperate game of distraction and self promotion.

Or are they? Increasingly fine photography collectors have come to treasure the refined skill they applied to their visual documentation. And a growing number of artists have taken the flat emptiness of their images, itself a product of the massive wide-angle lenses attached to their cameras and turned it inside out. Among the best on show are the many pieces made by Alison Jackson, a British artist, who has hired celebrity look-alikes of stars and politicians, staged them in plausible settings and then made grainy on-the-run style candid images demanding that we as viewers excavate the myths we have created for ourselves.

Will Eno's Comedy of Discomfort: The Open House

March 12, 2014, 12:52 pm

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What to do about the American family? Depending on where you stand, the poor thing needs to be either preserved in its traditional form or extensively modernized. And what about the American family drama? Admittedly a less pressing concern, it too is defended from one side and decried from another. At least one critic I could name feels the family drama was okay for Eugene O'Neill, began to wear out its welcome with Arthur Miller, and was completed, perfected and finished off in Sam Shepard's Buried Child (1978), only to return as a theatrical version of the undead.

The solution, for both the family and the family drama, may be to get rid of them. That's essentially what Will Eno does in an anarchic and deliciously clever play called The Open House, running at the Signature Theatre through March 30. As it begins, we see what looks like a family, embroiled in what seems to be a drama, but those impressions change. The show can be read as a comic reversal of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, in which the pod people come first and are gradually replaced. The five family members we meet at the outset are creatures of habit and genetics, stuck in their ways. The father either dominates by sniping at everyone else or withdraws into silence; his wife tries to be supportive and conciliatory, etc. Dad is literally stuck -- he's confined to a wheelchair -- and the other four remain nearly as frozen in place as he is.



In a way, they're soulless or dehumanized. None of them refer to one another by name; even the pooch who runs off at the beginning is mentioned only as "the dog." Nor is the location identified. Although you might, by the end, see a resemblance to the estate in The Cherry Orchard, it's basically an Everytown USA, as universally American as Grover's Corners in Our Town.

The original quintet also lacks shoes; Dad's in slippers, the kids are in their socks, etc. This may be a nod by Eno or by the show's director, Oliver Butler, to a recent fad in Brooklyn (where Eno lives) but is probably just one of the few signs that these people actually feel at home and at ease.

It's hard to decide how much to say about The Open House. When there's pleasure to be had in any work of art or entertainment, part of it usually comes from discovering how the experience unfolds. That's especially true for this play, which is why I've avoided being very specific. If you think I'm being cryptic, you should see what Signature says about it in the overview on its website.

Here's an example of the show's humor. When Dad's brother declares, "They said I was a fool to study Latin, but where are they now?," he's promptly quashed by Dad's answer -- "Probably at work." That's a snappy comeback, but it carries a little jolt of pain.

In The Open House, Eno is working with the comedy of discomfort, which at any given moment -- and probably from one performance to the next -- can be awful, hilarious, or an uneasy mix of the two. Maintaining a flexible tone and pace that allows for all these responses is the challenge that faces the five players, Hannah Bos, Michael Countryman, Peter Friedman, Danny McCarthy and Carolyn McCormick. Under Butler's guidance, they bring it off masterfully. If the typical family were so smoothly functional, or the typical family drama were this imaginative -- but that's like saying, "If pigs had wings..."

Photograph by Joan Marcus.

I Testify for Increasing Our City's Cultural Affairs Budget -- Join Me

March 12, 2014, 2:41 pm

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It is fiscal year 2015 budget season for the City of New York and time for all of us to make the case for arts and culture funding. The year began with the release of a Financial Plan, Fiscal Years 2014-2018, which includes a $149 million preliminary fiscal year 2015 expense budget for the Department of Cultural Affairs (DCLA), consistent with a financial plan released in November. The season continues with hearings by the New York City Council and the work of advocates, like you, to educate our legislative representatives on the importance of DCLA support and of arts and culture to all New Yorkers before a budget is adopted.

I, for one, advocate increasing the DLCA budget over prior years so the agency might include new groups in its funding portfolio and help currently funded groups scale up their delivery of public value. An increased allocation to DCLA could help arts and culture to better serve more New Yorkers in more of our geographies and contribute to a more equitable New York.

I offer the new Administration and City Council data in support of this request. Take, for instance, a State of NYC Dance report commissioned by the organization I run, Dance/NYC, based on the Cultural Data Project (CDP), and prepared with Fractured Atlas. Its findings show us the importance of City funding to eligible 501(c)(3) dance organizations. The City is the most substantial source of government funding for organizations in nearly every budget range, accounting for 46 percent of the total allocation of government funds, and helping to generate thousands of performances locally, millions of paying attendees, and $251 million in aggregate expenditures.

CDP trend data over a two-year period also indicate increased City investment (of 23 percent) in the smallest dance groups -- those with budgets of less than $100,000 -- contributing to a strong start-up culture and the future of the art form.

I invite City leadership not only to study the hard data that demonstrate healthy returns, but also to reflect on the multiple and alternative personal stories of why arts and culture matter to New Yorkers -- from families lifted up in the wake of Superstorm Sandy to small business owners whose livelihoods are supported by our audiences.

As part of a new visibility campaign, NEW YORKERS FOR DANCE, Dance/NYC has issued an open call for the filming of personal video statements on the role of dance in legislative districts in all five boroughs. I invite you to consider having Dance/NYC film your statement for release this budget season. (To learn more, visit DanceNYC.org and read The New York Times' "Bringing New York City Dance Into the Limelight.")

While my day job is to advocate for dance and New York's unique role as a dance capital, I recognize that the arts and culture work better as one, and I join my fellow advocates in advancing their agendas and a DCLA budget that will better serve all New Yorkers. Some of the recent efforts to which I have committed and encourage you to explore include: Arts and Culture for a Just and Equitable City, Center for Arts Education's Candidate Engagement Project, and One Percent for Culture. (Full disclosure: I am a member of the steering committee for the New York City Arts Coalition and of the advisory group for One Percent for Culture.)

I also recognize that as City leadership works toward adopting a fiscal year 2015 budget, they must weigh multiple funding priorities. I offer a vision for the City where the arts and culture are not viewed in isolation but as being reciprocally linked with society, and where they can be included as solutions for other priority issues -- for instance, jobs and economic development, equality for all, safety, sustainability and resilience. In addition to requesting an increase to the DCLA budget, I encourage our leadership to identify alternative sources of funding and resource provision for the arts and culture.

I thank the City leadership for the preliminary budget and its commitment to ending the "budget dance," referencing sizable movement from proposed cuts to subsequent restorations during recent budget cycles. With the preliminary budget as it stands, those of us working in arts and culture are already better prepared to plan for the future than we have been at this point in recent years.

Advocacy for the DCLA budget and other causes requires our individual and collective action. Please join me in acting on opportunities to speak up and be heard. Consider connecting with your legislative representatives, telling your friends and colleagues, and driving the conversation online @DanceNYC #newyorkersfordance.
With your help, I know we will succeed in keeping DCLA vibrant.

A version of this blog was presented as testimony to the New York City Council Committee on Cultural Affairs, Libraries, and International Intergroup Relations on March 11, 2014.

How the Internet Reshaped My Career

March 12, 2014, 3:11 pm

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I was on a major label for many years, and I only knew one way to make music: follow the template that has been in place for years, and work within the system the music industry was built upon. But after years of not having any records released, my label and I decided to part ways, which left me in an incredibly unique position. Due to numerous stipulations and overrides, I couldn't just go out and sign another major record deal. I was at a place where the standard music-industry template that the large majority of the music industry had always followed was no longer an option for me. Realizing I couldn't navigate the old system without a traditional label, I was forced to step out of my comfort zone to continue my career. I had to find a way to continue doing what I love without the luxury of a "system" to follow. It was both an exciting and scary place to be.

Over the years I had built up an amazing fan base on my label, but I was not sure how to reach them outside the conventional methods. Slowly I started to realize the power of the Internet. I began posting on social platforms and writing for blogs, and I began to see that the "brand" of Jo Dee Messina was still alive and well online. People recognized the name and found it relatable and real. And then it hit me: I didn't want to just make a record -- I wanted to make a record with the people.

Through posting songs on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other social tools, I was able to get direct input from fans, and they would give me a thumbs up or thumbs down on whether or not they thought a song should be on my new album. Putting the album together was a lengthy process, and when I finally compiled enough songs to make an album, I then had to find a way to fund it. Luckily, my 19-year-old cousin Alex Preston was living at my house during this time and suggested doing a Kickstarter campaign. After researching, I was intrigued by the idea of again going directly to my fans and audience to make the record.

Over the first two weeks of the 30-day Kickstarter campaign, my audience was confused, and we weren't raising much money at all. It was new for me, and it was new for them. After a lot of back and forth explaining why and how we were doing this campaign, it finally clicked. Not only did I surpass my goal, but by raising $121,000, I ended up with the largest Kickstarter music project to come out of Nashville.

Things didn't end with the Kickstarter campaign, though: I also used the Internet to allow the public to pick the name of my album, my label logo was created by a girl on Twitter, and through a Facebook poll my fans picked the first single. There was no army of record executives or public-relations managers standing in my way of reaching the public. I simply had to go online, and the people showed up.

I now use the Internet in every aspect of my career. When I am reaching out to specific markets, we run campaigns to sell tickets. When booking shows, we use analytics from YouTube to see where people are watching our videos, and we go to them. We use social media to rally people to thank their radio stations for playing my music. We engage the public and let their voice be heard.

People who were once out of reach are now reachable. I can talk with my fans, learn from them, and create with them, and in return they share with their friends and communities what we are creating. A complete artistic existence is possible by reaching a worldwide audience through social platforms. It's been a fascinating experience. Sometimes people don't understand when I tell them my vision. I think it's because they have the luxury of functioning within the old paradigm that I and many artists like me are no longer a part of.

The Internet allows artists and fans alike to remove intermediaries, who have often hidden or obscured great music, keeping artists from reaching their potential fans. It's a blessing that I can reach out to those who support my music and let them be a part of this wonderful journey.

A Dozen Music Choices for All Ages

March 13, 2014, 4:55 am

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This week, South by Southwest (SXSW) in Austin, Texas offers attendees the opportunity to explore the future of the music industry by giving a platform to over 2,200 music acts on over 100 stages. As SXSW kicks off, AARP has started developing several exciting music projects for launch in 2014. One of the projects, "Concerts for All Ages," will bring music lovers great new music in an online series. The list encompasses some of the dream bands for the inaugural season of the show and some of the best new music to fall in love with this year. Stay tuned on the @AARPMedia twitter feed, to find out more about the upcoming series.

This list contains only twelve extraordinary bands and musicians. Since everyone has their own opinion of what constitutes great music, please share yours with AARP on twitter by tweeting to @AARPMedia or in the comments section below, and your choices may be featured in a future AARP endeavor. Many of the finds came to us from NPR Music, Paste Magazine, the Newport Folk Festival and SXSW. Here's the list in alphabetical order:

ONE: Nicki Bluhm and the Gramblers
Nicki Bluhm and the Gramblers gained attention with fantastic video cover songs recorded in their van, the most popular of which has landed them plaudits from the duo they covered, Hall and Oates. But they have evolved into their own California band with the country-rock sound made famous by such stalwarts as the Eagles, Fleetwood Mac and Jackson Browne. In 2013 they put out their first full length, self-titled album. It'll no doubt be the first of many more albums.



TWO: Hurray for the Riff Raff
After listening to Alynda Lee Segarra and her band play the Newport Folk Festival online then saw them live at the Kennedy Center Millennium Stage in 2013, I realized how phenomenal they were. The Bronx born Segarra, a singer-songwriter of Puerto Rican descent, who ended up in New Orleans, has taken folk and Americana and turned it on its head. When I saw her at the Kennedy Center she talked about folk music history and then played a traditional "murder ballad" she had written from a different perspective than the folk music tradition normally demanded.

The first time I heard this band, I had been checking out the lineup for the Newport Folk Festival for 2013, and they didn't quite click for me. But I had just seen a web video that wasn't their best work. Segarra looks a bit like comedian and actress Aubrey Plaza, known for playing the character April Ludgate on the hilarious television show Parks and Rec. But there's nothing funny about the gorgeous sounds her band of riff raff have created. Buy their music here.



THREE: Jay Z
My dad, a Brooklyn born AARP member and music lover, is a Jay Z fan. Like me, he has no sense of rhythm. But Jay Z, also known as HOVA, the Jigga man, and a few other names, moves him. He also moves me. As he matures and grows, even as he embraces performance art, becomes more of a businessman, gets known as a family man, rather than a just as a young rapper with some sweet rhymes from the Marcy Projects, his music remains filled with beats and rhymes that many can get behind. As 2014 passes and Generation X begins maturing to their AARP eligibility age beginning in 2015, I suspect Jay Z's music will be present, even if his rhymes touch on artists, turkey bacon and family instead of just drugs, girls, and bragging.* Magna Carta Holy Grail, Jay Z's 2013 album, remains, like Jay, solid, and something great to listen to. He'll also reportedly be at SXSW this week.

*Beyoncé, Jay's spectacular wife, with whom he fell crazy in love almost ten years ago, will always be welcome at AARP too--any time she'd like to come by. There's definitely an argument to be made for the lady also known as Queen Bey here on this list as well.



FOUR: Lake Street Dive
Like Nicki Bluhm and the Gramblers, Lake Street Dive gained popularity through videos of cover songs and have a lead female vocalist. But the comparisons stop there. NPR says "this classically trained band blends jazz, folk, and pop in dangerously charming fashion." That's about as accurate as can be. Lake Street Dive plans to release a new album in 2014, but for now you can check out what they have to offer in their store.



FIVE: John Legend
I first saw John Legend in Boulder, Colorado in 2007. The now somewhat famous Robin Thicke opened for him and the contrast could not have been starker. Thicke's voice cracked and he looked like someone doing an incredibly poor imitation of Mr. Legend or another talented singer. Then John Legend came on stage and just made Mr. Thicke look like he might just want to look for a new career. But it was never a competition. Even though Mr. Thicke had a poppy number one song this year that at a minimum lifted heavily from a Marvin Gaye influence, Mr. Legend continues to churn out songs that should stand the test of time as his talent will undoubtedly do.

In 2013 Legend released a new record, "Love In The Future," and it's fantastic, just as his fans have come to expect. Though Mr. Thicke may have gotten slightly better since that night in Boulder, it shouldn't be too long before the likes of Robin Thicke look to lift riffs from the likes of John Legend. Legend's Love in the Future builds upon his impressive catalogue.



SIX: The Lone Bellow
Fans might as well have been seeing the Beatles for the first time on both occasions I saw this band in 2013. From kids to people who could have been AARP members, lots of folks literally became fanatic while watching the Lone Bellow perform. The core band members, lead singer and principal songwriter Zach Williams, Brian Elmquist, and Kanene Pipkin, had just as much energy as the fans.

The trio, who sound a bit like popular folk-rock-Americana artists The Lumineers, The Avett Brothers, and Mumford and Sons seem destined to vault to similar popularity. When they played at Wolf Trap as an opening band this past summer they came off stage to speak to fans at the end of their performance and the line to spend a moment with the trio stretched around the a good bit of the large outdoor venue. Next summer they may not have time to meet every fan as their popularity grows, but I suspect they'll try to. Their self-titled album is available anywhere you can find music. Get it and enjoy it as much as I do.



SEVEN: Lucius
The rock band Lucius has received well-deserved hype from a multitude of music critics, none of whom have anything but praise to offer. The two identically attired front women, Jess Wolfe and Holly Laessig, can belt them out. This fall they released their first full length album. I first heard them on NPR's Tiny Desk Concert series and immediately viewed the brief set several times. Then I began showing it to anyone who would watch.

I saw them at a sold out show at the Rock and Roll Hotel in Washington, DC, and they weren't exactly what I expected-- they were even better. They rocked when I expected them to have a softer sound, but for a grand finale they came off the stage out in to the middle of the audience and sang softly, without any microphones. No one seemed disappointed with any of their gorgeous songs judging by the throngs who flocked to buy the album, Wildewoman (pronounced Will-duh-woman) after the show.

At the show I met a woman who grew up in Texas with one of the three identically dressed guys in the band. She said that the band had stayed in her apartment until this trip when they'd visited DC. I hope they're already getting to live like the rocks stars they're destined to become. Get Wildewoman and other merchandise here.



EIGHT: Pearl and the Beard
I saw Pearl and the Beard open up for one of the bands my wife and I count among our favorites, The David Wax Museum, several years ago at the 9:30 Club and have been pleased to follow their progress. The Brooklyn based trio, Jocelyn, Jeremy and Emily all list their glasses as instruments on their Facebook page. Emily told me the three met at an open mic in Brooklyn but their sound and their bond onstage make them feel as though they met as kids.

What sets the three apart, aside from the possible rule that they don't allow each other to wear contact lenses, is the two women, one man harmonies. They plan on releasing a new album in 2014. Buy their current stuff here.



NINE: Shovels and Rope
My mother-in-law Valarie, a proud AARP member from New Braunfels, Texas, where she listens to KNBT radio and sees shows at least several times a week at Texas' oldest dancehall, Gruene Hall, told my wife and I about this husband and wife duo. As much as many of the other bands on this list are in synch with each other, these two Americana performers have amazing chemistry. But theirs is grittier around the edges, and their sound gives some listeners the feeling they may fall apart at the seams at any moment. Their single "Birmingham" is about their courtship and marriage to each other. Buy their music here.



TEN: Spirit Family Reunion
After also playing the Newport Folk Festival this past summer, this band went on a tour with Hurray for the Riff Raff sponsored by the outstanding Paste magazine, where the man who curates the Newport Folk Festival, Jay Sweet, also works as Editor at Large. I had a similar reaction to this band that I initially had to Hurray for the Riff Raff until I realized I couldn't get the song "I'll Find a Way" out of my head and I loved every second of it. The Spirit Family Reunion say they "play homegrown American music to stomp, clap, shake and holler with." I say next time they're in town, I'll find a way to see them.



ELEVEN: Typhoon
I first saw the thirteen or so members of Typhoon in 2011, and then again in their hometown of Portland, Oregon in 2012 at the MusicfestNW. The musicians, who all attended high school together, build most of their songs from a whisper to a monsoon of instrumentation that includes horns, strings, multiple drummers, and often a toy piano. They released the full length White Lighter in 2013.

When seeing them on a computer monitor, you may wonder how they all manage to fit on the screen at the same time. The band has a momentum that propels their joyous music, often with sad lyrics, to excellence for your ears.



TWELVE: Walt Wilkins and the Mystiqueros
Another AARP member and music lover, my father in law Randy, who spends many of his evenings going to see bands with my mother in law, could not stop talking about Walt. AARP shot a pilot episode of the Concerts for All Ages series with Walt and his band that should be available in 2014. Filmed at the amazing Mansion on O Street, the band gave an intimate, incredible performance that sounded perfect. The front man Walt Wilkins has a passing resemblance to the character Jeff Bridges played, Bad Blake, in the hit film Crazy Heart. His talent and the Austin band's talents seem limitless.

Wilkins also writes and produces for other musicians as do some of the others in the band. Corby Schaub, who plays guitar, was in the movie Crazy Heart as part of the band backing the fictional Bad Blake. In 2014 I missed it but for the last two years, with my wife's family, I've seen Walt Wilkins and the Mystiqueros play a four hour set of originals and a few covers that run the gamut from rock to Americana to a little bit country on New Year's Day at Gruene Hall's annual Hair of the Dog celebration. The Mystiqueros also have a 2013 album called Wildcat Pie & the Great Walapateya, and in addition to Walt, many of the other guys have great side projects as well. Bill Perry, Jimmy "Daddy" Davis, and Ray Rodriguez make up the rest of the band in addition to Walt and Cory.

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BONUS MUSIC:
Paul McCartney, The Rolling Stones, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, and Elton John
It's not like they need the publicity, but all four of these rock legends had new albums come out recently. Bruce has another new album that came out in January. All of them also recently toured, and they put on fantastic shows that didn't need any of the pyrotechnics that come as part of the package with a modern stadium show. The real fireworks came with their amazing song catalogues and the energy they had on stage for hours. These guys may have lost a step or two, but they've all still got it. If you've never seen them and you like their music, go see them when they hit the road.

The Milk Carton Kids
These guys had a new album out in 2013. Their voices sound so much like Simon and Garfunkel and their songs play so well, that if I had chosen thirteen bands, they'd have been on the list. Try the songs Michigan and Honey, Honey for an introduction to this phenomenal duo.

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6 West Coast Roadside Art Installations Worth a Pit Stop

March 13, 2014, 7:34 am

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When it comes to classic travel, there is nothing that screams Americana more than a road trip. With the wide open road, the freedom of dictating your own schedule and the potential to discover the country's hidden gems, it's no surprise that this is one type of travel that has lasted the test of time.

To make the most of your road trip, it's important to know where to find hidden gems along the roadside -- for those of you on the West Coast and Texas, these side-of-the-road art installations are for you:

1. The Beer Can House, Houston
This folk art house was built by homeowner John Milkovisch. He dedicated years of his life to covering his home with beer cans, bottles and other beer paraphernalia -- a testimony to a particular hair-of-the-dog habit and unique perspective on recycling.

• How to get there: The Beer Can House is between Washington Avenue and Memorial Drive in the Rice Military section of Houston -- just about 10-minute drive west of downtown. Road trippers can continue west and make it to San Antonio within three hours, or head just over five hours east to New Orleans.

2. Cadillac Ranch, Texas
Cadillac Ranch was built in the 1970s by a group of hippies from San Francisco called The Ant Farm. The cars are constantly changing as visitors are encouraged to add their own signature flair to the art piece -- so make sure to bring a can of spray paint!

• How to get there: Cadillac Ranch is off the side of I-40 in Amarillo. Less than 10 minutes from old Route 66, this area offers tons of road trip history. Within four hours is Albuquerque to the west and Oklahoma City to the east on I-40, the third-longest major nationwide highway that spans from California to North California.

3. Salvation Mountain, Niland, Calif.
Fans of "Into The Wild" should recognize this one -- near Slab City in Calipatria, Calif., the decorated mountainside has become iconic for wanderers and free spirits. Resident Leonard Knight is responsible for creating the site, which features many religious icons and verses.

• How to get there: Niland is about 2.5 hours northeast of San Diego. Road trippers can visit over a weekend by starting in Los Angeles, driving west through Palm Springs down to Niland. From there, you could head back west to San Diego or journey on to Phoenix, less than four hours east.

4. Queen Califia's Magical Circle, San Diego
French artist Niki de Saint Phalle is known for her large sculptures, and Queen Califia's Magical Circle showcases this as well as her intricate mosaic work.

• How to get there: Off the 15 in Escondido, this roadside attraction is located in Kit Carson Park. A 30-minute drive from downtown San Diego and under two hours from Los Angeles, this artist's haven is a perfect stop along a California-wide road trip.

5. Porter Sculpture Park, Montrose, S.D.
An unusual sighting among the flatlands of South Dakota, this sculpture park adds a whimsical flair to the prairie. The junk art statues were created by South Dakotan artist Wayne Porter.

• How to get there: Off the side of Interstate 90 in Montrose, this stop is just over a 30-minute drive from Sioux Falls. Interstate 90 is the longest highway in the United States and runs from Seattle to Boston.

6. Prada, Marfa, Texas
Off the side of the 10 in a desolate stretch of Texas is this unexpected slice of Italian couture -- a freestanding replica of a Prada store. Built in 2005 by artists Elmgreen and Dragset, the structure is out-of-place in the barren deserts of Marfa.

• How to get there: This trendy roadside stop is an hour and a half from the Mexico-U.S. border in western Texas. It's a bit of an isolated location, but road trippers can continue east toward to major metropolitans in Texas or north to Albuquerque or Colorado.

Nile Cappello is a producer at Travelzoo and based in Los Angeles. Travelzoo has 250 deal experts from around the world who rigorously research, evaluate and test thousands of deals to find those with true value.

Art Institute President Douglas Druick Talks Art and Life on The Interview Show

March 13, 2014, 7:54 am

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Douglas Druick, the Art Institute of Chicago's president and director, visited The Interview Show to talk about the museum, his "eureka" experiences with art and the best time of day to look at paintings. (Filmed at The Hideout, March 7, 2014)





The next Interview Show is April 4, 2014, at The Hideout. Guests include Wait, Wait ... Don't Tell Me Host Peter Sagal. theinterviewshowchicago.com

Six Practical Reasons to Save Old Buildings

March 13, 2014, 8:19 am

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Edited by Julia Rocchi and Steven Piccione; adapted from the article "Nine Practical Reasons to Save Old Buildings" by Jack Neely

[Preservation Tips & Tools] Six Practical Reasons to Save Old Buildings from PreservationNation

What is historic, and worth saving, varies with the beholder, but some definition is urgent. Simply put, "historic" means "old and worth the trouble." It applies to a building that's part of a community's tangible past. And to a degree that may surprise cynics, old buildings can offer opportunities for a community's future.

This article examines both the cultural and practical values of old buildings and looks at why preserving them is beneficial not only for a community's culture, but also for its local economy.

1. Old buildings have intrinsic value.

Buildings of a certain era, namely pre-World War II, tend to be built with higher-quality materials such as rare hardwoods (especially heart pine) and wood from old-growth forests that no longer exist.

Prewar buildings were also built by different standards. A century-old building might be a better long-term bet than its brand-new counterpart.

Take, for example, the antebellum Walker-Sherrill House in West Knoxville, Tenn. Until the City Council approved a zoning deal recently, the house was threatened by developers' interests. However, following its classification as a historic site, the house -- and its five-brick-thick walls -- will be reborn as an office building that could withstand the fiercest of tornadoes.


Built in 1849, the three-bay house is one of the few remaining examples of Federal-style architecture in Knox County.

2. When you tear down an old building, you never know what's being destroyed.

A decade ago, the Daylight Building in Knoxville was a vacant eyesore. A developer purchased the property with plans to demolish the building to make way for new construction.

However, following multiple failed deals to demolish the building, the Daylight went back on the market. Dewhirst Properties bought it and began renovations only to discover the building's hidden gems: drop-ceilings made with heart-pine wood, a large clerestory, a front awning adorned with unusual tinted "opalescent" glass, and a facade lined with bright copper.

Beyond surviving demolition and revealing a treasure trove of details, the Daylight reminds us that even eyesores can be valuable for a community's future.

3. New businesses prefer old buildings.

In 1961, urban activist Jane Jacobs startled city planners with The Death and Life of Great American Cities, in which Jacobs discussed economic advantages that certain types of businesses have when located in older buildings.

Jacobs asserted that new buildings make sense for major chain stores, but other businesses -- such as bookstores, ethnic restaurants, antique stores, neighborhood pubs, and especially small start-ups -- thrive in old buildings.

"As for really new ideas of any kind -- no matter how ultimately profitable or otherwise successful some of them might prove to be -- there is no leeway for such chancy trial, error, and experimentation in the high-overhead economy of new construction," she wrote. "Old ideas can sometimes use new buildings. New ideas must use old buildings."


Jane Jacobs' book, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, asserts that the destruction of old buildings hurts communities and local economies by creating unnatural urban spaces.

4. Old buildings attract people.

Is it the warmth of the materials, the heart pine, marble, or old brick -- or the resonance of other people, other activities? Maybe older buildings are just more interesting. The different levels, the vestiges of other uses, the awkward corners, the mixtures of styles, they're at least something to talk about.

America's downtown revivals suggest that people like old buildings. Whether the feeling is patriotic, homey, warm, or reassuring, older architecture tends to fit the bill. Regardless of how they actually spend their lives, Americans prefer to picture themselves living around old buildings. Some eyes glaze over when preservationists talk about "historic building stock," but what they really mean is a community's inventory of old buildings ready to fulfill new uses.

5. Old buildings are reminders of a city's culture and complexity.

By seeing historic buildings -- whether related to something famous or recognizably dramatic -- tourists and longtime residents are able to witness the aesthetic and cultural history of an area. Just as banks prefer to build stately, old-fashioned facades, even when located in commercial malls, a city needs old buildings to maintain a sense of permanency and heritage.

6. Regret goes only one way.

The preservation of historic buildings is a one-way street. There is no chance to renovate or to save a historic site once it's gone. And we can never be certain what will be valued in the future. This reality brings to light the importance of locating and saving buildings of historic significance -- because once a piece of history is destroyed, it is lost forever.

Read Jack Neely's original article, "Nine Practical Reasons to Save Old Buildings," at Metro Pulse.

All the Way: Bryan Cranston Shows How LBJ Passed the Civil Rights Act

March 13, 2014, 8:58 am

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Five days after the assassination of President Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson went before a joint session of Congress and to the surprise of almost everyone proclaimed that his first priority would be passage of a civil rights bill. All the Way, a riveting new play by Robert Schenkkan with a mesmerizing tour de force by Bryan Cranston as the 36th president, is a compelling account of how Johnson pushed that landmark legislation through a recalcitrant Congress.

History plays have not, by and large, been a large sell since Shakespeare. But Schenkkan has turned the yearlong battle over the 1964 Civil Rights Act into high drama. The play condenses the 11 months between Kennedy's murder on Nov. 22, 1963, in Dallas to Johnson's election the following November into just under three hours traffic on the stage, quick-cutting from scenes in the Oval Office to various flashpoints of the civil rights struggle in the South.

But All the Way (the title comes from Johnson's 1964 campaign slogan, "All the Way/ With LBJ") is more than a dramatized civics lesson. It is a vivid profile of one of the most complicated men to occupy the presidency, a man determined to enact civil rights legislation, even though it would cost his Democratic Party the South, because "it is right."

Perhaps it's not such a great leap to go from playing an accidental drug kingpin to an accidental president, but Cranston is simply brilliant as Lyndon B. Johnson. He captures the larger-than-life persona without ever falling into caricature. His Texas accent is pitch-perfect, and if it isn't always exactly Johnson's particular drawl, it is so close that anyone who never heard Johnson speak wouldn't know the difference.

Cranston has mastered the mannerisms, the posture, the gestures, even the facial tics, including what Robert Caro describes in the latest volume of his biography of Johnson as his "deciding expression." Whether working the phones or twisting arms, whether wheedling or threatening, it is a Lyndon Johnson that is instantly recognizable. And beyond the crudities, the thirst for power, the political maneuvering, Cranston finds and makes credible the insecurities and the need for approval and even love that haunted Johnson.

Johnson was a master manipulator. He could pinpoint what an opponent wanted or needed and exploit it. He could play on Everett Dirksen's vanity to get cloture in a Senate filibuster. He could convince Southern Dixiecrats that if the Civil Rights Act failed, Barry Goldwater would be in the White House. He would tell black leaders -- or rather he would send Hubert Humphrey to tell them -- they had to compromise. Misquoting Clausewitz, he mused "Politics is war by another name." And he loved that war.

But Johnson's personal commitment to civil rights was genuine. In that first speech to Congress as President he declared: "We have talked long enough in this country about equal rights. We have talked for one hundred years and more. It is time now ... to write it in the book of law." Later he would stand before the same Congress and outline what would become his Voting Rights Act, invoking the words from the civil rights anthem: "We Shall Overcome!"

Civil rights, of course, was not the only crisis Johnson faced that first year. And All the Way touches all the bases. Robert McNamara, for example, comes to him with reports North Vietnam has fired on American vessels in the Gulf of Tonkin. J. Edgar Hoover is busily trying to undermine the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. as a philanderer or a Communist. And the civil rights movement has its own infighting: Stokely Carmichael constantly spars with Roy Wilkins, and frictions arise between King and his wife, Coretta.

Every major figure in that turbulent year walks across the stage in Schenkkan's play and a first-rate cast of 20, many playing two or three roles, brings each to life under Bill Rauch's fluid and well-paced direction. Brandon J. Dirden gives a fine performance as King, delivering the Nobel acceptance speech and a eulogy for a slain civil rights worker in the emotive cadences of a Southern Baptist preacher.

Michael McKean is excellent as the cunning Hoover. Robert Petkoff is "nice," to use Johnson's description, as Humphrey, and John McMartin is solid as the good Dixiecrat Sen. Richard Russell. Rob Campbell is admirably unctuous as Gov. George Wallace and pragmatic as the UAW leader Walter Reuther. And Peter Jay Fernandez and William Jackson Harper are convincing as the quarreling Wilkins and Carmichael.

Betsy Aidem adds a touching turn as Lady Bird Johnson, and Roslyn Ruff is moving as Coretta Scott King and especially as Fannie Lou Hamer, the victim of a vicious beating and a member of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party delegation to the 1964 convention.

Poetry and Programming

March 13, 2014, 9:04 am

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I wrote the below when I first started learning programming. Looking back now, it became my unintended manifesto of intersecting arts and engineering: what one taught me about the other.

Not too long ago, I tutored creative writing for the first time at 826 Valencia. I was a nervous wreck. Even though I had tutored before, it was my first time teaching high school students and my first time offering creative writing feedback. Moments before the workshop, I was overcome by a fear that I would somehow horribly and irrevocably misguide these children. Forever.

But I had a beautiful time. I worked with a girl named Karen who spoke Spanish and greatly fluid, though unsure, English -- much more than she gave herself credit for. She had wanted to write a poem about her life, and had a few lines laid out on her page, each beginning with "Everyday..." I asked her what was the story she wanted to tell and where did she see it going. She told me then, "I want to write something... big and deep, you know, something deep about how I feel. Growing up. I want to write something that you read and you just feel l it. I don't know English very well, but I want to use the more difficult words. Can you help me?"

Those were not her words exactly, but I try to retell it now for the right feeling -- which was an authenticity with no moment of self-consciousness. I understood her well because this was also the kind of teenager that I was, drawn to gravity and the belief in a complex adulthood. What I forget now though was the sincerity I had for all of these big emotions -- the utter faith without irony in the sanctity of growing up and the mystical burden of messier, heavier lives. I look back and I critically conclude that I was wrought with melodrama, then laugh. Yet when I listened to Karen's attempt to communicate her feeling and need for meaning, I realized at once that this adult hindsight had no place in the purity of growing up.

She reminded me of my own journey with writing. I was once an aspiring creative writing major in college, but I never wrote a single new poem or story again after my first poetry workshop in freshmen year. This is a difficult story to explain even now. Even though at the end of the workshop I felt uplifted by the professor's email telling me that I had produced one of the best poems he had ever received from a student; it was also the first time that I became "artistically aware" of the difficulty in writing exactly what you mean. Overcome by the discipline it demanded and the inevitable sense of inadequacy that accompanied, I retreated instead of worked harder.

Then suddenly, at the beginning of this year, I started writing poems again. It was more of a reckoning of my long procrastination than anything else grand or mysterious. Around the same time, I started learning programming.

What started as a pragmatic desire to learn a new life skill unexpectedly became the most giving metaphor of poetry in my life -- more than a metaphor and perhaps even a paradigm-shift. The beginning of programming was mind-bending. I instantly fell in love with the problem solving and the practical and philosophical concerns behind its mental model. The layers of abstraction and strive for elegance drew me in. But most of all, I was taken by its immense creative potential. To my surprise I found that writing code reminded me of writing poems. In the act of creation, you encounter the same tension of raw, boundless possibility against disciplined construction.

Programming began to change my way of looking at poetry. I encountered a greater exactness in thought that I had not previously really cared for, and I became much more patient in dealing with syntax and construction. Unlike a piece of writing, a program simply would not work if it had bugs -- and it would often crash and burn at the first attempt of running. The premise of programming did not rest on godly inspiration or quickness of talent; it rested on hard work. It taught me to look at poems with scientific precision rather as shapeless sentiments. It took away the burdening belief of talent and divine alignment. It reinforced in me, after all these years, the importance of discipline in your craft.

The two share philosophical tendencies, but for certain they are also different in many respects -- I am not going to carry this metaphor too far. Still a shift had happened.

In Why Read? Mark Edmundson wrote:

A language, Wittgenstein thought, is a way of life. A new language, whether we learn it from a historian, a poet, a painter, or a composer of music, is potentially a new way to live.

And of course that includes programming.

On the day that I met Karen, my mind came full circle to the first impulse of creation, before any of this rigor and restraint in craft. The excitement. The velocity. The faith. The possibility. She reminded me of how we got here and why we stay here -- of why we are driven to hone our craft, and of how ultimately little that means without the pulsing desire and bravery to create -- to pass belief to meaning.

PABallet's Carmina Returns and Sublime Balanchine

March 13, 2014, 11:06 am

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For its 50th anniversary season, Pennsylvania Ballet revived John Butler's Carmina Burana, literally back by popular demand for audience members of a certain boomer age who love watching those monks go theatrically wild once again.


(photo: Alexander Iziliaev)




Scored to Carl Orff's saga of the sacred and profane, Butler can still compete with the equally popular, even fleshier version by PB's galactic update by PB choreographer Matt Neenan, which by now has its own following.

Meanwhile, opening the program, PB's company premiere of George Balanchine's Stravinsky Violin Concerto, held so much fire, depth and dimension that it stole some of the Carmina's thunder. For the past few seasons, the artistic director has programmed the choreographer's most famous 'black and white' ballets -- Four Temperaments and Agon, with distinction -- but Stravinsky's Violin Concerto is more than vintage Balanchine. Balanchine not only is equally movement profound, the inventions and pace has a relaxed quality, which allows the personalities of these dancers to come, in moments, wryly through.

PB principals Lauren Fadeley and Jermel Johnson danced the lead pas de deux conjuring searing chemistry In contrast, Jong Suk Park and Amy Aldridge, the other lead couple, move in more distressed angles, Balanchine deconstructing his own variations. Balanchine's duets are studies in classical technique and transitional movement variation suggesting psychological complexities, or not. At different times, Aldridge's legs are even turned in, as Park manipulates her perfect pointe work. At the time, dance editorial by Balanchine? Who knows. Fadeley, after gorgeous bodyscapes and balletic deportment, spiders across the stage, her torso bowed into an arc and at one pointe, her working leg in a hyperextension with her pointe shoe pressed against Johnson's face. All four leads executed the cryptic configurations with measured attack.


(photo: Alexander Iziliaev)



Meanwhile the corps de ballet flows on- and off-stage with pulsing precision and ensemble esprit. Configurations of a lead woman and four supporting men, alternated with a lead man and four women in signature Balanchine geometrics that keeps evolving, but not with signature Balanchine cleverness, the patterning is earthy and athletic. Razor-sharp unison aerial work from the men's corp, highlighting Balanchine's more distinctive presence of male dancers in his black-and-white era.

The other star of the work is Luigi Mazzocchi's violin solo that lives inside Stravinsky's musical language, as he bathes the opera house with luminous tone.

Pennsylvania Ballet Orchestra and The Philadelphia Singers (under choral director David Hayes) do a great job in equalizing the patchwork structure of Carmina Burana. Conductor Beatrice Jona Affron was also toning down its cinematic bombast and maximizing the lyrical qualities -- with arias by soprano Karin Wolverton, tenor Javier Abreu and baritone Levi Hernandez -- all bookended by the thundering chorale of "O Fortuna" that audiences seemingly never tire of hearing.

Onstage, the choreography has lasting charm, but there are static passages and Butler's literalness can get clammy. Angled bodies and sculptural poses by the leads are all pristinely detailed by the four leads. James Ihde and Brooke Moore have great chemistry: Moore's acting and physicality bringing a needed arc to the redundancy of some of the choreography; and Ihde's steeled presence is a perfect foil to that, together they conveyed a real relationship. Alexandra Hughes and Ian Hussey are less dramatic, bringing another, but no less effective, interpretation.

In the ensemble sections, the corp de ballet couples work with Bulter's slim choreographic template and rich character performance level to avoid having it look like nostalgic pageantry. For the most part, they succeed in keeping it a forward narrative and take every opportunity to nail the ballet's more engaging technical strengths. This program is in repertory this month with PB's production of Marius Petipa's Coppelia.

www.paballet.org

10 Youth Movements That Changed History

March 13, 2014, 12:41 pm

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Teenagers didn't always exist. They had to be invented. As the cultural landscape around the world was thrown into turmoil during the industrial revolution, and with a chasm erupting between adults and youth, the concept of a new generation took shape. Whether in America, England, or Germany, whether party-crazed Flappers or hip Swing Kids, zealous Nazi Youth or frenzied Sub-Debs, it didn't matter - this was a new idea of how people come of age. They were all "Teenagers."

Here, Matt Wolf, the director of the documentary TEENAGE, highlights 10 youth movements that have changed history:

Boy Scouts




Around the turn of the century, child labor was ending, and a new second stage of life emerged. Adolescent "hooligans" were seen as a social problem that needed to be controlled. In 1908, a British man named Baden Powell said that he found a solution to the problem of youth. He wrote a military training manual for the young called Scouting for Boys, and it became a manifesto for the Boy Scout movement. In the Scouts, young boys transformed from hooligans into fit and healthy soldiers, primed for war. With its military origins, it's perhaps unsurprising that Presidents Clinton, Bush and Obama were all once Boy Scouts too.


Sheiks and Shebas




The 1920s was the first era with bonified movie stars, and Valentino was the biggest. His leading role in the 1921 film The Sheik sent girls swooning, and inspired all the hip boys to slick their hair. The film was so popular that the term Sheik became slang for a young man on the prowl. The objects of the Sheiks' desire were called "Shebas." In other words, there's a long lineage of Bieber Fever.


Bright Young People




The Bright Young People were an elite group of rich kids in England, who threw decadent "Freak Parties." In 1929, one notorious event was called the "second childhood" party, where androgynous, flapper socialites dressed as babies. They were the first group to glamorously identify as "young." One of them was Brenda Dean Paul, a notorious drug addict, who was the object of paparazzi fascination and condemnation. She was like a 1920s Lindsay Lohan.


Wandervogel (Wandeling Birds)




In Germany there's a long history of youth movements. One of the most important and fascinating is the wandervogel, or in English, "wandering birds." They were like 1920s teenage hippies, who would trek into nature with guitars and fiddles. They'd make bonfires, wreaths and danced, most of the time in the nude. Unlike the Boy Scouts, the wandervogel were leading themselves, and creating a private world. It's not so different than the 1960s flower children in Haight-Ashbury, who were also rebelling against their parents' conservative values with youthful abandon.


Jitterbugs / Swing Kids




African American jazz music had been popularizing for a decade, but a youth craze for Swing exploded in the 1930s. The young fans were called Jitterbugs and they danced in a wild style to hot jazz performed by big orchestras. White kids and black kids were dancing together, and it didn't take long for adults to join the party too. An announcer at the 1939 World's Fair declared, "Enthusiastic Jitterbugs are young Americans living for the world of tomorrow!" They were like breakdancing b-boys, whose street culture became a mass media phenomenon.


Hitler Jugend (Hitler Youth)




The horrors of Nazi Germany are well known, but you've probably heard less about the Nazi's youth organizations -- the Hitler Jugend and Bund Deutscher Mädel, a division for girls. When Hitler rose to power, Germany was in great political and economic turmoil, and the young generation was searching for answers. One Hitler Youth leader Melita Maschman wrote a diary that explains why she rebelliously joined the organization. She said, "I wanted to be different, to escape from my narrow, childish life." Every weekend the Hitler Youth went into nature for swimming and obstacle races, sort of like summer camp. But once World War II started, they were brainwashed, militarized and ultimately sacrificed.


Hamburg Swings / Swingjugend




As World War II raged on, Nazi Germany became a fascist police state. The Nazis declared American culture "degenerate," and said Swing music was "fit only for negroes and Jews." All art and social dancing was strictly forbidden. But one rebellious group in Hamburg, Germany bravely smuggled American jazz records and British fashion across the border. They hosted underground Swing dance parties to subversively rebel against the regime. The police criminalized the swing kids, calling them "race defilers, fornicators, homosexuals and robbers." One of their leaders, Tommie Scheel once said, "We wanted to tell all these dumb bastards that we were different, that was all." Tommie and his friends are like the original British punks from the 1970s, whose rebellious music and fashion made a real political statement. But the Hamburg Swings risked their lives to party.


Victory Girls




During World War II, American youth were in a pressure cooker. Their fathers were serving in the military, or their mothers were working in the factory, so adolescents had a lot of time on their hands. Young girls started fraternizing with off-duty soldiers, and they had freer attitudes about sexuality than their conservative parents. The media called these young flirts "Victory Girls," and their canoodling was deemed a nationwide epidemic. MTV's Teen Mom wasn't the first morality tale about teenage sexuality.


Juvenile Delinquents




Victory Girls were only part of the problem. Wartime "Juvenile Delinquents" were smoking reefer on street corners, robbing stores and in some cities even starting riots. In 1943 off-duty soldiers started violently attacking Latino hipsters, who wore stylish Zoot Suits. Young people were reacting to the chaos of war, and adults were desperate for a solution to control them. This kind of upheaval is not uncommon during war or in the midst of economic depression. Think back to the young looters, who wreaked havoc during the London Riots several years ago.


Sub-Debs




During World War II, young people got jobs and they were earning their own money. Adults recognized a powerful new consumer demographic, and young girls started getting their own magazines, fashion and cosmetics. They were called "Sub-Debs," and they were on the cover of Life Magazine in 1945. These girls weren't debutantes yet, just trendy high school kids, who liked to shop. Alicia Silverstone's character Cher from Clueless would have fit in perfectly.

A hypnotic rumination on the genesis of youth culture from the end of the 19th century to the first half of the 20th, TEENAGE is a living collage of rare archival material, filmed portraits, and diary entries read by Jena Malone, Ben Whishaw, and others. Set to a shimmering contemporary score by Bradford Cox (Deerhunter / Atlas Sound), Matt Wolf's TEENAGE is a mesmerizing trip into the past and a riveting look at the very idea of "coming-of-age." In theaters March 14 (opens at the Sunshine Cinema in NYC).

Website: http://teenagefilm.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/teenagefilm

Twitter: https://twitter.com/teenagefilm

Tumblr: http://teenagebillofrights.tumblr.com/

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On the "A" w/Souleo: Yoga Activists Fight Human Trafficking

March 13, 2014, 1:37 pm

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Take a breath. Is it short and strained or is it deep and full? Posing this question to a victim of human trafficking may seem insignificant but according to Lara Land it is a crucial step in the rehabilitation of the more than 4,200 children served by the anti-trafficking organization, Odanadi Seva Trust.



Lara Land with children of Rwanda/Courtesy: Land

Land, a yoga instructor and owner of Land Yoga in Harlem, was introduced to human trafficking victims during visits to India and Rwanda, where she helped to rehabilitate genocide survivors using yoga as therapy. On March 18 she will host a Bollywood-style fundraiser for victims of human trafficking at celebrity chef Marcus Samuelson's Red Rooster Harlem restaurant. On March 15, prior to Land's fundraiser is the fifth annual, Yoga Stops Traffick a global one-day initiative to raise awareness about modern day slavery and funds for Odanadi to address India's rate of more than 100 million victims, including 1.2 million child prostitutes. These projects point to a growing number of yoga activists who utilize the practice to address political and social issues and share yoga with underserved populations. The goal is direct if not simple: use yoga to make the world a better place.

"Organized evil such as human trafficking occurs when a seed of hatred is allowed to grow. It starts with something small," said Land. "Practicing yoga has the simple effect of making people feel better. Those who practice correctly tend to experience a calm and contentment as they walk through life. That feeling is equally contagious and does in fact lead to a better world."

And yet the $27 billion yoga industry, designer yoga wear and bodies of yogis being touted as "perfect" may alienate those Land and other yoga activists most want to reach. For Land the only way to break down those barriers is to get off her mat and into communities where yoga holds little or no value. "It takes a real, human experience with members of those communities that are distrustful or resistant. You have to prove yourself to be qualified and valuable to their lives and recovery. My biggest challenge is how to positively affect and change lives at the scale that I want to and continue to offer the intensely personal individualized attention that is so key."



Harriette Cole/Credit: Cam Camarena

As women across the world face the realities of human trafficking another group of women in the U.S. must deal with the financial challenges of raising a family. According to The Shriver Report, 42 million women and the 28 million children who depend on them are living at less than 200 percent of the federal poverty line, or in other terms, an annual income of $47,000 supporting a family of four. Although addressing this issue will involve large systemic changes there is one new web series aiming to empower women with advice, "The Root Live: Bring it to the Table." The series addresses financial issues with experts offering salient tips on everything from money issues related to single parenthood to debt and job loss.

"We live in a different world today. Families are structured differently with many single moms. Our program is a perfect response since each segment offers informative nuggets of solution-driven content for the audience," said Michele Wilson, producer and director of the series.

On the show's latest webisode is a discussion about the challenges that many single female parents face in managing finances. Guests include Sabrina Lamb, founding chief executive officer of WorldofMoney.org, Michaela angela Davis (her spelling), an image activist and unmarried parent and Juliana DeSouza, a financial adviser, providing information on savvy budgeting strategies.

"The information gleaned from each guest is valuable for every rung of our culture," said Harriette Cole, executive producer and host. "We talk to our viewers in practical and realistic terms."

With examples such as Land, Wilson and Cole there are many promising alternative ways to address serious issues impacting the lives of women.

****

The weekly column, On the "A" w/Souleo, covers the intersection of the arts, culture and entertainment scene in Harlem and beyond and is written by Souleo, founder and president of event/media content production company, Souleo Enterprises, LLC.

How Artists Are Banding Together to Celebrate the Muppets

March 13, 2014, 2:05 pm

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Sweetums by Beth Sparks

In anticipation of this month's debut of Muppets Most Wanted, many are declaring their Muppets love -- some more creatively than others. Earlier this month, Zwoltopia, an artist based in Belgium, invited his social media followers to illustrate their favorite Muppets.

More specifically, Zwoltopia kicked off a Muppets-themed collab, one of many of artistic collaborations that are blooming across Twitter and Tumblr. Collabs are typically kicked off by one or two independent artists, who choose a theme (typically a favorite show, game or genre), create a Google Doc listing characters associated with it, and invite fellow artists to sign up for those characters to contribute illustrations via social media (typically Twitter).

Other collab themes include Ghostbusters and Disney ladies.

You can see contributions to Zwoltopia's Muppets collab, which has a May 1 deadline, by visiting the project's Tumblr page or checking up on the #MuppetCollab hashtag on Twitter.

I met Zwoltopia in the midst of recruiting artistic talent for ArtCorgi, a site that makes it easy to commission original art from up-and-coming artists. He was kind enough to agree to an interview about this project and experience with artist collabs. To stay up to date with this project and Zwoltopia's work, be sure to follow him on Twitter.

Simone Collins (SC): What inspired you to kick off a Muppets collab?

Zwoltopia (Z): First and foremost, my personal love for the Muppets.

Doing a Muppet-themed art collab seemed like a fitting tribute to those felt puppets that have entertained and moved people from around the world for over 60 years. It was a way to get the community together and excited about the Muppets; with the new movie coming out this month, it seemed like the right time.

SC: How did you determine the final list of characters in this collab?

Z: I started the list by going over all the major Muppets productions, be it a TV show, movie or special.

I tried to please the casual and hardcore Muppet fans by providing a solid list of characters ranging from the very popular to the really obscure. If possible, I provided a few variations of the most popular Muppets, as I expected demand to draw these characters to be bigger.

SC: What makes Muppet characters so ideal for a collab? What makes them fun to draw?

Z: Muppet characters all have very iconic looks and shapes. They are colorful and can easily be converted to a drawing. You can basically draw a Muppet in any style and still make it instantly recognizable.

SC: What character did you choose to draw, and why did you choose that particular character?

Z: For myself, I chose Miss Poogy from 2011's The Muppets. She was a personal highlight from that movie to me and looked like a lot of fun to explore. But really, I would be content with any Muppet character, I only picked mine a week after I started the art collab as I wanted the artists signing up to have first pickings.

SC: Could you tell me a bit more about your background and focus as an artist?

Z: I am an Illustrator based in Ghent, Belgium who specializes and focuses on illustrations for books, magazines, etc.

SC: Do you think collabs can contribute anything to an artist's career, or are they just for fun and creative development?

Z: While the keyword in this art collab is "fun" and getting the community together and excited, I do think the works produced can contribute to an artists' exposure. I know I have followed some amazing artists myself I never heard of before because of an art collab and the awesome work they produced for it.

Heck, I have made quite a few art friends through collabs.

Literature, Longevity and Mavis Gallant

March 13, 2014, 2:08 pm

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I'm in mourning for Mavis Gallant.

You don't remember Mavis Gallant? If you're older than 14, you shared a century with her characters. You would have passed them on the streets of Manhattan, or Montreal, or Paris. They were people you recognized... even if you might not have stopped to talk with them. Where you really got to know them was in the pages of The New Yorker, which published 116 of her stories over a span of 40 years.

Mavis Gallant died recently at the entirely respectable age of 91. She produced sharp, beautifully crafted and highly readable short stories for more than half of those years. Collections of her stories were published in 1956 (The Other Paris), 2009 (The Cost of Living: Early and Uncollected Stories), and a dozen more collections appeared in the years in between -- it boggles the short story writer's mind.

And here's the rub for me: In addition to the mourning, there is envy, admiration and -- to be honest -- a dash of literary despair. On the one hand is the shimmering example of a writer -- a woman writer at that! -- still writing great stories well past the age of, ahem, this octogenarian writer. And on the other is the sheer heft of her oeuvre. One volume of collected stories alone ran to 900 pages. We are not talking pages of tripe.

Mavis Gallant understood the abandoned and deceived; her own mother deposited her at a boarding school when she was four, saying, "I'll be back in 10 minutes." She also understood the displaced, having left her Canadian home for France, briefly wandering elsewhere in the post-World War II years when displacement was a fact of life for much of Europe and Asia. As a woman who defined the phrase "living by one's wits," she turned those wits to short fiction in a singular way. She also wrote novels and essays, critically acclaimed nonfiction.

But here is another rub: On top of the lack of maternal love and affection, Gallant endured other unimaginable emotional assaults and upheavals, realities that underlie her fiction. As a girl of 10, she was lied to about her father -- she waited two years for him to reappear because nobody told her he had died. She was briefly and unhappily married, and heart-breakingly betrayed by her literary agent, who pocketed the money from the first New Yorker stories while Gallant struggled with hunger and despair in Spain and France. Gallant took it all in, survived and turned her life to short fiction, to the benefit of us all.

The rubs boil down to this: Suppose you're a writer with a plain old happy childhood? You've already watched with envy -- sometimes admiration and way more than a dash of despair -- the flood of memoirs documenting addiction, abuse and aberrations of every conceivable kind, most of which inhabit bestseller lists for months. And here are the obituaries for one hugely admired short story writer, with the news that she too has a personal depth of Shakespearean tragedy to mine. Bless her battered heart.

At least she shared it all with us, in those dozens and dozens of marvelous stories. And kept at it until the end of her 91 eventful years.

Rest in peace, Mavis.

Perseverance: An Evolution of Japanese Tattoos (NSFW)

March 13, 2014, 2:44 pm

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LITTLE TOKYO -- Home of the Japanese American National Museum is currently hosting a photography exhibition on the history and evolution of Japanese tattoos, Perseverance. The title takes from the concept of resilience despite rejection, opposition or difficulty, mirrored as a similar plight of the Japanese-American community and their internment during WWII. The opening reception was on Friday night to museum members and Saturday to the general public, which included live tattooing, a lecture series, model unveilings, and a book signing by all participating artists, including: Horitaka, Chris Horishiki Brand, Horitomo, Miyazo, Shige, Junii, Yokohama Horiken, Jill Horiyuki Halpin, Chaz Bojorquez, and Kip Fulbeck. The goal of the exhibition is to demonstrate the true artistry of Japanese tattoo tradition as a fine art despite its accessibility within popular culture, its association to mafia in Japan and amongst elder Japanese Americans, and its imitation within the Western world as simple caricatures often without historical narrative, tradition or understanding. As tattoos become more mainstream and acceptable in modern society, so does the importance to understand the rich tradition, training, craftsmanship, discipline, scholarship, and trajectory of the art form, specifically, when common tattooers render absurd imagery without any concern for meaning or symbolism. An exhibit like this is necessary to set the true masters apart from the masses.

Throughout the main museum hall there was live tattooing of Japanese irezumi tradition, including tebori, which is the hand-poke application, and inside the gallery observers could see photographed traditional Japanese body suits and pieces, including Japanese-influenced forms such as those by: Chuey Quintanar, Evan Skrederstu, Stan Corona, Tim Hendricks, and others. Of main interest was the cross-cultural fusion concept, which can have a dual effect of keeping a custom and culture alive to ensure its place in history, but also losing its purpose and tradition. In the case of Chris Horishiki Brand and Jill Horiyuki Halpin, we can see that this natural process of hybrid form is a triumph, while it respects the ancient tradition in a modern setting. Chris Brand, my main tattoo artist and great friend, showed me a brilliant back piece many years ago on Ben Grillo, Big Huero's Swan Song, which is a Chicano gang member juxtaposed as Rorihakucho Chojun of the Japanese version of the 108 outlaws or heroes of The Water Margin. He is presented in a traditional Japanese back piece with a sword between his teeth opening the bars of a water gate somewhere in the LA River. I was left astonished by this phenomenal concept and even more so a few years later when Chris mentioned his plan to execute the entire 108 heroes and retell the full story in the context of Los Angeles Chicanos set in the 1980s, inspired by both Japanese and Chicano art and tattoo symbolism dealing with motifs about the human condition such as: protection, religion, community, and others, while lending use to its heavy reliance of black and grey shading. The 108 Heroes of Los Angeles is a modern-day adaptation of the ancient Chinese novel, retold in Japanese culture, of rebellious individuals who fought against oppression and corruption and their whimsical journeys of bravery and pride. In Japan, it made sense that many Yakuza members tattooed these stories across their bodies that represented their similar outlaw journeys. When I was invited to be a part of the 108 Los Angeles Heroes, I accepted and recalled my upbringing within the conflict of West Los Angeles gang culture between Lennox and Inglewood near LAX.

Jill Halpin's version tells the story of an identity clash stemming from an origin of Spanish conquest and Meso-American indigenous peoples that helped create a new breed of people, the Mexican, but now transplanted in the United States as a Mexican American. From a distance the body suit resembles Japanese tradition with wind bars and flowing water, yet upon close inspection it maintains symbolism of European and indigenous cultures such as: a conquistador, a coat of arms, traditional Aztec and Mayan gods, as well as an eagle perched on a cactus. Both Chris Brand and Jill Halpin's work demonstrate how the ever-changing fragmented metropolis of Los Angeles is really a combination of cultural influences that create a fusion of identity that accurately captures the essence of the New World. In addition, Los Angeles native Chaz Bojorquez, created the lettering for the exhibition and lectured about his history as a pioneer of tagging, graffiti, and cholo style since the 1940s, and his experience with decades of rejection. Shunned by the Chicano Movement for being dark and progressive, and ignored by fine arts establishments, Chaz persevered and today is hailed as the "Godfather" of cholo lettering style and has exhibited locally and internationally with artists of many genres. Don't miss out on this exhibit currently on view until September 14th, 2014.

Images courtesy of Kip Fulbeck

Battered Women Behind Bars

March 13, 2014, 3:15 pm

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Like most New Yorkers, my family was cooped up in our apartment building during Hurricane Sandy. Many of my neighbors gathered in the front foyer where we allowed our kids to ride tricycles and share toys. Hanging out in the hallway, I spent hours with people I'd never normally have a chance to get to know. Here I first became acquainted with my neighbor Elizabeth Rohrbaugh, a director at MTV.

Rohrbaugh told me she was working on a documentary about women who killed their husbands. I was taken by surprise. Why was this nice Brooklyn mother of a toddler spending her free time with murderers instead of getting manicures? Rohrbaugh immediately made my list as one of the most badass women in Brooklyn.

Her film,The Perfect Victim, tells the story of a lopsided judicial system that put victims of domestic abuse behind bars. The documentary expertly chronicles the stories of three women in Missouri who were beaten, raped, sold and almost murdered by their husbands for years prior to their desperate act of murder.

At the time of their trials, the legal system had little understanding of the Battered Spouse Syndrome and did not allow evidence of ongoing abuse to be presented to the judge and jury. As a result, these women were harshly convicted with life sentences.

Recently, I had the opportunity to interview Rohrbaugh about the film.

JFB: The subject matter of A Perfect Victim is rather intense and startling. What initially inspired you to make this documentary?

ER: A friend told me about the case of Shirley Lute, the oldest female prisoner in the state of Missouri. Lute was incarcerated for killing her abusive husband. I learned a group of lawyers and law students from the major law schools in Missouri came together to form the Missouri Battered Women's Clemency Coalition. This coalition sought clemency for Shirley Lute, along with 9 other women in similar situations. After years of hard work, they secured clemency for Lute, and after 33 years in prison, she was set free.

The story was fascinating and disturbing. In cases of what seemed like self-defense, how were these women still in prison over 30 years later? And how incredible that busy and overworked students and professors would work tirelessly and without pay to secure their freedom!

I contacted the Clemency Coalition's founding professor, Jane Aiken, who became a strong supporter of the documentary. She showed me the clemency videos that the law students had made. The stories were riveting. What I found fascinating was the misguided public perception of these cases. These women endured domestic abuse for years prior to their crimes. The more layers I pulled back the more interesting the stories became.

JFB: I imagine the road to making a film that deals with the criminal justice system around issues of domestic abuse was filled with obstacles. What were some of the challenges you faced in producing this film?

ER: The roadblocks to making this film were endless, particularly regarding prison and prisoner access. The governor's office was determined to give us the least possible press access to the prisoners -- obviously in hopes that we would give up.

Because of the limited access to the women, it was a challenge to earn their trust and help them understand our intention was to tell the truth about what happened to them. Through the years, the local press vilified these women, portraying them all as savage murderers without any knowledge of the ongoing abuse they suffered. I worked to earn their trust through phone calls and letters, and through their lawyers, who understood our intentions with this film.

JFB: Did the process of making A Perfect Victim shed light on anything for you personally?

ER: Making this film was such an eye-opening experience for me, Reflecting back, I realize how naïve I was at the outset. I learned a great deal about the complexity of marriage, the significance of gender roles and the impact that poverty can have on the outcomes of our justice system. I also learned how difficult it is to make people care about an issue like this. The tremendous dedication of the attorneys and lawmakers to represent and continue to fight for these women kept me inspired and motivated through the long process of making the film.

JFB: What was it like for you personally to document the traumatic narratives of these women? Did the story of their abuse, violent retaliation and harsh penalization take a toll on you? How did you take care of yourself during this process?

ER: Most of my anxiety occurred before I actually began filming. I couldn't wrap my mind around the fact that I was going to be in a prison to meet a person who had killed someone. But once I arrived at the prison and met our first subject Carlene, my anxiety dissolved. Carlene was trembling with fear and I realized that this process was not about me. I was asking them to trust me with their traumatic stories and in some ways their future. I needed to be the brave one and use this opportunity to get their story out.

JFB: What would you like your audience to understand after viewing your film?

ER: I would like people to walk away with a better understanding of the criminalization of victims of domestic violence. The system is changing, but not as quickly or effectively, as we would like. Victims of domestic abuse still are judged and misunderstood. These battered women are often left to defend themselves when the system does not work for them in one way or another. If we can learn that domestic violence is not simply an individual problem but a structural and systemic issue, we can begin to make a difference.

JFB: What do you think we can do to help change a system that treats victims of abuse as hardened criminals?

ER: Many, if not all, of the women in this film would have served considerably less time if their crimes happened today. Each case is fraught with massive failures in our justice system, and as a result victims have been locked up for decades. It is essential we develop a greater understanding of the psychology of a woman who kills her abuser.

A Perfect Victim is now available on iTunes and Amazon.