1077 The End‘s Summer Camp concert sold out Marymoor Park on Saturday and included an impressive lineup with Cold War Kids, Surfer Blood, New Politics, Wavves, The Neighbourhood, Family of the Year, MS MR, and more. Hey Marseilles was a last-second and welcome addition to the indie/alternative rock lineup. Despite the brief downpour, 107.7 put together a solid daylong festival. Here’s our photographic perspective.
The glorious Seattle summer has finally arrived, and with it comes a treasure trove of light-hearted and fun classical concerts. Experience the joy of live music outdoors at one of several concerts in local parks, or cool off with some chamber music favorites.
Jun. 29-Jul. 26 — Seattle Chamber Music Society‘s Summer Festival is in full swing with three more weeks of concerts in the books. Highlights include the world premiere of Lawrence Dillon’s Sanctuary on July 8, the performance of a string quartet by Fanny Mendelssohn (whose fame was eclipsed by that of her brother Felix) on July 10, a free outdoor concert of Dvořák’s “American” string quartets on July 18 at Volunteer Park, and a live recording of two Shostakovich string quartets on July 24.
Jul. 12-13 — Cirque comes to Benaroya Hall this month! The Seattle Symphony teams up with the acrobats of Cirque de la Symphonie for a series of performances that blend classical favorites with routines by aerialists, jugglers, contortionists. Now’s your chance to witness acrobats dangling from the rafters of Benaroya’s sumptuous auditorium.
Jul. 12-27 — Let yourself be whisked away to a world of Venetian romance and intrigue with the Seattle Gilbert & Sullivan Society‘s production of The Gondoliers. A local institution, this theater company knows their stuff — they’ve been producing performances of Gilbert & Sullivan operas since 1954.
Jul. 18 — Join members of the Auburn Symphony for a sunset concert of chamber music at the idyllic Mary Olson Farm. The first of the Symphony’s summer chamber music series highlights the brass section, featuring favorites by John Philip Sousa.
Jul. 18-21 — Experience the cutting edge of sound art and digital media at the four-day Substrata 1.3 festival. Performances focus on a variety of different topics, from digital sound design to experimentation with the electric guitar. The festival concludes with a guided listening workshop.
Jul. 27 – Hear new music from around the world at Octava Chamber Orchestra‘s Summer Chamber Music Extravaganza. The program includes a whopping ten works by living composers from near and far, including locals Nathan Jensen, Asher Hashash, and Meredith Connie.
Starting a few days earlier than usual, the Seattle Chamber Music Society’s Summer Festival opened Saturday night at Nordstrom Recital Hall with some new faces and music. Under violinist James Ehnes, who succeeded Toby Saks as artistic director a year ago, the festival is branching out with more music for winds or brass. The opening night’s concert reflected this with works by Honegger and Enescu for trumpet and piano. (The next concerts are tonight and this Wednesday, July 3, beginning with recitals at 7 p.m., the concert at 8 p.m.)
Before these, however, came one of those moments which remind one of how sublime a chamber music performance can be in the right hands.
From the three trios of Beethoven’s Op. 1, his first published work, violinist Ida Levin, cellist David Requiro (a festival newcomer) and pianist Inon Barnatan performed No. 3. It was one of those magical times when the rapport between the players, their musicianship and sensitivity, their awareness of the environs in which they played all came together to create something rare and memorable. It engaged the listener from the first notes.
There was also the marvel of realizing what Beethoven achieved at the tender age of 21. This trio in C Minor is a turn in the path of classical music, a step towards the, as yet, unknown of classical ideals veering towards a more romantic style, a change from what Haydn and Mozart had been creating in their chamber music.
There is little that is truly uncomfortable in Haydn’s and Mozart’s chamber music. It’s exquisite, elegant, imaginative, profound at times, with depth, but rarely goes beyond what would then be considered decency in allowing emotions to show. Not so Beethoven, who uses sudden changes in mood, tensions versus calm, unmasked feeling and drama in his trio. It is also a wonderful vehicle for the pianist, who has the lion’s role.
Here, too, one can sense Beethoven’s fascination with discovering the limits of what could be done with what was still a very new instrument in 1791, an all-wooden piano with a light key action, quick sound decay and the ability to change dynamics. Today’s nine-foot concert grand piano is a very different animal, heavily braced with metal, with heavier key action and a long decay. Yes, there are differences in the stringed instruments, also, with their now usually metal strings and bracing inside the body to enable higher tension and louder sound, but nothing like so much as with a piano.
Beethoven has the pianist racing from end to end of the instrument with lightning fast runs and expressive dynamic changes, and it says volumes for Barnatan that he encompassed his busy role with lightness, ease, excellent articulation, and without ever drowning out the violin and cello.
Such was not the case in the earlier concert recital, in which pianist Andrew Armstrong and clarinetist Ricardo Morales performed Brahms’ Sonata in F Minor. Armstrong could play with expressive gentleness when called for, but often in louder passages he gave it such volume that the clarinet sound was mostly drowned.
He played the same way in Honegger’s Intrada (1947) for trumpet and piano, and in Enescu’s Legende (1906) for the same instruments, but here he was more than matched by the clarion sound of Jens Lindemann’s trumpet. An angular piece, the Honegger is often dissonant, a bit jazzy or jaunty, quite short, while the Enescu is more impressionistic, almost a lullaby at times. Both require a gifted trumpet player, which they had in Lindemann, a newcomer to the festival (as is Morales). Nevertheless, both works served to show that the trumpet can be too loud an instrument for a small concert hall.
The performance ended with Brahms’ familiar Quintet in B Minor for clarinet and strings. Here it was possible really to savor Morales’ butter-smooth, effortless, eloquent clarinet playing. He was joined by Ehnes and Stephen Rose, violins; Rebecca Albers,viola; and Brinton Smith cello; both these last two also newcomers, who from their prominent parts in the variations movement leave one eager to hear more of them.
The entire festival this year is dedicated to the memory of two women who did a great deal to further the aims of the Chamber Music Society, Helen Gurvich and Arlene Hinderlie Wade.
Tonight through Saturday, June 15, is the run of the inaugural Sandbox One-Act Play Festival (at Erickson Theatre Off Broadway; tickets), presenting, as promised, four one-acts from playwrights Scot Augustson, Emily Conbere, Elizabeth Heffron, and Paul Mullin. If you’ve ever prayed on your knees for theatre to break free from the tyranny of the 3-act structure, this festival is for you. Also, if you have a shorter attention span — PAY ATTENTION! — this festival, etc.
I haven’t seen anything by Emily Conbere, who won an Artist Trust grant in 2011 and was a member of the Seattle Rep Writers Group last year, but Augustson, Heffron & Mullin, Playwrights, are a trusted name in theatrical entertainments & misc. Place yourself in their hands, is what I’m saying, but keep an eye open.
The lineup is as follows:
MILWAUKEE, by Scot Augustson — Humor and pathos collide as an aging mother struggles to communicate with her two grown sons. Directed by Julie Beckman.
…DISPOSE OF ME…, by Elizabeth Heffron — A young woman and a former step-father figure try to redefine their relationship, in the midst of a life-changing event. Directed by Carol Roscoe.
OPENLY WE CARRY, by Paul Mullin — An allegorical tale about an openly carrying gun community and the rise of a comely female prophet. Directed by Annie Lareau.
KNOCKING BIRD, by Emily Conbere — What happens when a professional couple leaves the city and desperately attempts to cut ties with the outside world? Directed by Andrew McGinn.
City Arts spoke with Augustson, who says Mullin “challenged him” (that sounds like playwright-ese for a bet involving whiskey) to write “something completely realistic, with no flashbacks, no talking animals, just start to finish, no cuts in time.” This to the author of Shadow Odyssey. “Knocking Bird,” Conbere told The Examiner, “is about the extreme and uncomfortable ways that couples transform and adapt themselves to each other in order to remain together.”
Heffron you may remember from such works as Mitzi’s Abortion or Her Mother Was Imagination: profanely funny phenomenological quests. Mullin hit the “completely realistic” trail himself, earlier, with his Ballard House Duet. His new work, Openly We Carry, has attracted the attention of open-carry advocates, says The Stranger. Apparently, they “fantasized that the play might support their cause—until they got their hands on a copy.” Sad trombone.
The 2012 City Arts Festival begins Wednesday evening and wraps up Saturday, October 20. Some of the festival’s wristband passes have already sold out, so if you are a procrastinator, you may be hunting for tickets on an event-by-event basis. David Byrne and St. Vincent are opening the music side of the festival at the 5th Avenue Theatre, but there’s an equally anticipated arts facet as well.
How anticipated? The Arts Adventure Pass is sold out. That’s for people who want to see every single arts event during the festival. They want, for instance, to hear marimba player and singer Erin Jorgensen perform her “Waiting for Signs” at a local tattoo parlor. The show is “best suited for adults” and should contain, reference, or ignore “3 a.m. visions, melancholy chansons, and the philosophy of Simone Weil.”
Also suited for adults, in both senses of the word, is the KT Niehoff/Lingo Productions & Jill Donnelly fashion-party/installation-spectacle “Emerald City: I Have to Be Seen in Green.” It’s about “adornment, personal aesthetics, and how we choose to present ourselves to the world” and there will be live music. It may get weird.
Speaking of getting weird, there’s also Jose Bold & Friends, in their “Dream House,” which is possessed by a spirit highway. This also comes with musical accompaniment. On the dance front, there’s a smaller (physically) work from Zoe | Juniper called “Kate & Zoe” (the Kate being Kate Wallich) that offers “a brief glimpse into the mystery of the other,” and Danielle Agami‘s “Dance in a Public Place,” which is more or less what it sounds like.
There are many more events, including pop-culture historian Jennifer K. Stuller’s multimedia presentation on the female hero in modern mythology, “Ink-Stained Amazons & Cinematic Warriors.” Also of note, a multi-hour literary pub crawl.
Seattle’s True Independent Film Festival lasts just until May 12, so you have to jump on it if you haven’t been yet. Their indie venues are the Grand Illusion, Central Cinema, Varsity, University Heights Center, and Wing-It Productions. The programming is distinctly eclectic, offering everything from low-budget, high-concept features to rough-hewn documentaries, and from disturbing animated shorts to a Student Film Block (16 student films for just $5, May 10, from 7 to 11 p.m.).
There’s still much more to come, including Saturday morning cartoons and Bloody Marys at the Grand Illusion (2 to 4 p.m., which is still morning for movie people). Before that, on Friday night, I can’t let you go without suggesting Jake & Jasper, in which Jasper is a ferret. I did not have a chance to watch a screener, but it is from Canada and stars a ferret, and if those two things are wrong, I don’t want to be right.
Tuesday night brought the real-life “I built a zoo” documentary ZOOMAN, which chronicles the efforts of 54-year-old Buddy to run a “backyard” zoo (lions, tiger, bears, hyenas, and much more) in Upper Michigan, with the help of his 27-year-old fiancée. Ostensibly about the power of a dream’s pull, the film also shows a relationship disintegrating under financial stress, as Buddy’s zoo has outgrown his earning power. It’s an unflinching portrait, full of people you don’t see on TV, and indie cred. Without STIFF, I’d have probably never seen it.
