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Indie-pop band Guster will be gracing the Brandeis stage—breezy melodies, keytar/disco ball antics and all—on Sept. 24 in the Gosman Sports and Convocation Center with opener Jukebox the Ghost, Student Events announced at noon last Friday.
Indie-pop band Guster will be gracing the Brandeis stage—breezy melodies, keytar/disco ball antics and all—on Sept. 24 in the Shapiro Gym, Student Events announced at noon today. Formed in 1991 at Tufts University, the band solidified itself in the alternative rock scene after releasing its first album, Parachute, in 1994. Since then, Guster has toured internationally and released five more studio albums, including last year's Easy Wonderful. The band comes to the University hot off the trail of a summer tour that included a performance at Boston's Bank of America Pavilion on Aug. 12. Guster appeared at Brandeis in 2002 for the spring concert. Tickets for the event will be available at the University Box Office in the Shapiro Campus Center starting today. Tickets will cost $10 for the first week of presale. After that tickets will cost $15 for students and $20 for off-campus guests. Please check back for updates.
"Cheap" and "ethnic" are key words for any college restaurant-goer, and Steve's Greek Cuisine on Newbury Street, just a 10-minute walk from Beacon Street and Mass Avenue, qualifies as both. It's a casual coffee shop-style joint with the best Greek wraps in town, not to mention a variety of Mediterranean appetizers you won't find anywhere else, such as tzatziki ($7)—yogurt served with cucumbers and garnishes—and saganaki ($8)—fried cheese—which I ordered to begin my light dinner there. The saganaki, which is a pan-seared Greek goat cheese, is a treat. Our waitress brought it out flaming with brandy, then doused the fire scuttling around the cheese with lemon juice. The red burnt edges of the dish had the slightest crunch to them, giving it great texture. The cheese itself is light yet salty enough to offset the brandy and lemon juice flavors. The brandy proves overwhelming at times, so I'm glad our waitress was generous with the lemon. The bitter alcohol aftertaste finishes strongly in the throat, a sensation that may surprise some but one that I enjoyed thoroughly. Like burgers in American cuisine, wraps are an affordable and hefty staple of Greek food. First-timers who don't know what else to order should opt for the wraps as a default choice. The shish kebab wrap ($9) is classic and meaty but perhaps too rich for that light lunch to break up your Newbury shopping spree. Instead, it's a well-portioned dinner with bigger-than-bite-size pieces of lamb or beef. The lamb I ordered could defeat even the hungriest of students. Wrapped in hot pita bread with tomatoes, tzatziki sauce, onions and lots of lettuce, it's the healthier Mediterranean equivalent of the double bacon cheeseburger. The souvlaki wrap ($8) is similar to the shish kebab wrap, though with smaller chunks of meat and spicier seasonings. The menu refers to these flavorings as "Steve's special spices," and they give the beef a nice peppery taste. Both wraps are recommended. One caveat for the unskilled: Beware of intense dripping of the sauce. It'll take me a trip or two more to really get that wrap-handling down, so in the meantime, I'm bringing hand sanitizer. I had a meaty meal, but vegetarians also have just as much to drool over at Steve's, including the veggie grape leaves wrap ($7), tabbouleh wrap ($7) and falafel wrap ($8). The vegetarian mousaka is worth checking out—it's eggplant, potato and zucchini topped with béchamel (also known as "white") sauce. The restaurant also serves burgers, though the only two I would recommend are the salmon burger ($10)—stuffed with feta cheese and spinach—and Steve's Special Burger ($9.45), which is a pita wrap with hamburger meat, sautéed onions, mushrooms, peppers and feta cheese inside. Steve's Greek Cuisine is in a cozy red-brick street corner of Newbury Street that's hard to miss. The food and service is quick, which means more time dedicated to browsing the name-brand clothing stores or frozen yogurt spots you've been eyeing all day. Ask any local and they can instantly point you in the right direction to the restaurant, a testament to its great track record over the years. Steve's Greek Cuisine is located on 316 Newbury Street in Boston. It is open 7:30 a.m. to 11 p.m from Monday to Saturday and 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Sunday. Call (617) 267-1817 for more information.
Ellie Ann Hutchinson '12 is very excited. The self-managed singer-songwriter will debut her first music video this Saturday on her YouTube channel. The video, produced by Tribal Films from Burlington, Mass., took over 7 hours to film and features Hutchinson singing on piano with two modern dancers. The video is for her latest single, "When He Lied," which premieres on iTunes on the same day. Hutchinson, who is a Music Composition major, sat down with justArts to talk about how she got started with music, her plans for the future and singing Raffi when she was 2. JustArts: So you'll be releasing your first-ever music video on Sept. 3. Ellie Ann Hutchinson: I've come out with a lot of videos on YouTube before, but they were only slideshows. I've received over 70,000 hits just on those videos. I wanted to make a full-length music video because that's what people go to YouTube to watch. So I contacted someone from Burlington with a film company. We shot it this summer, and I'm excited that it's premiering soon! JA: What was filming a music video like? EH: It was very long. We shot it at Brandeis on a Sunday at Slosberg Recital Hall. For the same 3 minutes of video we shot for 7 hours straight. I was singing and playing piano for 7 hours straight. He took so many different angles. We had a lot of water. JA: How many takes was that? EH: Seven hours divided by 3 minutes, I guess. We shot from inside and outside the piano. There were close-up shots, stage shots, mid-shots, etc. JA: You mentioned you had two modern dancers filming with you. EH: The filmmaker's friend is a choreographer, so she choreographed the music video and brought in two dancers. Imagine dancing that routine for 7 hours straight! JA: Is the song for the video a new composition? EH: It's called "When He Lied." It's premiering on iTunes on the same day. About a year and a half ago I released my first song on iTunes and YouTube, but it was just the audio. It's an original song off of my demo CD. The song itself is autobiographical. It's an extremely slow and sad song. The other two [on the CD] were upbeat and fun. I wanted to round out the whole demo CD with a slower ballad. JA: How much time do you dedicate to promoting your music? EH: It's pretty much my life. It takes over everything I do. It's not like at a concert when you're telling people about your music after the show. You can't tell how exactly it will affect publicity, but when you're promoting online, you can tell how many hits you get per week and how many followers you get on Twitter. I can remember all the numbers—I just reached 18,000 followers on Twitter, I have 117,000 channel hits on Youtube and 2,100 Facebook Likes. JA: As a senior, your career must be on your mind. What are you plans for after graduation? EH: I want to be a full-time musician. That's my goal. I've found a bass player (Jake Weiner '13), drummer (Josh Goldman '11) and guitarist (Ben Gartenstein '14) at Brandeis. And I'm planning to do gigs around Boston—we're playing a gig in October. I assume I need a day job coming out of graduation and that it's going to take longer than my senior year to do music full time. JA: How did your passion for music begin? EH: I've played piano for 12 years and sang since fifth grade. I've always wanted to be a singer-songwriter. I never wanted to be anything else. I think I was 2 when I performed Raffi songs in front of my family. I started composing in high school and began studying composition in college. JA: What are you musical influences? EH: Alanis Morissette. Jagged Little Pill is my favorite album. I listen to everything, which is hard sometimes when I'm composing to see what style I want. I also love Elton John. JA: How do you compose your songs? EH: All my songs are autobiographical. This can be frustrating because all my friends and family can analyze them and figure out how I'm feeling about them. When I compose, I just like to sit in my room and express something. In 3, 4, 5 hours, out comes some song. JA: What was the first song you wrote? EH: My mother has my first song. It was a song about my mother who was the "birds in my sky" and the "sand in my beach." It's in her notebook, all the way from second grade. I was a horrible speller then, and I wrote in two directions with both hands. JA: What are you hopes for the new video? EH: The way most people are "found" is now through YouTube. A lot of people produce videos and get a million hits. That's how people get signed onto record deals. So even if it might be a long shot, that's what I hope will happen.
Now that I'm a senior, I suppose I should make myself useful and offer up some course-taking advice to Brandeis' incoming class. And while my top suggestion—taking interesting courses—sounds like a no-brainer, selecting those four or five classes that will really expand your mind can be as difficult as taking the courses themselves. Over my 3 years here, I've realized that Brandeis' Music Department has one of the most diverse and stimulating lineups. Here are a few music courses that first-years and upperclassmen alike should consider.
Last Saturday, the day before he received an honorary degree from Brandeis at its 60th commencement ceremony, filmmaker Errol Morris spoke with students and alumni in a talk titled "Investigating with the Camera." JustArts caught up with Morris before the event to speak about his occupational hazards and his fascination with human error. Note: Full coverage of the event can be found on page 19.JustArts: The topic today is "Investigating with the Camera." How did you decide to talk about this?Errol Morris: Prof. Alice Kelikian (HIST) asked me if I would be willing to do something in connection with graduation. I thought for a moment and I thought, "let's do this." It's something I've thought about for years and years, but I've never put it into this form before. I hope it interests other people, it definitely interests me.JA: Why? EM: Well, I used to be a private investigator.JA: I didn't know that.EM: You would think that the way you discover new facts is through some kind of stealth or subterfuge. Why would you be able to find out anything new with a camera crew present? If there was a reason for people to be on their guard you would say, this is it. And yet, I discovered unexpected things while filming interviews. JA: Has your interviewing style changed? EM: My interviewing style has changed, I guess, but it's still the basic idea that remains the same. If you know the answer to a question that you're going to ask, then don't ask it. You should expect to hear something unexpected. . It runs contrary to lot of what people imagine is the appropriate recipe for journalism. JA: How do you find your characters for your films? Is mostly luck, or is it method?EM: There's no method. [Laughs] I am attracted to all kinds of different stories. It's a mixed bag-Robert S. McNamara, Fred Leuchter, Rodney Brooks. JA: Does something just hit you, and you think, "I want to make this into a film"?EM: That is actually the correct way to describe it, I think. If there's something about a story and I think there's something there, what that is exactly, I don't think I can really put my finger on it. JA: What are the topics going around the world now that interest you?EM: Everything. It's kind of an exciting time for me. I'm planning to direct a dramatic feature, and we are in the process of casting that. And I've started other documentaries as well, and I'm writing too. JA: What was going through your mind during your college graduation? EM: I wasn't interested in film, really. I was a History major at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. I spent a lot of time rock climbing. I graduated a little bit late because I spent a good part of my senior year in Yosemite Valley. JA: I used to go to music camp at UWM all the time when I lived in Milwaukee. EM: What do you play?JA: The trumpet. EM: That's great! I play the cello. JA: So when did you first get into film?EM: I started getting interested in film when I went to [University of California,] Berkeley. I was about 24, 25 years old. I started going to movies. Then I met a number of filmmakers like Werner Herzog. I worked for Herzog on a film, then I made my own film. JA: So you really didn't watch a lot of movies before you were 24?EM: Not really. But then I went to three movies a day for maybe 3 years. What interested me in The Thin Blue Line is that I'm really fascinated by error. How people actually make mistakes. They convicted the wrong man and let this guy loose, this 16-year-old kid, who was a killer. This story [The Wilderness of Error] about the Green Beret doctor is also a story about a horrendous series of errors. It's one of the themes that really interest me. Not how people learn the truth, but how people avoid, in many instances, learning the truth. JA: How do you get people talking about making mistakes?EM: I don't know. That's another great mystery. Interviewing is mysterious. I have all types of wacko theories about why I'm successful at it, but ultimately, I don't really know. . I was interviewing Eddie Murphy for the beginning of the Academy Awards. I asked him, "Do you ever worry that someday you'll wake up and you won't be funny?" And he said, "All the time." And so I asked him if he could try to be not funny for me. And in his effort to be not funny, he was, of course, really, really funny. If you're good at something, and I'm supposed to be good at interviewing, and you don't really know why you're good at it, then there's always the fear it might vanish. You might wake up on the wrong side of the bed someday.JA: Could you conduct a bad interview if you tried?EM: I've done bad interviews, but I have a high success rate, and I'd like to keep it that way if I can.
Unexpected things can happen during the documentary filming process. Since a director cannot predict how an interview or on-scene shot will turn out, the end product tends to be a surprise. What originally starts out as a film about an execution technology expert, for example, may turn into a discussion on Neo-Nazism-that's what happened to filmmaker Errol Morris in his 1999 film Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr. In Morris' most famous work, The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara, the director had no idea that the controversial former secretary of defense would go into detail about the "war crimes" committed by the United States while firebombing Japan in World War II. Through interviews in The Thin Blue Line-originally planned to be a documentary about prosecution psychiatrist Dr. James Grigson-Morris achieved what he said was "one of the best things I've ever done": He helped release a man who was wrongfully convicted of murder and nabbed the confession of the person who actually did it. Last Saturday, the day before he received an honorary degree from Brandeis at its 60th commencement ceremony, Morris showed clips of The Thin Blue Line, Standard Operating Procedure and The Fog of War in a presentation titled, "Investigating with the Camera." A former private investigator, Morris' interviewing style was an important element in explaining how these films-which all revealed something about their subject matters that no one else knew-came to be. After University President Frederick Lawrence, a former attorney, introduced Morris, the filmmaker noted that his style of interviewing is the exact opposite of a lawyer's. While an attorney's mantra typically goes, "Never ask a question unless you know the answer," Morris' philosophy highlights the unexpected parts of the interview: "If you know the answer to a question that you're going to ask, why bother asking it in the first place?" Prior to speaking with McNamara-who, after researching Morris, had originally refused the interview-Morris had no idea that General Curtis LeMay had employed brutal tactics in the United States' strategic bombing of the Pacific theater in 1945. McNamara, who was a lieutenant colonel working with LeMay at the time, discussed the reasoning behind LeMay's decision to bomb Tokyo. The implications behind the decision, which resulted in over 100,000 civilian deaths, were astonishing. Morris juxtaposed McNamara's voice with images of the bombing and statistics of Japanese civilian deaths, which he found in national archives after the interview. Morris did not expect to hear such surprising words coming out of McNamara's mouth. The result was a film that changed audiences' perspectives on World War II, the Cuban Missile Crises and the Vietnam War. How did he do it? In terms of technology, he did it with an Interrotron. Morris invented the Interrotron to achieve a true first-person experience between the audience and the interviewer. It is a camera that displays Morris on a monitor so that interviewees may look directly at the camera when answering his questions. He has used this device in almost all of his films. What Morris has come to realize is that when filming a subject during an interview, people can end up saying extremely astonishing things. "You would think that the way you discover new facts is through some kind of stealth or subterfuge. Why would you be able to find out anything new with a camera crew present?" Morris said in an interview with the Justice. "If there was a reason for people to be on their guard, you would say this is it. And yet, I discovered unexpected things while filming interviews." For example, in Standard Operating Procedure, Morris discovered that Janis Karpinski did not really play the role that everyone thought she did in the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal. It is a famous photograph-there she was, bending over the corpse of a tortured prisoner of war, smiling and giving a thumbs up. The immediate reaction, understandably, was that Karpinski was somehow responsible for the killing of the man. But, as the film revealed, a photograph can only tell so much of a story. In fact, Karpinski had no idea where the victim came from, and as she speaks into the Interrotron, the audience realizes that the whole picture is much more complex. "Interviewing is mysterious. I have all types of wacko theories about why I'm successful at it, but ultimately, I don't really know," Morris said. When asked about when he knew that a film was completed, he suggested that he just stops filming when the producers start bugging him. Morris' upcoming works include Tabloid (opening July 15)-he screened the film at Brandeis last semester-which traces the journey of a beauty pageant winner who allegedly kidnaps and rapes a Mormon, and The Wilderness of Error, a book (yes, he writes too) about a "horrendous series of errors" surrounding a Green Beret doctor.
One of the reasons why the annual Liquid Latex show is one of the most popular events in the Levin Ballroom is that students get to see their friends covered in extravagant body art and dancing around in nothing but thongs. Another reason is that it's simply one of the most creative things to happen on the Brandeis campus. Where else but college can people get naked and get painted as Hansel, the American flag or cybernetic androids?This year's coordinators Alex Hulse '12 and Shayna Medley '12 have continued the 11-year tradition of blending art, dance and modeling in an outstanding show titled "Art is Only Skin Deep." I suppose art doesn't need to go any deeper than the skin if the painters and choreographers can create imaginative worlds like Charlotte Oswald's '12 recreation of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. Students painted as fairies, donkeys and royalty acted out the disorienting plot of "Magic at Midsummer." Nati Peleg '13 garnered cheers when he brandished two glowing Poi orbs and spun colors in the dark, showing that skill and creativity were the main tests of the show. I've only seen this once-in-a-lifetime experience from the audience, but something tells me that the true appeal of Liquid Latex lies in the creative process of recreating the model's exterior. All of the dancers and painters of Liquid Latex assembled at noon to begin the bodily transformations necessary for the show. Students spent the day in these new skins dancing, sweating, posing for photographs and socializing. Each of the 10 dances and the fashion show featured a distinctive interpretation of the Liquid Latex performance. In April Kolb's '12 "Decadent Despair," the painted dancers splashed red paint while on stage. I could whiff the raw, plastic smell of it from the floor onto a girl's dress, representing her blood and sin. Ariel Bernstein '11 threw Snickers and 3 Musketeers bars into the crowd during designers Diana Flatto '12 and Allie Joseph '12 and choreographer Rachel Klein's '12 Hansel-and-Gretel-themed "Sweet Tooth." Designer George Falk '11 and choreographer Mei-Ling Caldera's '12 "Techno Genesis" included students dressed as gigantic fast food items with womanly legs who were later violently attacked by robots wielding Usdan Café utensils. Don't ask. If the performances were to be judged on dance alone, then Alejandra Castellanos '12, Nicole Cordero '11 and Carly Greenberg's '11 "Global Exposure" certainly stole the show. Marc Eder '12 and Daniel Lee '12 struck confident poses as the United States of America and South Korea, respectively, while Hulse captivated the stage with Parkour-style athletics, jumping on and off the runway and into the audience. Claire Cooper '11, Elizabeth Watson '12 and Greenberg also stunned the crowd as they celebrated the piece's exuberant world music. If Liquid Latex was purely a visual art show, then the stage design team behind "A Place Like No Place on Earth" would take the prize for its dazzling Alice in Wonderland-inspired creations. Jordan Warsoff's '11 Mad Hatter costume displayed devious blacks and purples that contrasted with the light blue and white of Shayna Medley's '12 Alice costume, while every other character sported effective patterns as well. I must give kudos to the painters for using such bright, noticeable colors. The props-two large playing cards and the iconic rose bush-completed the Wonderland picture. Finally, I must comment on Rachel Gillette '11, Emily Nhaissi '11, Julia Korn '11 and Amy Stricoff's '11 "Lady Marmalade" dance. When the announcer first introduced Liquid Latex as a show "meant for mature audiences only," she meant it. The four girls' provocative energy struck the audience instantly as they twisted their bodies on top of chairs, couches and tables. Like the Wonderland piece, the props used here were elaborately designed-they even included a dresser complete with a mirror-and I'm impressed at how quickly the stage crew moved the set pieces between the acts. Within 10 minutes of the show's end-around 9:40 p.m.-everyone had disposed of their sticky exoskeletons. "It feels like pulling duct tape from your body," remarked Travis Chui '12. "It's especially painful behind your arms and on the inside of your thighs." The students were no longer Harley Quinn, or a pirate, or Lady Gaga, or Gretel or a biomechanical hybrid wishing to eat food. They were now students again, normal people just like you and me, wearing merely human skin until the next year's Liquid Latex.
The audience rose instantly when the 78-year-old man walked onstage. He shuffled over cords and past amps, as if the deafening cheers hindered his step. His eyes, barely visible in the dim purple light, darted between the stool in front of him and a sheet of music he held in his left hand. In his right hand, a soprano saxophone gleamed in the spotlight that rolled onto him. Now that he and his instrument were illuminated, the fans applauded even louder. They had loved his compositions and records for years. They continued to clap, if not for his arrival, then for his contributions to a musical idiom that they-as fans, students, educators-are now responsible for keeping alive. It was as if they were thanking the man with their applause, thanking him for "Footprints"; for "Speak No Evil"; for his fiery hard-bop improvisations as part of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers; for composing countless standards; and for taking jazz into the modern realm with Miles Davis' second great quintet and with his own jazz fusion group, Weather Report. Wayne Shorter's presence, in a night dedicated to Wayne Shorter, could only have been met with this type of explosive enthusiasm. The members of the rhythm section behind him, all successful musicians, laid down their instruments to clap for the pear-shaped gentleman, who wore a navy-blue button-down, pleated black dress pants and black loafers. They, along with students, had already played an hour and a half's worth of Shorter's compositions before this moment. Now, they were to share the stage with the man as a final tribute to the living jazz legend.The audience members finally sat down, upright with eager postures. They waited for him quietly as he adjusted the music and microphone stands. He shuffled his feet some more. He decided to put the sheet music on the stool-OK. Finally, drummer Terri Lyne Carrington broke the silence with a funk groove for "Footprints," a tune composed by Shorter in 1966 that most jazz musicians know by heart. The drummer closed her eyes as she played, as if to focus on transferring rhythmic energy from the core of her body to her arms and legs, then jolting it into the ride cymbal and snare. Each emphasized hit was deliberate but on subtle, unexpected beats. Bassist John Patitucci-always phenomenal performing live-had the squinted eyes and scowl that said, "Ow! That's hot!" David Gilmore smiled at Shorter as he strummed his electric guitar. Pianist Danilo Perez, who had introduced the night's guest of honor, alternated between bending his head down in concentration at his instrument and lifting it in reverence toward Shorter. Saxophonists George Garzone and Joe Lovano stood with their instruments to their sides as they waited for Shorter's entrance. The moments before Shorter played his first note were uncertain and tense. It was not clear when his melody would begin. The audience did not know what he would sound like. Would his tone be filled with youthful bounce, like in his earlier recordings? Or would it be raspy, indicating an aging embouchure? The people in the hall loved him too much to see Shorter be anything less than spectacular. They had, unavoidably, placed the highest of expectations upon him. The first note pierced the hall with its bright clarity. A hint of hoarseness rode underneath the high, glossy tone until it emerged to the surface-the raspy sound of air and reed. Surprised by how loud his sound was, the audience leaned back in unison. Shorter's tone was raw, bright and, most notably, young. The 1,200-plus fans in the hall dropped their shoulders in relief. The way he moved from note to note was methodical yet sporadic, causing his back to arch as he sped through the registers of his instrument. The concert was the Berklee College of Music's "The Footprints of a Mysterious Traveler: Berklee Global Jazz Institute First Anniversary Concert Celebrates Wayne Shorter," held at the Berklee Performance Center in downtown Boston on Monday, April 25. The National Endowment for the Arts' Jazz Masters Live-a fund that will be discontinued after 2012-helped fund Shorter's stay at Berklee. Instead of awarding a modest sum to the living legends that have shaped jazz, often called the only American art form, the federal grant will now award a modest sum to one group or performer in the categories of Performing Arts and Visual Arts, which contains too broad a spectrum for the award to retain significant meaning. Shorter was officially appointed NEA Jazz Master-the highest honor the United States bestows upon jazz musicians-in 1998. His performance represented one of the last opportunities students have to hear from a leading jazz musician in this type of academic program. There were a few empty seats during the first act of the concert. However, at intermission, the owners of these seats arrived in swarms for Shorter's performance. Yet, when the faculty combo began playing at the start of the second act, the man of the hour still had not arrived. He would not come onstage until the concert was almost over. His presence was a rare treat for the patient audience, and his departure felt like it came too soon. He had offered the hungry crowd sparse notes in his solos, leaving the John-Coltrane-sheets-of-sound style of the '50s and '60s behind. He did not show off. He did not command the crowd-he had won them over years ago, as a young tenor saxophonist in Art Blakey's quintet and later in Miles Davis' second great quintet. Shorter hardly made eye contact with his listeners throughout the night. When the audience members rose again at the end, yelling out their collective love for him, he did not bow or nod. Shorter instead smiled appreciatively at the conductor and pointed to the orchestra, as if to deflect the applause to the musicians behind him. He then walked off the stage, slowly, treading through the same molasses of modesty as he did when he entered.The facial expressions of the performers said much about the concert. BGJI artistic director Perez struggled to find satisfactory words to introduce Shorter, but he maintained his buoyant smile as he spoke. He held the confident face of a well-recognized performer. Yet when the billowy-blue jazz legend emerged from stage right, Perez's smirk disappeared. A wide, reverent smile took its place. Perez's eyes, which were intense and calm before, seemed to widen then dissolve in front of the man. No, the jazz combo didn't bow its head to him, but it might as well have. Gilmore helped Shorter with his sheet music and beamed when the man patted him on the back. These accomplished musicians joined the audience in its humble appreciation of his presence. Wayne Shorter always had a sound that no contemporary could imitate, and he stands out as a ceaselessly innovating performer and composer. When Shorter first joined Davis' second great quintet in 1964, the renowned trumpet player instantly recognized the man's gift. "He understood that freedom in music was the ability to know the rules in order to bend them to your own satisfaction and taste," Davis wrote in his autobiography about Shorter. "Wayne was out there on his own plane, orbiting around his own planet." He summed, "Getting Wayne made me feel good, because with him I just knew some great music was going to happen. And it did; it happened real soon.
They are the Asian-American hip-hop sensations that have taken Los Angeles and the rest of the country by storm and dominated the Billboard and iTunes charts. Last year, they toured internationally with Lady Gaga and also have performed alongside Jay-Z and the Black Eyed Peas. Their name comes from a new cultural movement that they also like to call "free wired." It's hard to pinpoint what this movement is, but in the same way that the Grateful Dead paved the way for the hippie movement or the Sex Pistols created their own punk subculture, Far East Movement is the spearhead for a new, multicultural identity in 2011. Like many recent artists, no single genre defines Far East Movement's music. Words like "hitronica," "electro-hop" or "techno-pop" may give one a sense of their style-but this fails to capture the core energy that drives Far East Movement's clothing and partying style as well. According to Kev Nish (Kevin Nishimura), essentially the front man of the group, "free wired" means two things: That they are free to be their own selves and create the music they want, and they are wired-always partying, staying up late and always on the Internet. Many interviewers have asked them if their lifestyle reflects a certain cultural background. Kev Nish is of Japanese and Chinese descent, Prohgress (James Roh) and J-Splif (Jae Choung) are of Korean descent and DJ Virman (Virman Coquia) is of Filipino descent. Do accolades, then, like "Top-Ten Greatest Asian-American Rappers of All Time" or "First Breakout Mainstream Asian-American Act" express the Far East Movement's musical goals? On one hand, they never sing about race. Ethnicity takes a backseat to partying hard on the dance floor and getting slizzard (drunk). Consider these lyrics from their first hit, "Girls on the Dance Floor": "I'mma get you drunk and make you lose control/Gotta arch your back, swing your hair/Just like that, I don't care." These are young people enjoying their life to the fullest in clubs all over the world-they just returned from a hectic tour in Asia-with or without the intention to pave the way for Asian-Americans in popular culture. "We never really made race our basis," Kev Nish told the Dallas Morning News. "We just grew up as L.A. kids. ... 95 percent of the kids just want to party rock and they don't care about race. They just want to wild out. That's refreshing to us."On the other hand, Far East Movement has always stressed the importance of coming from the L.A. Koreatown music scene. They began their careers performing at charities, such as Movementality, that benefitted Southeast Asian communities and networked with important industry members over Korean barbeque in downtown L.A. Like the hip-hop scene that emerged in Brooklyn in the late '90s and early 2000s, the recent Asian-American music scene in L.A. has created an environment where "people are pushing themselves up at the same time," Prohgress said in an interview with soompi.com, commenting on the recent flood of Asian-American artists emerging out of Koreatown. "You're constantly inspiring each other." It's hard to say exactly what movement the members of Far East Movement represents, but they have always cited the people who influenced them in the community. They're huge fans of rappers like Lyrics Born and Bambu and have given nods to YouTube stars like David Choi. They've known Koreatown rappers like Roscoe Umali and Dumbfounded for years. Officially formed in 2003, Far East Movement's path to mainstream success had its ups and downs. In the beginning, it was like most other emerging artists in the area. The crew brought their gear to the back of Prohgress' parents' house and spent the day making beats and jamming out to them. After a few hours, they'd listen to their work and post it online on aznraps.com and hollafront.com and wait for replies. If someone wrote that it was okay, then they'd say, "Hey! He thought it was a'ight!" If others thought their rhymes were corny, then they'd take the criticism and use it as inspiration for the next jam. It wasn't until after countless tracks posted online, repeated complaints from Kev Nish's girlfriend at the time that they were "losers" and hours of waiting for feedback that aznraps.com finally featured their song, "That Feels Good," as an "A+" track on the website's main page. They performed at open mics and charity events until their first big break came in 2006 with the inclusion of "Round, Round" in the film The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift. Deals began to come in and their music appeared on TV shows like CSI: Miami, Gossip Girl and Entourage. DJ Virman became their official disc jockey, and they struck collaborations with The Stereotypes, Bruno Mars and Wiz Khalifa and teamed up with Wong Fu Productions in concerts titled "International Secret Agents" celebrating Asian-Americans in popular culture. Far East Movement cemented its success in 2010 with a major record deal with Interscope Records in February."It's a dream where we don't want to wake up," Prohgress said in an interview with soompi.com. "We used to intern at Interscope in the PR department. We were in the third floor and I never got to go to the fifth floor. It was like heaven. You never got up there. It's the home of Dr. Dre, it's the home of Gwen Stefani, . Eminem, . Black Eyed Peas. This was the holy grail for us. . The fact that we got signed to them is just crazy." After entering the pearly gates of Interscope, Far East Movement recorded "Like a G6" later that year, propelling the group to the No. 1 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 list and iTunes. It was a song that defined the lavish, hardcore-partying lifestyle and created a new vocabulary for young clubbers. Type in "what is" into Google during late 2010 and it would have automatically generated the words "what is a G6?" The lyrics of the song are catchy and make witty references to a drink made with promethazine and codeine (sizzurp), rap group Three 6 Mafia and the Gulfstream 650, the fastest civil plane in the world: "Sippin' sizzurp in my ride, like Three 6/Now I'm feelin' so fly like a G6."Far East Movement's mainstream success caused the Dallas Morning News to ask, "Does 'Like a G6' signal the arrival of Asian hip-hop?" It's still early to see how they will influence Asian-American culture, but the emergence of shows like K-Town-the Asian-American version of Jersey Shore to premiere later this year-indicate the proliferation of a new type of lifestyle. Free wired will not burn out anytime soon. "It's a generation of kids that aren't defined by specific genres but are defined by a playlist of music," Kev Nish told Schema Magazine about the Free Wired movement. "Hip-hop, trance, pop, alternative rock. Kids that geek out. Kids that live online. Those multicultural kids that you don't know their race but you know their screenname. Kids that blog. It's this new influx of kids or adults who are living free wired.
Electronic hip-hop group Far East Movement (click here for in-depth profile) and indie rock band of Montreal will headline this year's SpringFest concert on Sunday, May 1. The day-long music festival will also include alt-garage artist Dom and student rapper Abdul Aziz Dieng '14, Student Events and WBRS announced last Saturday. SpringFest, the music festival on Chapels Field, is co-sponsored by WBRS and Student Events and is part of the Leonard Bernstein Festival of the Creative Arts. Far East Movement, or FM, which consists of four Asian Americans from Los Angeles, will be the first music group with a No. 1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100 to perform at Brandeis. The group's members are Kev Nish (Kevin Nishimura), Prohgress (James Roh), J-Splif (Jae Choung) and DJ Virman (Virman Coquia). Far East Movement is best known for its singles "Rocketeer" and "Like a G6," the latter of which became the No. 1 song on Billboard and iTunes in October 2010. Of Montreal lead singer Kevin Barnes began the funk, electronica and afrobeat-inspired group in 1996 in Athens, Ga., allegedly naming the band based off of a failed relationship with a woman from Montreal. The group's current members include Dottie Alexander, Nicholas Dobbratz, K Ishibashi, Davey Pierce, Bryan Poole, Clayton Ryclik and Thayer Sarrano. The group will be releasing a new album titled thecontrollersphere on April 26. Dom is a five-man psych-pop band based in Worcester, Mass. known for its singles "Living in America" and "Jesus." It released its debut album, Sun Bronzed Greek Gods, in May 2010. The group's lead singer, Dom, is a mysterious figure who "has dreams of making artful pornography and playing video games with Lil Wayne" and has not released his last name because he "owes a lot of money," according to an interview with Pitchfork Magazine. Student Events began coordinating with WBRS in choosing the SpringFest headliners and drafting contracts early in 2011. With the help of booking agency Pretty Polly Productions the student clubs were able to book the three bands for the University's largest concert of the year. In addition to the headliners, Aziz Dieng will perform as the opening act. Dieng, whose stage name is simply Aziz, began rapping when he was 9 and has performed in numerous venues outside of Brandeis since coming to college. Maxwell Zotz '11 acts as his manager. SpringFest will feature a Chapels Field laden with free food and activities. Among other things, a beer garden, snow cones, cotton candy, Japan relief posters, Student Sexuality Information Service's Sex Olympics, a sock drive by the Brandeis Interfaith Group and numerous Student Events and WBRS giveaways will appear on the field, according to Student Events Director of Concerts Alyssa Folickman '11. "It won't be just about the music this year," Folickman said in an interview with justArts. "Student Events has collaborated both interdepartmentally as well as with other clubs to include novelty events, giveaways and a variety of other activities besides the main concert, so this time it'll be about creating an entire festival atmosphere to celebrate the end of the year.
Liquid Latex is one of those Brandeis experiences that students have to see to understand. Dancers, wearing nothing but colorful liquid latex, showcase the imaginative creations of painters and choreographers in an evocative and sometimes provocative performance. Coordinator Alex Hulse '12 and Assistant Coordinator Shayna Medley '12 offer justArts a preview of their show on Thursday night in the Levin Ballroom.JustArts: Liquid Latex has always been a highly anticipated show. How do you plan to surprise students in this year's performance?Alex Hulse: We will surprise everyone by having another show with male and female models in only latex body paint. While this is what we do every year, I think it still surprises a lot of people that their peers will put themselves out there in such a way. This year, we expect an even better show, with new ideas being used in the pieces as designers push their limits more and more.Shayna Medley: I think the show in itself carries surprise and shock value every year. It's something so unique about Brandeis and incorporates so many levels of art. This year in particular, we aren't limiting ourselves to a specific theme, which I think has allowed all the groups to get as creative as they want. Usually groups have to struggle to fit their ideas to the show's yearly theme, but this year we just decided to see what everyone would come up with on their own. Also, the runway designs are going to be designed by individuals, rather than one person designing the whole thing for one specific theme.JA: The show is coming up soon. Tell us a little bit about the process of putting everything together the past few weeks.AH: Well, we came into the semester with the piece designs and over the past few months groups have been preparing their choreography. The last few weeks the board has been putting the final touches on everything. We have been doing allergy tests to make sure all participants are safe. We have also just placed our large paint order and have been finalizing music and designs with the groups.JA: What types of new ideas have students presented to you? Anything that took you by surprise?AH: Designers this year went all kinds of ways with the pieces. Many do new things with both the latex paint and with the dancing. We have groups this year playing with both painted and clothed models. We also have a number of pieces that present stories, both original stories and known ones that are presented in a new way. There are also a few pieces that can simply be described as strange, but those are some of the most exciting ones, truly utilizing the unique medium in art and dance.JA: Is Liquid Latex a performance of dance, of art or of sexuality?SM: It's funny, I don't really think of the show as representing sexuality, but really I'd say it's all three. It's definitely a dance and art performance piece, but it's also very liberating.AH: This year, and in the past, some designers have juxtaposed sexuality with non-sexual or innocent things, such as the Pokemon piece two years ago, while others play directly to the sexuality. However, even more than sexuality, Liquid Latex provides a unique freeing experience for the models and the audience, a safe place to use their bodies openly as art.JA: How has the production changed over the years?AH: The first year it was originally just a simple fashion type show at the Festival of the Arts. We are now in our 10th year and there has been a professionalism that has developed. Pieces are more thought-out, better designed, and even more thought provoking. Some groups have been developing their pieces for a year or more, and this can be seen in how the show improves from year to year.JA: If you had to pick one reason for a student to attend Liquid Latex, what would it be?AH: They should attend for a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Our show is not only unique on the Brandeis campus, but it is the only show like it anywhere. We are the only college that does a performance with latex paint. We are known outside of the Brandeis community, even being mentioned on Playboy.com. We have something for everyone: wonderful dance, beautiful artwork and beautiful male and female models that donate their bodies for our show.SM: You will almost definitely never see this kind of performance anywhere but Brandeis. Liquid latex dance performances are sometimes seen at festivals in other countries, but to my knowledge Brandeis is the only university that does it. It really is a once-in-a-lifetime experience! I strongly encourage new students and students who haven't had the chance to go in the past to attend. The show usually sells out quickly!
Adagio treasurer Taylor Lombard '13 got it right when she quoted Austrian writer Vicki Baum on the joys of dance. "There are shortcuts to happiness, and dancing is one of them," Lombard wrote on the Facebook page advertising Adagio's Annual Spring Show. It was an apt description of the passion that nearly 100 performers displayed at the Levin Ballroom that night. And while the attendees gladly displayed their happiness-with shout-outs and cheers from the crowd, hugs and roses from friends after the show-the dominant emotions exhibited by the performers were less indulgent and primarily derived from hard work. With 15 energetic pieces, the members of Adagio took no shortcuts in putting together, on both Thursday and Sunday, the most popular dance performance of the semester.More than anything else, the Annual Spring Show was a celebration of the Adagio community. This was shown in the first piece, "Circle of Life," which was choreographed by Adagio Co-president Julie Judson '11. Nearly 70 dancers filled the stage and aisles of Levin while Jordan Warsoff '11, playing The Lion King's Simba figure, summoned an orange spotlight on the wall that resembled a sun. When all the dancers raised their hands in unison, the effect was powerful and dramatic. The emcee for the night, an animated Marc Eder '12, moved things along to introduce modern and jazz offerings like the colorful "Bass Down Low," choreographed by Emily Zoller '14; and "Who Do You Think You Are," choreographed by Lombard. The latter piece featured the scorned expressions of its dancers interpreting singer Christina Perri's "Jar of Hearts," which concluded with Camille Dolfen '12 defiantly shoving off another dancer's arms and jumping off the middle of the stage-a stunning ending. Adagio Co-president Greg Storella's '11 "Foley Room" presented abstract interpretations of the drum and bass of Brazilian musician Amon Tobin in what must have been an artistically and physically challenging piece for the dancers-each, however, moved along to the zips and zoops of the music with the individualistic confidence of a violin maestro following his conductor.One of my favorites of the night was choreographer Sam Cortez's '13 "Smooth," a humorous all-male dance that starred the jaw-dropping, hip-hop skills of Shaquan Perkins '13 and an adorable, charismatic Rocky Reichman '13 dancing to Justin Bieber's "Baby." Even without the technical caliber of the modern dances, the dancers' attitude and vigor made the performance a blast.The most imaginative piece of the night was Storella's "Conversations about Dance," during which instead of music, dancers moved along to their own sound bites about dance. "It takes all my stress away," a contemplative Melanie Shapiro '12 said as part of the prerecorded dialogue that played over the sound system as Shapiro herself spun these words into movement. There were exceptional bits of discourse by all dancers here: "'I didn't think of myself as a dancer at first.' . 'It's how I met my best friend.' . 'I'm so much happier because of it.' . 'Who am I if not a dancer?' . 'If you choose to dance, you have to do it for nobody but yourself.'" The sentiment expressed in that last sentence is something, I think, most students deeply involved in extracurricular activities at Brandeis understand. When barely keeping up with the constant flurry of midterms and papers, it's not unusual for a student club leader to ask if the hours spent organizing this performance or event a worthy sacrifice.For Dance Ensemble Coordinator Danielle Gurr '11, involvement with Adagio has been a privilege. "Adagio has allowed me to push my boundaries, try new things, work hard at something I love and take the support I was given and give it to others," she said. "It's been amazing."Judson, also a graduating senior, spoke about how Adagio was an opportunity to grow, make lasting friendships, appreciate her body and understand the creative process of dance. The Annual Spring Show was the final stage of an experience that "has given [her] more than [she] ever expected it would." Something Judson will always remember about Adagio after she graduates is the visceral feeling of "standing at the edge of the stage and looking out at the people who are watching and supporting us," she said. "I will miss all of it, but with the wonderful feeling that I know I experienced it from the top of my head to the tips of my toes, and with my heart and soul."It was precisely this packaging of physical and emotional feeling that made for such a successful show.Editor's note: Rocky Reichman '13 is a Features staff writer for the Justice.
The Brandeis Arts Council has funded all proposals made by the three departments within the School of Creative Arts, awarding $95,000 in grants to the Fine Arts, Music and Theater Arts departments for the establishment of new courses, residencies and projects for the 2011-12 academic year. The annual Council gift funded nine proposals in total, with three grants going to each of the departments.The Council was founded in 2008 and consists of 20 Brandeis alumni, parents and friends. According to its website, the mission of the Brandeis Arts Council is to "support outstanding performances, exhibitions and programs in the School of Creative Arts" and "to enhance the quality and diversity of the arts at Brandeis through the combined annual contributions of its members." The Council meets on campus every spring to allocate funds to submitted proposals. It met this year on March 7.One of the grants that went toward the Music department will help fund the MusicUnitesUS series, a world music residency program founded by Prof. Judith Eissenberg (MUS), to bring the Talujon Percussion Quartet, the South Indian dance theater group Navarsa and Afghan musician Homayun Sakhi for its residencies next year. The grant will also fund an instructor for the African drumming and dance ensemble. The creation of "Polyphony: Workshop, Performance and Symposium," another proposal made by the music department, will allow vocal and ensemble students to work with professional musicians and attend a retreat. The grants going to the Fine Arts department will help establish a new course titled "Memory and Photography" for intermediate-level photography students. The Council will also support the department with funds going toward guest lectures, as well as study abroad and internship opportunities for students. The funds will allow the Theater Arts department to create the Senior Thesis Theater Festival, which would provide production materials to students writing and producing plays. The Council will also fund a residency with actor and director Bill Barclay, as well as new courses in African American and feminist theater. "Often times, the arts has an experiential element that requires many different resources," Director of the Office of the Arts Scott Edmiston said in an interview with the Justice. "What the Brandeis Arts Council does every year is a very tangible way to support the arts at Brandeis." Edmiston, along with Amy Silberstein of the Development and Alumni Relations department, created the Council with the help of Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs Marty Krauss. For the 2010-11 academic year, the Brandeis Arts Council awarded grants to support a full-day concert with international guest artists by the Brandeis Electro-Acoustic Music Studio, professional guest artists for the Brandeis Theater Company and new studio arts courses. For the 2008-09 academic year, the Council funded the faculty appointment of Julia Hechtman, who taught the University's first photography class. During the fall, the Council meets informally in New York City to connect with alumni in the area. Last fall, Metropolitan Opera Resident Costume Designer Mitchell Bloom '84 led the members of the council on a tour of the Metropolitan Opera.The Council met with students and faculty who made the proposals on March 7 in a day-long decision making process led by Senior Associate Dean of Arts and Sciences Elaine Wong. The Council also met with University President Frederick Lawrence to discuss the future of the Arts at Brandeis. "The department chairs were very excited about the funding, and we were as well," said Betsy Pfau '74, a member of the Brandeis Arts Council. "As a singer myself, I was pleased to learn that President Lawrence sings and is involved in the arts. I've liked everything I've heard from him so far and I love that he really understands the importance of the arts.
K-Nite is the Korean Student Association's largest event of the year, featuring music, cultural performances, games, raffles, fundraising, and free food. KSA President Dong Hyun Lee '12 and Vice President Sujin Han '12 spoke with justArts about getting the show together.JustArts: K-Nite is this Saturday. What's the one thing that you're most excited about and why?Sujin Han: The quality of the performances is better than ever this year. The act participants have been working very hard to perfect their dances, singing, instrument playing, acting, etc. and I cannot emphasize enough how much effort is put into this Saturday's show. I am most excited about the audience's reaction and the precious rewarding moment when the curtains go up, which called me back to working for K-Nite this year again.Dong Hyun Lee: I am most excited about the fact that Brandeis community will have a chance to eat Korean food after our culture show. While other East Asian food is well-known, such as Chinese and Japanese, I believe that Korean food is not. I am really excited about this fabulous opportunity to introduce Korean food as well as well-prepared acts within our upcoming show.JA: What have you guys been doing the past few weeks in preparation for the show?DL: In a broad sense, half of our executive board members focused on administrative aspects of planning the show and the other half focused on preparing each act. We actually started preparing this show from last semester. For the past few weeks, more than 50 participants of each act practiced every weekend and to tell you the truth, I cannot explain how hard we prepared until now. So I would like to tell everyone to come to our show and check out what we have been doing for the past few weeks!SH: For KSA e-board members and participants of the acts, the K-Nite preparation has taken our entire past few weeks. Endless practices and rehearsals have filled our weekends, not to mention all the administrative work in order to carry out one of the best culture shows on campus. The past 2 weeks have been focused on publicizing the show, for which we posted flyers, a huge banner on the Rabb steps, made a teaser video on Facebook, sold K-Nite sweatshirts, etc.JA: Can you speak a little about the performances you have lined up for K-Nite?DL: I hope people come to the show without any previews. However, I assure [you] that it will be a great experience and enjoyable time for all.SH: As much as I don't want to spoil the show, I'd like to say that this year's K-Nite has been focused on the theme "Korea 101" and has been choreographed in a way that people can be actively engaged with the performers on the stage. Although I firmly believe that every moment will be a highlight of the show, just to list a few: Korean traditional drumming, modern dances and a unique fashion show will arouse curiosity and amaze the audience.JA: What kinds of activities should students be looking forward to?SH: Students and anyone who is coming to the show should look forward to our grand raffles winners. We are also raising money for Japan's tsunami/earthquake relief with many other student clubs and organizations. Students should get excited for our free Korean dinner after the show, for it is simply the best and words cannot describe.DL: Audiences should be looking forward to our great raffle prizes such as an iPod touch, Fuji instant camera and two gift cards. You all can be the winner! Plus, I assure that people would encounter things that could never be found on textbooks or encyclopedias. Our modern dances and traditional music team and more would be shown. Oh, and the great food as well!JA: Finally, what does K-Nite mean for you?DL: K-Nite is an opportunity to me. It is an opportunity to introduce Korea to our community since not many of us know much about Korea. Moreover, I also believe that it is a great opportunity for myself and our e-board members along with act participants to gain more experience. I am confident that our members would not only gain a lot from preparing and planning this show, but also from actually delivering the show.SH: When those lights go off and the curtain goes up, K-Nite is more than just an event we organize. Countless rehearsals and meetings will flash before our eyes and we cannot thank enough everyone who has worked all along with us to carry out the show. It is the biggest chance we have as a student culture club to share our unique culture and tremendous talent. K-Nite is a way of conveying to the greater Boston area Korean community that Brandeis KSA members are not forgetting our heritage and background even in our busy college lives. K-Nite is a promise to our older and younger generations we will continue to embrace and celebrate our culture.
Demo booths, console and PC tournaments, concerts, expert panels, celebrity appearances and tons and tons of fellow gamers: The Penny Arcade Expo East is quickly becoming the place to be for gamers and industry members alike. Besides providing hands-on demos of the biggest upcoming games, the convention was also an opportunity for the gaming community to network-be it for friends or for jobs-or to just geek out. Since its 1988 beginning as a webcomic in a Spokane, Wash. apartment, Penny Arcade has grown to not only include the wildly popular comic but its own video game series; a charity called Child's Play that donates games and toys to children's hospitals around the world; and Penny Arcade Expo, an annual convention in Seattle that attracts thousands of fans and game companies and is one of the largest gaming events in the country. In fact, PAX became so large that last year an offshoot convention was founded in Boston, titled PAX East. Last year's gathering at the Hynes Convention Center was only supposed to be a test run, but following the comic's example, it outgrew its humble origins with 50,000 people attending the weekend-long event. This year the convention-held this past Friday, Saturday and Sunday-was moved to one of the largest convention centers in the Northeast, the Boston Convention and Expo Center. JustArts was able to attend PAX East on Saturday where fans, video-game makers, tabletop-game companies and musicians came together for what can only be described as one of gaming's biggest parties. In fact, party might be a more apt name than simply calling it a convention. The creators of Penny Arcade, Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins, began PAX with the goal of creating a show that was, first and foremost, for the fans. This could be felt the minute you entered, as a sea of excited gamers greeted newcomers, many in costume, trying to figure out what to do first. The main expo floor was the natural choice for many, where people sought out demos of upcoming video games or went to the tabletop area to play a game with their friends. The upper floors contained countless presentations on subjects that ranged from talks on gaming culture, how to get into the industry and even how to be a "Geek Parent." The upper levels also hosted concerts and game tournaments that reminded attendees that PAX is about fun more than anything else. The "fans first" mind-set was present in numerous little touches around the show, from stages where people could hold Rock Band jam sessions, to the hallway that was filled with beanbag chairs and reserved as a handheld gaming lounge. That said, the gaming industry's presence could still be felt. The expo floor was packed with developers and publishers offering previews of their newest games. Big name releases like Portal 2, Gears of War 3, Star Wars: The Old Republic and Nintendo's upcoming 3DS system shared floor space with smaller outfits like The Behemoth and the local independent developers that occupied the Boston Indie Showcase area. The two most popular booths were probably for Portal 2 and the 3DS demo, both of which had lines that snaked around the displays, where fans would sometimes wait for more than an hour just to get a short look at future releases.Here are our top three highlights from Saturday:Nintendo 3DS: Essentially a Nintendo DS with camera and 3D capabilities, Nintendo's newest handheld console didn't quite impress me at its demo booth. Still, the next iteration of the bestselling console of all time has potential to truly change the way handheld games are played. In a similar vein to the iPhone 4, the 3DS boasts a camera facing toward the player and a camera facing out. After a few minutes of adjusting, the inward-facing camera captured my face and turned it into a funky-looking avatar for in-game use that I did not see demonstrated at the show. It wasn't clear how this real-life photo differs in use from a Mii, which you can now create and share with other 3DS users. When used in conjunction with the front-facing camera, the handheld device can essentially sense which direction you're holding it in, useful for games such as Pilotwings and Kid Icarus: Uprising, in which you control flight by tilting the system. Alienware Exhibit: The PC gaming hardware company hosted an impressive caged area consisting of a game lounge, two game booths, two PC clusters and two sets of benches demonstrating its latest PC and peripheral products. The PC clusters and benches were used for mini-tournaments throughout the day for Portal 2, Team Fortress 2 and Call of Duty: Black Ops, complete with prizes for the winners and an energetic commentator. It was exciting to see a game like Team Fortress 2 played live-each team of eight stood in their respective clusters while high-definition TVs overhead highlighted top performances and the commentator announced the most notable plays ("A blue Scout is now taking point B-what will the Red team do?"). That's not to say the hundreds of other representing companies on the floor didn't also have amazing shows or giveaways at their stations: Nexon (demoing Vindictus and Dragon Next), Ubisoft (with its Microsoft Kinect title Child of Eden), Microsoft (with Gears of War 3) and the Boston Indie Showcase (featuring small-size game developers in the Boston area) all made an awesome appearance on the showfloow.Various game demos and exhibits: Videos were shown for the highly anticipated L.A. Noire and Portal 2, both of which were housed under extravagant set pieces. A live demonstration of RAGE, an upcoming first-person shooter from id Software, wowed crowds with its action-packed vehicle combat sequences. Ska Studios demoed The Dishwasher: Vampire Smile (Xbox Live Arcade), a highly stylized and violent co-op beat 'em up. And finally, an entire section of the center was dedicated to tabletop gaming, offering players the opportunity to trade and compete in games such as Dungeons and Dragons and Magic: The Gathering.
Fritz Lang's sprawling vision of a futuristic dystopia driven by underground machines and the oppressed workers who operate them was brilliantly realized in 1927 as Metropolis. When the silent film reached the United States from Berlin, Paramount shortened the film for commercial purposes to a total of 90 minutes. Quickly hailed as a landmark achievement in film, Metropolis was restored in 1984 with color tints and a score composed by the Alloy Orchestra, then again in 1987 with title cards and photographs representing missing scenes, and yet again in 2001. In 2010, the film received its final restoration after the curator of the Buenos Aires Museo del Cina discovered a 16 millimeter dupe negative of the picture, complete with 25 minutes of lost, though admittedly grainy, footage. Last Saturday, World Music/CRASHarts screened Metropolis in its magnificent near-entirety of 150 minutes (it is estimated that the film ran around 153 minutes at its debut in Berlin) at the Somerville Theatre with a live accompaniment from the Alloy Orchestra. The performance brought the picture to life with expertly-timed sound effects and a raw, driving score. Since composing the score for the film in 1984, the three-man orchestra-Roger Miller on the synthesizer, Terry Donahue on percussion and accordion and Ken Winokur on percussion and clarinet-has worked with four different versions of Metropolis. That night, their performance was longer than ever, playing the entire 150 minutes of the film and providing background themes for the beginning and ending credits. After the credits finished, the three musicians stood up, stretched their backs and hands and bowed to a sold-out crowd, which was offering the most energetic of standing ovations. Unlike symphony orchestras, the Alloy Orchestra performs without break; the short pauses of sound in the film provide barely any time to turn the page or switch, as Winokur often did on Saturday night, from bass drum to clarinet to wood-on-metal contraption. I counted three emphatic moments of total silence-an example was when Freder, the son of the city's architect, opened the menacing entrance of Rotwang's house in an attempt to save his love, Maria-and for those 2 seconds, Miller wiggled his fingers while Donahue and Winokur, located opposite Miller in a jungle-like station of bells, snares, drums and other percussive tools, arched their backs and move their shoulders in relief.The Alloy Orchestra's physical capacity to sustain the music throughout the film seemed an inhuman feat. The musicians' consistency with each precise sound mirrored that of a carefully-edited soundtrack. But a well-oiled, unexpressive machine it was not; each of the three brought human expression and interpretation to the film score that proved once again the old mantra, "music makes the movie." The orchestra followed the momentous black-and-white screen like an ensemble following its conductor; Winokur, hammering on the bells and snares, drove the hopeless workers of Metropolis toward their machines in an unrelenting march, complemented by Miller's exasperated organ theme and Donahue's pounding bass drum. In an opening scene, they conveyed the confusing clash of emotions when to the na've Freder's astonishment, Maria brought the worker's children out to the upper-class utopia.There were a few limitations in last Saturday's presentation. There were only four main musical themes in the film-a worker's march, a jazzy parlor tune to portray sinful partying, a melancholic theme for close-ups and a haunting theme for the catacombs-so they became tiring by the third act of the film. The sound effects-cymbals for crashes and falling objects, a metal box for the creaking of doors and a strange oscillating apparatus for the futuristic laboratory noises-were also predictable. On Lang's part, the characters' overacting often incited laughter (even in the serious scenes) and showed that many of the gestures used in the silent era do not age well. Nevertheless, Metropolis remains a timeless staple of science-fiction epics, and the Alloy Orchestra's performance of the film's most recent restoration, which took about one year and $840,000 to complete, was a rare treat for film buffs and music lovers alike.
Emily is really great.
What first impressed me about the Boston Symphony Orchestra was the acoustics of its famous Symphony Hall. Located within a monumental and ornate building, the Hall gives each note a chance to resonate in all 2,625 of its seats. There is a single set of speakers above the orchestra and 20 or so microphones reach down from the ceiling like long, black vines, yet hardly any amplification is used during the concert. Listening from the orchestra section of the Hall, I felt the sound of the strings and horns encompassing me, rather than bombarding me. In any other large venue, such as a gymnasium, a violin's sound would either be swallowed up by the empty space or have so many echoes that notes would lose their precision. Neither is true in this hall, which has remained largely unchanged since it was built in 1900. I couldn't help but look around and marvel at the intricate golden decorations and the 16 Greek and Roman statues surrounding me, not to mention the humbling 4,800-pipe organ behind the musicians. Musical attractions aside, students should visit Symphony Hall just to look at the architecture, either before a show or during one of its many tours, and see current exhibitions such as the tribute to BSO Music Director Laureate Seiji Ozawa. Every sound was precise in last week's Underscore Friday program, which featured Korean composer Unsuk Chin's "Concerto for Cello and Orchestra" and Finnish conductor Susanna MNlkki. Sounds ranged from the soft string sections to the loud brass arrangements, from the jovial chords in Haydn's "Symphony No. 59 in A," which is also known as the Fire Symphony, to the dissonant punches in Chin's pieces. My band teacher once told me that the best measure of an orchestra's caliber is the effectiveness of its crescendos. If this is true, then the BSO excelled last Friday, particularly in Chin's unnerving and enigmatic pieces. In fact, a man in front of me jumped in his seat during a jarring climax of Chin's second movement, "Energico."Solo cellist Alban Gerhardt-the virtuoso for whom the concerto was written-had built up tension in the piece with jittery runs and strained phrases and was interrupted by a loud clash of notes from the percussion and brass sections. The effect was not cheap; these sudden moments, when placed in the context of the four 30-minute movements, fit into a musical narrative with clear structural statements. While the 2008 piece lacked an easily discernible harmonic or rhythmic structure-Chin employs many unfamiliar compositional techniques-the essential elements, which are the beginning, middle and end, are all present. The night concluded with a triumphant rendition of Jean Sibelius' "Symphony No. 5 in E-Flat Major, Op. 82." Malkki's interpretation was impressive and her small, forceful frame helped the orchestra accentuate the bell-like tolling motif of the three movements. The conclusion-a return to the same joyous figure with the call of trumpets-ascended with drama until Malkki raised her arms high to signal the six final hits, ending the night with a strong and definite E-flat.
Crying-that essential human act-is a large part of violinist John Blake Jr.'s music. He plays African-American spirituals, songs that originated from the cries of enslaved Africans after they were shipped to America in the 18th and 19th centuries. He also aurally invokes the sorrow of slavery in songs like "Go Down, Moses" with a technique on the electric violin that makes its strings sound like the cries of a human voice. Most remarkably, the jazz musician told me that the listeners of his music sometimes cry as well. "Sometimes when I play, I see people crying. Some are hugging the wall or rocking their heads with their eyes closed. The music reaches people, engages people. It's the greatest tribute to the music to see people clap and cry during a performance," he said, speaking about a time when he visited a retirement home with his quartet. Playing for listeners who remember the songs and have experienced the hardships they describe was an enlightening experience for Blake.Since blues songs and spirituals came from the struggles of African-American slaves, the experience of listening to Blake's music can affect people in various ways. A black teenager, around 13 years old and accompanied by his grandfather, approached Blake to shake his hand after his concert last Thursday at the Berklee Performance Center: Because of their age difference, the two listeners inevitably had a different understanding of the songs that were played. Yet while Blake's music is defined by history and race, people of all ages and backgrounds attended and adored his concert. Blake's quartet-which consisted of pianist Sumi Tonooka, bassist Avery Sharpe and drummer Harry Reed-played with Howard University's jazz choir, Afro Blue, switching off between combo-based, instrumental blues tunes and vocal-heavy spirituals. The concert was fantastic, and Blake's electric violin blended with the choir as naturally as a singer would. Songs like "Hold On" had the choir singing like a horn section, using swinging hooks to accompany Blake's warbling solos. Tonooka's improvisations were steady and virtuosic, and the few solos by Sharpe and Reed were equally sturdy. On the other hand, Afro Blue featured soloists that ventured beyond the harmonic range of the song by using dissonant lines to build color and tension. Blake's violin wonderfully combines the soulful wails of vocalists and the technique of combo jazz improvisers. He is a gifted musician who toured with Grover Washington Jr.'s big band and played for 5 years with McCoy Tyner, the pianist known for his work with John Coltrane in albums such as A Love Supreme. Blake had listened to Tyner's albums extensively in the 1970s and finally had the chance to collaborate with him in New York City. "One of the things I learned how to do with McCoy was how to blend. People never associated the violin with jazz, but he made me feel very welcome playing with horns and piano," he said. "He had a great influence on my playing. I understood how instruments blended with the violin, and I could begin to make my violin sound more horn-like or vocal-like. Sometimes, I hear air going through my fingers, even though the instrument I'm playing is made out of wood and string."Blake also highlighted how much he enjoyed recently working with students at The Berklee College of Music and using his experience to develop younger players' ideas. He mentioned that the rehearsals with Afro Blue were very positive and had "the makings of a great performance." I may not have noticed anyone crying afterwards, but the warm applause and standing ovation indicated that the audience enjoyed his spirituals as much as I did. "These were very powerful people who created this music," he said toward the end of the night. "Without their sacrifices, none of us would be here.