Halloween Events Around Ann Arbor

Halloween Events This Weekend

It's the Great Pulpkin, Charlie Brown.

If you're looking for some fun events around town for the Halloween weekend, read on for creepy cemetery tours, devilish dance parties, shadow puppet theatre, and more Halloween arts & culture:

Book-Themed Halloween Costume Contest
Monday, October 31st - 10:00am-9:00pm
Literati Bookstore - Ann Arbor, MI

Halloween at the Market
Saturday, October 29th - 12:00pm-2:00pm
Ann Arbor Farmer's Market - Ann Arbor, MI

Highland Cemetery Lantern Tours
Sunday, October 30th - 7:00pm-9:00pm
Highland Cemetery - Ypsilanti, MI

Shadow Puppet Double Feature
Saturday, October 29th - 9:00pm-11:00pm
Triple Goddess Tasting Room - Ypsilanti, MI

Cultivate Masquerade & Costume Bash
Friday, October 28th - 8:00pm-12:00am
Cultivate Coffee & Taphouse - Ypsilanti, MI

Black Cat Cabaret - Neighborhood Theatre Group
Friday, October 28th and Saturday, October 29th - 8:30pm
Bona Sera - Ypsilanti, MI

Halloween Treat Parade
Monday, October 31st - 11:00am-5:00pm
Main Street Area - Ann Arbor, MI

A2DC Presents: Hullabaloo Halloween Spooktacular
Sunday, October 30th - 6:00pm-10:00pm
Ann Arbor Distilling Company - Ann Arbor, MI

The Bang! Halloween Dance Party
Saturday, October 29th - 9:30pm
The Blind Pig - Ann Arbor, MI

Nightlife Arcade Gaming Spooktacular
Friday, October 28th - 6:00pm-9:00pm
The Forge by Pillar - Ann Arbor, MI

Events Roundup: Theo Katzman, Ofrenda Altars, & More

Theo Katzman

Hard workin' Theo Katzman works hard.

UMS Wallace Blogging Fellow Adam DesJardins recommends some great upcoming musical performances and art installations. From the Arab-American National Museum's exhibit of graphic novelist Leila Abdelrazaq's work to a Blind Pig appearance by Vulfpeck's Theo Katzman and collaborator Joey Dosik, he's got your early November booked.

“Thou shalt bringeth the funk” is a quote no one ever said to me. Luckily, funk-bringers Theo Katzman and Joey Dosik will be doing just that when they grace the stage at the Blind Pig in Ann Arbor on November 5." writes DesJardins, in case you needed more of a reason to buy tickets for the show.

Catch more of UMS Wallace Bloggers DesJardins and Marissa Kurtzhals in their weekly roundups!

Preview: ypsiGLOW

PREVIEW VISUAL ART MUSIC

The Wonderfools team sports GLOWing headgear  in front of ypsiGLOW partner Riverside Arts Center.

The Wonderfools team sports GLOWing headgear in front of ypsiGLOW partner Riverside Arts Center.

YpsiGLOW--the first annual family-friendly, multi-sensory light, art, and music celebration of fall--will be held in downtown Ypsilanti this Thursday, October 27. Festivities commence at 5 pm at the Main Branch of the Ypsilanti Public Library at 229 W. Michigan Avenue with a preGLOW kid's costume party. Treats, activities, games, and a costume contest will be followed at 6:30 pm by a walking costume and luminary parade from the library to the nearby ypsiGLOW block party on Washington between Pearl and Michigan Avenue.

As a DJ spins tracks from his scissor-lift perch, a UV light-activated dance floor and blacklight animated alleys provide space for costumed adults and kids to move with the music. YpsiGLOW artists will perform on the street and in shop windows. Blacklight body artists will be on hand to paint faces and make hair glow in the dark. Also featured will be a blacklight reactive superhero mural, a giant luminary skull, a six-foot-tall grizzly, jack-o-lanterns, shadow puppets, and much more. Dancers from the WCC Performing Arts Department and the EMU Dance crew will perform, and films and projections will light up the night. Costumes are encouraged, trick-or-treaters are welcome and stores will be open until 9:30 pm. There is ample free parking on streets and in city lots for the event.

And for adult GLOWers who want to continue the party, there is an afterGLOW in the spooky black cellars of Bona Sera with DJ Ryan Gerald until midnight.

It took a village to get this event going. It began two years ago when members of the Washtenaw Convention and Visitors Bureau, The Downtown Association of Ypsilanti and Wonderfools Productions (of Ann Arbor Festifools fame) decided a Halloween-season festival would be a great addition to Ypsilanti's already very successful First Fridays. Wonderfool organizers Shary Brown, Mark Tucker, Jeri Rosenberg, and Adriana Zardus began meeting with creative members of the Ypsilanti community, the Ypsilanti Public Library staff, and local educational institutions as well as with civic leaders. Together, they developed a plan to leverage the outsize creative capital of Ypsilanti, the under-utilized downtown real estate, and a little seed money to create the one-night annual cultural festival that is ypsiGLOW.

Just a few of the artists who will be participating in ypsiGLOW:  (clockwise from top left) Angel Vanas, Jermaine Dickerson, Oona Goodman, Cre Fuller.

Just a few of the artists who will be participating in ypsiGLOW: (clockwise from top left) Angel Vanas, Jermaine Dickerson, Oona Goodman, Cre Fuller.

I asked some members of the Wonderfool production team about their process:

"Two of our first partners were Barry LaRue and Will Hathaway of Riverside Arts Center. They, in the space of less than a week, had sent out email introductions. So we spent two and a half to three months just meeting people," says Shary Brown.

Adriana Zardus adds, "Those three months were really important--we called it our discovery phase. We weren't prescribing any ideas. We were just saying that this is what our organization does: we connect different businesses, artists, and community organizations together to make their own creative vision... There's such a wealth of artists and creatives and community leaders that it was the easiest thing in the world to let go of the creative reins and hand it over.”

One thing that was very clear to the team from the start though, was that the event had to have its own unique Ypsi character that to showcase the strengths of this diverse artist, musicians, and creatives-rich community, starting with the choice of a name. They came up with ypsiGLOW in consultation with community members. It was an instant hit.

"GLOWing is positive, it's artistically descriptive and appropriate for the season,” says Shary Brown.

To prepare for the big night, 23 ypsiGLOW workshops have been held by community and arts organizations like Ozone House, Project 23, FLY Children’s ArtCenter, and many others. Masks, jack-lanterns, luminaries, and giant light creatures are now ready to make the night GLOW.

YpsiGLOW will get its first airing this Thursday but certainly not its last. The Wonderfool production team and Ypsi’s artists, educators, businesses, and community leaders are hoping to start an annual tradition that will bring everyone in the Ann Arbor/Ypsi area together for a satisfying shared community art experience for all ages.


K.A. Letts is an artist and art blogger. She has shown her work regionally and nationally and in 2015 won the Toledo Federation of Art Societies Purchase Award while participating in the TAAE95 Exhibit at the Toledo Museum of Art. You can find more of her work at RustbeltArts.com.


The first ypsiGLOW is Thursday, October 27, 2016, from 6:30 pm to 9:00 pm at Washington Street (between Pearl St. and Michigan Ave.) in Ypsilanti. Glow-gear and costumes are strongly encouraged.

Review: Gimme Danger

REVIEW FILM & VIDEO MUSIC

No Fun at Hill Auditorium

No Fun at Hill Auditorium

When Ann Arbor punk pioneers the Stooges played a tribute show for their deceased guitarist Ron Asheton at the Michigan Theater in 2011, arthouse director Jim Jarmusch was in the house. Having announced that he was beginning work on a documentary about the Stooges just the year before, one might have guessed that the Cuyahoga Falls-born director behind Night On Earth and Broken Flowers was planning to include the Ann Arbor show in his film.

But the amusing stories of Jarmusch's terse interactions with townies are the only real creative legacy the director left behind from his Ann Arbor visit. There's no footage from the Asheton tribute in Gimme Danger, Jarmusch's Stooges documentary, which will open in Detroit on Oct. 28. And in many ways, that's for the best.

Jarmusch was at the Asheton tribute, and presumably has been around for other moments in the lives of Iggy and Co. over the past decade-plus, as a friend and casual observer, not a documentarian. Jarmusch first worked with Iggy Pop, the Stooges' legendary and arrestingly bizarre frontman, on a standout scene from Jarmusch's 2003 narrative film Coffee and Cigarettes. In 2010 Pop personally requested that Jarmusch make a documentary about the band. The resulting film plays not like a staid rock biopic but like an intimate conversation between friends, a fun, loosey-goosey retelling of the tumultuous tale behind one of the most influential bands in rock.

Jarmusch begins the film in 1973 with one of the band's apparent endings. At the time, the Stooges had already released their three seminal albums The Stooges, Fun House, and Raw Power, but as a title card puts it, "They were dirt." Critically maligned and dragged down by Pop's drug abuse and increasingly unmanageable behavior, the band called it quits in 1974. From there, Jarmusch jumps back to the Stooges' childhoods, examining how they got to that low point and how they bounced back in 2003 to begin touring extensively in response to broad recognition from a host of younger artists. The stories, from the tale of Pop calling up Moe Howard to request his permission to use the name "The Stooges" to Pop's explanation of Soupy Sales' influence on his minimalistic lyrics, are outrageous and often hilarious.

Jarmusch's focus is relatively narrow. He interviews almost no one other than Iggy and the Stooges themselves (including Minutemen bassist Mike Watt, who toured with the band throughout the 2000s). The interview settings are almost laughably casual; Pop gives one of his interviews in a laundry room, and he idly plays with his bare feet as he talks. Guitarist James Williamson appears to have given his interview in a public bathroom, guitar in his lap.

The director doesn't attempt to editorialize or add much of his own flair to the material. Compensating for the lack of archival photos or footage of the band, he frequently makes amusing use of period-appropriate stock footage and even a couple of animated sequences to illustrate the Stooges' tales of their misadventures. But overall he seems to revel in the entertainment value of letting the Stooges tell their own stories. When you've got the gaunt, bug-eyed, slightly anxious Pop alongside the gaunt, hood-eyed, utterly deadpan drummer Scott Asheton (now deceased), what better method than to just wind these two characters up and let them go?

The relatively straightforward documentary may seem to fit oddly into the oeuvre of the director who made such visually striking and idiosyncratic films as Mystery Train and Only Lovers Left Alive, but in a way it also occupies its own very singular territory. The tale told here is unlikely to throw Stooges aficionados any new curveballs; Jarmusch himself has noted the difficulty he had finding any new footage of the band to include in the film. And the film's relative modesty (especially given its frequently outrageous subjects) seems unlikely to cause enough of a stir to attract many Stooges newbies to the theater. Like any of Jarmusch's other films, Gimme Danger is perfectly happy being exactly what it wants to be – a thoroughly fun, no-frills, firsthand account of the story behind one of rock's greatest bands – and nothing more.


Patrick Dunn is the interim managing editor of Concentrate and an Ann Arbor-based freelance writer whose work appears regularly in Pulp, the Detroit News, the Ann Arbor Observer, and other local publications. He ain't got time to make no apologies.


Gimme Danger premiered last night, October 25th, with a special screening at the Detroit Film Theater (DFT) featuring Iggy Pop and Jim Jarmusch. It opens officially Oct. 28 at the Detroit Film Theater, and will expand to a wider release on Nov. 4.

Preview: Celebrating 20 Years of Edgefest in One Year

PREVIEW MUSIC

Edgefest celebrates 20 years at the Edge

Edgefest celebrates 20 years at the Edge.

To do anything for twenty consecutive years is an accomplishment to be lauded with high praise. When it involves the cutting edge of creative improvised jazz, it’s an even larger feather in one’s cap.

Twenty years of presentations at Edgefest will be summarized in this year’s event. Bringing back longstanding favorite ensembles, emphasizing our local contingent of progressive-thinking musicians, and adding new twists and turns other events might not dare attempt bodes well for future generations of patrons and performers to continue looking up while getting down.

Over the decades, Edgefest has received national and international acclaim for their risk-taking bookings. Substantial grants have financially buoyed their ambitious line-ups, astute listeners have reveled in the innovative music heard here and nowhere else in one setting, while many musicians look forward to their return to Ann Arbor. Even throughout the year with the regular Music At The Edge series, Michigan audiences always have the opportunity to hear this music during any given season.

What is creative improvised jazz? It takes on many forms, from pure spontaneity to open ended composed work that goes beyond notes on a page. It can be serene or jarring, pastoral or jagged, even incorporating true new music based on folk forms from other countries melded with the swing, blues, and improvisation of finely tuned American-based jazz. For sure every flavor is different, yet each somehow holds a universal appeal that even the uninitiated can appreciate if they take the time--and the equally bold step--not to pre-judge but instead to just listen deeply.

Pre-Edgefest events have already taken place. Saxophonist Dave Rempis and Gunwale played Encore Records October 14. A week later the substantive duo of drummer Gerry Hemingway and trombonist Samuel Blaser performed at Encore October 7. That afternoon the University of Michigan hosted a piano duet between Kris Davis and Craig Taborn and included a sampling of her new CD Duopoly featuring the two pianists and others with Davis in strictly composed or improvised duets.

Trumpeter Mark Kirschenmann and keyboardist Stephen Rush’s electric Miles Davis tribute band Big Fun played the University of Michigan Museum of Art October 2. Both Kirschenmann and Rush are part of Edgefest’s proper line-up.

Pianist Kris Davis

Kris Davis is at the top of the lineup. / Photo by Peter Gannushin.

What sets Edgefest apart is the inclusion and emphasis of our local area performers, including recent Ann Arbor transplants such as percussionist Matthew Daher and bassist Will McEvoy; saxophonists Marcus Elliot and Tim Haldeman; the fascinating Balkan fusion group Ornamatik; U-M professors Kirschenmann, Rush, and Ellen Rowe; U-M graduate (and student of Geri Allen) Michael Malis, who was at the A2 Jazz Fest with Andrew Bishop and has been touring and appearing in New York City in support of his recent debut CD Lifted from the No of All Nothing; Tad Weed’s Freedom Ensemble, celebrating the music of pianist Herbie Nichols; tabla drum master John Churchville; Michigan’s famed Northwoods Improvisers; multi-instrumentalist Ken Kozora; multi-woodwind player Piotr Michalowski with the potent MoTreetown Collective and their three horn front line reminiscent of the Griot Galaxy; keyboardist Kenn Thomas; and U-M students performing large ensemble works written by John Hollenbeck.

The festival has gone though its share of trials and tribulations. At times crossing international borders has been tricky for musicians. Late arrivals or last minute cancellations always present timing problems, especially during the tragic and memorable Hurricane Sandy. And the festival has lost a few mighty performers who have passed away, including European multi-instrumentalist favorite Lars Hollmer, Chicago tuba player Aaron Dodd, trumpeter Paul Smoker, bassist Dominic Duval, and Dutch master Willem Breuker.

A special set during this year’s fest will come from the group TranceFormation in tribute to pianist Connie Crothers, who recently passed on. A disciple of Lennie Tristano, Crothers was initially in Ann Arbor nearly ten years ago when the International Society for Improvised Music hosted their annual conference here, and then played at KCH. A tribute to Crothers will be staged, featuring vocalist Andrea Wolper, bassist Ken Filiano, and saxophonist Vinny Golia, celebrating his 70th birthday.

Pianist Kris Davis will be the clear star of Edgefest for this year, as part of a tour supporting her 2014 trio CD Waiting For You To Grow on the Clean Feed label with drummer Tom Rainey and bassist John Hebert.

Then again, there are favored and featured artists returning, most notably Golia and Filiano in other bands; the legendary Trio 3 with Oliver Lake, Reggie Workman, and Andrew Cyrille; acclaimed trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith and bassist John Lindberg; John Hollenbeck’s Claudia Quintet; bassist William Parker; saxophonist Tim Berne with the wild electric guitarist David Torn; violinist Jason Kao Hwang; koto expert Miya Masaoka; the top notch co-op collective Conference Call; and, especially, the participation of Edgefest co-founder David Lynch, who is consultant for 2016.

KCH’s Deanna Relyea has seen all the changes, borne the brunt of audience shifts and trends in modern music, yet continues to be motivated to set up venues, book musicians, and support the event. Like her Nash Bash, which celebrated its tenth year in 2016, these ideas endure because audiences want to hear the music.

Wadada Leo Smith

Wadada Leo Smith.

The inaugural edition in 1997 featured Tim Berne, Rova, Charlie Kohlhase, and Dave Douglas in a one-day event. Things have expanded beyond everyone’s expectations, even the originators Lynch, Relyea, Jules Ryan, and Damon Stanek.

In an interview with creative singer, founder, and artistic director Relyea, she talked about the Edgefest audience, and KCH’s objectives. “I think the Concert House is here to bring music ahead, whether it be classical music, jazz, or contemporary music in general. So it’s our mission to do new music. I don’t think there would be such an audience for this music if not for us, and people would not be as aware of it. I most certainly have grown into it. I feel like I’ve had my graduate education.” In recent years for instance, Relyea has become a part of Jason Kao Hwang’s vocal project on the Innova label Voice.

Audience development is key to the broadening of all horizons. “This is not a festival drawing thousands of people,” she added. “Even people in New York City don’t have this audience, but in Ann Arbor we started with a one day festival with Dave Douglas.” Now it’s nearly thirty bands in at least six different locales, not including schools.

Another aspect of Edgefest is that it brings back former area players like bassist John Lindberg, and especially ex-Ann Arborites like the renowned and brilliant pianist Craig Taborn, who will accompany two different groups and play a stand-alone solo piano set. “We are all proud of that. It’s really great to have them. Also our Saturday afternoon slot specifically emphasizes our area musicians, in this case the MoTreetown Collective and Northwoods Improvisers."

Then there’s at least one European, Canadian, or foreign group, in this case Sylvaine Helary’s Spring Roll, direct from Paris, France, and on tour in the U.S., who have a double CD out on Ayler Records Printemps/Spring Roll. Helary wields four different flutes and sings in a manner that has been described as a cross between Nina Hagen and Iva Bittova--sassy and minimalist-- while the band has been depicted as a hybrid between theatre, music, sound, poetry, and political manifesto. “I really look forward to that,“ Relyea said. “People love her, and in my conversations with her she seems charming.”

There will be commissioned works written by violinist/violist Jason Kao Hwang and his Burning Bridge Ensemble written and premiered specifically for this 20th Edgefest, featuring strings, brass, the Chinese erhu, and pipa. Another highlight should be the debut of trumpeter Mark Kirschenmann’s All Sanctuary trio featuring the trumpeter Jennifer Ellis on harp, and Churchville’s tabla, while Stephen Rush’s original Piano Concerto will be played prior to a scheduled Big M Records recorded document.

If jazz is indeed the music of surprise, there will be a thousand such moments in store at the upcoming Edgefest celebration.


Michael G. Nastos is known as a veteran radio broadcaster, local music journalist, and event promoter/producer. He is a former music director and current super sub on 88.3 WCBN-FM Ann Arbor, founding member of the Southeastern Michigan Jazz Association, Board of Directors member of the Michigan Jazz Festival, and writes monthly for Hot House Magazine in New York City.


Edgefest takes place October 26-29 at the Kerrytown Concert House, 415 N. Fourth Ave. for main performances, along with other locales. Workshops will be at the Community High School, Scarlett & Clague Middle Schools, and the University of Michigan School of Music.

Preview: Ingrid Racine Moving Toward Major Player Status

PREVIEW MUSIC

Ingrid Racine at the recent Ann Arbor Jazz Festival

Ingrid Racine, with Ben Rolston and Chuck Newsome, at the Ann Arbor Distilling Company during the recent 2016 A2 Jazz Festival.

Our local contingent of modern jazz improvisers is as substantial as those coming in from out of town. We’re fortunate to have them, considering the paucity of performance spaces for them to ply their craft.

One performer who seems to take it all in stride is trumpeter Ingrid Racine. Juggling motherhood in tandem with her mate, club DJ Alvin Hill, creating and exploring performance spaces, teaching, performing some administrative duties, and recently making her debut recording would be a bit overwhelming for anyone. Add to that the tricky parameters of playing a brass instrument and one has to admire how from day to day she fits all this in yet plays so beautifully, straddling the not so fine line between jazz tradition and her personal brand of modernity that appeals to a mostly younger -- but some older, universal -- jazz demographic.

She has listened to and incorporates many aspects of the 100 years of jazz; she embraces everything from early trad and swing to mainstream jazz, and be bop, fusion, folk forms, and even the hip hop of her generation.

It's rare for a jazz musician to be born, raised, and continuing to live in Ann Arbor. Racine graduated from the jazz program at Community High School, guided by Mike Grace in 2000. She obtained her BFA in Jazz Studies at the University of Michigan where she was instructed by the great Detroit saxophonist Donald Walden, and Detroit Symphony Orchestra and jazz trumpeter Bill Lucas.

By graduation, Racine was entrenched as a member of Phil Ogilvie’s Rhythm Kings, Mady Kouyate’s Heat of Africa, and the Detroit-based all female jazz group Straight Ahead. She toured and recorded with the Afro Beat large ensemble NOMO from 2003-2009, recording for the West Coast based Ubiquity label. In 2007, she returned to University of Michigan to study with vaunted jazz piano star Geri Allen while completing her Masters Degree in Improvisation. She also curated for three years the summer outdoor series of shows on the patio of the Gandy Dancer.

Other associations include collaborations with Marion Hayden, the Paul Keller Orchestra, Wendell Harrison, the Heather Black Project, Jesse Kramer's Juice Box and Ethan Davidson. She’s also been heard with the Gin Dandies.

Ingrid Racine was working professionally during her days as a student. Her playing has fit in with trad jazz groups like P.O.R.K - Phil Oglivy’s Rhythm Kings led by James Dapogny, the Paul Keller Orchestra and Women In Jazz ensembles. While far from petite, Racine handles her brass trumpet with a savvy that has recalled veterans twice her age such as Freddie Hubbard, Jack Walrath or Valery Ponamarev, while also adding some of the ethereal qualities of the late Kenny Wheeler.

As a composer, Racine is also asserting herself, as evidenced by the release of her independent Kickstarter funded debut CD Concentric Circles. She’s a little on the funk side of jazz, can swing as hard as she needs to, and sings on occasion delightfully. Her recent hit performance at the A2 Jazz Fest with her regular quartet, numerous club dates, and her regular gig every Sunday for brunch at the Gandy Dancer has shown her to be a reliable player that delivers consistently. In a world dominated by male instrumentalists, Racine is proving she is a leader among women or any gender in jazz, a contingent that is finally ascending with rapid and overdue recognition.

Her regular band with guitarist Chuck Newsome, bassist Ben Rolston, and drummer Rob Avsharian are proving that practice does indeed make perfect, especially hearing the quartet at the Gandy Dancer. On the CD she’s joined on select tracks by rising star keyboardist Ian Finkelstein and veteran trombonist Vincent Chandler.

The fluid motion of her horn lines belies the fact that hard metal pressing against teeth and lip skin embouchure is no easy task, and can eventually be damaging, yet she takes care of business on all of these levels to emerge as perhaps the premier female jazz player in this era and this region.

She recalls her early days listening to funk and ska music. “In ninth grade it was the British second wave - The Specials and English Beat. Then I went backwards to the Jamaican stuff. There were strong Community High school bands back then. I played in an all-female punk band Vomica, named from the homeopathic remedy, and The Brewts, whose drummer was Barrett Miller, Ben Miller from Destroy All Monsters’ son.”

The unlikely bridge between the harder edged music and jazz was Chet Baker. “My brother was in the CHS Jazz band and the rockabilly group Lucky Haskins. Justin Walter and Ben Jansson were in his band - great jazz players. It started for me with Chet Baker on records, something that was accessible to me, and someone singing, and the playing. I heard a Thelonious Monk compilation record which I listened to death. Then I was in Sandy Machonochie’s jazz band at Tappan Middle School and she made me take improvised solos against my better judgment."

The juxtaposition of working simultaneously with James Dapogny a.k.a. Phil Oglivy, and NOMO as a bridge between Jelly Roll Morton and Duke Ellington to Fela Kuti might seem disconnected, but Ingrid Racine considers it a blessing. “For NOMO, it was cool kids playing at dance parties, but when I was hungry for gigs I sat in and got my butt kicked for the first two years with P.O.R.K."

Her career path has led her to the long overdue solo recording Concentric Circles, the culmination and an offshoot of her 12 year, regular Sunday brunch gig at the Gandy Dancer, where she has honed her playing and singing. “I feel like writing-wise I go through phases. I’ll book a gig and challenge myself to write all new tunes. So this batch of music with this band goes back to 2012 at The Raven’s Club. I knew the vibe I wanted to go with. So over the course of a few years we only played it a few times. Then there was music we did at the Elk’s Lodge. So the CD is an amalgamation of two writing periods."

“I’m not a big wailer, a high note player. My approach to the instrument is more forgiving. Just the way I hear things is more lyrical. I even didn’t want to think about it being a so-called jazz record, because I didn’t want that pressure of being virtuosic."


Michael G. Nastos is known as a veteran radio broadcaster, local music journalist, and event promoter/producer. He is a former music director and current super sub on 88.3 WCBN-FM Ann Arbor, founding member of SEMJA, the Southeastern Michigan Jazz Association, Board of Directors member of the Michigan Jazz Festival, votes in the annual Detroit Music Awards and Down Beat Magazine, NPR Music and El Intruso Critics Polls, and writes monthly for Hot House Magazine in New York City.


Ingrid Racine & Friends perform every Sunday for brunch at the Gandy Dancer, 401 Depot St., from approximately 10 am - 2 pm. For dining reservations, call 769-0592. Ingrid also performs every Sunday with the Heather Black Project at the Ravens Club, 207 S. Main St., from 8 pm - 11 pm.

Ingrid is also leading an ongoing Music Production workshop presented by All Arts Access at AADL on Tuesday, October 25, November 8 and 22, 2016 at the Downtown Library.

Preview: Joe Hertler & The Rainbow Seekers at the Blind Pig

PREVIEW MUSIC

Rainbow Seekers

Someday you'll find it, Rainbow Seekers.

Joe Hertler & The Rainbow Seekers were just in Ann Arbor a couple months ago to play a rousing show at Sonic Lunch, and they’ll be making the trip across the state again to play the Pig on October 21. Spread out all over Michigan, from Kalamazoo to Lansing to metro Detroit, all the band members have day jobs and then travel together most weekends to perform. It makes for a hectic lifestyle, but they don’t seem to mind. In an interview this summer, Hertler poked fun at the popular phrase, “If you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life.” “It’s bullshit,” he said. “We work our asses off, and it's hard work, but we think it's worth it."

The band boasts of their ability to “make a sprightly young groove doctor out of anyone,” and with their folksy, funky, Motown-like jams, it’s a promise that they can uphold. The seven-man band traces their roots back to 2008, when lead singer Joe Hertler dropped out of music school at Central Michigan and started trying to put together his own band. He met guitarist Ryan Hoger and bassist Kevin Pritchard in Lansing in 2010 and with that, the Rainbow Seekers began to assemble. Saxophonist Aaron Stinson, violist Joshua Holcomb, and drummers Micah Bracken and Rick Hale all felt the pull of the rainbow and joined the band over the next four years.

Joe Hertler et al believe in providing their audiences with a true “experience,” which is why they don’t only play songs from their albums, the most recent of which, Terra Incognita, came out last year. Instead, they play a mix of old and new material, and improvise on stage, too. Typically dressed in bright clothing and costumes—Stinson sometimes puts a giant sunflower in his sax—Hertler and the Rainbow Seekers instill their infectious energy and good cheer into the audience, often accompanied by a giant inflatable rainbow that they drag on stage with them. Audience members are always encouraged to dance, clap and sing along. “Having a good time is contagious, and we try to spread that,” Hoger said earlier this year. At their Sonic Lunch performance this summer, they got almost everyone up to the front of the stage to dance to “Future Talk,” one of the best songs off of Terra Incognita.

The band is planning to release as-yet-unnamed new album, which Hertler claims will be their best yet, in early 2017.


Elizabeth Pearce is a Library Technician at the Ann Arbor District Library.


Joe Hertler & The Rainbow Seekers are playing at The Blind Pig on Friday, October 21. Doors are at 9:00 pm. Tickets are $15. Ages 18+. For more information, visit http://www.blindpigmusic.com/ .

Review: Detroit Public Theatre's Murder Ballad Slays

PREVIEW MUSIC

Murder Ballad

Murder Ballad hits it off with audiences.

The Detroit Public Theatre hit the ground running less than a year ago, after the vision of creators Courtney Burkett and Sarah Winkler finally came to fruition. The DPT shares its home with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, in the Max M. Fischer Music Center in the heart of Midtown. Now in their second season, the DPT offers audiences four new plays, all new to Michigan and all, the company believes, relevant to Detroit audiences. The first of these, running from September 28 to October 23 and directed by Burkett, is Murder Ballad, a rock musical about love, lust, rage, passion, obsession, and jealousy that got its start at the off-Broadway Manhattan Theatre Club.

Described as “a dark thriller with a razor’s edge,” the musical stars Arianna Bergamaschi as Sara, a broken-hearted New Yorker trying to rebuild her life, only to have her former love, Tom (Rusty Mewha, a current Resident Artist at the Purple Rose Theatre) continue to haunt her dreams and ultimately, her reality.

The play opens ominously: as the audience takes their seats in the small Robert A. and Maggie Allesee Hall where the DPT shows take place, a single spotlight shines down on a pool table at the center of the room with a baseball bat lying across it. A live band, comprised of Shawn Neal on drums, Mike Shriver on bass, and Jeff Sufamosto on guitar, is set up at the back of the stage and starts the show off with a crash of rock music. It’s great fun to see the band throughout the whole show, and they offer a dramatic backdrop to the scenery in the foreground.

The main conflict takes place quickly: Sara and Tom are in love (demonstrated by a series of sexy scenes where they crawl around on top of a bar and a pool table), but he breaks her heart. Stumbling home drunk and devastated, Sara meets Michael (Eric Gutman), who comforts her and the two eventually marry and have a child (This child, “Frankie” is invisible throughout the play, although the characters engage with it frequently, which is mildly off-putting.). Sara can’t get Tom off her mind though, and the two reconnect years later with disastrous results. Hint: the baseball bat makes a reappearance.

The highlight of the show is actually the nameless Narrator, played by Arielle Crosby, who takes audiences breath away with her hugely powerful voice. Fed up with all the other characters, she alternately encourages and discourages their actions through song and movement, wielding the baseball bat as a prop, although the others rarely interact with her. Bergamaschi also has a strong voice, although her attempts to mask her native Italian accent seemed ill-advised, as they somewhat affect her ability to sing to her full potential and it would not have detracted from the show for her character to have a non-American accent.

Overall, Murder Ballad is a fun performance to watch despite its somewhat predictable storyline and a lack of truly memorable music. The excellent set design and choreography keep the show moving, and the buildup to the climax of the show is well-executed, with everything concluding in a neat 75 minutes. And of course, who doesn’t love a little murder, passion and rock’n’roll?


Elizabeth Pearce is a Library Technician at the Ann Arbor District Library who only likes to use baseball bats to play baseball.


Murder Ballad runs from September 28-October 23, 2016 at the Detroit Public Theatre in Detroit. Tickets and more information are available at their website. DPT's second season will continue with Dot, running November 16-December 11, 2016, The Holler Sessions, running February 1-26, 2017 and The Harassment of Iris Malloy, running May 3-28, 2017.

Preview: Katie Geddes Serves Music Community On Several Levels

PREVIEW MUSIC

Preview: Katie Geddes Serves Music Community On Several Levels

Katie Geddes / Katie's debut album We Are Each Other's Angels from 2010.

There are many musicians, promoters, and support staff who thrive on service to the community. They tirelessly and with inadequate recompense give of themselves for the greater musical good. Then there’s Katie Geddes, who fills that bill beyond the call of duty.

A premier singer in our midst for some three decades, Geddes (pron: Ged-us) makes appearances at The Ark, the Green Wood Coffee House, smaller clubs, nursing and direct care facilities, the occasional festival, and even hosts house concerts. Her profession as a financial planner feeds her monetarily enough to be able to take music and acoustic folk art to as high a level as any local musician.

She also programs the shows at the Green Wood Coffee House in the First United Methodist Church at Green Road on Ann Arbor’s near north side. The series has been active since 1995. Recent performers have or will include Melanie (which was sold out), Chuck Mitchell, Don Henry, Mary McCaslin, Chuck Brodsky, Lou & Peter Berryman, Don White & Christine Lavin, John Ford Coley, Laurie McClain, Jeremy Horn, Sally Barris, and of course Geddes. In a room capacity of 200, most patrons hearing big name folk acts while not being church parishioners, is impressive.

We have breaking news: Katie Geddes has plans to record as many as six new CDs in the coming years. One will feature Melanie singing on it and producing it; as well as a tribute to Carly Simon. “I can’t believe no one has done that," she said in a recent interview. “Don Henry will produce that one.”

She’ll also do a solo album, another alongside her vocal trio All About Eve, plus a gospel, and a Christmas album. Whatever project she finishes first will be released first. She hopes all will be done in the next several years. “I would like to think so, but it takes me a long time because music is my side project.” When asked if she is a perfectionist she says no. “I do things over, but the time that goes between my recording sessions might be six months. David Mosher is very patient with me. He keeps my hard drive right there in his studios so when I do show up he’s ready."

Her debut studio CD We Are Each Others Angels was issued in 2010 and was made at Mosher’s Lake Studios in Brighton and Big Sky in Ann Arbor. The Live At Green Wood with The Usual Suspects dates back to 1999. It’s safe to say these new ideas have had plenty of time to germinate and now they are getting ready to sprout wings.

Because of the specific use of guest artists, most times Geddes has to wait until they come to town to book them at Green Wood. Her personal producer is a constant. “Now David Mosher is a wizard on all different kind of instruments, so I would lay down vocals and he would record a mandolin or a fiddle, then I’ll decide whether to keep it or not. The one I’m doing now has Robin McNamara, then a good two years later Jonathan Edwards added harmonica. That’s how I work.”

The guest artists become friends through her booking them at Green Wood. She also interprets other folks' music exclusively. “I do no song writing. I did write a book of poetry that maybe someday someone will put to music. They’re not really formatted."

“I cover songs and I think I'm pretty good at choosing songs and interpreting them. I like to ‘folkify’ pop - I’m a big fan of 1970s radio pop. I’ll countrify it or add a yodel, or harmony where there was not one before. By chance I’ll hear something I haven’t heard in forever and it’ll be stuck in my and really need to redo it. Or we’ll do something in church like Joe South’s 'Games People Play' because it was perfect for the service that day. It’s very relevant. We used Hammond organ on that.”

Some of the artists songs she has covered include Nanci Griffin, Gillian Welch, Woody Guthrie, Leadbelly, J.D Souther, John Lennon & Paul McCartney, and John Prine.

She mentions songs in church done by Mary Gauthier or Susan Werner, emphasizing the lack of hymns or strictly spiritual music. "We don’t do church music at our church.” As far as dream artists to book or collaborate with, she listed Sweethearts Of The Rodeo, Jennifer Warnes, and Dion.

Then there was the sold out show in the late 2000s with the recently deceased Rod McKuen. “We knew ahead of time we would have had too many people for the room so we put it in our downtown location. His fans had been waiting decades to see him. They came from all over the country."


Michael G. Nastos is known as a veteran radio broadcaster, local music journalist, and event promoter/producer. He is a former music director and current super sub on 88.3 WCBN-FM Ann Arbor, founding member of SEMJA, the Southeastern Michigan Jazz Association, Board of Directors member of the Michigan Jazz Festival, votes in the annual Detroit Music Awards and Down Beat Magazine, NPR Music and El Intruso Critics Polls, and writes monthly for Hot House Magazine in New York City.


Katie Geddes performs at 8 pm, Saturday, October 8, at the Interfaith Center For Spiritual Growth in Café 704, 704 Airport Blvd. off State St. For reservations e-mail Al Carter at cafe704@gmail.com or call (734) 327-0270.

Preview: Judy Banker emerging as a premier singer/songwriter

PREVIEW MUSIC

Judy Banker Band

Judy Banker Band

By day she's a therapist and the Executive Director of the local Center for Eating Disorders. But on more occasions lately, Judy Banker continues her ascent as one of the brightest stars on the acoustic music scene, writing her own songs, playing exuberant music on her guitar, and vocalizing lyrics that have a universal appeal.

It’s no stretch to say that Judy Banker is ultimately so happy when performing it all seems completely natural. Her enthusiasm and sheer elation while playing her music is infectious and evident. Her radiant smile and stage presence has made her popular, leaving her fans and admirers asking for more. She possesses that rare combination of charisma and charm, along with a healthy injection of musicianship that seems so organic and soul driven, not produced in any way, shape or form.

At the last three editions of Nash Bash in the Kerrytown Farmer’s Market, Banker has been a shining star, eliciting the remark from Kerrytown Concert House’s Deanna Relyea that she “now can’t imagine a Nash Bash without Judy Banker.” Singing as a member of the Bill Edwards group for a scant few years as she did at the recent Nash Bash, but also extensive time working with Jay Stielstra, she’s now become a leader in her own right with encouragement from Stielstra and friends who recognize her singularly unique talent and stage presence.

Making her way from her native Manitowoc, Wisconsin west of Milwaukee to Ann Arbor, Banker is living proof that life’s lessons and feeling one’s own share of personal blues can turn into positive messages and the kind of music anyone can relate to - no matter their lot in this human condition of America. Inspired by similar artists of the 1960s, Banker writes songs with a more creatively complex vision, yet with simple and easy to understand lyrics. She’s already written several that could be considered classics, like the tune prompted by a comment from her son, the title track on her debut CD Devils Don’t Cry, “If You Could Read My Mind” (not the Gordon Lightfoot hit), “Feet Of Clay,” and the deeply poignant “Regrets." Devils Don’t Cry is a complete compendium of the twists and turns anyone might face, turned into a delightful and at times heart-weary mix of cautionary tales and tonics for the troops. The initial CD could perhaps see a follow-up soon - she has more material laying in wait - but her first effort could easily be issued on any major folk music label. It’s that good.

Banker's support group is perfect for what she attempts and accomplishes as an artist. The band includes renowned slap bassist and vocalist David Roof, violinist/vocalist Greta Mae Barnard, lap steel, dobro, and slide guitarist Tony Pace, and drummer/percussionist Stuart Tucker.

Initially Influenced by the likes of The Beatles, Bob Dylan, Peter, Paul & Mary, Joan Baez and Joni Mitchell, Banker’s music is neither stern nor ethereal, yet she retains threads of some of those values, along with a heart that professionally and musically wants wrongs to be righted. She is also not strictly urban or rural, but takes in elements of simplicity and sophistication to make music that is clearly all her own.

In a recent interview, Judy Banker talked about the inspiration behind her personalized story/songs. “I want to express this complex of emotions in a thought. It’s continually fascinating to me how right and wrong are so hard to decipher - it’s all a point of view. It isn’t really hard to pick a subject. I will look back on something that I’m stuck on or can’t figure out."

As a player, she started on a cheap guitar, and, along with her older brother, took lessons. “We played piano as kids. We learned chords in the key of C and G, then our teacher said that was all he knew. Then we had a cover band in middle school.” She also mentioned Joni Mitchell and had all of her albums: “Her writing is incredible, but I didn’t play her songs because I didn’t know the chords. It was outside of my Mel Bay music book. Some of my melodies have that feeling."

When asked where her songwriting can go she admits this is an early foray, as she’s been doing it for only four years. “What I imagine - the area that I’ll branch off into - is working on other people’s stories more. I hear people’s stories all the time - the battles that women go through all the time. I haven’t written anything political or about disenfranchised groups. I wouldn’t rule that out, it’s something I’m passionate about and care about - people who are being battered by our culture."

Banker is delighted with her audience response, feeds off it, and is interested in taking it to a higher level. Once again, her happiness quotient on stage is shared with her listeners. “I would love to channel bringing joy to people’s lives in a substantial way instead of, say, buying them a new toy. Helping people clear out some of the gunk and have better lives - I’ve dedicated my whole life to that."


Michael G. Nastos is known as a veteran radio broadcaster, local music journalist, and event promoter/producer. He is a former music director and current super sub on 88.3 WCBN-FM Ann Arbor, founding member of SEMJA, the Southeastern Michigan Jazz Association, Board of Directors member of the Michigan Jazz Festival, votes in the annual Detroit Music Awards and Down Beat Magazine, NPR Music and El Intruso Critics Polls, and writes monthly for Hot House Magazine in New York City.


The Judy Banker Band performs at 7:30 pm on Thursday, October 6 at Johnny’s Speakeasy, 2923 Dexter Ave. on Ann Arbor’s far west side. E-mail only for reservations at johnnyspeakez@gmail.com. Seating is limited. The neighborhood has little if any local parking, so promoters are providing a shuttle between Plum Market in the Westgate Shopping area and The Speakeasy to easily access the show. Board from 6:30-7 pm. E-mail a reservation for the shuttle at judithbanker@gmail .com.