In a vast and vigorous metropolis that just renewed its world-class status by hosting an international sporting event and countless international visitors, locating an out-of-town daily newspaper seemed like the simplest of tasks. Quite honestly, it seemed like no task at all. This is Chicago, Illinois, not Elko, Nevada. From the Cubs to Kup to […]
Tag: Vol. 23 No. 42
Issue of Jul. 28 – Aug. 3, 1994
Posted inNews & Politics
Dare to Bowl
Dear editor, As an aspiring professional bowler I found the opening paragraph of Jeffrey Felshman’s “Blind Alley” (7/15/94) dreadful. I personally know hundreds of people who could answer his questions and thereby refute his “nobody . . .” statements also. I’m not sure if his opening remarks are intended to denigrate bowling or blind people […]
Posted inNews & Politics
The City File
Hey, I can’t find the clutch on this thing. Piano rebuilder Paul Revenko-Jones of Music of the Spheres Pianoworks (Chicago Industrial Bulletin, May/June): “There are 11,000 to 12,000 parts in a piano. That’s more parts than there are in a car.” Musical inspiration. According to Mike Konopka in the Eardrum (June), “It is a common […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Group Effort
FRIENDS WITH FIRE ARMS: A FAREWELL TO FEMINISM at Chicago Filmmakers, through August 28 I couldn’t imagine a more unlikely multimedia performance collaboration than one between brash performance artist Paula Killen, refined actress-violinist Miriam Sturm, and intellectual filmmaker Katy Maguire. But here it is, framed by Mary Brogger’s beautifully spare and elegant set, and it […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Confederacy of Dunces
Dear editor: One step forward, one step back: you finally terminated “President Bill,” a comic strip so lame as to be embarrassing. But then you brought in something called “The City” by “Derf”; it achieves shameful new levels of stupidity, ignorance, and offensiveness. Is this what’s left of the left? Stereotypes worthy of the right? […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Chicago Symphony Orchestra
John Williams has scored some of Hollywood’s biggest sellers–from the Star Wars trilogy to E.T. to Jurassic Park. He’s no master of subtle orchestration; rather, he’s a specialist in blockbuster sound, a facile author of the bombastic. A onetime conductor of the U.S. Air Force Band, Williams began his show-biz career as an arranger for […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Half Japanese: The Band That Would Be King
What’s the appeal of Half Japanese? This documentary profile by Jeff Feuerzeig makes abundantly and hilariously clear that the punk rock band founded by brothers Jad and David Fair 20 years ago has acquired a rabid cult following. In filmed testimonials, an assortment of fanzine critics and fellow rockers wax apostolic over the band’s purity […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Lois
Like Patti Smith, Lois Maffeo was a rock critic before she was a recording artist. And like Smith she plays rock ‘n’ roll without catering to preconceptions about what women can or can’t do. But there the similarities end. Maffeo came up through the indie-rock ranks of the Pacific Northwest, writing for fanzines and deejaying […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Chicago Underground Film Festival
The first Chicago Underground Film Festival will be held at two screening facilities at the Bismarck Hotel, 171 W. Randolph, from Friday through Sunday, July 29 through 31. Single-day passes are $12.50, and three-day passes are $25; single admissions are $5, except for the Tom Palazzolo program on Friday and the “New Films From the […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Barbara Cook & Janis Ian
What an inspired pairing of talents for a gay and lesbian rights fund-raiser. Barbara Cook, an unchallenged master of luxuriously lyrical singing in the classic Broadway style, is teaming with folk-pop singer-songwriter Janis Ian in “A Statement for Freedom/A State Meant for Freedom,” a benefit for the Illinois Federation for Human Rights’ efforts to pass […]
Posted inArts & Culture
A Letter to Harvey Milk
A LETTER TO HARVEY MILK Bailiwick Repertory at the Theatre Building “What good does remembering do?” asks an elderly Holocaust survivor in Leslea Newman’s deceptively simple A Letter to Harvey Milk. Seventy-seven-year-old Harry Weinberg, a San Francisco widower, takes a creative writing course for the elderly (“to pass the time”) and finds himself confronting, in […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Bailiwick Moves Up/Theater Lite/New Group’s New Party
Not long ago Bailiwick Rep had a debt of $50,000 and a reputation for not paying its bills. Now artistic director Cecilie Keenan and executive director David Zak and the rest of the company have a new space and a ten-year lease.
Posted inArts & Culture
Kahil El’Zabar Quartet with David Murray
David Murray’s expressionistic tenor work has infuriated as many listeners as it has impressed. Supporters revel in his extended upper-register flights and ballsy rhythmic drive; detractors complain about uninformed squawks, repetitive phrasing, and general showboating. I wonder how much of the controversy has to do with the circumstances of Murray’s arrival on the scene. Having […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Field & Street
The summer heat has gotten sullen. Zucchini and tomato plants thrive in the sweating air. My zucchini explode at dawn with gigantic yellow blossoms, and before you know it inflate their fruit to the size of dirigibles. I walk from neighbor to neighbor offering these fine logs of food, good only for zucchini Parmesan and […]