GREGG BENDIAN In his work with a number of free-improvisation giants, spectrum-spanning drummer Gregg Bendian has demonstrated that he can both float like a butterfly–as while accompanying the abstractionist guitar player Derek Bailey on last year’s Banter (O.O. Records)–and sting like a swarm of bees, as in his work with the ferocious pianist Cecil Taylor. […]
Tag: Vol. 26 No. 1
Issue of Oct. 10 – 16, 1996
Posted inNews & Politics
Two Cents From Dorchen’s Girl
Two Cents From Dorchen’s Girl I am deeply and personally offended by the grotesque inaccuracy of Jack Helbig’s piece on Jeff Dorchen (“Curtains?” September 27). I’m his current girlfriend, and I assure you that no one could possibly be miserable or suffer a midlife crisis while going out with me. Anaheed Alani Chicago
Posted inMusic
Jimmy Burns
JIMMY BURNS Jimmy Burns bills himself as a bluesman, but he’s actually a sensitive purveyor of songs from a broader spectrum of African-American popular music. Born in Mississippi, Burns taught himself guitar by plucking notes from broom wire nailed to the planks of his front porch. By the 50s he’d come to Chicago, where he […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Old Times
OLD TIMES, Court Theatre. Harold Pinter’s 1971 drama explores the elusiveness of memory through the interaction of three people: Kate and Deeley, whose marriage has reached the point where neither one much looks at the other anymore, and Anna, Kate’s onetime best friend and possibly lover, who joins the couple in their retreat on the […]
Posted inArts & Culture
The Campaign of Marilyn Quale and Her Sister and Theater Oobleck
THE CAMPAIGN BY MARILYN QUAYLE AND HER SISTER AND THEATER OOBLECK, Theater Oobleck, at the Lunar Cabaret and Full Moon Cafe. If any show captures the absurd reality of the current presidential race and the hypocrisy inherent in American democracy, it’s Theater Oobleck’s, as the former vice president’s wife, Marilyn Quayle, and a troupe of […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Dorchen Speaks. Again.
Dorchen Speaks. Again. To the editor, [Re: “Curtains?” September 27] Jack Helbig sits at a table in an Indian restaurant on Devon Street, looking not unlike a portly and unshaven Darren McGavin in the role of the hectored, down-at-heel reporter in the cult TV series The Night Stalker. He dabs his face with a napkin, […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Chicago International Children’s Film Festival
The Chicago International Children’s Film Festival, now in its 13th year, continues from Friday through Sunday, October 11 through 13, at Facets Multimedia Center, 1517 W. Fullerton. Tickets are $4 for children and adults, but various discounts are available to those who buy four or more tickets, including an unlimited pass for a family of […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Police Scanner
Monday, September 16, 11:55 PM 1142: 142. Three things. One, we have a subject stopped whose heart is beating like a drum and his first words out of his mouth is “I’m not runnin’ from the police.” Two, can we get a description of who we’re chasin’? And three, does 1414 know where these guys […]
Posted inArts & Culture
The Children of Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Whining and Digg the New Breed
CHILDREN OF STRANGELOVE, OR HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WHINING AND DIG THE NEW BREED, Aardvark Theatre Company, at the Famous Door Theatre Company. Set in the year 2060 in the extensive underground Dr. Strangelove had built as a retreat for the ruling elite in the event of a nuclear war–which comes at the end […]
Posted inArts & Culture
The Male Intellect (An Oxymoron)
THE MALE INTELLECT (AN OXYMORON), at the Mercury Theater. Three and half years ago Robert Dubac performed this tedious, trite one-man show at the now-defunct Chicago branch of the Improv. Filled with tired bits borrowed from other, better comics (like George Carlin’s joke that “jumbo shrimp” is an oxymoron) and the sort of ancient observations […]
Posted inNews & Politics
City File
I like science, and every time the sun completes another turn around the earth I resolve to learn more about it. “More than 80% of Americans believe that science and technology make their lives healthier, easier, and more comfortable,” reports the International Center for the Advancement of Scientific Literacy at the Chicago Academy of Sciences, […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Landmark Decisions
The demolition of treasures like the Stock Exchange and the McCarthy Building may have saved the Reliance Building.
Posted inArts & Culture
Le Cirque Invisible
Le Cirque Invisible is a collaborative, fanciful mini big top that for two whimsical hours piles goofiness on goofiness. More shtick than substance, it’s nonetheless a performance full of wonderful contrasts: the ethereal and the coarse alternate as Victoria Chaplin (yes, she’s Charlie’s daughter) and Jean Baptiste Thierree take turns creating entertaining, surprising illusions. Chaplin’s […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Lost Art
A theft at Around the Coyote has fingers pointing in all directions.
Posted inMusic
Born Again
Chicago Symphony Orchestra at Orchestra Hall, September 20 By Sarah Bryan Miller One of the great underdiscussed, underacknowledged factors in music performance is repertoire fatigue–the weariness and boredom engendered by doing the same work over and over. Keeping something fresh is a big enough problem for singers during relatively short runs at the opera, where […]