The standout line on Cedar Walton’s resume covers his years with Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers–1961 to ’64 and again in the early 70s–during which he added some marvelous pages to the Messengers book (“Mosaic,” “Ugetsu,” “The Promised Land”). But read on and you’ll find the pianist backing John Coltrane on the first takes of “Giant […]
Tag: Vol. 33 No. 41
Issue of Jul. 8 – 14, 2004
Posted inArts & Culture
Lauren Feece
Lauren Feece’s ten paintings at Lobby are suffused with the twin desires to touch the visible and memorialize the past. The woman in Reflection stands over a large globe strewn with pale leaves and flowers, her arms reaching out as if to embrace the whole world. In Tulips four women stand amid flowers whose color […]
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Defiance Dares to Think Big
The Pyrates Defiant Theatre at the Chopin Theatre We live in a time that seems locked into an anti-Daniel Burnham mind-set. “Make no big plans” is the shibboleth that seems to guide too many of our theaters. There are exceptions, of course, and these give me hope for a more interesting tomorrow. The recent Court […]
Posted inNews & Politics
TRG Music Listings
Rock, Pop, Etc. Concerts ALUMINUM GROUP performs on the roof at a grand-opening celebration for Millennium Park. Sat 7/17, 10 PM, Harris Theater for Music and Dance, 205 E. Randolph. 312-742-1168. AMERICAN ENGLISH (BEATLES TRIBUTE) Fri 7/16, 6 PM, Millennium Plaza, 21 S. Stolp, Aurora. 630-844-4396. STEVE ANTHONY ORCHESTRA Ballroom dance concert. Sun 7/18, 2 […]
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Guitar Shorty
Guitar Shorty’s been around: he cut his teeth in southern jukes, recorded briefly as a sideman for Chicago’s Cobra label in the late 50s, and married Jimi Hendrix’s stepsister in Seattle–he maintains that Hendrix appropriated some of his licks for “Purple Haze” and “Hey Joe.” But he didn’t record his debut LP, On the Rampage […]
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The Dastardly Ficus and Other Comedic Tales of Woe and Misery
THE DASTARDLY FICUS AND OTHER COMEDIC TALES OF WOE AND MISERY, at the Athenaeum Theatre. In Emily Schwartz’s bright, funny collection of four one-acts about two unmarried sisters, Carol Enoch’s brilliant Geneva Derbyshire is the prim, cool elder sibling to Kara Klein’s excitable Jennifer, a woman whose passion and imagination far surpass her reasoning abilities. […]
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You Can’t Take It With You
YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU, Open Eye Productions, at the Athenaeum Theatre. You can’t fake it either. Rooted in realistic eccentrics, George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart’s 1936 comedy pays tribute to the pursuit of happiness and ends with an engagement symbolizing the union of the materialistic, repressed Kirbys and the maverick Sycamore clan, […]
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There’s No “I” in Improv
THERE’S NO “I” IN IMPROV, Second City Training Center, at Donny’s Skybox Studio. In this sketch-comedy revue, writer Rob Biesenbach simultaneously mocks and affirms the conventions of improv. The ensemble’s six members break with tradition only by including both a male and a female fatty. The ingenue protests the narrowness of her roles before proceeding […]
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Second City Goes to War
In his memoir Days and Nights at the Second City, Second City cofounder Bernie Sahlins cites the troupe’s roots in ancient Greek street theater, namely “cheerfully obscene sketches that lampooned not only the gods but politicians, philosophers, generals, and other public figures.” For its annual appearance at the Theater on the Lake, Second City will […]
Posted inNews & Politics
News of the Weird
Lead Story In May the Washington Times reported on entrepreneurs Mark and Lorraine Moore and their successful line of bird diapers, which allow pet birds to roam the house while their droppings collect in a removable pouch. Made of Lycra, elastic, and Velcro, the reusable diapers cost between $20 and $26; sales have reached about […]
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Los Amigos Invisibles
Los Amigos Invisibles made a brief stateside splash back in 1998, when the hype for rock en espanol was at its loudest, but this group from Caracas, Venezuela, has always been less concerned with cultural politics than having a good time, insouciantly blending house, funk, acid jazz, disco, bossa nova, and various Afro-Cuban styles into […]
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Godzilla’s 50th Anniversary
Since its 1954 release, the Japanese fantasy Godzilla has spawned two remakes and 17 sequels, proving there’s a lot of entertainment value in a man in a rubber suit stomping on miniature buildings. All this week the Music Box continues its revival of the original film, and diehards can travel out to the Holiday Inn […]
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Chi Lives: How Rich Seng found his true calling
Rich Seng started producing and distributing the monthly series of free CD and DVD compilations now called Cherry Bomb when he moved to Chicago in 1995. But for eight of the nine years since then Seng’s business has been stalled–by God. Seng dropped out of a business program at Miami University in Ohio to come […]