Guest Contributor Victoria Elisabeth Garcia

Ancient, Ancient is a fierce, challenging, and occasionally perplexing swirl of a book by emerging speculative fiction author Kiini Ibura Salaam.  The winner of the 2013 James Tiptree, Jr. Award for science fiction and fantasy that expands understanding of gender, Ancient, Ancient is a collection of thirteen stories, three of which are original.  Though her short fiction has previously been published in Sheree R. Thomas’s groundbreaking Dark Matter anthology series and elsewhere, Ancient, Ancient is Salaam’s first book-length publication.

Salaam’s stories employ magic and time travel, spacecraft and prophecy to explore deeply human questions about motherhood, sex, identity, and inequality.  Written in lush, precise prose and deeply rooted in feminine experience, they evoke feelings both hauntingly familiar and disorientingly alien.  Though readers who are not frequent consumers of science fiction may find a few of the stories rather opaque, the book as a whole is a joy and a revelation.  Adventurous souls willing to journey beyond their comfort zones will be well-rewarded.

The collection begins with “Desire,” a commanding and deeply physical piece about Sené, a hunter-gatherer woman worn out by hard work and childbirth, who learns to reclaim the erotic power of her body.  Full of crocodiles, longing, and animal-bodied gods, the story hums with passion and poetic intensity.  Its sonorous, folkloric tone is makes for a compelling and satisfying read.

“Desire,” is followed by a smart and graceful trio of linked science fiction stories.  In these, we meet WaLiLa and MalKai, a pair of mothlike beings who travel, incognito, among everyday human beings in order to collect a vital human essence that their elders need for survival.  The first of the three stories, “Of Wings, Nectar, & Ancestors,” is a broad and ambitious piece.  Blending club music and glow sticks with nonhuman thoughts and prayers, the story gives the reader a convincingly alien perspective on the limits of spoken language, the power of sex, and the cycle of life. In contrast, “MalKai’s Last Seduction,” the second story, is an intimate tale that focuses tightly on male-bodied MalKai’s erotic connection with Cori, a deeply closeted gay man.  Earthy, sensual, and emotionally rich, it is a gorgeously rendered character study that just happens to include an alien.  In the third story, “At Life’s Limits,” Salaam uses WaLiLa’s striking and unearthly voice to describe Lukumi religious practice, family conflict, and neighborhood life in Havana, Cuba.  The result is an elegant and resonant tale about the hardening and softening of boundaries; between people, between nations, between human and nonhuman, between life and death.

Not all of Salaam’s work quite so fantastical. A few are more tightly grounded in the day-to-day.  “Rosamojo” is a tale about a young girl whose decision to use conjure to defend herself against abuse turns her world upside-down.  Though the magic is drawn with convincing sharpness, the non-supernatural parts of Rosa’s world (family betrayals, a funeral, kitchens, cranky siblings) are drawn with equal sharpness, and affect the reader with equal power.  With a nicely understated adolescent voice and a satisfyingly snappy ending, the piece is one of the collection’s standouts.  “Marie,” is another nearly-mainstream story.  Full of funny, heartbreaking, and often uncomfortable detail about pregnancy, race, assimilation, and being a Southerner in New York City, the piece is one of the most accessible in the collection.  Though it morphs, midway through, into a rather predictable deal-with-the-Devil story, its well-wrought characters and gorgeous flashes of sensory insight keep the reader engaged until the end.

Several of the stories, however, are almost impenetrably strange.   “Ferret,” for instance, is a very short piece about a grandfather and granddaughter who have been lost for years in space.  Control of their spacecraft involves freeing a sphere of flesh and viscera from their bodies and coaxing a special sort of creature to enter it. Courses are plotted through divination.  The depiction of far-future travel in original and evocative, and Salaam’s play with notions of bodily integrity and body horror certainly has the power to fascinate.  But that may not be enough for some readers; especially those who aren’t already science fiction fans.  Though also fascinating, “K-USH: The Legend of the Last Wero,” is similarly problematic.  It is a meaty story that explores themes of sacrifice, loyalty, mentorship, and natural disaster, and it is certainly well worth reading.  But because it is packed with neologisms, and built almost entirely of imagined beliefs and social structures, its depth of strangeness may prove alienating to some readers.

Still, some of the book’s most bizarre pieces are also among the best.  “Debris” is a surreal and eerie story about a family of skeletal beings who visit the earth on the Day of the Dead.  In this piece, a grandmother goes insane after inhaling dust, and starts giving away her bones; the souls of living people can be pulled from the body and juggled; and human emotions act as a drug on the skeleton-beings, producing trembling and exaltation.    The story is disconcerting, but beautifully so, and its devastating final note hints at a kind of uncanny redemption.

The collection’s final piece, “Pod Rendezvous,” is likewise both rich and strange. Set in the far future, in this sprawling, carnivalesque coming-of-age story, marriage is for the moneyed, and motherhood is done by dedicated collectives who live bound together in communal veils.  Here, Salaam’s ability to see the emotional dimensions of social and technological structures is gorgeously displayed.  When a room is no longer needed, its walls disassemble themselves and coalesce elsewhere; a nostalgic character runs her hands along these new partitions, hunting for traces of her past.  The twisting, smart-fabric veil of a mother-group produces claustrophobia and anxiety in a woman first learning to use it, but later, it brings clarity of vision, and even comfort.  One mothering collective redefines its mission, and its members decide to forgo children, and to nurture themselves, each other, and the world around them.  The longest piece in the book, “Pod Rendezvous” is also perhaps the best.

Salaam, in sum, is a powerfully talented new writer.  Catch her on her way up.

Published by Aqueduct Press. 272 pages.  $18.00 in trade paperback and $9.95 as an ebook. (affiliate links)

Additional link:

• Kiini Ibura Salaam official

Guest Post by Kiini Ibura Salaam

On Wednesday night, Alice Smith ended a brief tour for her new album She at New York City’s Bowery Ballroom. Alice is modern woman with an old-school style: She boasts a riveting stage presence, mind-blowing vocal and breath control, and a raw realness that cuts to the quick. Her voice—the unquestionable centerpiece of her performance—is uniquely throaty and earthy, with a grown-ass-woman depth. Captivating the audience from the opening of the show to the final note at the end of the three-song encore, she delivered a full-bodied, incandescent, and startling performance.

The evening began with “Cabaret.” She sang the acapella intro from the wings as if to tell the audience—this is my instrument, this is what you have come to witness, this is the gift I plan to slay you with. And slay us she did. Barring a brief interlude in which she flirtatiously asked if we liked her dress—which was skin-tight and sheer when the light hit it; her hair—which was poufy, old school glamour; and the lights—which skittered around trying to keep up with her, she didn’t bother chatting us up, introducing songs, or providing us with background. On this night, she came to sing. She blew through the Bowery Ballroom like a freight train with a mission. If her mission was to ensure that everyone in attendance would follow her siren’s song to its final whisper, she succeeded.

In a generous set, she covered both her new album She and her critically acclaimed debut, For Lovers, Dreamers & Me. Halfway through the evening, when I was already dizzy and intoxicated on the deliciousness of her performance, she ripped into her cover of Cee Lo Green’s “Fool for You.”  The whole evening could have been encapsulated in that performance. I’ve heard her rendition of “Fool for You” on YouTube as well as live at the AfroPunk festival—the song obviously speaks to her. Those renditions are fantastic, and yet don’t hold a candle to the performance she threw down at the Bowery Ballroom. The potency in her performance is in the power of her voice, the womanly conversational tone of her phrasing, and the fierce passion she feels for whatever lyric she’s singing. Her singing is a demand that you feel—the echoes of your past, the vibrato of her voice, the heartbreak of humanity. Live, Alice introduces extra grit and texture, more dramatic rolling, heightening the vibration of each of her recorded songs. The entire time she sang “Fool for You,” her face was contorted and emphatic as she told us everything we needed to know about that particular love story. You didn’t just feel like you wanted to witness the show, you wanted to step into the skin of the song and show with your energy that you got what she was laying down on you.

Another writer mentioned what a difference a few years make. It’s true that when Alice started performing years ago, she seemed to undersell her physical presentation. She wore button-down shirts and jeans, glasses and cut-off shorts. Her clothing seemed to assert that she was here to sing. There is something in her demeanor that radiates the message that she won’t be pandering to the audience. She’s not here to titillate. On Wednesday night, the woman that stood before us did not need to dress down to let us know what she was about. Her curves on display did not signal that she had become a puppet or the type of performer who plays to the audience for thrills. The body conscious dresses and out-to-there hair just seemed to demonstrate that she had sunken that much deeper into her own skin. That now, all these years later, there was more to her—more depth to her voice, more air in her lungs, more scars on her heart. She was radiant and well seasoned. During her absence she seems to have been developing into a performer that fully and unapologetically embodies her full self. If you see an Alice Smith concert date in a city near you, buy the ticket. Your soul, ears, and heart will thank you for it.

(Editor’s note: While not from the same performance, this rendition of Jeff Buckley’s “Lover, You Should’ve Come Over” captures the energy and vibe on display on Wednesday night.)

Additional link:

• Alice Smith official

Kiini Ibura Salaam is recent alum of the Bold As Love reading series Sundays @.  She is a writer, painter, and traveler from New Orleans, Louisiana whose work is rooted in eroticism, speculative events, women’s perspectives, and artistic freedom. Her collection Ancient, Ancient –winner of the 2012 James Tiptree Award–spins sensual tales of the fantastic, the dark, and the magical. Visit her Website or follow her on Twitter.

(photo credit of Kokayi: Go Fresco)

On  the song “Over There,” taken from his 2010 album Robots and Dinosaurs, DC-based multi-hypenate Kokayi posed the question of what an experienced MC and producer can offer hip hop when everything about the genre is about celebrating the new and next. Then and now, I’d suggest his answer is both simple (for him) and difficult (for too many): Just do you.

So what exactly do you do as an MC and producer who’s married with kids? You talk about how you see life from where you’re standing, not from what’s “popular” among the tween and twenty-something set. In fact, his recently released Pro Deo et Patria is a great example of full—but never over-produced—soundscapes surrounding headnod-inducing beats and supporting his trademark strong songwriting. The biggest takeaway I can offer is that his songs are passionate (he clearly loves music and making music), but considered. They’re not brash.

For example, on the current album’s “Wayyts (Weights)”, he could be talking about Trayvon Martin or any number of the young black men murdered on a daily basis:

Young boy lost his life today now
ooh woah ooh woah i wanna know
if justice is blind who is gonna pay now?
ooh woah ooh woah uh huh uh huh
pay for the tears and the stolen moments
for the memories that will never be mentioned
dreams that will never be fulfilled
we forfeit the children

Check it out

When it comes to black relationships in songs, it’s usually all fairy tale-like bliss or arguing, fighting and other recriminations. I guess those extremes are supposed to signify deep love or, on the other end, deep passion. Ultimately, what they only scratch the surface of the many facets of relationships. And, usually, it’s depressing to hear half-hearted renderings of relationships from people who are either unwilling or unable to make a serious commitment.

Which is why one of my favorite tracks on the album is “Been Thru” featuring Alison Carney. As someone who’s been in a married almost 15 years, it’s gratifying to hear a song that take a clear-eyed view of relationships. For example:

It’s been a lifetime of bitter
A bucket fulll of grief and
And a 5 lb bag regret
Like 17 winters left me aching
From the weight of what i went and tried to forget
Now I suppose one may think that
All this means that the clouds never
wondered away but it’s quite the contrary
and precisely the reason i decided to stay

It’s a song about love that has endured despite the ups and downs life has thrown at a couple. Take a listen:

Other standout tracks include “Breeve Long E,” the reggae-inflected “Punchdrunk” and “Old People Talk Too Much”.

Without a doubt, Kokayi is a talented producer. In fact, he wrote, produced and arranged much of the album himself. However, I think his real gift is songwriting. For listeners, the gift to us is that he has the courage to tell his own truth is such an artful way. That makes for one of the more engaging listens of 2012.

Additional links:

• Pro Deo et Patria on Bandcamp
• Kokayi official

Two albums have been in near constant rotation: MuthaWit’s PMS Junkie (full album stream here) and P.O.S.’s We Don’t Even Live Here, both of which easily qualify as two of the most passionate, political and neck-snapping albums of 2012.  Both albums, very different responses to the upside-down-is-rightside-up economic and election cycles we’ve live through, are exemplary in their passion, and  easily qualify as two of the best of the year. But whereas P.O.S. declare a fierce resistance to the status quo in the form of an alternative point of view and community, MuthaWit’s Boston Fielder confronts the absurdity head-on, embraces it and reflects it back.

PMS Junkie is a post-punk-jazz satire, a pointed critique of our consumerist culture undergirded with pulsing, headnodding polyrhythms.  Fielder’s supple arrangements, combined with deft lyrics eschews simplicity if only to challenge the listener to seriously engage him.  Have to admit: I was immediately hooked by the album’s lead single, “Celine In America” [link], but much of the album resisted my attempts to get my arms (and ears) around it.  But then, one day recently, the whole thing opened up to me.  Yes, having the lyrics helped.

For example, you get an immediate sense of where Fielder’s head in from the lyrics of the opening track, “The Gorilla In The Room”:

Pizza barons and the Mormons
taxless opportunities.
Top 1 percent of 1 percenters
bitch got business equity.

All the Arabs named Muhammed
Hard to know who to arrest.
Every tourist has a camera.
Every blogger’s a journalist.

But it’s an album that pays big dividends by just getting under the headphones and turning the volume up.  In addition to the aforementioned “Celine,” standout tracks include “The Last Time I Ask For It (Give It To Me)”; “Mughs Don’t Love You Cause You Vote” and “Two Fisted God”.  And “She Don’t Recognize Me No More”  (track #12 here) is a poignant meditation on a soldier who’s returned from war.

Know going into the P.O.S. album that Stefon Alexander is a hip hop punk anarchist and this is his 11-song manifesto.  That’s a nice way of saying he calls bullshit on not only most of hip hop, but the overall environment of capitalist impulses that the mainstream examples of the genre and Western culture at large reflect.

As he says in “They Can’t Come”:

I was kicked out of school, never warned | picked out, red flagged as a dirt bag | sick fuck, punk with a rat in his book bag | pig pen with a head full of deal wit it | mouth full of fuck that, no concealing it

Or this from “Lock-Picks, Knives, Bricks and Bats”:

didn’t get in to win | cause I don’t respect the game | I got up with all my friends | and picked a repellent name | I constantly recommend a little bit of disdain | a little bit of resistance | they can hang

It’s a pushback and, at the same time, a reach for some third way where the goal is neither blind conformity nor holding onto independece long enough to cash out to the highest bidder, but rather achieving some impossible dream.  Not sure what that is, but he implies a state that involves excellent work, solidarity with his Doomtree comrades and other likeminded people who want an alternative our consumption-focused culture.  In fact—and here’s the anarchist part—he wants to smash all of the consumerist, materialist facades we hide behind.

For example, check out the video for “Bumper”:

Is this all a pose?  I certainly hope not, and I’m encouraged that Alexander’s background suggests that this is who he really is.  After all, this is the guy who started out as a member of a punk rock band in high school, and seems to have kept a healthy skepticism when it comes to authority. (“No Kings” was the title of this year’s Doomtree album, and is something he shouts out on WDELH and his previous one, Never Better.) He references the West Bank, shouts out hacker collective Anonymous, and even works the late Christopher Hitchens into a rhyme.

But, at the end of the day, all the politics and ideas wouldn’t mean anything if the music didn’t hold up, which is does, start to finish.  WDELH is full of rich soundscapes that range from hip hop boom bap to raucous indie drums, thick basslines and even Bon Iver pushed through autotune.  Add to that Alexander’s delivery, which is nothing short of urgent throughout, and you’ve got a thrilling listening experience.

What’s most exciting is that in MuthaWit and P.O.S., we have albums that provide honest musical responses to the environment we’re all living through.  I’d say these are something of zeitgeist-y albums, each in their own way: Bracing in their fierce individuality and invigorating with their particular visions.  And pulled off masterfully, the way all good music and art should be.

Bravo.

Additional note: Earlier, we’d mentioned that P.O.S. was going to be on tour.  That’s been cancelled due to his need for a kidney transplant.  His crew has successfully crowdfunded money to cover the costs of the transplant, but he could use additional dollars. That’s the fact of life of musicians, who typically don’t have stable incomes.  If you want to donate, you can do so here.

Additional links:

• MuthaWit on Facebook
• P.O.S.

Gil (Colman Domingo) and Adelaide (Sharon Washington) in Wild With Happy (credit: Joan Marcus)

Colman Domingo’s Wild With Happy is a comedy about serious topics: Death, grief, healing and coming to terms with who you are.  While it’s true that these topics have been covered many times before what helps this play soar is Domingo’s take on them, which is alternately humorous, acerbic, and poignant.  More to the point, it’s grounded in a worldview that’s completely his.
Colman Domingo may be a familiar name to those of you who saw his Obie-winning performance in Passing Strange, or saw him in The Scottsboro Boys, for which he got a Tony nod.  So, it’s clear that he’s got acting chops, right?  But the surprise—and pleasure—was the discovery that he’s a strong writer, too.

Wild With Happy “explores the bizarre comedy that lies between death and healing.”  Domingo also stars as Gil, a man struggling to create the life he’s always dreamed of—that of a successful New York City actor.  The various parts of his life—family, friends, romantic relationships—all collide when his mother dies and he decides to have her cremated.  The more pressing question: Where can he scatter the ashes? What he ultimately decides is the story of the play’s second half.

Playwriting is very much like music.  That is, the rhythm of words can mesmerize you much in the same way that the phrasing of a musical melody can.  The dialogue, delivered by Domingo and his equally talented cast, is in many places a sharp staccato, one that volleys back and forth between characters with the focus and force of a Williams’ Sisters tennis match.

The dialogue also reveals the distance Gil is trying to put between his roots and where he’d like to be in life: “I went to Yale. “My urban is a little worn off.”

Sharon Washington’s portrayal of both Gil’s mother, Adelaide (seen through flashbacks) and his Aunt Glo deserves special note.  As the former, she was the doting mother who’s son seemed to be her best friend.  As Aunt Glo, she drew on many stereotypes of the nosy, loud and seemingly pragmatic black aunt that many in the audience would recognize from their own families.  However, she never descended into stereotype with this portrayal, nor she ever give the impression that she didn’t respect this character’s dignity.

The set design stands out, as well.  Since it’s a play about death and grieving, much of the set is composed of coffins.  However, as conceived by scenic designer Clint Ramos, the coffins are used for several inventive purposes: In addition to being the display in the funeral home, they later  flip up to become armoires; pull out to become a divan couch; open to become seats in cars, as in the photo below. Bravo.

Terry (Korey Jackson), Aunt Glo (Sharon Washington), Gil (Domingo) and Mo (Maurice McRae). credit: Joan Marcus

What’s also impressive is the way that Domingo handles the fact that Gil is gay.  I was struck by the fact that his being gay is just a fact of the story.  Yes, he and the male undertaker (Terry, played by Korey Jackson) have a fling in the funeral home.  And, yes, his good friend (Maurice McRae as Mo) is flaming.  But these are treated as facts that are details of his reality and nothing more.  Wild With Happy isn’t a play about being gay.  It’s achievement is that it’s a play in which a gay man works through his grief on the way to healing, all with a good sense of humor in tow.

UPDATE: Wild With Happy was supposed to close on Sunday, November 11, but has been extended to Sunday, November 18 due to the performance interruption caused by Hurricane Sandy.  All remaining tickets are $25!  Use code STORM when you click here, call 212-967-7555 or visit the Public Theater boxoffice.

Additional link:

• Wild With Happy at The Public Theater

Derek (Omari Hardwick) and Ruby (Emayatzy Corinealdi) in Middle Of Nowhere

“Soft power” is a term typically employed in diplomatic circles and it roughly means “the ability to attract and co-opt rather than coerce [or] use force.” However, I think it’s appropriate to use it in connection with filmmaker Ava DuVernay’s body of work thusfar.  Both her debut I Will Follow and her recently released Middle of Nowhere her ability to tell a stories using “soft power” is on full display, and it’s one of the reasons she became the first African American woman to win Sundance’s Best Director honors.  Resisting the urge for over-the-top drama, she and her collaborator–the brilliant cinematographer Bradford Young–expertly deliver a powerful and satisfying cinematic experience that packs an emotional punch.  While the outward action of the film encompasses a lot of stillness, there are a lot of emotions roiling beneath the film’s surface In the case of Middle of Nowhere, still waters do run deep.

This isn’t to say that nothing happens in this film.  Hardly. Ruby (Emayatzy Corinealdi) is a woman trying to keep her marriage alive while her husband Derek (Omari Hardwick) serves time in prison. When we meet her, they’re in year four of an eight year sentence. Ruby is stuck between the love she has for her husband and the attraction she has to a handsome bus driver (David Oyelowo).  But she’s unsure of whether to let go of the one and head into the future with the other. Legitimately so: There is a chance that Derek could get an early parole for good behavior.  Unfortunately, a prison sentence changes everyone–the prisoner and his or her family–something that Ruby is reluctant to admit.  What she ultimately decides, well, that’s the story of the film.

The “soft power” thing I referenced at the beginning is something that’s rare in films these days.  That is, what you have in “Middle of Nowhere” is a deep dive into a black woman’s internal story.  Yes, there are these outside circumstances that impact her.  But the film is really an exploration of how she deals with them, how she wrestles with the inner turmoil that these circumstances cause.  And though worn down, Ruby remains a fighter: One of the best scenes is when she barges into her husband’s lawyer’s office to plead for her to represent him at his parole hearing.  It’s not ballsy: Rather, you know immediately that, once more, she’s got to put her pride aside and almost beg the lawyer to stay on the case.

Film, of course, if visual.  Cinematographer Young’s camera work uses closeups, blurred lenses and flashback sequences that are more like daydreams that make it clear the powerful tug the past has on Ruby and the memories that anchor her to her life with Derek before his arrest.

And, as with any person with a complicated past, we don’t get to know Ruby’s story fully until the end, until we’ve spent time with her.  It was a satisfying reveal.

DuVernay is to be commended.  She’s leading the charge of 21st century black filmmakers–including her fellow 2012 Sundance directors such as Terence Nance–who understand that excellence in filmmaking doesn’t have to come at the expense of audience accessibility.  It’s not necessary to pander to lowest common denominator tactics.

Bottom line: If you haven’t seen Middle of Nowhere yet, do yourself a favor and get to a theater in your area.

Additional links:

• Middle Of Nowhere official
• Theaters and showtimes

@felamusical

It’s hard to believe that I first saw Fela! in December of 2009.  Since, then the show has gone on to win three Tony Awards the following year.  And they were well deserved, as can be seen in this short, month-long revival of the play that began on July 9 and runs only thru August 4. The show remains a thrilling, immersive theater experience.  Its politics come across overtly in the story of Fela’s activism through music, but also covertly in the joy of watching the triumphant celebration of black beauty on display and black bodies in motion.

The musical takes place on the night of the last performance at the Fela’s Shrine, several months after the death of his mother Funmilayo who, we learn, was brutally killed in a raid on venue by the military regime in 1978.

Storywise, this night is significant because Fela has decided to leave Lagos.  His mother has been murdered, the members of his compound brutalized (we learn how in a particularly powerful scene), and despite his desire to resist, he feels he and his family are no longer safe in Lagos.  However, in Yoruba tradition, before undertaking a long journey, one has to ask the ancestors for both blessing and permission to do so.  Early on in the show, we see that Fela is aware that his mother is trying to tell him something.

Fela! is not a passive theater experience. Not only does the ensemble physically break the “fourth wall”—running, dancing, cavorting up and down the aisles—but the show does an excellent job of approximating how it might have felt to have actually been in the audience in Fela’s compound in Lagos via call-and-response songs, sing-a-longs, and dance lessons (have you cleaned your clock lately?).  Too bad you can’t stand up for the whole show.

My first experience was with Kevin Mambo in the title role (who I’d seen in Lynn Nottage’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Ruined), but this time got to see Sahr Ngaujah, in the role for which he received a Tony nomination.  Both of these men are great actors, and more than rise to the physicality required by the role.  I remember Kevin brought a hard edge to the role.  My perception here may have been influenced by just having seen as the Commander in Ruined.  Sahr brings a different kind of passion and intensity to the role, which he completely inhabits. You can see the difference in his performances from 2010 to now in a clip from the Tony Awards performance.  At this point, he’s settled into the role even more, deeply embodying Fela Anikulapo Kuti.  He even stayed in character when he broke from the story to playfully deal with a an audience member, who wanted him to share the massive joint he was puffing on.

Photo credit: Sara Krulwich for The New York Times

Much of the original cast has returned.  From Antibalas handling the music; to the Queens, to Rasaan-Elijah “Taju” Green on djembe; to Sahr himself.  There’s great continuity among this group, which enables them to go from 0-60 in no time.  And you get to sit through two-plus hours of Bill T. Jones’s great choreography.

Memory is hazy, but some things about this version seemed different.  For example, “B.I.D. (Breaking It Down)” is a necessary party of the story.  Here Fela explains how he created Afrobeat by combining various musical elements—highlife, afro-cuban music, the heavy bass line and James Brown’s funk—into something greater than the sum of the parts. But this explanation felt more impactful the first time I saw it.

This version also seemed to expand the role of Sandra Isadore, the black American who, upon meeting Fela in 1969, introduced him to the ideology of black power.  On one hand it was a nice to see a new dance routine that involved books from across the spectrum of black liberation ideology.  After all, where else do you see dancers moving around with books by Malcom X, Stokely Carmichael, Angela Davis and others? That said—and while I acknowledge her considerable vocal ability–she ultimately annoyed the shit out of me.

Beyond that, I’m not sure what the musical gained by giving Sandra Isadore, here played by Paulette Ivory, such increased spotlight.  I’m not sure the musical needed to give Sahr/Fela a female vocal counterpoint.  She has an absolutely fine voice.  But there was something about it that took me out of the world of the Shrine, some kind of incongruity that was more distracting than additive.

Photo credit: Chad Batka for The New York Times

Also, there’s no discussion of Fela and AIDS.  That’s partly, I think, by design and the fact that the producers have framed the story around this last night at the Shrine.  There’s no way that this could be a strict autobiography (it already runs 2 hours and 40 minutes).  I bring this up not as a mark against the musical, but just to manage expectations.  Fela and AIDS is an entirely other story.  What you’ve got here is a focus on his resistance to a corrupt state and his fight for justice.

All that said, the crossover scene—where Fela makes the journey to the land of the dead to consult with his mother—is still powerful and visually thrilling.  The show’s great use of black light, screens, costumers and choreography expertly evokes Fela’s otherwordly journey.  And, like Lillias White before her, Melanie Marshall conveys the regal, groundbreaking figure that Funmilayo must have been to her son and to so many Nigerians.

And a special shout-out is in order for Ismael Kouyate, who hails from a family of renowned artists and praise singers from Guinea, West Africa.  He is part of the ensemble, but his voice is incredible in the way it pierced strong and clear through all the other sounds of the musical.  If you want to check him out, he lives in NYC and performs with his band Ismael Kouyate: Waraba Band.

The final scene with the coffins remains a sad but stinging critique of our society that seems replete with so much injustice and murder.  The names on the coffins—Oscar Grant, Troy Davis, Ken Saro-Wiwa, Rodney King, James Campbell, Sean Bell, Trayvon Martin, Citizens United—are powerful reminders that justice still has to be fought for.  It’s even more sad to realize that there will always be names to add.  However, what it does is bridge this look at Fela’s life (he died in 1997) with the fight for justice today.  In that way, the musical is very much in the audience’s face about need for justice that is still present.

Should you run to get tickets for this show? Absolutely!  Sitting there, you are reminded of how rich an experience Broadway can be.

Additional links:

• Discount ticket info
• NY Times slideshow: Fela’s Women
• Fela! on Broadway official

@gypsygirlbliss

On her own Imani Uzuri has a formidable voice, one that’s full of the boom and depth of the North Carolina church girl she is.  But something else was on display last Friday night at Joe’s Pub, where Imani held her release party for her latest album, The Gypsy Diaries.  So much of that show was about the magic that happens when she takes her songs and weaves them into a musical, emotional and spiritual tapestry. And did I mention that we all had fun, everyone from the musicians onstage to the standing room-only audience?

See, the thing about Imani and her music is this: As solid as her recording’s are, they are really best experienced live. The albums are meant to be performed.  They only gain power from the spontaneity of the musicians and the palpable give-and-take between Imani and the audience.  The night was full of special moments: Like when  Imani handed the mic and the spotlight over to Dr. Kyra Gaunt for some impromptu vocalese; or when she brought a trio of powerhouse singers onstage: Karma Mayet Johnson, Toshi Reagon and Rozz Nash-Coulon; or when she brought out Fred Cash, who’s one of those musicians who’s probably forgot more about the bass that most cats will ever learn–to add some of his signature low-end to a couple of songs.

In true gypsy fashion, Imani drew her instrumentation from all over the world, eschewing a traditional band setup.  Instead, she employed cello, Japanese shinobue flute, acoustic guitar, world percussions, and sitar and daf. Burnt Sugar’s Greg Tate called the sound “transcendental grindhouse,” but he’s is good for coming up with some out descriptors.

Imani with her full band (l to r): Marika Hughes (cello), Kaoru Watanabe (japanese shinobue flute, western flute), imani uzuri (vocals, tambourine, album Co-Producer), Christian Ver Halen (acoustic guitar, album Co-Producer), Todd Isler (myriad world percussions) and Neel Murgai (sitar and daf), not pictured special guest Fred Cash (electric bass). This is not a Boldaslove.us photo, but one that Imani sent. Shouts to the photographer, whoever you are Nisha Brady.

Karma Mayet Johnson (l) and Toshi Reagon

Christian Ver Halen (l); Imani Uzuri; and Todd Isler

Fred Cash (l) toying with the low end, while Imani sings on

As it was an album release party, The Gypsy Diaries is now available worldwide via iTunes.

Additional links:

• See the full set of event photos on Bold As Love Magazine’s Facebook page
• Hear the track “Dream Child”
  
• Imani Uzuri official
  

@affrm @restless_city

Andrew Dosunmu’s feature debut is nothing short of a visual feast.  Not in that slightly over-the-top, Carravagio-esque way that Tarsem Singh art directs his films.  Rather, you’re in the hands of a photographer who has evolved into film director, but who still maintains that strong sense of framing, color and still-film visual drama.

Restless City, which opened last Friday in New York, LA and Atlanta, captures the immigrant experience in NYC.  The story settles on Djibril (portrayed by Sy Alassane, above right), a young Senegalese man doing odd jobs, some of which are of dubious legality, all the while looking for a way to restart his singing career.  One of the jobs he does is selling bootleg CDs, which he gets from Bekay (Anthony Okungbowa), a smalltime African gangster (portrayed as part Fela, part Idi Amin).  It’s through his dealing with this shady character that Djibril falls in love with Trini (Nicole Grey, above left), who works for Bekay as a prostitute.  (An aside: At various times in the film, Grey’s look reminds me of Whitney Houston or, as above, Jean Grae.)

The story unfolds languidly and in African time.  This is not a criticism, just know that there’s no “ticking clock” plot device that keeps things moving forward, as is the case with most Western films.  Aside from the Djibril-Bekay-Trini triangle that’s fully developed, what we’re shown of this group of immigrants is a bit like a buffet.  Some are minor story arcs, such as Trini’s friendship with the hair salon owner.  Others start, but don’t finish.  For example, one of Djibril’s associates, Midi, is beat up early in the film because he owes Bekay money.  After he takes a few shots at the guy in a crowded club, we basically don’t see him for the rest of the film.

Where’s Midi?

But in some ways, the story within Restless City is beside the point.  That is, the film is such a visual feast—the abstracted New York City as a background; the lens flare so nicely placed; the scenes of people that look like photographic portraits; the rose filter that evokes the dust of an imagined African city—that you find yourself transported into Djibril’s world.

Visually, director Dosunmu and cinematographer Bradford Young (who shot Alrick Brown’s Kinyarwanda and Ava DuVernay’s upcoming Middle of Nowhere) have unhooked viewers from the visual and emotional cues that comfort us and clue us that we’re watching a film set in New York City.  In that regard, they’ve achieved something important in conveying even deeper the feeling, not of an experienced New Yorker, but of an immigrant far, far from his native land.

NOTE: As of Friday, May 4, Restless City gains additional screens in LA, and opens in Chicago, DC, Philly, Detroit, Seattle, San Diego and Denver.  Click here for a full list of theaters.

Additional link:

• Restless City official

On Tuesday March 6, 2012, Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts (above, left), author of Harlem is Nowhere: A Journey to the Mecca of Black America and artist Simone Leigh sat down for a conversation with moderator and art critic Claire Barliant for the New York Public Library’s LIVE series to discuss history, memory and legacy. Harlem is Nowhere, the name taken from a 1948 essay by Ralph Ellison, explores the legendary place through Rhodes-Pitts eyes as she unearths and adds to the history of Harlem. For Rhodes-Pitts, much of black history is still being uncovered and is therefore eligible for editing. The same rings true for Simone Leigh who plays with the narratives of black history in her work, particularly in the film Breakdown, which was shown on Tuesday night, and questions the idea of black women and mental health. Opera singer Alicia Hall Moran sings text from the 1970s show Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, the modern-day television show Intervention, and lines from Anthony Harvey’s 1967 film adaptation of The Dutchman by Amiri Baraka.

In the film, Moran (left)  belts operatically and erratically about mundane things, one of which is the line “I don’t want to go to the ball game” while making staggered, uneasy movements and staring blankly. She looks as if the psychological paint of her mind is peeling. She elicits both discomfort from the viewer and a sense of relief at seeing a black woman lose it –a very different action then “showing out” as one male audience member put it. The film provided a sanctioned space for a black woman to have a mental breakdown as culturally it is not something that has been afforded to black women. Barliant stated Leigh’s work operates from a revisionist angle to which Leigh responded her revisionist lens came from her study of art in college and realizing that what was being offered was not a real art education as it did not speak to black art or art by women, “what was being offered was fraudulent.”

Rhodes-Pitts brings to light lesser known but influential players in the history of Harlem in her book. One fascinating man, Alexander Gumby, was a scrapbooker, who much like Arturo Schomburg, was intent on recording black history and culture. Rhodes-Pitts writes, “ Gumby’s dreams, what he remembered and what he failed to remember, reached their fullest expression through his rather feminine, peculiar occupation. He was building a diorama while his contemporaries engaged in the outward, upward, excavating, campaigning activities more typically associated with the race man.” Barliant observed in the way Gumby pieced together his work, Rhodes-Pitts constructed her book in a similar vain. Both are capturing things that would have been lost and are making history tangible.

Rhodes-Pitts and Leigh use history as a means to interact with the present. Much of Harlem is Nowhere places history and present side by side. The conversations with residents living in Harlem today are necessary to gauge what Harlem was and is. Watch the walking, not the dead, a striking quote from a man in the book named Julius Bobby Nelson with whom Rhodes-Pitts interacted, was an order for her to pay attention to the now; though the work of mapping history, to see where we are going, cannot be done without doing both. When asked a question about black art, particularly black art in America, a woman questioned the encouragement of black artists to only look to the past as a resource for their work. Leigh refuted this by saying she was told to do the exact opposite. Rhodes-Pitts posed that black people were the only group that she knew who were repeatedly asked to forget their history, especially with the advent of terms like “post-black” – this evoked loaded laughter from both writer and artist and some in the audience. “Post-blackness” was clearly too big a topic for the small stage in the Trustees Room that night, but a good answer for the women’s question was the sentiment expressed by Arthur Schomberg in his essay The Negro Digs Up His Past, and which fueled Rhodes-Pitts writing, “history must restore what slavery took away.”

Additional links:

• Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts official
• Simone Leigh official
• Alicia Hall Moran official