Midwest Guest

Where I Live: Global Thursdays launches fall season September 8 in Dearborn, Michigan

Detroit's Concert of Colors is such a great catalyst for hope and unity, so it's exciting to see that summer festival's spirit continue to shine during the rest of the year at a series of Global Thurdays performances organizers call a "sister" series to the Concert of Colors.

This season's Global Thursdays schedule launches September 8 with a performance by Los Angeles-based Syrian American hip-hop artist and producer Omar Offendum. This show is part of a weekend schedule of special programs related to the 10th anniversary of 9/11, U.S. Rising: Emerging Voices in Post 9/11 America, which explores the country's journey over the past decade and the road forward towards a more unified nation.

Offendum was born in Saudi Arabia, raised in Washington D.C. and lives in Los Angeles. His lyrical hip-hop and rap contains reflections of those multiple cultural influences like the short Spanish-language snippet I caught in "Damascus".

October 13 brings a performance from Armenian-American Ara Topouzian, who honors his Armenian heritage while incorporating music from around the Middle East, as well as jazz, fusion, new age and blues influences, into his own music. The Detroit-based artist performs on the kanun (a Middle Eastern harp) and other Armenian and Middle Eastern instruments, along with oud (Arabic stringed instrument) virtuoso Joe Zeytoonian and percussionist Myriam Eli.

Get ready for laughs on November 3 as a crew of young Arab-American creatives hit the stage for an evening of sketches and stand-up comedy. The Ann Arbor-based indie folk musician Hana Malhas, who spent her childhood in Jordan, rounds out the bill that evening. You can check out Malhas' music online.

Wendell Harrison

We caught Wendell Harrison's appearance during the Don Was All-Star Revue at this summer's Concert of Colors, and jazz buffs have another chance to see this legendary saxophonist as he closes out this Global Thursdays season with a December 8 show. Detroit-based soul/funk musician Amp Fiddler joins Harrison onstage to help the sax legend celebrate his first new release in seven years, It's About Damn Time, with this performance. You can also check out a few of Amp Fiddler's tracks online.

Global Thursdays programs begin at 7:30 p.m. in the Arab American National Museum's 156-seat auditorium, which is on the lower level of the museum at 13624 Michigan Avenue in Dearborn, Michigan. Free parking is available in the lighted lot behind the museum. Global Thursday shows are $10 ($9 for museum members).  Purchase tickets in advance at the museum's Web site or at the door.

© Dominique King 2011 All rights reserved

Photo Friday: Detroit's Motor Honey

Summer is a great time to catch some live music from some great local bands, and many gigs take place at free festivals!

I saw Detroit's own Motor Honey at the 2010 Berkley Art Bash. I loved the band's funky, bluesy blend of rock. I also liked the fact that they played a lot of their own songs interspersed with some fun covers, so I bought their CD and took it home last year so Tim could hear them as well.

2010

2010

2010

When I saw that Motor Honey was playing the Berkley street fair again this year, I made sure Tim and I both went over for the band's scheduled set.

2011

2011

Check out a few of their tunes on their MySpace page or check them out on Facebook to see where they are playing next.

Thanks to Debbie Dubrow of Delicious Baby for creating and coordinating Photo Friday to link travel photos and blog posts across the Web.

Photo Friday: Detroit's 2011 Concert of Colors

We love Detroit's Concert of Colors, the city's annual diversity and world music festival.

Martha Reeves

Wendell Harrison

Don Was

Raion Taiko

African Diaspora Revue

As always, we saw plenty of great performances this past weekend, and I took hundreds of photos. Again, I took many of these photos with my Canon EF- 70-200 f/4L IS USM lens and found it extremely responsive in the low-light conditions at the festival's indoor venues.

You can check out more of my photos from this year's Concert of Colors in my Flickrstream set, and you can see many of Tim's pictures in his own Flickrstream Concert of Colors photoset.

Check out my complete Concert of Colors recap from Wednesday.

Thanks to Debbie Dubrow of Delicious Baby for creating and coordinating Photo Friday to link travel photos and blog posts across the Web.

© Dominique King 2011 All rights reserved

Where I live: 2011 Concert of Colors recap

It's always difficult to pick a favorite moment from Detroit's annual Concert of Colors because there are always so many great moments during the multi-day diversity and world music festival. Here are some highlights from this year's edition of the Concert of Colors:

DJ Invisible at The Wright Museum

We managed to get into the auditorium at The Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History on Thursday night, which turned out to be a neat trick as reportedly half of the people who came to see the two-hour show that night couldn't get into the auditorium. The Wright's debut as a Concert of Colors venue turned out to be a great success as with a series of revue-style performances of music from across the varied African Diaspora cultures.

From rapping to traditional African drumming to Puerto Rican folkloric dance and song, the show was a high-energy dose of positive empowerment, cultural pride, and a call to unity and mutual respect among all cultures.

Rapper Mike-E advised the crowed to be "color-kind", rather than "color-blind", celebrating and respecting each other's cultural traditions.

From the Wright Museum, we walked down the street to the Scarab Club, another first-time Concert of Colors venue, to check out a bit of out the night's spoken-word and mellow jazz performances.

The Concert of Colors moved to the Detroit Institute of Arts on Friday evening to welcome Mr. B's Joybox Express to an outdoor patio.

Mr. B at the DIA

Mr. B and the Joybox Express arrived earlier in the day, transporting their 352-pound piano and an eclectic collection of instruments in from Saugatuck, Michigan via a specially constructed trailer drawn by a custom-built tricycle.

Boogie-woogie piano music was the order of the afternoon with the Joybox Express as part of the group's drive to raise money for children's arts and athletic groups.

Hot Latin music and dance followed in the DIA's blissfully air-conditioned movie theater auditorium with Orlando "Maraca" Valle. The Cuban-born Valle brought his band of talented musicians to the stage for an evening of Cuban dance music and afro-Cuban jazz.

Dancers filled the theater's aisles and the show culminated with a group of dancers going onstage to show off some of their best salsa and cumbia moves.

There is always at least one act that surprises us each year. This year, we went to see Raion Taiko, a group from the Great Lakes Taiko Center in Novi, Michigan, performing a concert of Japanese drumming music.

You don't always think about music being specially written for drums, but this concert was a fascinating selection of music written especially for these a variety of Japanese drums and performed as an ensemble. Some of the larger drums the group used that day were created from a single piece of wood, with the largest being several feet in diameter and weighing in excess of 200 pounds!

Curious? You have a second chance to check them out this weekend with a free concert at the Detroit Institute of Art's Friday Night Live!

Funkadesi performed Saturday

The Chicago-based Funkadesi filled in as a last-minute schedule addition when one of the originally scheduled acts had to cancel. The energetic world music group dished up a hot set of music, drawing from various traditions within their multi-culti cast.

The Don Was Detroit All-Star Revue is always a much-anticipated high point of the festival for us. I loved seeing classic soul singer Melvin Davis, after missing seeing him because of the cancellation of his show at the DIA earlier this summer because of a power outage. You also have a second chance to catch him at the DIA's Friday Night Live! on July 29.

Guitar virtuosos seem to do well with Revue crowds as Jim McCarty (guitarists with Mitch Ryder and The Detroit Wheels, the Buddy Miles Express, Bob Seger, and others) earned a standing ovation for his performance this year, much as Dennis Coffey earned a similar ovation at last year's Revue show.

Martha Reeves closed out the Revue with a rousing rendition of Dancing in the Street that brought the crowd to its feet again to applaud and see her celebrate her 70th birthday by blowing out the candles atop a giant cake brought onstage at the end of the show.

The Concert of Colors' concluding Sunday brought yet another varied menu of world music, including performances that we caught ranging from the funky rhythms of the Odu Afrobeat Orchestra and Columbian folk and jazz from Pablo Mayor's Folklore Urbano Orchestra.

We eagerly anticipated Bettye LaVette's Soul and R&B that closed out the main stage offerings on Sunday evening. LaVette began recording in the early 1960s, but her career really caught fire after she won the prestigious W.C. Handy Award for "Comeback Blues Album of the Year" for A Woman Like Me in 2004.

We saw her electrifying performance in 2006 at the Detroit Festival of the Arts, so we knew we were in for a real treat.

We were not disappointed.

LaVette pretty much tore the roof off of the joint so to speak with her powerful pipes and emotional performance.

I particularly enjoyed the cuts she did from her Interpretations: The British Rock Songbook. The album contains classic rock songs like the Who's Love Reign O'er Me and Ringo Starr's It Don't Come Easy, which LaVette performed that night. I'd seen a YouTube clip of LaVette doing Love Reign O'er Me, but seeing it performed by her live took it to a whole other level for me.

The cuts on the Songbook album may be familiar, but LaVette makes each one uniquely her own with amazing arrangements and powerful performances. We bought the album at the festival, taking it home to join the other two albums we bought from her in 2006.

It was especially encouraging to see the Concert of Colors expand back into a four-day format this year, and it's interesting to see how the organizers can create such a diverse schedule of music using a lot of Detroit- and Midwest-based acts. The festival's ability to adapt and continue in the face of what everyone still acknowledges as a challenging economic climate bodes well for its future and the enjoyment of music lovers who look forward to it year-after-year.

© Dominique King 2011 All rights reserved

Where I live: Detroit's Concert of Colors returns July 14-17, 2011

Detroit's 19th annual Concert of Colors kicks it up a notch July 14 to 17, returning to a four-day format and adding the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History and the Scarab Club to its family of festival venues.

Regular readers here know how much I love this annual diversity and world music festival, so imagine my delight at seeing the festival persevere and expand even as other much-loved events continue to downsize or disappear.

Grammy Award-winning producer and hometown guy Don Was, who produces the annual Detroit All-Star Revue of hometown talent for the Concert of Colors, talked about the event's role as a catalyst for hope and unity when I talked with him before last year's festival.

Don Was at 2008 Concert of Colors

"I think it's amazing that while Detroit is in such an economically disastrous situation, the people here have such a great spirit. That great spirit can overcome adversity," said Was at that time.

The Concert of Colors kicks off on Thursday (July 14) at the Wright Museum with revue-style performances from Mike-E & AfroFlow (African and hip-hop), Steffanie Christi'an (rock/soul),  Amp Fiddler (soul/R&B), BombaRica (Puerto Rican folkloric drum and dance), and Omowale African Drum & Dance Ensemble.

Festival goers can also pop around the corner that same evening to the Scarab Club poetry and music with Saladin Ahmed (narrative), Audra Kubat (acoustic folk), Julie Patton with Paul Van Curin (poetry + guitar), The Doll Hairs with Tom Orange (rock/alternative/improv), and Faruq Z. Bey with James Hart and Scott Farrow (jazz and poetry).

I fondly remember both of these sites as venues for the Detroit Festival of the Arts, so I'm happy to see them participating with the Concert of Colors this year. I also saw Faruq Z. Bey as part of the Detroit All-Star Revue at the 2008 Concert of Colors, and I hope to catch a bit of his performance at the intimate Scarab Club.

Faruq Z. Bey at 2008 Concert of Colors

This year's Concert of Colors action moves to the Detroit Institute of Arts on Friday (July 15) with boogie woogie and blues from Mr. B's Joybox Express and Latin jazz from Orlando "Maraca" Valle, as well as a showing of "From Britain With Love: Africa United, which is part of the DIA's acclaimed Detroit Film Theater schedule.

The Concert of Colors moves to the Max M. Fisher Music Center for the weekend (Saturday July 16 and Sunday July 17).

Saturday's schedule includes: Japanese drum performance from Raion Taiko; East Indian jazz and soul from Susheela Rama; Arabic/world fusion from Wisaal; Asian rock and soul from the October Babies; funk/jazz fusion from Will Sessions; world rock from Immigrant Suns; reggae, ska, and rock from The Layabouts; American popular music from FAR Senior Band; traditional Irish from Seacht; Detroit Bellydance performances; African drum and dance from Heritage Works; tradition Greek music from ELLAS Band; traditional Eastern European music from The Klezmorim; classical from Richard Rischar and Ling-Ju Lai; soul from Charity; and, of course, Don Was is back to coordinate his fourth annual Detroit All-Star Revue, which is always one of the festival highlights for me.

"It's my favorite night of the year," he told me when I interviewed him last year. "There's a great spirit and great music."

Don Was at 2010 Concert of Colors

This year's Detroit All-Star Revue features Martha Reeves, Mitch Ryder + The Detroit Cobras, Melvin Davis, Wendell Harrison, Ivan Kral, The Brothers Groove, Jim McCarty, The Muggs, Billy Brandt + Sarana VerLin, Black Irish, and Carolyn Striho.

I'm especially excited to see Mitch Ryder and Melvin Davis this year. Mitch Ryder's performance of "What Becomes of the Broken Hearted" was one of my favorite performances at the 2008 All-Star Revue, and we were recently disappointed to miss a scheduled performance of classic soul from Melvin Davis when the DIA cancelled its Friday night program due to a power outage earlier this month.

Mitch Ryder at 2008 Concert of Colors

The All-Star Revue house band backs many of the acts and includes Don Was on bass, Luis Resto on keyboards, Terry "Thunder" Hughley on drums, and Brian "Roscoe" White on guitar.

I'm also looking forward to the Sunday, July 17 Concert of Colors schedule, when Bettye LaVette headlines with what is sure to be a great soul/R&B performance.

Bettye LaVette at 2006 Detroit Festival of the Arts

LaVette began her recording career in the early 1960s, but, despite cutting some great tracks, her career remained at a very slow simmer for many years. She released her first album in the early 1980s, but it wasn't until 2004 when LaVette's career hit a real resurgence after she won the W.C. Handy Award for "Comeback Blues Album of the Year" for "A Woman Like Me".

We saw LaVette's electrifying performance at the 2006 Detroit Festival of the Arts, so I'm thrilled being able to see her again this year at the Concert of Colors.

Bettye LaVette at 2006 Detroit Festival of the Arts

Sunday's schedule also includes; Brazilian jazz and fusion from Nanny Assis featuring Sean Blackman; Columbian folk and jazz from Pablo Mayor's Folklore Urbano Orchestra; storyteller La'Ron Williams; reggae from Universal Expression; southern folk/rock from Lukas Nelson & Promise of the Real; the Odu Afrobeat Orchestra; classical from Linnea Powell; jazz from Tia Hanna; the percussion duo To Hit Things; Puerto Rican folkloric drum and dance from BombaRica; Caribbean music from the Gratitude Steel Band; a contemporary dance performance with the Living Arts Youth Dance Ensemble; global fusion from the Hamtramck World Music Ensemble; traditional African music from Nanou Djiapo-Afrikan Drum & Dance; and gospel from the Nazarene Baptist Church Youth Choir.

Want to preview the artists for this year's Concert of Colors? I've included links to the Detroit All-Star Revue performers in the section about them above. You can also check out the Concert of Colors site for links and info about the rest of the performers.

Can't wait for the festival, or want to see what you missed last year? Check out Detroit's 2010 Concert of Colors is a celebration of diversity and city pride here at Midwest Guest or Tim's 2010 Detroit Concert of Colors Recap at The Wandering Photographer.

Check out video clips from the three previous Concert of Colors Detroit All-Star Revues at the Wasmopolitan Cavalcade of Recorded Music.

We can't wait! Will we see you there?

© Dominique King 2011 All rights reserved

Where I live: Global Thursdays launches winter series on Friday, January 21, in Dearborn, Michigan

No, that's not a typo in the headline! The Arab American National Museum (AANM) launches their latest Global Thursdays series with a smokin' Friday evening performance by Detroit blues legend Alberta Adams at 7:30 p.m. on January 21 at the Dearborn museum.

I saw the 93-year-old Adams at the Concert of Colors this past summer when she amazed everyone with a powerful performance and earned a standing ovation from an SRO audience in Detroit's Orchestra Hall. I can only imagine what her show might be like in the more intimate venue of the AANM's theater. Blues and Detroit music fans should be in for a real treat!

Music fans around town know the AANM as a major presenter of the Concert of Colors, Detroit's annual summer world music and diversity festival. Global Thursdays is an extension of the popular festival and presents a diverse bill of talent and ideas from around the world.

Simon Shaheen appeared at last summer's Concert of Colors and appears for a special performance benefiting the museum that features his fusion of Arabic, jazz, and Western classical styles and his virtuosity on the oud (a stringed instrument that is extremely popular in Arabic music). An Evening with Simon Shaheen happens Thursday, March 11 at the museum.

Orquesta La Inspiracion rounds out the musical portion of the Global Thursdays winter/spring schedule on Thursday, May 12, as a 10-piece band featuring some of Detroit's finest veteran salsa and jazz musicians serve up a hot program of salsa and other Latin-flavored dance music.

Preview an upcoming PBS documentary on Thursday, February 10, with a showing of Freedom Riders, the story of more than 400 black and white Americans who risked their lives to challenge segregation and Jim Crow laws in the Deep South during 1961. A discussion following the film featuring a Freedom Ride participant offers a personal perspective on this profound and affecting story.

I wonder if the rise in popularity here of programs featuring short talks about a variety of ideas, accompanied by projected slides or images, has its genesis in the Tokyo practice of PechaKucha, or "chit chat". Check out PechaKucha Night on Thursday, April 14, when speakers present five-minute programs, accompanied by 20 images, about some of the newest designs and creative ideas. The museum invites architects, graphic designers, industrial designers, and other creatives to apply as presenters and invites those with an interest in new ideas to come and watch the presentations.

Global Thursdays programs begin at 7:30 p.m. in the AANM's 156-seat auditorium, which is on the lower level of the museum at 13624 Michigan Avenue in Dearborn, Michigan. Free parking is available in the lighted lot behind the museum. Check out the AANM site for information about the programs, prices, and purchasing tickets.

Watch video of Alberta Adams' great 2010 Concert of Colors performance on My Damn Channel. You can also check out Amazon for Alberta Adams and Simon Shaheen to listen to samples of their music.

Looking for a little extra bit of summer? The Alfred Shaheen: Fabric to Fashion exhibit is at the AANM through March 13. The Lebanese American engineer popularized the men's Hawaiian shirt and developed many mid-20th-century textiles and technical innovations in the islands' clothing industry. The show features dozens of vintage textiles, garments, and photos. Check the AANM site for information about museum admission and hours.

© Dominique King 2011 All rights reserved

Midwest travel links for October 2010

Check out some of these great Midwest-related stories I read online in this past month:

• World's Largest Toilet, Columbus, IN-The term "go big or go home" takes on a whole new meaning with Julie's post about this, um, pit stop at the Kids' Commons Columbus' Community Children's Museum in Columbus, Indiana on the aptly named Go Big or Go Home blog.
• 20 Things to Do in Grand Rapids Before You're Dead-Great Lakes Guru Tim shares some great ideas for visiting this west Michigan city, including some of my favorites like ArtPrize, the Grand Rapids Art Museum (a.k.a. the GRAM), and the public art-filled campus at Grand Valley State University.
• Art at the Indianapolis International Airport-Stuck at the Indianapolis airport while waiting for a flight? Nicole suggests checking out the airport's great collection of public art and sleek modern architecture in her recent Indiana Insider blog post.
• Rock and Roll of Fame and Museum-Check out this story about the Cleveland, Ohio, museum at What Locals Like About Cleveland Plus. The short video tour gives you a sneak peek inside of the museum, including a quick look at my favorite part of the museum--its collection of performers' stage costumes (something I haven't been able to do on Midwest Guest because of the museum's photography restrictions for visitors).
  
  
• A little trip up north...and Thomas Story Kirkbride-We've enjoyed several photowalks with Photowalks Detroit. I enjoyed seeing Carolyn's story on Michigan in Pictures about a photowalk at the Village at Grand Traverse Commons in Traverse City, a former mental hospital in and ongoing residential/commercial development. Be sure to check out the links in this story to see some great pictures in the Flickr streams from individual photographers involved in this photowalk.
• Drinking and Drawing in Chicago-These informal, after-hours art sessions in several Chicago studios and galleries sound like great fun. Join Rosalind at Uptake as she checks out several events that involve creativity and cocktails!
• Schlitz Fest-Read Designslinger to find out how German-born Milwaukee brewer Joseph Schiltz sent thousands of barrels of beer to thirsty folks in Chicago in the wake of the big 1871 fire. German expats there, grateful for the free beer, probably helped the company's expansion into Chicago and the establishment of these architecturally beautiful Schlitz taverns during the late 1800s/early 1900s.
• A Road Trip to...Brandywine Falls-Anthony of Ohio's Stark County News & Views takes us to Brandywine Falls at the Cuyahoga Valley National Park. This story brought back fond memories of our visit to this beautiful spot.
  
  
• Road Trip: Finding Oz in South Dakota-Kristen shares the story of author L. Frank Baum's beloved book, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, and its surprising connection to Aberdeen, South Dakota. This is one in a series of Midwest Road Trip posts at Vera's A Traveler's Library blog involving books and movies with Midwestern connections (including A Road Trip to an Ordinary State: Kansas, where Vera shares the story of Truman Capote's book In Cold Blood, the movie based on the book, and the lurid crime that inspired both of them). Be sure to check out companion posts to this series at Music Road where Kerry suggests musical selections to accompany the Road Trip posts. Here's a link to Kerry's suggestions for tunes to accompany the Nebraska and Kansas leg of the trip.
• It's Buster's Birthday-Classic comedy fans will want to visit Muskegon, Michigan, where the incomparable Buster Keaton and his family called home during summers while preparing to travel the vaudeville circuit the rest of the year. Check out the Great Lakes Gazette where Kath shares the story of the Keaton family, the area's early 1900s Actors' Colony, and an annual festival dedicated to the great silent movie actor and filmmaker.

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

Where I live: Alloy Orchestra returns to the Detroit Film Theater September 24-26

Fans of classic films are in for a treat as the Alloy Orchestra returns to the Detroit Film Theater September 24, 25, and 26 to accompany silent classics that include an experimental Russian feature, the complete version of the masterpiece "Metropolis", and a rarely seen silent film from Alfred Hitchcock.

The Boston-based Alloy Orchestra is a trio that composes and performs soundtracks for an eclectic selection of silent films. Performances feature traditional percussion instruments, electronic synthesizers and keyboards, as well as banjo, accordion, a musical saw, and a variety of found objects.

The Alloy Orchestra describes their sound as "the Berlin Philharmonic meets Godzilla" or "the sound of water dripping into a sink". Both descriptions may be accurate at least in part, but the music produced by this trio on their amazing "rack of junk" and assorted instruments defies easy categorization. Maybe this is one of the reasons Alloy Orchestra gigs continue to surprise and delight me after hearing them perform many times at the DFT.

Although we'd heard Alloy Orchestra perform in a darkened movie theater many times, we never saw them perform until a special pre-movie performance in the Detroit Institute of Arts' Rivera Court last year (where I took the photos accompanying this article).

The original group line-up of Caleb Sampson, Terry Donahue, and Ken Winokur first performed together as the Alloy Orchestra at a First Night event in Boston on New Year's Eve in 1990.

The manager of a local art movie house caught the show and approached the trio about accompanying a showing "Metropolis". This particular version of "Metropolis" was a 1984 reissue with a soundtrack by music producer Giorgio Moroder (a version featuring 1980s pop/rock that I described here as "somewhat bizarre" when I previewed the DFT's summer season, featuring the newest restoration of the film).

The trio, by now named the Alloy Orchestra for their collection of weird musical instruments and found objects, had only two weeks to produce a suitable soundtrack for the film. Their soundtrack was a hit, and the group looked for other chances to accompany silent films.

This year Winokur and Donahue, along with keyboardist Roger Miller (who joined the group after Sampson's 1999 death), celebrate the Alloy Orchestra's twentieth anniversary with a tour of "The Best of Alloy Orchestra".

Over the years, Alloy Orchestra created scores for nearly 30 feature-length films and many silent shorts. They usually premiere new scores at the Telluride Film Festival in Colorado (playing there every year since 1993) and perform in theaters, museums, cultural events and other venues around the world.

This weekend with the Alloy Orchestra at the DFT kicks off on Friday, September 24, with "Man with a Movie Camera". This 1929 film directed by Dziga Vertov, originally intended as a Russian propaganda flick, offers an impressionist view of life through a photographer's eye. We saw this film with its Alloy Orchestra accompaniment last year. The stunning cinematography and editing in this film make it surprisingly cutting-edge, and it's a must-see with the always inventive Alloy Orchestra soundtrack.

The Alloy Orchestra accompanies the newly restored "Metropolis" on Saturday, September 25. I saw this particular version this summer, without the Alloy accompaniment, and it should be a highlight of this weekend's Alloy Orchestra gig at the DFT.

Families may enjoy a special Alloy Orchestra program called "Masters of Slapstick" on Sunday afternoon (September 26). This hour-long show features a selection of short comedies featuring Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton.

Catch the Alloy Orchestra's accompaniment to the 1929 Alfred Hitchcock film, "Blackmail" on Sunday evening (September 26). Hitchcock made two versions of this film, a sound version considered to be the first talking picture made in England, and the seldom-shown silent version featured in this showing.

The DFT's Autumn 2010 schedule continues through November 2010. Check out the DFT online for a complete film schedule, times and ticket prices.

Want to listen to the Alloy Orchestra in your own home theater? Check out the DVD of "Man with the Movie Camera" with the Alloy Orchestra soundtrack, or hear samples of the group's music for several different films on the album New Music for Silent Films in CD or MP3 format.

 

Note: "Where I live" posts are part of a series of periodic stories about special events and people in, and around, metro Detroit. "Where I live" posts are stories I'll post in addition to my regular schedule of stories about attractions around the larger Midwestern region. I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I enjoy writing them.

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

Midwest travel links for August 2010

Check out these great Midwest-related stories I've read online this past month:

• Colorful Caribbean Floats-Charlie spotted some beautiful flashes of color while riding his bicycle through Detroit recently, discovering a workshop and artists creating floats and costumes for the city's Annual Caribbean International Festival Parade. Check out his story and photos of the workshop and the subsequent parade at Bikes, Books & A Little Music.





• Chicago and Milwaukee: Large Public Art and Placemaking-Public art pieces in Chicago like The Bean and a huge American Gothic sculpture are big tourist draws. Jeramey takes a look at <heh> Chicago's latest piece of public art and argues that Milwaukee could benefit from emulating Chicago's penchant for large pieces of statement art. Oh, and check out Milwaukee's Bronze Fonz, which is exactly what you probably think it is-the Fonz of Happy Days fame immortalized as (you guessed it) a bronze statue.

• Backyard Adventures: 100 Acres at the Indianapolis Museum of Art-Check out this outdoor arts park at the Indianapolis Museum of Art at Arrows Sent Forth. Traveling with kids? This story also has some great tips about the terrain, rest rooms, parking, picnicking at the museum, and more.

• Evansville Otters Baseball for Southwest Indiana-There is still a bit of time to take in a baseball game this season, and Erik takes readers to a game with the Evansville Otters of the Frontier League at Indiana Insider Blog. I enjoyed hearing about the team's historic 95-year-old ball park and its connection to the movie, "A League of Their Own".

• Thriving in the BWCAW-Join Rob and his family on a canoe adventure in Minnesota's Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. It's been a while since we visited the area ourselves, but I vividly remember the quarter-mile downhill portage and the quarter-mile uphill portage we did during one of our day trips, so I can feel Rob's pain as he talks about two miles worth of portages during his trip at The Intense Traveler. But it's all worth it!





• Looking at the End of Summer from the Lighthouse Steps- The marble, Albert Kahn-designed William Livingstone Memorial Lighthouse on Detroit's Belle Isle is a real beauty, so I particularly enjoyed taking a closer look at this unique tower at Belle Isle Home.

• Road Trip Music: Indiana-Kerry explores the Midwest and its music at Music Road. Check out this profile of Indiana folksinger Carrie Newcomer (born in Michigan, by the way) and other Midwest musician profiles at Kerry's site.

• Discovering Musical History on Race Street-Michael takes us to historic Herzog Studio in Cincinnati, Ohio, in his Soapbox Cincinnati story. Popular music legends like Hank Williams, Patti Page, Flatt & Scruggs, and Bull Moose Jackson (an early R&B artist whose song, "Big Ten Inch Record", some music fans may remember best as an Aerosmith cover) all recorded at Herzog Studios.

• Highway 100-Travel the length of this Minnesota highway via video in a matter of minutes! I enjoyed this little virtual vacation at the Nokohaha blog.





• 7/79 video takes views on unique visual tour of Cincinnati's center-Driving into the Ohio River? Seeing Cincinnati-area landmarks like the Roebling Bridge or The Ascent in nearby Covington, Kentucky, from the air? Randy posted this virtual vacation on Urban Cincy.

Do you know of any other Midwest-related blogs I should check out?

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

Where I live: Explore the world of music, enjoy a taste of tropical style in Dearborn, Michigan

Summer may be nearing its end, but things are heating up at the Arab American National Museum (AANM) in Dearborn, Michigan. The museum offers a hot musical menu and a taste of tropical style with its fall season of Global Thursdays concerts and a new exhibit featuring the fashions of famed Hawaii-based designer Alfred Shaheen.

 Music for every taste

Organizers envision Global Thursdays as an extension of Detroit's annual Concert of Colors celebration of diversity and city pride. Global Thursdays, much like the Concert of Colors, brings music from around the globe to metro Detroit with the goal of celebrating diversity and developing unity through music.

Photo courtesy of AANM
• The series kicks off September 9 with Jesus "Chuy" Negrete, who plays guitar and harmonica, as an early celebration of Mexican Independence Day (September 16). The talent of Negrete, the founder and director of the Mexican Cultural Institute in Chicago, as a story teller who shares the Mexican experience through words and music led author/historian Studs Terkel, no slouch as a story teller himself, to dub him "the Chicano Woody Guthrie".

Photo courtesy of AANM
• Composer and violinist Riad Abdel-Gawad brings a unique style of Arabic music to the AANM on October 7. His music combines and integrates a variety of Western and Eastern musical genres-not fitting neatly into any specific genre, yet encompassing many of them at the same time. The native of Cairo, Egypt, is the premiere artist and musical educator in this music that preserves and protects its Arabic roots.

Photo courtesy of AANM
• Composer/guitarist Sean Blackman merges music reflecting his own Armenian roots with the rhythms of Senegal and Brazil for the final concert of the fall Global Thursdays series on November 4. Blackman settled in Detroit specifically to work with the city's amazingly deep talent pool of the ethnic musicians, and this show promises to feature some of the best Detroit-area ethnic musicians. This sounds like an especially intriguing show for music fans interested in unusual instruments and sounds as it combines the sound of Blackman's nylon-string guitar with unusual instruments like the oud, kora, and kanun.

Tropical treat

Fashion fans are in for a real treat as a free reception prior to the Riad Abdel-Gawad concert on October 7 serves as a preview for Alfred Shaheen: Fabric to Fashion, an exhibit featuring dozens of vintage textiles, garments, and photos.

Shaheen, a Lebanese American engineer, is primarily responsible for popularizing the men's Hawaiian shirt, as well as developing many mid-20th-century textiles and technical innovations in the industry, according to AANM Director of Communications Kim Silarski.

"On the cover of his "Blue Hawaii" album, Elvis Presley wears a Shaheen shirt," she says.

Shaheen created garments using imported material in the years immediately following World War II, but quickly realized the economic and environmental wisdom of creating his own fabrics at home in Hawaii. Innovations like mass producing silk-screened textiles and production sewing techniques, plus an in-house training department, established him as a leader in the islands' industry.

"He did for clothing what Ford did at the Rouge, start to finish, designing and finishing his products under one roof," says Silarski.

Shaheen maintained his factory and production on Oahu, even as his company distributed his informal tropical styles reflecting Hawaiian, South Pacific, and Asian culture worldwide.

Photo courtesy of AANM

Those styles remain popular today says Silarski, who is a real fan of Shaheen's work.

"Shaheen vintage shirts and dresses go for hundreds on eBay," she says.

Don your best tropical attire and enjoy complimentary refreshments at the opening reception for the Shaheen exhibit at 5:30 p.m. on October 7. The exhibit runs through March 13, 2011 and is free with museum admission.

Tickets for each Global Thursdays concert are $10. Purchase tickets at the door, or order online in advance until 5 p.m. the day prior to each show.

Global Thursdays concerts begin at 6:30 p.m. in the AANM's 156-seat auditorium, which is on the lower level of the museum at 13624 Michigan Avenue in Dearborn, Michigan. Free parking is available in the lighted lot behind the museum.

Also be sure to watch the AANM site for upcoming events like the museum's annual film festival December 2-5.

Note: "Where I live" posts are part of a series of periodic stories about special events and people in, and around, metro Detroit. "Where I live" posts are stories I'll post in addition to my regular schedule of stories about attractions around the larger Midwestern region. I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I enjoy writing them.

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved