Spotlight on the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis

Get set for a night of pure pleasure on April 25 as Cityfolk and the Victoria Theatre Association present the most famous jazz big band in the world, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. Led by trumpet icon Wynton Marsalis, loaded with virtuoso musicians and a far-ranging repertoire, the JLCO specializes in sending audiences home happy. Don't take my word for it: take a listen!

Earl Scruggs: The Root

When Cityfolk and Joe Mullins joined forces in 2002 to present Earl Scruggs: Family and Friends at the Nutter Center, it was perhaps the most ambitious concert we have ever undertaken. The goal was to celebrate the most influential banjo player of all time, showcase him with his own band in one part of the concert while featuring some of the major players who descended from the Scruggs line in the other. Mullins, in addition to wrangling the players, produced an afternoon workshop that allowed participants in the concert including banjo giants Sonny Osborne, J.D. Crowe, Tom Adams, Jim Mills, Rob McCoury and Joe himself to talk about the profound impact Scruggs had on their playing. The concert itself brought together a constellation of gifted performers. It was one of Cityfolk's proudest moments and, we always hoped, a night that Earl Scruggs carried good memories of. For a more complete description of the event, read Jon Weisberger's review from the No Depression archive.

And don't miss Steve Martin's recent appreciation of Earl Scruggs from the New Yorker online.

Spotlight on De Temps Antan

Quebecois music lovers, I know you enjoyed Genticorum. And you're in luck -- we have more amazing French-Canadian music on it's way to you on April 24 with De Temps Antan. 

Founded in 2003, this trio of current and former members of La Bottine Souriante has taken the high-energy sound of traditional Québécois dance music around the world. Using fiddle, accordion, harmonica, guitar, bouzouki, foot percussion and a number of other instruments and rich call-and-response vocals, the band (Éric Beaudry, André Brunet and Pierre-Luc Dupuis) offers “a new take on Quebec folk music…traditional music with nothing old-fashioned about it” (CBC Radio). De Temps Antan has a more traditional, stripped down sound than La Bottine Souriante, but this virtuoso trio produces an equally awesome power on stage. The band's newest release, Les Habits de Papier, has been nominated for Traditional Album of the Year by the 2011 Canadian Folk Music Awards. 

Soul Rhythms is Rocking Successfully Along

Sones de Mexico share the music and dance of
Vera Cruz, Mexico

Soul Rhythms is rocking successfully along, with each school actively rehearsing performance pieces for the culminating show April 22! The visiting artists were in Dayton the week of March 5th, setting a high bar and giving tremendous motion to a wonderfully diverse group of Dayton participants! The theme of migration is inherently active, as are the incredible dances that are growing among the disciplined dancers

Week 1 brought some incredible moments in workshops and lecture/demonstrations across Dayton! Hosts included Sinclair Community College, for Coffee & Conversation with Turkish kanun master Hasan Isakkut and a dance department master class with Sones de Mexico; East End Community Services for a distinctively Turkish evening of music and food; University of Dayton’s Women’s Center and Art Street where lots of students came out to see the action from native Daytonian LaFrae Sci, whose work is internationally known, and Hammerstep, a dance ensemble boasting a UD grad as a founding member; and the Hispanic Catholic Ministry at St. Mary’s Church where a robust crowd heard Sones de Mexico share music, dance and cultural nuggets about Vera Cruz.

Children at Omega Baptist Church dancing
with guidance from Step Afrika and Hammerstep

The lovely people at Omega Baptist Church hosted an evening of dance (and food) for families in west Dayton. The turn out was awesome! Folks of all ages watched Step Afrika and Hammerstep dance their way through a description of how the Irish and African people revolted against oppression through dance: expression of anger, hurt, dissatisfaction; dance that grew out of military movement; dance that allowed citizens to be heard, an inspiring look at how migration happens, even within cultures, through performance art that lends freedom to the captive.

Check out more photos from these events. These two photos are by Adam Alonzo.

Don’t miss this final performance folks! April 22  at Dayton Masonic Center at 3:00pm. Experience a rich cultural fusion, captivating collaboration and young people from Dayton learning new ways to express the human experience.

Volunteer Spotlight: Juliet Fromholt

Another new face on Cityfolk's Board is local music whirlwind Juliet Fromholt. The Dayton native, who has been listening to WYSO for as long as she can remember, now is on their staff and hosts two radio programs.  In her spare time, Juliet is also on the board of the Antioch Writers' Workshop and writes about local music for DaytonMostMetro.com.

RECORDINGS I'M LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW: Old Ideas by Leonard Cohen, Tramp by Sharon Van Etten, and Take Control by Good English

LAST THREE BOOKS I'VE READ:Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann, Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrrl Revolution by Sara Marcus and currently reading Down and Out in the Great Depression: Letters from the Forgotten Man edited by Robert S. McElvaine

FIRST CITYFOLK MEMORY: Attending the National Folk Festival on Courthouse Square with my parents.  I remember it being really hot out, but hearing some fabulous music.

WHAT I ENJOY MOST ABOUT CITYFOLK:  Cityfolk challenges us to reach outside of the box and experience something new....and that something new comes in the form of amazing live music, and that helps make our community a better place to live.

FAVORITE LIVE MUSIC EXPERIENCE: I have SO MANY great ones - it's way too hard to choose!
 
FAVORITE COMFORT FOOD:  My grandmother's chicken & noodles

FAVORITE PASSTIMES: Aside from listening to music and reading?  Writing, knitting, and riding my bike

DREAM VACATION:   Anywhere with great local culture to experience.

CBC Artist Statement: LaFrae Sci

by Jazz Drummer LaFrae Sci

I was halfway through college and completely uninspired by the course direction I had chosen. This lack of inspiration was reflected in my grades to the point that Oberlin College sent me a letter saying that I was academically suspended unless I appealed. I chose not to appeal and returned home to Dayton, Ohio.

I took a job as a custodian at the Victoria Theatre because I liked the idea of not having to work after 2pm and it was close to my apartment located near the Dayton Art Institute. One morning I was vacuuming the Cityfolk office when I noticed a job announcement on one of the desks that was about to be posted. Cityfolk was hiring an administrative assistant! Not having a computer at home, I sat down in that office and used the Cityfolk computer to craft a resume, and thankfully I was hired for the job.

During my time at Cityfolk I was inspired by the music, and most especially the Jazz series curated by jazz master-mind, Dave Barber. I had the opportunity to meet, speak with and attend performances by some of the greatest legends of the music. This experience inspired me to want to be a Jazz Drummer!

Inspired and focused, I returned to Oberlin and graduated while working as intensely as possible to grow as a musician on my instrument. After spending a few years gigging in the greater Cleveland, Pittsburgh and Detroit areas, I made the decision to move to New York City and test my mettle.

I have now been in NYC for 12 years. During this time I have (fortunately) worked non-stop as a freelance player, and an educational consultant internationally. I also write music and lead my own group, The 13th Amendment. I am so grateful to be able to bring the breadth of my experience and contribute back to my own community through the Culture Builds Community residency. I am certain I would not be where I am had it not been for the experience I had at Cityfolk. It is truly one of the brightest gems in the gem city! Thank you.

Volunteer Spotlight: Rick White

Rick White is a new member of the Cityfolk Board and chair of the Communications Committee. He's a native Texan who arrived in Ohio with wife (Becky) and family after times in Texas, California and Michigan. Family and adult children are now scattered across the country living in Dallas/Ft. Worth, Austin TX, Greenville, SC and Boston, MA. His passion for music was instilled in him during his freshman year of college. Acclaimed composer and his music mentor Don Gillis, Sr. exposed him to various forms of unique, multicultural American music and expanded his appreciation of all forms. Enjoying all genres of music remains one of the foundations of his daily life. After a long career as a sales and marketing executive with an international computer systems provider, White is now employed as an independent business consultant assisting automotive dealers in understanding and making technology decisions for their business.

RECORDINGS I'M LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW: Power of the Pontchartrain by Tab Benoit, All Night Long/All Day Long by Donald Byrd and Kenny Burrell, Frontiers by Jesse Cook, Watching The Dark: The History of Richard Thompson by Richard Thompson and Miss Understood by Carolyn Wonderland

LAST THREE BOOKS I'VE READ: Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything by Joshua Foer, The Power of Losing Control by Joe Caruso, and The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement by David Brooks

FIRST CITYFOLK MEMORY: Attending the National Folk Festival

WHAT I ENJOY MOST ABOUT CITYFOLK: Our audiences are real, unpretentious folk  

FAVORITE LIVE MUSIC EXPERIENCE: Attending the Texas International Pop Festival, 1969 (2 weeks after Woodstock) and Listening to BB King warm up backstage before a gig in Detroit.

FAVORITE COMFORT FOOD:Dewey's Pizza

FAVORITE PAST TIMES: Birding

DREAM VACATION: Kauai

Genticorum Favorites

When Genticorum was in town last month, I asked them to fill us in on some of their favorite things. True to form, they put a fun and unexpected twist on the normal responses we receive: all three of them chimed in!

FAVORITE RECORDING(S) RIGHT NOW:
Pascal - The Entertainer - The Very Best Of Scott Joplin
Alex - KAN - Sleeper
Yann - Jan Johansson - Jazz På Svenska

FAVORITE UP-AND-COMING YOUNG MUSICIAN OR GROUP: 
P and Y - Alexis Chartrand and Colin Savoie-Levac
A - Qristina and Quinn Bachand

LAST BOOKS I'VE READ: 
P - Hell.com by Patrick Sénécal and Une histoire du Québec by Jacques Lacoursière
A - Le roman de Julie Papineau by Micheline Lachance
Y - I'm in the middle of A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson, Mycophilia: Revelations from the Weird World of Mushrooms by Euginia Bone and Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins

Vasen

FAVORITE LIVE MUSIC EXPERIENCE (in the audience): 
P - (latest) Listening to Breabach at Celtic Connections 2012 / (all time) Väsen show at the APAP music conference
A - Väsen at the Sebastopol Music Festival
Y - Swåp, somewhere near Newcastle

FAVORITE LIVE MUSIC EXPERIENCE (on stage): 
P - Not possible to pinpoint one: Playing in the rainforest in front of 8,000 people in Malaysia / playing in a middle age castle in ruin in Estonia / playing at THE Library of Alexandria in Egypt...
A - Rainforest Music Festival (Malaysia)
Y - Woodford Folk Festival, in Australia, on stage with The Mammals and The Duhks

WHAT I LIKE BEST ABOUT MAKING MY LIVING AS A MUSICIAN: 
P - The music itself--being connected to all those generations that came before us through the music we play.
A - Meeting new people and discover new places
Y - Doing what we love for a living. And you never what the next day will bring.

FAVORITE COMFORT FOOD: 
P - Vietnamese Phö soups with everything (the special)
A - A good Thai seafood curry
Y - All of the above

FAVORITE PASSTIMES: 
P - Doing real work :) Electrical work around the house/plumbing/building things or repairing things in general.
A - Playing fiddle
Y - Cooking, cycling, playing music

DREAM VACATION: 
P - Staying at home and spending time with my family/fishing in the river in my backyard
A - Places where the beaches are beautiful and where there are some nice hiking trails around. Kauai is great for that and I'm looking forward to discover new ones.
Y - Lesquerde, France

Soul Rhythms Gets Underway Monday!

Soul Rhythms, our intense residency project, begins Monday March 5! For the next seven weeks, artists will be working in each of the five Neighborhood School Centers (so named by the Fitz Center at University of Dayton) sharing culture through the rich resources of artists, neighbors and students combined! Visiting artists will collaborate with local artists and students, devising dance pieces on the theme of migration. Artistic Director, Rodney Veal, will pull those pieces together into a dance concert performance that will showcase all collaborators! This will be the performance called Soul Rhythms.

The residency is about learning, through relationships between people, sharing traditions and culture, collaboration, compromise, action, commitment and art! The work is about celebrating our uniqueness, our commonalities, our beautiful diversity as the collective, greater Dayton community!! We are Dayton! This is our home! And we come from all over the globe!

Cityfolk’s Culture Builds Community program invites you to participate as well, as audience members at the culminating performance April 22. You will witness a community of performers, built from five different working groups: Jazz/African American roots, African American Fraternity Step Dance, Irish step/Clogging/Hip Hop, Turkish folk dance and Mexican foot percussion. Cityfolk welcomes the visiting artists that will work with local artists in each school:

• LaFrae Sci (Fairview School) with Renee McClendon, Sierra Leone and Stivers Jazz Band.
• 
  
• Step Afrika (Edison School) with Central State University Steppers
• 
  
• Hammerstep (Cleveland School) with Beth Wright and The Corndrinkers
• 
  
• Hasan Isakkut (Ruskin School) with Twin Towers Turkish Dance Collaborative
• 
  
• Sones de Mexico (Kiser School) with Orgullo Mexicano

Track the process of the residency here on Cityfolk’s blog or through the Culture Builds Community Facebook page. Nearly 100 students will be involved from the Dayton Pubic Schools, including members of the Stivers Jazz Band.