They’re gathering skilled artisans from the Boston area to teach classes of all kinds, including precision metal machining, woodworking, welding, fabricwork, painting, photography, and much more. Currently they’re taking a survey to see what types of classes people in the community would be most interested in. Visit their site for more information, take the survey, and get involved!

Laura Jorgensen (photo by Ethan Walfish), Rob Potylo (photo by Danae Legrow), Goli (photo by Karen Clunes), and Walter Sickert's ArtBeat octopus.

There’s so much great music to check out this week, I can only touch on some of it. See listings on the sidebar for more, and please let me know if I’m missing something interesting (I frequently do). We’ve got two FREE daytime concert series in four different locations, presented by arts organizations around Cambridge. Somerville has their annual Art Beat happening Friday and Saturday in Davis Square. And there’s interesting shows (and a few new album releases) coming up with Laura Jorgensen and Nature In The City; Rob Potylo and HUMANWINE; and Sarah RabDAU and Goli.

Summer Concert Series @ Harvard & Kendall Squares

Wednesdays 12-1 pm, Kendall Square, Cambridge | Thursdays 12-1 pm, Palmer Street, Harvard Square, Cambridge | FREE!

Central Square Arts Outdoors

Thursdays 4-6 pm, Lafayette Plaza (Main St & Mass Ave), Cambridge | Fridays 4-6 pm, Barron Plaza (Mass Ave & Magazine St), Cambridge | FREE!

This ALSO FREE concert series (July and August) is in Lafayette Plaza (Main Street and Mass Ave.) in Cambridge Thursdays 4-6pm and in Barron Plaza (Mass Ave. & Magazine Street) on Fridays 4-6pm. It features performances from the Cambridge Symphony, Central Square Theater, Dance Complex, ImprovBoston, and Other Leading Central Square Arts Organizations. For a full schedule, see CentralSquare.com. This week: on Thursday, The Middle East presents Destroy Babylon at Lafayette Plaza (their site includes styles; this one says “Rock”, but they have reggae, punk, and dub influences) and on Friday, Cambridge Symphony Orchestra Chamber Group (which is indeed “Classical”).

Laura Jorgensen CD Release Party with Nature In The City

Thursday 7/15 at Cafe 939 | 8pm, FREE admission!

Rob Potylo Double-CD Release Party with HUMANWINE, Super Power, Bacchus King

Thursday 7/15, T.T. the Bear’s Place, Central Square, Cambridge | 9pm show, $9

Rob Potylo (photo by Danae Legrow)

Somerville ARTBEAT 2010: W A T E R

Friday and Saturday 7/16 & 7/17 ~ Davis Square, Somerville | FREE!

Don't miss Walter Sickert and the Army of Broken Toys @ ArtBeat!

The City of Somerville hosts its annual Art Beat Festival on Friday and Saturday in and around Davis Square. (from their press release): “At the height of summer, artists and festival goers converge on Davis Square, transforming it into one of the area’s largest and most innovative arts festivals. This year’s ArtBeat theme is W A T E R, which artists will explore in a variety of ways.” Somerville Arts Council has a complete schedule listed. Note! Walter Sickert and the Army of Broken Toys will be performing Friday at 6:30pm at Park Stage, Seven Hills Park (behind Somerville Theatre). He also designed their awesome poster this year (bet you would never guess that).

Goli | Sarah RabDAU | Nohow On

Saturday 7/17 ~ Cafe 939 | 8pm show, $8

Goli (photo by Karen Clunes)

Goli is the very interesting cello and marimba duo of Valerie Thompson and Vessela Stoyanova. But before you assume this is “straight classical music,” their musical backgrounds include world music, rock, folk ensembles, free improv, and yes of course, symphony orchestras. I take this from their MySpace page: “wrestling with the universal subjects of death and getting laid while playing the cello and marimba.” Oh yes, most definitely worth checking out. I’ll include a little sample below (filmed by AdrenalineSleep). They’re joined at Cafe 939 Saturday night by pianist/vocalist Sarah RabDAU and delightfully quirky folk trio Nohow On (formerly No Eye Contact).

I’m not usually in the habit of reviewing parties, but I must make an exception in this case and say a few words. It was a ridiculously cool event put on by Boston-area bloggers – Boston Band Crush, Bradley’s Almanac, Exploit Boston!, Playground Boston, Ryan’s Smashing Life, Tea Party Boston, Zed Equals Zee, and Agent Bishop Productions – and hosted by the fine folks at the extremely classy production facility The Bridge Sound and Stage (formerly home to the legendary Fort Apache Studios).

Music lovers from every corner of Boston’s diverse artistic community were in attendance – bands, club promoters, press people, photographers, studio engineers and label reps, DJs… All enjoying a day and evening-long concert at an open mic with many excellent impromptu performances, great food, and lots of beer (courtesy of Narragansett). There was a charity raffle and local music scene trivia contest with some wonderful prizes, including studio time and photo shoots for the bands, and show tickets for the bloggers (no, it wasn’t fixed, completely random, but weird how well that turned out!). All for an excellent cause as well – a local children’s music organization called Zumix.

TAB The Band

Midnight Spin

Besides being a perfect way to spend part of the Memorial Day Weekend, what a fantastic idea to bring together Boston’s music community. That we have a crazy vibrant scene here is obvious, but the support and comraderie amongst all its various participants isn’t always apparent, what with everyone racing around in their individual lives, so it’s really nice to stop, kick back, and connect with like-minded souls. Here’s to more events like this!

One more thing. In the photograph below, Sarah Miller and Justin Emile (Boston Band Crush, Big East drummer, Milky Way booker) are performing Justin’s original composition “The Message”. They sounded amazing together, and at the end of the night, were talking about forming a band. As the only one not drinking the entire day & evening, it was decided that I would make sure this came to fruition. I’m holding you to it, guys! It’s in print now, so get going.

Sarah Miller and Justin Emile

By the way, I ended up with a few CDs by the end of the evening, so some reviews are on the way.

[Mick Murray of In Your Face Photography shot some really fun video of the proceedings, which is up on the Playground Boston site - thanks!]

(from their press release):

“Join us for a one-day celebration to commemorate the Food Not Bombs movement, birth, and history. Live music, theater, workshops, interactive table spaces, exhibits, kids activities, a picnic, and more will be featured throughout the day with the purpose of raising awareness of poverty, issues of food security, and homelessness. Please join us May 23rd 2010 to celebrate 30 years of community, homeless advocacy and free food. The mission of Food Not Bombs is to serve free, weekly community meals to those in need. Two meals take place in Boston each week, including Friday from 4-6pm at the Park Street MBTA station and Sunday from 3-5pm at the Central Square MBTA station. All food served is nutritious and vegan. The organization functions in a non-hierarchical manner and everyone share leadership responsibility. Food Not Bombs got its start in Cambridge in 1980, but has since spread to all corners of the globe. Currently, there are over 1,000 autonomous chapters of Food Not Bombs.”

Ok, just a quickie here to introduce a new club I’ve just found out about this week. It’s called The Royale, and it’s on the site of the old Roxy, at 279 Tremont Street. You can read more about it (and see a few photos). Their grand opening is tonight, with a live performance by Tyson Ritter (from The All American Rejects) and “special guests”. Never mind about the mention of “Playboy events” – this is a new 800-capacity rock venue, folks, in downtown Boston, and one of the bands scheduled for May 4 & 5 is Public Image Limited. So definitely a club to keep an eye on. And I will.

Meghan Chiampa, Associate Editor of Deli Magazine New England

It was a lovely evening of New England bands, hand-picked by Deli Magazine New England’s Associate Editor, Meghan Chiampa, and as diverse as the website’s eclectic musical focus. This was to celebrate The Deli officially making its welcome foray into the New England states. Now based in Boston, she started writing for them in Burlington Vermont. This excellent online magazine covers the indie music scenes in NYC, L.A., San Francisco, Chicago, Nashville, and elsewhere.

The festivities started with Vermont’s The Day’s Weight, who seemingly brought their own fan base with them, as the place was packed, though unfortunately it half cleared out after their set. I missed the beginning and came in, appropriately enough, for a very good cover of The Band’s “The Shape I’m In”. Well yes, appropriate for my mood that evening, but what I meant is appropriate because they very much have that same vibe – rootsy, country and hippie-flavored rock, very well done and I’m guessing you’ll know what’s coming next… yeah, I wasn’t really in the mood for it. My fault, and certainly not the band’s, as they were excellent.

The Day's Weight and guests

The Day’s Weight centers around Patrick McDermott on lead guitar and Kyle Toomey on rhythm guitar and vocals, with Andrew Abboushi on bass and Jereme Vinette on drums. Nice vocal harmonies with a warm, comfy, jamming sound. If I heard correctly, they brought some friends on stage, Chris and Chuck McDermott (who actually, I’m thinking now, are probably relations of Patrick McDermott’s), and also introduced Jamie Bright on bass. Apologies if any of this is wrong. My hearing in rock clubs leaves a lot to be desired.

Otis Grove were up next, and these guys were really, really good. More suited to my mysterious mood swing that night, odd in a way because I don’t always get that seriously carried away by funky jazz fusion, but I definitely was. An added compliment to their musical prowess. There was Sam Gilman on a Hammond Organ (large, bulky, wicked cool and sounding fantastic), Tyler Drabick on guitar (with some pretty awesome playing), and Blake Goedde on equally mesmerizing drums and percussion. These guys have that special sort of chemistry that creates something far more than the sum of its parts. Very happy they’re local, as it means I’ll be able to see them again sometime.

Locally, they’re performing on January 21 at Regattabar, a venue I don’t think I’ve ever mentioned on this blog as they specialize in jazz, but I’ll make an exception in this case! They also have shows scheduled in New York and New England. Check them out if you can.

After a nice little plug for The Deli New England by its esteemed Associate Editor Meghan, Muy Cansado came on to perform a very enjoyable selection of tunes, quite Pixies-esque, though they’ve also been compared to such bands as Dinosaur Jr. and Lemonheads. They’ve got a rambunctious punk/pop sound, with nicely complementing vocals from guitarist Chris Mulvey and bassist Lisa Libera, and drummer Jon Ulman (the newest member of the band) adding to the infectious groove they had going.

They started things off with their friend Cory (didn’t catch his last name) on guitar, and ended with a very pretty slower duet with Lisa shedding her bass to concentrate on some lovely vocals to compliment Chris’s. I’ll be keeping an eye out for these guys as well. Their debut album (released summer 2008) is Stars & Garters. Contact the band on their MySpace or their official site for more info.

I suppose you could say that the final band to play, 28 Degrees Taurus, were the “headliners”, though judging from the high level of musicianship, it was really a night of four headliners. All different styles and moods, but equally compelling. 28 Degrees Taurus… loud wall of psychedelic space music. Unfortunately though, the emphasis was on “loud”, so virtually all of the prettiness and subtle nuances in their songs which I know is there (from listening to them on MySpace) was lost in the onslaught. Honestly, I don’t know why on earth some bands feel they need to be deafeningly loud when performing live.

Having said that, I’ll talk about their music rather than this actual show, because I really like them a lot, and I think, if the sound was right, they would have been my favorites of the evening. Dreamy, dark and ethereal with vocals from bassist Karina Dacosta alternating between angelic and anarchic. Chiming, hallucinatory, otherworldly guitar from Jinsen Liu (who provides a nice vocal counterpoint to Karina, as in “Wherever You Can Find It” and “Low Light”). This mystical trip is propelled along nicely by Greg Murphy on drums. There’s ’60s psychedelia and pop in there, with more recent harder-edged bands, and a dash of Eastern traditional music. An interesting mix, giving them quite a varied and fascinating sound. Live, they were joined on a few songs by Brian Murphy on trumpet; not sure if he plays on their recordings as well.

Ah yes, I see now in their bio “We’re usually loud as hell but not above playing an occassional ballad.” Well, ok then. Apparently their first two full-length albums and two EPs are available for free download at gimmiesound.com and their new album How Do You Like Your Love is available from ToneVendor. So, if you’re like me and you actually like to be able to hear stuff, I suggest you download their music and choose your own volume at home. Or see them… oh, I don’t know… outdoors, maybe. [in retrospect, listing My Bloody Valentine as one of their influences should have probably clued me in to at least bring along some earplugs.]

This benefit concert presented by Boston Music Spotlight will take place on Thursday, December 3 at Hennessy’s Hooley House (25 Union St., Boston) and will feature Boston bands Cassavettes, Shadwell, Three Day Threshold and Taste. All proceeds will be donated to the national Marine Toys for Tots Foundation benefiting needy children in the Greater Boston area this holiday season. Tickets for the 21+ show are $10 or $5 with an unwrapped toy and can be purchased in advance online at TicketLeap.com. Live Nation and Straight Stitch Custom Embroidery & Silkscreen will co-sponsor the benefit concert.

Read the press release from Boston Music Spotlight.

On Thanksgiving Day (a.k.a. the Native Americans’ National Day Of Mourning), Victor Robert Venckus presents his Annual WZBC Pow Wow. He’s been doing this, well, forever… over 20 years now. From noon until midnight, he’ll be playing Native American and Native American-inspired music in all possible genres, including rock, folk, traditional, new age, and spoken word. He’ll also have live reports from the demonstrations in Plymouth and possibly interviews regarding Native American spirituality and politics. Tune in to WZBC 90.3 FM, or listen online, for the perfect soundtrack for your Thanksgiving dinner or whatever you happen to be doing that day.

To commemorate this event, I’ll do a brief profile on a local group called The Wolf Cry Singers, whom Victor will be playing that day.

The Wolf Cry Singers

The Wolf Cry Singers

The Wolf Cry Singers are an intertribal woman’s hand drum group, founded in 2003, who perform traditional and contemporary Mi’kMaq, Cherokee, Navajo, Abenaki and Delaware songs and chants. Singing in both native languages and in English, and including their own songs as well, they regularly perform at pow wows throughout New England and in Canada, and at Native American ceremonies and cultural events. Their mission is to keep the spirit and languages alive and to connect with others through their music. Their members are descendants from various tribes such as Mi’kmaq, Blackfoot, Oneida, Abenaki, Cherokee, Inuit, and Passamoquaddy.

You can listen to a sample of their unique and beautiful singing, accompanied by hand drums, on their official site, and you can see a few videos of them performing on the Wolf Cry Singers Facebook fan page. These ladies are absolutely wonderful, so if you have a chance to see them, I highly recommend it! Native American Pow Wows are fascinating cultural events as well, if you’ve never been to one. I’ll pass along a schedule of Massachusetts Pow Wows for this past year which give links to the various organizations sponsoring them. They’re usually annual events.

The Wolf Cry Singers have a CD available (information on ordering can be found on their website, and I see now they have a performance tomorrow at Wheaton College (Norton, MA), celebrating Native American Heritage Month.

from The Boston Globe

(Cambridge Community Television press release):

It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of storyteller Dr. Hugh Hill, known as Brother Blue. Brother Blue, perhaps the original performance artist, has entertained generations of children and adults with his tales, often accompanied by tambourine and foot stomping. He is survived by his wife, Ruth Hill; together they produced hundreds of hours of storytelling in CCTV’s studio, on Cambridge Community Radio, and BeLive.

CCTV will show a retrospective of Brother Blue’s programs in December.

Following is his full obituary:

Brother Blue, aka Hugh Morgan Hill, died peacefully at home on November 3, 2009 at the age of 88. An internationally renowned storyteller, mentor to hundreds, inspiration to thousands and beloved husband of Ruth Edmonds Hill, Brother Blue’s life exemplified his passionate belief that telling and listening to stories changes the world. His stories have changed the worlds of everyone who heard him.

Brother Blue was born in Cleveland, Ohio on July 12, 1921. An exceptional student, he served in the US Military from 1943-1946 in both theaters during World War Two; he was honorably discharged as a First Lieutenant. He obtained an AB from Harvard College, an MFA from Yale School of Drama and his PhD from Union Graduate School.

By the late-1960s Brother Blue, always accompanied by his wife Ruth, was telling stories on the streets, in prisons, in classrooms and more. His stories always allowed the listener to imagine bigger worlds, see themselves in the heart of the tale and believe that they, too, were storytellers. Brother Blue said that he told stories, “from the middle of the middle of me to the middle of the middle of you,” and that if you heard another person’s story you could never harm them, so stories could save the world. He never stopped telling stories. Brother Blue ran a storytelling series in Cambridge for over 20 years, where many storytellers found their own voices. Brother Blue and his wife Ruth always listened with uncritical and loving ears, encouraging everyone. He received multiple international awards for his art and was the official storyteller of both Cambridge and Boston.

Brother Blue is survived by his wife Ruth Edmonds Hill, his sister Beatrice Hill, his niece Lynda Hill, his nephew Thomas Hill and hundreds of storytellers. Visiting hours are on Sunday, November 8, 2009 from 2-4pm and 6-8pm at Keefe Funeral Home, 2175 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge MA. The internment will be on Monday, November 9, 2009 at 1pm at the Pittsfield Cemetery, Pittsfield MA.

In lieu of flowers please send donations to the League for the Advancement of New England Storytelling (www.lanes.org) and the National Association of Black Storytellers (www.nabsinc.org). For obituary, directions or to send a condolence visit www.keefefuneralhome.com

Obituary from Boston.com