Tonight there is a very special presentation of Mirah & Spectratone International’s “Share This Place” @ The Cedar Cultural Center.
Mirah will also be back celebrating Modern Radio’s 9th Anniversary. A label on which she will release her next album comprised of outtakes, unreleased and hard to find tracks..
Here is a brief summary of tonight’s interesting performance.
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“Share This Place” is a multi-media performance with original live music by Lori Goldston and Kyle Hanson of Spectratone International and Mirah Yom Tov Zeitlyn, and stop motion films by Britta Johnson. Based in part on the writings of the influential French scientist/poet, Jean Henri Fabré , the show explores the tender, dramatic, sordid, tragic and triumphant lives of insects.
Mirah has been recording emotional and ravishingly nuanced songs for Olympia, Washington’s K Records since 1997. For“Share This Place” she’s composed a song cycle with long-time collaborators Lori Goldston and Kyle Hanson. After leading the critically acclaimed Black Cat Orchestra for many years Goldston, a cellist, and Hanson, an accordionist, formed Spectratone International in 2004 with percussionist Jane Hall and Kane Mathis on oud. Their sound is full, subtle and meticulously rendered, moving easily among a wide range of influences, including psychedelia, folk and early music.
Britta Johnson has created luminous stop motion animated films for each of the songs. The insects, created out of corks, ashtrays, old balloons and other bits of domestic detritus, are seen singing, hatching, rolling balls of dung and otherwise fulfilling their destinies.
“Share This Place” draws inspiration and fact from many sources, including Karel Capek’s surreal “The Insect Play”, where the epic and dramatic lives of the insects overpower the human in their midst. Another long-gone collaborator is the late-nineteenth century entomologist J. Henri Fabre, - “the Homer of Insects” according to Victor Hugo - who wrote about every encounter with his tiny neighbors so intimately as to give the distinct impression that he viewed his subjects equally alongside himself as weavers of the social fabric of provincial life.
The show was co-commissioned by the Portland Institute for Contemporary Art and the The Seattle International Children’s Festival. Produced by Phil Elvrum and Stev Fisk, a recording of the music is available on K Records as a CD and LP record with the same title.
