ANNOUNCING LINCOLN CENTER OUT OF DOORS 42nd SEASON
JULY 25-AUGUST 12, 2012

100 FREE PERFORMANCES AND EVENTS ACROSS THE PLAZAS OF LINCOLN CENTER

17 World, US and NY Debuts, Premieres and Commissions, Including:
* Phil Kline's dreamcitynine - festival-long GPS-based audio app installation plus live performance
* Art meets sport this Olympics summer with Kimmo Pohjonen's Accordion Wrestling
dance theater piece featuring the accordion experimentalist and ten Finnish wrestlers
Los Irreales de Ondatrópica - Quantic and Frente Cumbiero lead an intergenerational all-star gathering of Colombian musicians
* Celebrated Turkish psych-folk icon, singer Selda Bagcan, highlights Istanbulive
* The Bad Plus: On Sacred Ground - Re-envisioning Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring
* Brandt Brauer Frick Ensemble - German minimal techno group's chamber orchestra
* Polyglot Theatre's Tangle - site-specific, audience-created installation and kids' "play space"

AND...
Marking the 40th Anniversary of "Soul and the Center," Lincoln Center's Landmark Festival of African-American Artists
With: * Black Rock Coalition's Pardon Our Analysis
Nile Rodgers * Lenny Williams * Cleo Parker Robinson Dance Company * Otis Clay * Aloe Blacc
* Willie Mae Rock Camp for Girls All-Stars * Swamp Dogg
Celebrating The Music That Shaped the Culture:
Laura Nyro, Frisner Augustin, Tite Curet Alonso, Gil Scott-Heron, Sister Songwriters, Irish American Songbook

words & photos by Jacob Blickenstaff

Maxine Brown & The Sweet Divines

The 1st Brooklyn Soul Festival was a great success. Sell out crowd on the 1st night and nearly so on the second. The crowd was a nice mix of the soul intelligentsia, older music fans and twenty-somethings out to hear some good music. Both backing bands, Eli Reed and the True Loves and the Sweet Divines/Divine Soul Rhythm Band did a phenomenal job bringing the groove and nuance out of a large range of material with obvious love and attention. That set the stage for the artists - Hermon Hitson, Roscoe Robinson and Barbara Lynn on the first night and Maxine Brown and Otis Clay on the second - to shine brightly and deliver stunning performances.

"The Sweet Divines seem to be taking a tip from the Sweet Inspirations, a sixties soul quartet that included Cissy Houston, who was Whitney's mother and Dionne Warwick's aunt. In addition to recording their own songs the Sweet Inspirations sang back up for Aretha Franklin and Elvis. Similarly, the Sweet Divines have sung back up for soul singers such as Sharon Jones (see Purplish Rain). In a move that seemed to bring everything full circle, old school soul meets retro soul, on Saturday the Sweet Divines sang back up for Maxine Brown, who was backed up by the Sweet Inspirations in the 1960's." [The Strongest Women I Know]

Continue reading "The Brooklyn Soul Festival @ the Bell House - night 2 in pics (The Sweet Divines, Maxine Brown, Otis Clay & friends)"

words & photos by Jacob Blickenstaff

Eli 'Paperboy' Reed and Barbara Lynn @ The Bell House

The 1st Brooklyn Soul Festival was a great success. Sell out crowd on the 1st night and nearly so on the second. The crowd was a nice mix of the soul intelligentsia, older music fans and twenty-somethings out to hear some good music. Both backing bands, Eli Reed and the True Loves and the Sweet Divines/Divine Soul Rhythm Band did a phenomenal job bringing the groove and nuance out of a large range of material with obvious love and attention. That set the stage for the artists - Hermon Hitson, Roscoe Robinson and Barbara Lynn on the first night and Maxine Brown and Otis Clay on the second - to shine brightly and deliver stunning performances.

One of the great highlights for me (among many) was Maxine Brown performing a gorgeous take on "Piece of My Heart" - the song originally performed by Erma Franklin, then Janis Joplin, and then interpreted again by Ms. Brown around the same time. If felt as if the whole room was singing along.

The music at the festival was able to connect the different groups and ages in attendance as well as the artists themselves. Many musicians who had played previous nights at the monthly series Dig Deeper were in attendance. Dean Parrish, Lenis Guess, Otis Clay (on the night before he performed) and Baby Washington were all enjoying themselves, watching each other perform with respect and reverence.

The music of the festival spanned blues, gritty funk, Brill Building craft, Hi Rhythm grit, gospel raves and plaintive ballads - and most importantly connected with the audience as great music of the here and now.

More pictures from the first night, below...

Continue reading "Brooklyn Soul Festival - night 1 in pics (Eli Reed & The True Loves, Hermon Hitson, Roscoe Robinson, Barbara Lynn)"

Eli "Paperboy" Reed @ Madison Square Park in June '08 (more by Chris La Putt)

The Brooklyn Soul Festival will take place at the Bell House on August 28th and 29th. Acts on the bill include Otis Clay, Barbara Lynn, Maxine Brown, Roscoe Robinson, and Hermon Hitson.

Two nights of full sets from legends of soul music from around the country, rarely seen individually, never before on the same bill together - backed by two of the most in-demand bands in soul music today. Before and after the live performances, top soul DJs from around the world (Germany, UK, Georgia, LA, and NYC confirmed so far) will spin the finest 45s for the dancefloor. Vintage clothing and record fair the afternoon of day 2! On the first night, Eli "Paperboy" Reed & the True Loves will be the backing band (as well as playing some new songs from their forthcoming Capitol Records album), and on the second night, the Sweet Divines will be the backing band (as well as doing their own set).

Continue reading "2009 Brooklyn Soul Festival - 2 nights in August (Eli 'Paperboy' Reed & the Sweet Divines are the house bands)"

photos by Jacob Blickenstaff

Dr. Ike

"Before Kansas City was recorded by everyone from the Beatles to Peggy Lee, the song was first released in 1952 as K.C. Loving by an obscure Houston pianist named Little Willie Littlefield.

The single became a regional hit in the Los Angeles area, where Littlefield was recording for Federal Records, but it would be up to Wilbert Harrison, Trini Lopez, James Brown and Hank Ballard to turn Kansas City into a top 25 hit on the national pop and R&B charts. Littlefield remained a fascinating, mysterious footnote to pop-music history.

The annual Ponderosa Stomp festival in New Orleans exists to bring such footnotes to life. This showcase for the semi-legends of rockabilly, blues and R&B was founded eight years ago by Ira Padnos, a local anesthesiologist and record collector who goes by the moniker of Dr. Ike and favors thrift-shop fezzes and Indian headdresses atop his unruly bush of dark curls. His extravaganza has grown from a local bar to this year's two-night stand at the French Quarter's House of Blues, with 37 sets spread out over two stages.

And so, on Tuesday, the first day of the eighth-annual Ponderosa Stomp, there was the 77-year-old Littlefield, dressed in a dark-blue brocade blazer and grinning with delight beneath his comb-over." [Jazz News]

Continue reading "the 2009 Ponderosa Stomp in New Orleans - Day 1 in pics "

Orchestra Baobab

"2008 BAM Rhythm & Blues Festival at MetroTech Jump Starts a Summer of Soul Featuring Music Superstars Oleta Adams, Meshell Ndegeocello, The Skatalites, Alice Smith, Orchestra Baobab, Phoebe Snow, Lionel Loueke with Somi, Otis Clay and Ryan Shaw, Leela James, and Richie Havens with Marcus Carl Franklin"....

Continue reading "2008 BAM Rhythm & Blues Festival at MetroTech "

the Punch Brothers @ Wintergrass 2008 (armadilo60)

Chris Thile's new band The Punch Brothers are playing a free show in Rockefeller Park in NYC this summer. Same with Otis Clay, Jill Sobule, The Avett Brothers, Steel Pulse, and a few others. Chris Thile also has three solo shows coming up at Living Room. All shows below....

Continue reading "free shows in Rockefeller Park, The Punch Brothers and Chris Thile tour dates (Living Room) "