Author Archives: weinberg

“Imagine a music video made especially for a Greek chorus — if that Greek chorus were, say, reciting your favorite poems. Well, that’s what Parallel Octave do, and trust me — it’s the kind of thing you never knew you were missing til you see it for the first time.”

More here on Baltimore Fishbowl!

ANTHOLOGY I premieres tomorrow, Friday, July 8th at 7 pm, at the Creative Alliance.
Event info here.
Tickets and info here.

Anthology I premieres July 8th at the Creative Alliance, and we have two newsbytes this week:

(1) Music director Joe Martin was interviewed by WYPR today. The interview will air Friday and Saturday on The Signal: Friday at 7 PM and Saturday at 1 PM. Streaming at www.wypr.org.

(2) Two trailers are online now on the Facebook site for the event.

Tickets: www.creativealliance.org

Yes, penguins, tomorrow is the last day to buy your tickets ($10) to the July 8th ANTHOLOGY I premiere before June 15 and receive buckets of free merch. Tickets here: Creative Alliance, 410-276-1651.

Those who purchase by June 15 will receive a free Decadent Parallel Octave Party Favor Bag at the event, containing gourmet Baroque Popcorn Balls by a local chef, a limited-edition CD of the ANTHOLOGY I soundtrack, a kazoo, a Purim noisemaker, condoms, Pop Rocks, and more outlandish surprises.

Buy your tickets ($10) to the July 8th ANTHOLOGY I premiere before June 15! Tickets here: Creative Alliance, 410-276-1651.

Those who purchase by June 15 will receive a free Decadent Parallel Octave Party Favor Bag at the event, containing gourmet Baroque Popcorn Balls by a local chef, a limited-edition CD of the ANTHOLOGY I soundtrack, a kazoo, a Purim noisemaker, condoms, Pop Rocks, and more surprises.

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We’ve had a wonderful time performing open sessions for actors, musicians, and the community at the Baltimore Free School, and we want to go out with a bang. Join us for our last open session at the BFS this Saturday, May 21st, at 1323 N. Calvert, from 2-3:30 pm. Poems: Elizabeth Bishop and Emily Dickinson. There will be free pizza.

What’s that, Wallace? Tickets for our July 8th ANTHOLOGY I premiere are $10 and are on sale now at the Creative Alliance–410-276-1651–you say?

It’s true! Those who purchase by June 15 will receive a free Decadent Parallel Octave Party Favor Bag at the event, containing gourmet Baroque Popcorn Balls by a local chef, a limited-edition CD of the ANTHOLOGY I soundtrack, a kazoo, a Purim noisemaker, condoms, Pop Rocks, and more surprises. It may not be the “Anecdote of the Jar,” but it’s certainly like nothing else in Tennessee.

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Blog post today on the Open Society Institute’s Audacious Ideas blog about Parallel Octave’s collaboration with Writers in Baltimore Schools. Written by Patrice Hutton.

Excerpt: “In our workshop, students went around the circle and each read a stanza out loud. We read and re-read the poems until our voices came to carry the poem’s emotion. Then we added the chorus. Students chimed in to enhance certain lines or echoed a few beats behind the main speaker. During a reading, I watched my students exchange glances–haunted almost. They’d brought the poem to life.”

Read more here.

Our next public collaborative session, open to all, will be held on Saturday, May 21 at the Baltimore Free School, 1323 N. Calvert, from 2-3:30 pm. Poems: Elizabeth Bishop and Emily Dickinson (TBA). There will be free pizza.

We invite you to join us and create a chorus.
Poems will be read aloud;
music will be improvised and performed;
and an audio recording of the poems-as-choruses will be made, to be posted on our website. (Examples here.)

All poetic questers of all ages are welcome, including musicians of all genres and styles (BYOinstruments), actors, poets, singers, and friends (or foes) of the poetesses.

This will be our last open session at the BFS in 2011.
(We will hold one more open session this year, on July 8th, after our screening of Anthology I at the Creative Alliance.)

Texts: Edna St. Vincent Millay, “Travel” and “What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,” and
Emily Dickinson: “My life closed twice before its close” and “There’s a certain slant of light.”

[Sound files from this session not yet edited for posting.]

Poems below:
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Friday, July 8: Film Premiere: Parallel Octave Presents Anthology I, A Short Films Collaboration!

It’s a music video! It’s a Greek chorus! It’s ANTHOLOGY I. The Baltimore-based Parallel Octave chorus records poems with live improvised music. Eight filmmakers have shot videos for their tracks, from animation to live action to W.B. Yeats as performed by giant plastic lizards to Emily Dickinson read over a soundtrack of pitch-shifting synthesizers. This is the premiere of the half-hour long film collaboration, followed by a live performance by Parallel Octave, in which the audience will be cordially invited to make some noise. Bring your washboards, trombones, vuvuzelas, and your best T.S. Eliot impressions. Poetry was never like this, and neither was MTV. http://www.paralleloctave.com. 7pm. $10, $5 Creative Alliance mbrs.

Location:
Creative Alliance at the Patterson
3134 Eastern Avenue
Baltimore, MD 21224
410-276-1651
www.creativealliance.org