||8ve: the parallel octave chorus

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

We will hold open sessions on these dates:
Saturday, April 23 & Saturday, May 21
Baltimore Free School, 1323 N. Calvert
2-3:30 pm
Poems: Dickinson, Bishop, and Millay (TBA)

Texts: the poems of Dylan Thomas (pasted below the jump): “In My Craft or Sullen Art,” and a selection from “Quite Early One Morning.”

We also read, but did not record, those old chestnuts “Fern Hill” and “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night.”

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

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Parallel Octave is proud to announce the eight filmmakers collaborating on the ANTHOLOGY I film project:

Jacob Appet, of Baltimore: “Delight in Disorder” by Robert Herrick

Alice Bever, of Jackson, Wyoming: “Richard Cory” by E.A. Robinson

Ryan Edel, of Baltimore: “The Second Coming” by W.B. Yeats

Adam Gray, of Baltimore: “My Grandmother’s Love Letters” by Hart Crane

Marie Ilene, of Los Angeles: “588” by Emily Dickinson

Margaret Rorison, of Baltimore: “The world is lunatic” by [poet redacted]

Daniel Schwartz, of Baltimore: “The Emperor of Ice-Cream” by Wallace Stevens

Valerie Smith, of Baltimore: “Die Rich” by [poet redacted]

The movie will premiere in summer 2011–stay tuned for details!

Texts: the poems of Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes :
Plath: “Among The Narcissi” and “The Moon and the Yew Tree”
Hughes: “The Black Beast” and “A Childish Prank”

[sound files from this session still being edited, not yet available for posting]

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Thanks to all who applied for the Anthology I collaborative film project: we will post a list of the selected filmmakers by March 1st. Check back here then to find out who they are, and to learn more about them and the project.

A reminder that our next open session will be
on Saturday, February 26,
at the Baltimore Free School,
1323 N. Calvert at Mt. Royal,
from 2-3:30 PM.
Texts: the poems of Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes (TBA)

The application for ANTHOLOGY I, Parallel Octave’s collaborative film project, is now online. Interested filmmakers should send their information to paralleloctaveATgmail.com by February 15, 2011.

ANTHOLOGY I:

Ten poems. Ten short films by different filmmakers.
One anthology.

Parallel Octave (www.paralleloctave.com) is a Baltimore-based group of actors and musicians, and we make audio recordings of poems in a format inspired by Greek choruses. (Many voices at once.)

Here’s how the project will work:
1) We provide the audio.
2) You (the filmmaker) provide the visuals for a short film, for one poem. (Think of it as a music video for a poem: you don’t have to deal with recording any sound.)
3) We combine the ten short films into one collaborative film, Anthology I, to be screened in Baltimore in mid-June.

Join us! Apply by February 15.

Link to application:https://paralleloctave.wordpress.com/anthologyi/
Contact: Producers: paralleloctaveATgmail.com.
More info on Parallel Octave:
http://citypaper.com/music/all-together-now-1.939200

will be on Saturday, February 26,
at the Baltimore Free School,
1323 N. Calvert at Mt. Royal,
from 2-3:30 PM.
Texts: the poems of Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes (TBA)

Text: [poet redacted], “Sandpaper,” two versions: cacophony and isolation.

Each of these versions of the poem contains a fourth stanza section in addition to the three that the poem properly contains: a stanza of all the stanzas stacked on top of one another, and recited simultaneously.

(A) A cacophonous chorus:

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Parallel Octave is launching a collaborative film project, Anthology I, in 2011. For more info, click here. The application for interested filmmakers will be available, on this site, in January. The application is now online. Interested filmmakers should send their information to paralleloctaveATgmail.com by February 15, 2011.