Thursday, December 5, 2013

SJI as a puppet show!


Imagine attending a concert in which a "master puppeteer" presents three shows in an evening. One, based upon a script by Federico Garcia Lorca, one based upon a poem by Wallace Stevens, and one based upon the song "St. James Infirmary." The latter featuring string-marionettes, a hand-painted scrolling backdrop, and a puppeteer who manipulates his characters while belting out the song as a one-man band.

You can find out more about Blair Thomas at his web site: http://www.blairthomas.org/ The photos I have included here to illustrate this post might be misleading - Thomas performs with puppets of many forms and sizes (some as large as the people animating them).

Look into it. This is fascinating!


(For more on Blair Thomas see here and here)

Monday, November 18, 2013

A cappella SJI: performance video

A couple of months ago, I posted an article about, and a link to, sheet music for an a cappella version of SJI. The composer, Everett Howe, with the JUUL Tones, recently performed this at a church in San Diego. So, first we had the sheet music, now an actual performance (clicking here will take you directly to the video on YouTube; the embedded version below is unfortunately truncated). Enjoy!

Inquiries into the early years of SJI