On the Boards: 12 Minutes Max, February 3, 2014

I confess:  it has always been hard for me to "get" modern music, dance, etc.  The abstraction has always driven me to...distraction.  It can be hard to see beauty when you don't know where to look for it.  But then again, the last time I tried, I was in college and completely obsessed with the three Bs.

Okay, I'm still obsessed with the three Bs.  But at least I'm no longer convinced that nothing else is worth listening to.

Tonight, my friend Estrella invited me out to an "On the Boards" event called "12 Minutes Max", which is an eclectic collection of performances by local artists in dance, music, acting, etc.  The venue was an old building in downtown Seattle called Washington Hall.  It is a historic building, and originally the 12 Min Max productions were held there regularly, since 1978.  Tonight was a coming-back to it, though I don't know the details of the absence.  It's a large, block brick building with wooden interior; the event was held in a standard auditorium with the performances in front of the stage.  The acoustics blew me away from the first song.  The sound quality is crystal-clear, warm and round, enveloping; amplifiers unneeded.  This later became a problem, actually, but for now let's focus on the positive.

The first group was a Brazilian band (though the members are not Brazilian) called "Choroloco", consisting of clarinet, guitar, cavaquinho, and percussion. The balance was very good; the two strummed string instruments filling in the range harmonically while the sparkling clarinet (played by Rosalynn De Roos) vividly created and embellished melodies.

The second artist, Maya Horowitz, did a dance called "Self-Portrait" with a voice narrative and piano background.  While her dancing was very enjoyable to watch, and she definitely sold the empathetic side of her story of her battle with dyslexia through her dance, I felt that the narration didn't really speak to me.

The third act was a comedy act by Forrest Baum called "Smarter Than I" in which the artist described his experiences as a father.  Clearly, the audience was well acquainted with him, as his act was received quite favorably, but I felt that whatever inside jokes he was making were not clear enough to those who didn't know him.

The fourth act was unique and poignant.  It consisted of eight ballet/modern dancers who each carried a framed photograph of a man and a tall purple iris; in the beginning, the pictures were set up and the flowers laid to the sides as if at the site of a grave.  They did various things with the pictures; threw them on the ground, picked them up and cradled them, laid them to the side and curled up on the ground next to them; at the end, they each announced the name of the man, who were their fathers, and the interior struggles they had with their relationships, and that they were "laying them aside".  Artistically, I would have liked to have seen more finesse in the production itself, but the idea stuck with me on an emotional level.

The fifth act, the one which my friend had come for specifically, was a duo of singer Cristina Orbe and pixie dancer Huameng Yu. This act appealed to me on several levels; the music was that special blend of quirky and melancholic that I enjoy in particular, particularly the 3rd song, in a very carnival-esque timbre.  Cristina has a very unique voice with moments of powerful clarity; Huameng struck me instantly as "professional"--all of her moves were flawless yet spirited, as if she was giving everything all at once.  The originality of their act as a whole earns a double "Brava!" from me.

"Was Here", a pas de deux consisting of Victoria Jacobs and Laura Aschoff, with live music mixer Nico Tower, at first struck me as very odd, and, though I use this word not in a derogatory sense...queer.  They were both dressed in shabby white outfits and their movements could only be described as gritty.  As the dance progressed, I found myself pulled into it; they used their bodies in a sort of set of developing architectural structures.  There was symbolism mainly of interaction; the images that came to me were of a hospital ward, of death (obviously), of marital strife, and the relationships between electrons in an atom.

The final act of the night, "Narrative Landscapes" by Town Forest, was unfortunately unbearably painful for me--not on account of artistry, but because it was so loud, and the reverberations collaborating with the acoustic qualities of the room vibrated in my entire body to the point that it made me physically ill.  I was unable even to get up and leave; the torment was incredibly intense.  Yes, I get the point.  I just wish I didn't have to experience it.

With the exception of that last act, I'm very glad I attended this event, and I will be sure to come back sometime in the future...hopefully back at Washington Hall.

-G