Blogs

Well hello.

My name is April. I am the new Events and Web Media Co-ordinator here at the PAU. This is my first stab at posting a blog entry on here, so this should be fun.

This is my first post to my PAUblog.

Around the office, we've just got the OAC Community Arts grant off in the mail; it was a long haul for Kate and Sue, our grant writer and bookkeeper respectively. Kate has proposed a song/video project based on the experience, and I hope she goes forward with it.

The exhibit in the Gallery, works by Erin and Sylvi Parker and my sister, Cassandra Shaw, is up and ready - except for the tags, which will totally be up by Thursday. I think. The installation of a cloud of butterflies escaping into the skylight is certainly getting the most comments, but the whole show is pretty awesome.

I missed Score and Shoot this weekend - I was in Owen Sound, wearing my Artistic Director's hat and judging Summerfolk's Last Chance Saloon - but from what I can tell, it went really well. There was a great range of artists, form emerging to seasoned, and I can't wait to see the shorts up on YouTube.

I'm super-stoked to see that sales in our record store are finally picking up - local music is selling like hotcakes. My favourite, currently, is Tiny Davis' 'Heart Wood,' an album that rests on good songwriting and deliberately simple production.

Okay, now I've gotta figure out how to find this blog once I post it.

La!

Well, I had a most amazing experience last night, and I thought I'd use it as an opportunity to get this blog thing rolling... 

I attended the latest PND Emergency festival, it was inspiring! I watched all three programs in one evening- quite epic, but a delight from start to finish. As I was watching, I had a series of impressions, and, rather than simply describing each performance, which could get tedious (the performances were not, but my descriptions might be), I figured I would share my impressions...

Laugh in Pathos as life weaves through

The dance of the family has to be seen to be believed

Jangly jazz of string and body

In movement and rest
Staccato breath and body
It moves me to awe

We are all ageless when we dance barefoot

Confidently awkward, humor in compassion, an astoundingly simple magic

Wordless prose spoken with body the power lies behind the cycles of loss and comfort

Savage tribal modernity caught in the headlights of the electric drum

Presenting the shadow play emerging from the interplay in a crowd of three

Fragile flesh flowers we stand proudly when we see it

Obligatory floor show... MTV is in the house?

Then the "C" program- Rock on? No wait, earlier in the day I was watching tv and saw an aging "rock star" that was my idol when I was 9, but now he was just regurgitating all the worst misogynistic rock clichés, and I said to myself, rock and roll has become a sad parody of itself. But here in the "C" program, I was reminded that there has been an (r)evolution, some rock has claimed it's feminine side, has realized that to be vulnerable is to show infinitely more strength than to hide behind macho posturing... Bravo!

To the performers and artists, excelent work, and I apologize in advance if I mangled or misinterpreted your work, my intension here is to say, you inspired me!

And a note on the ordering, I presented them here in order ABC, although I witnessed them as BAC, but I think it works :-)