As a percussionist with the world-renowned Alloy Orchestra - described by Roger Ebert as "the best in the world at accompanying silent films" - Ken Winokur reveals that the group doesn't have to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on musical upkeep. A simple trek to the kitchen or garage will suffice.
"Our standard rack includes horseshoes, plumbing pipes, truck springs, that sort of thing," Winokur says. "Pots and pans, hubcaps, scraps of metal ... our most talked-about instrument, perhaps, is a bed pan. If it makes noise, we'll play it."
It's awkwardly paced. It's often indifferently acted. The composition is remedial, the humor is juvenile, and for every scene that soars, another one crashes.
In the wake of Artistic Director Johanne Jakhelln's departure from Ballet Quad Cities after nine seasons, Executive Director Joedy Cook found a replacement in Minneapolis-based Matthew Keefe, who first worked with Cook and Ballet Quad Cities eight years ago. "I just started calling my friends in the dance world," says Cook, "and Matthew was one of the first people I called."
Ted Priester, the new president of Open Cities Cinema - formerly the Open Cities Film Society - knows he has a fight on his hands.
IDLEWILD
"A long time ago, way back in history / When all there was to drink was nothin' but cups o' tea / Along came a man by the name of Charlie Mops / And he invented a wonderful drink and he made it out of hops."
SNAKES ON A PLANE
There are a number of fascinating and entertaining elements in the Clinton Area Showboat Theatre's production of Cabaret. But at the show's opening-night performance last Thursday, what fascinated and entertained me most was watching how Cabaret's thematic storyline was being unwittingly enacted by Cabaret's audience.
