The Memorial Art
Gallery’s Fountain Court has been transformed into a chapel with the addition
of a recently restored 18th-century baroque
organ. It sounded as majestic as it looked on its October 8 debut. Paul O’Dette directed early music
ensembles Tragicomedia and Concerto Palatino (revivalists of the
cornetto, the baroque trombone, and the chitarrone — a cross between a lute
and a giraffe) performed Monteverdi’s 1610 Vespers to a full house.
I
arrived after the organ’s initial blast and was only able to hear it in a more
supporting role with the other instruments and singers. The lighting in the
hall was more like the set of All In The
Family than that of an old church, but the music reverberated hauntingly
anyway. Painful childhood church wounds were opened anew with the Madonna with
child and crucifixion artwork on the walls, but it helped add to the “shhh,
we’re in church” feel of the place.
To
hear the breath once again bellowed though this organ’s pipes after who knows
how long was a little humbling.
Snuck out the back to
catch Every Time I Die play the same
song four times at Water Street. Cool old-style mosh pit, though.
The next night LA’s Voodoo Organist sang of hellfire,
damnation, weeping, gnashing of teeth, and torture with carny abandon at The
Bug Jar. I’d love to see this cat apply his Vincent Price shtick and fingers to
the baroque organ. Monteverdi would spin in his grave.
The Bellrays send me. In what will probably go down as the best show this fall, the band
blasted and wailed with sweet soul and rock chaos at The Bug Jar. Still
preaching revolution, the band came off a little less angry than they did when
they were here five years ago. They were no less intense, though, as singer
Lisa Kekaula preached and testified while perched on heels that would give
vertigo to a stripper. The band blasted rock ‘n’ soul as if out of a blast
furnace. Original guitarist Tony Fate (looking like a police composite drawing)
is back with the band, wringing the hell out of his red guitar.
The Hi-Risers warmed up the joint before the Rays shined. Hi-riser drummer Jay Smay has got
to be this town’s best. I left the show beaming, sweaty, and spent and flew
home doing 51 in a 35 (or so I was told).
This article appears in Oct 19-25, 2005.
