ArtistRecoveryFundSeries

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CD REVIEWS Dusting off hell’s bells AC/DC is back. After eight years devoid of new material, the old Aussie boys have pulled yet another trick out of their hat. dailyiowan.com Black Ice is AC/DC’s 22nd official studio album since its 1976 début, T.N.T., and from the sounds of it, these guys have still got all AC/DC the grit, power, and sleaze of Black Ice the good old HHHH out of days.

Black Ice HHHHH kicks off with the anthemic “Rock ’N’ Roll GIVE A Train,” which is LISTEN nothing short Featured Tracks: of the classic, blues-influ• “Rock ’N’ Roll enced AC/DC Train” sound. This “War Machine” • brazen introduction is bound to have fans old and new begging for more. Fortunately, the group is here to deliver the goods. This album, in its entirety, contains everything that anyone familiar with AC/DC has come to expect in its 30-plus-year history.

Even though the group has been at it for so many years, the stamina of these new tracks is undeniable. AC/DC still carries the banner for straightforward rock and roll with such tracks as “She Likes Rock ’N’ Roll”, “Rock ’N’ Roll Dream” and “Rocking All the Way.” Clearly, there’s a theme. The album is rounded out by slower, more grooveoriented numbers “Skies on Fire,” “Smash ’N’ Grab,” and “Money Made.”

The remaining nine tracks on Black Ice, especially the closing title track, provide a classic good-time soundtrack that only AC/DC can deliver.

Lead singer Brian Johnson’s ferocious growl has become a bit scratchy as of late, but that doesn’t stop him from putting all he’s got into his performance. Brothers Angus and Malcolm Young provide the high-energy and muscle that only this pair of guitarists ever could. Finally, AC/DC’s celebrated “groove” is perpetuated to the fullest by bassist Cliff Williams and drummer Phil Rudd.

In all honesty, there is nothing bad to be said about AC/DC’s long awaited return, aside from its being such a long wait — and, of course, there will never be another Back in Black. Sorry, folks.

When it comes to AC/DC, it is one hard-rock band that has been able to stick to what it’s good at. It has remained successful for more than three decades, and it’s not going away anytime soon.

Rebecca’s Picks: “Rock ’N Roll Train,” “War Machine” — by Rebecca Koons

Rock out with your Kaiser out The British hipsters in Kaiser Chiefs really enjoy playing music, and it’s highly evident on the band’s third album Off With Their Heads. The quintet rocks out throughout the disc’s 11 tracks, with a wealth of near-flawless pop melodies serving as the cherry atop a fun, musical sundae.

“Never Miss a Beat,” the album’s first single, is indie pop-rock at its best. The repetitive, lively chorus is insanely catchy, which helps mask more cynical lyrics — “What did you learn in school? / I didn’t go /… It’s cool to know nothing.”

“You Want History” and “Always Happens Like That,” meanwhile, sound like updates of Duran Duran with a little Scissor Sisters thrown in for good measure.

Similarly structured are “Like It Too Much,” a cool song with plenty of swagger, and “Addicted to Drugs.” The latter’s blunt Kaiser Chiefs lyrics (doesn’t get much clearOff With Their er than singing Heads “You might as well face it, HHH1⁄2 out of you’re addicted HHHHH to drugs” over and over) paired with its dance hall-ready opening bars exemplify the album’s overall attitude.

The band keeps the energy high for the entire album, with things slowing down only on the final track. The calm, melodic, gently rocking “Remember You’re a Girl” serves as a refreshing cool-down lap after running the race that is Off With Their Heads.

Jake’s Picks: “Never Miss a Beat,” “Like It Too Much,” “Remember You’re a Girl” — by Jake Jensen

More fun from Of Montréal It has to be tough to make a follow-up to an album as brilliant and entertaining as Of Montréal’s Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?.

But sure enough, the band is back with another collection of bizarre, electronic-fueled tracks. Fauna showcased the long-time sextet’s newfound mastery of synthesizer-based indiedance-pop tracks (thanks, in part, to flamboyant frontman and glitter aficionado Kevin Barnes’ new alter-ego, Georgie Fruit), and the band keeps that sound pumping on Skeletal Lamping.

Opening track dailyiowan.com “Nonpareil of Favor” properly sets the album’s theme of shifting song arrangements.

It starts with classical-soundOf Montréal ing strings, then morphs Skeletal into a peppy Lamping toe-tapper before becomHHHH out of ing an orgy of HHHHH guitars and drums.

Other highGIVE A lights are the LISTEN energetic first Featured Tracks: single (and closing track) • Id Engager “Id Engager” and “An Eluardian Instance,” which finds the band utilizing horns to create a sweeping upbeat sound.

Of course, no Of Montréal album is complete without Barnes’ trademark homo-ambiguous lyrics. Case in point on Skeletal Lamping: “For Our Elegant Caste,” in which Barnes sings, “We can do it soft-core if you want / But you should know that I go both ways.”

At times, the record gets a little too weird (e.g., the last two minutes of “Plastis Wafers”), but that’s to be expected. Of Montréal is as creative as ever on Skeletal Lamping, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Jake’s Picks: “An Eluardian Instance,” “Id Engager,” and “For Our Elegant Caste” — by Jake Jensen

Arts&Culture

The Daily Iowan - Iowa City, Iowa - Tuesday, October 21, 2008 - 7A

More than a lost violin UI music-performance and -education major Kate Truscello is one of many students who lost personal items in the June flood. Locked inside Voxman, Truscello’s valuable violin was destroyed by ravaging waters.

BY ELIZABETH TIMMINS elizabeth-timmins@uiowa.edu

UI senior Kate Truscello entered the doors of Halsey Hall. The attendant already knew her name — this was not the first time she had been to the building. The large room stored things she was used to seeing every day, all misplaced, which left her with an eerie feeling. The attendant came back carrying a case. This time, they were the only ones in the vacated room. She opened it, expecting devastation. Tears rolled down her cheeks as Truscello unlatched the clasps and peered inside. The oncevibrant violin lay lifeless, fragmented wood dispersed throughout the instrument’s case.

Truscello left Halsey Hall carrying a trash bag filled with the moldy remains of her roughly $4,500 violin.

“Actually opening up my case and looking at my instrument was like a kick in the stomach,” she said. “It was really traumatic.”

While traveling in Italy this summer, the music-performance and -education major left her instrument in the lockers of Voxman Music Building. After her return from Europe, she learned of the flooding on the UI campus — too late to retrieve her instrument. Highways and bus lines were closed, and the UI had locked down Voxman and other buildings near the Iowa River. She hoped the UI’s actions were just a precaution and that the waters might spare her violin.

Truscello is not the only student who lost personal items on the Arts Campus. From sheet music to socket sets, the historic summer left many finearts students and faculty with missing or damaged tools and materials.

After the waters receded, School of Music faculty con-

ducted “rescue missions,” in which they collected items from offices, classrooms, and lockers, Truscello’s instrument included. Officials left her violin to dry out in Hancher until the end of July, when it was sent to Halsey Hall for her retrieval.

Not only had she put love and time into the instrument, but the violin had sentimental value to her as well.

Prior to graduating high school, an orchestra teacher replaced her violin with one more appropriate for college.

Truscello baby-sat for the instructor to make up for the monetary difference of the two violins. Even the bow had emotional value; it had been a Christmas gift from her father.

She admits that when she came forward about her destroyed violin, many people criticized her for leaving it in Voxman over the summer.

But transporting the violin from hostel to hostel during her three-week excursion was not a suitable option. “It would have surely been stolen,” she said.

And Truscello believed keeping the delicate instrument in her non-air-conditioned apartment would be detrimental to its structure.

“I thought I was doing the right thing,” she said. “I kept it where I thought it would be safest.”

Because of the time difference, she had little contact with friends or family while she was in Italy and did not know about the flooding until she peered out the windows of her connecting flight from Chicago to Des Moines.

After seeing photographs of Voxman, she knew she needed a new violin. She called her father and he assured her that it would be covered under the family’s homeowner’s in surance. Unfortunately, Truscello’s plan did not include flood damage, and the UI’s insurance did not cover her violin.

For now, she plays on the borrowed violin, but by next semester, she hopes to have enough money to purchase a new one.

“I started off the year much further behind than I should have been for starting my senior year,” Truscello said. “I think that I’ve caught up fairly well, and I’ve put in enough practice hours and really tried to make up for that loss.”

the museum, but just the idea of the interplay between technology and humanity.”

The quintet — which uses keyboards, glockenspiel, and a musical saw — will perform at 9 p.m. today at the Mill, 120 E. Burlington St., as part of the Tuesday Night Social Club, a weekly series of free concerts.

Andre Perry, the talent buyer for the Mill, said he came up with the idea of doing

a free, weekly series as a way to bring in audiences that might not otherwise attend shows.

“It’s really inclusive to have it not cost anything,” said Perry, 31. “Money is always an issue when trying to get people to go out, so this is a way to showcase stuff with no strings attached.”

Now in its third week, Tuesday Night Social Club mixes local talent with touring

PATRICK LARKIN/THE DAILY IOWAN

UI music major Kate Truscello plays a borrowed violin in her efficiency apartment on Monday after a stressful lesson at West High, where some UI musicschool classes are temporarily located. Truscello lost her violin during this summer’s floods.

When Truscello returned to Iowa City she immediately contacted one of her UI instructors. Together they worked to find a violin Truscello could borrow. Luckily, a gracious student came forward with a violin she could use until she could purchase one of her own.

“I got [the borrowed violin] a day before auditioning for First in a three-part orchestra,” she said. “So it took me a while to get used to it.” series Because most of the financial the DI takes a look at the stories burden is hers, she juggles 18 of fine-arts students with lost or semester hours of classes and damaged possessions and the works part-time. Her supportpost-flood efforts to help these ive parents help out as much as affected students recover, leading they can, but because her lossto the development of the UI es top several thousand dollars, Artists’ Recovery Fund. she hopes to obtain outside Today: UI violinist Kate Truscello support. from Italy to find her $4,500 returns Truscello researched various violin ruined. organizations and philanthroWednesday: A recent UI art grad py efforts to jump-start the finds a number of his equipment and process. She wrote letters to supplies, stored on the Arts Campus, the American Stringed Teachdestroyed. ers Association and the Music Thursday: The Artists’ Recovery Fund Educators National Conference, created by COGS for commubegins, and received a $500 flood-relief nity members and artists seeking grant through the UI Financial assistance. Two benefits concerts Aid Office. She said she also have been scheduled to raise funds hopes to get financial support to help replace damaged and stolen from the local Artists’ supplies.

Recovery Fund.

Kate Truscello • Senior • Grew up playing violin by the Suzuki method • Music performance and education major • Enjoys playing Bach and Mozart • Hopes to one day teach and play in an orchestra

MILL SOCIAL Not necessarily museum music When searching for Musée Mécanique on Google, don’t expect to find many images of the Portlandbased indie folk-with-electronictouches band.

Instead, one will see images of animatronic puppets and penny-arcade games, taken at the famous San Francisco museum of the same name.

“It’s a place we like and were inspired by,” said Micah Rabwin, the singer and guitarist for Musée Mécanique. “We’re not necessarily trying to make music about

acts. Perry admits it’s hard to get big names to play free shows, but he’s happy with the energy so far.

“We’re just trying to grow it,” he said.

“We want it to become an institution.

People can wake up on Tuesday or get off work and think, ‘I’ll stop by the Mill.’ It’s for total music nerds or people who just casually like going to shows.”

—by Jake Jensen

dailyiowan.com for more arts and culture

Arts&Culture

Flood cleanup costly for sculptor Former UI grad student John Hansen lost most of his sculpture tools when flood waters and cleanup crews left little for him to reclaim after leaving them in his locked studio over the summer.

John Hansen PATRICK LARKIN/THE DAILY IOWAN

By ELIZABETH TIMMINS elizabeth-timmins@uiowa.edu

When UI alum John Hansen returned to Iowa City in midJune, it was evident his honeymoon was over. The newlywed discovered mucky waters occupying the lower level of his apartment and his nearby studio located on the UI Arts Campus.

Within a week of his homecoming, he entered his condemned apartment and removed valuables. But across the street, UI officials had closed the studio art buildings, a second home to many, forcing students and faculty to surrender possessions stored inside.

Hansen estimates he lost more than $4,500 worth of tools and materials ranging from wood chisels to a welding helmet.

“At first I was kind of sick, but there was so much in my life that distracted me from it,” he said. “I stored everything in there from my digital camera to my backpack.”

Still under a teaching-assistant contract when the flood occurred, Hansen sent a list of missing items to the UI, hoping for reimbursement. However, the university’s flood-insurance policy does not cover personal items. For the three years he had worked toward obtaining a Master’s of Fine Arts in sculpture, Hansen inhabited the same locked UI-owned studio.

Despite receding waters, the UI limited property access.

“They just wouldn’t let anyone in,” Hansen said. “I just kept waiting around; there were a couple people who broke in. I was like, ‘I’ll just wait, hopefully, they’ll let me in.’ I think that was the wrong thing to do. I should have just broken in and got my stuff out. Within a couple hours, I could have it all thrown out of the building, and within another couple hours, I could’ve had it all moved wherever it needed to.

But they just never let me in.”

In July, Hansen and his new wife had family obligations in Utah. While the couple celebrated their recent marriage and attended family reunions, cleanup crews in Iowa City treated the abandoned buildings.

However, when UI officials cleared departmental access, Hansen was not around. For much of July he remained in

Utah with his mother while she approached the end of a twoyear battle with cancer, only returning briefly to pay bills.

Upon his return to Iowa City at the end of the month, his studio had already been cleared.

“By the time I got back, they just threw away so much,” Hansen said.

Yet Hansen did not lose everything. Tony Sutowski, the lab coordinator for the sculpture department, retrieved many of Hansen’s sculptures.

“We finally got into the woodshop area, which is where [Hansen’s] studio was located,” Sutowski said. “Initially, I went in and worked with the people from Cotton [Catastrophe] and tried to point out what were pieces of artwork, getting those things together after they got cleaned up, and piled them up. I worked with one of the graduates in ceramics, and we ran

Twelve seasons deep, and “South Park” is showing its age.

What will it take for the show to find its Fountain of Youth?

brian-dau@uiowa.edu

The DI takes a look at the stories of fine-arts students with lost or damaged possessions and the post-flood efforts to help these affected students recover, leading to the development of the UI Artists’ Recovery Fund.

Tuesday: UI violinist Kate Truscello returns from Italy to find her $4,500 violin ruined.

Today: Recent UI art grad John Hansen finds a number of his sculpting equipment and supplies, stored in his locked studio on the Arts Campus, destroyed.

Thursday: The Artists’ Recovery Fund begins, created by COGS for community members and artists seeking assistance. Two benefits concerts have been scheduled to raise funds to help replace damaged and stolen supplies.

John Hansen, a UI art adjunct assistant professor, on Monday shows his sculpting class a slide of one of his works that was destroyed in the June flood. Hansen, who was out of town on his honeymoon when the flood hit, lost thousands of dollars worth of tools and materials that he had kept in his studio in the UI Art Building.

‘South Park’ going south

BRIAN DAU

Second in a three-part series

• Former UI sculpture graduate student • Completed undergraduate degree at Utah State • Originally wanted to be an anthropologist • Was on his honeymoon during the week of the flood • Most of the tools lost were Christmas gifts them over to [Hansen’s] house.”

Despite the help, Hansen said, he lost thousands of dollars’ worth of tools, most of which he said he suspects were thrown away by contracted cleanup crews.

“To them it’s ‘Why does this guy even have this crap,’ but to me, it’s valuable, and a lot of it I hauled from Utah and other places,” Hansen said. “Wash it off, and I’ll use it.”

Without renter’s insurance or eligibility for student loans, he will have no financial assistance when replacing the lost tools. He bought enough supplies to make do, but he does not have the spare cash to purchase replacements for all the tools he lost.

“I’ll still make stuff, but it’s been a big obstacle to get around, that’s for sure,” he said.

The Daily Iowan - Iowa City, Iowa - Wednesday, October 22, 2008 - 7A

I was watching the latest episode of “South Park” the other day when a sobering thought occurred to me.

When this ridiculous animated satire about four elementary schoolers from Colorado first aired in 1997, I was just starting the sixth grade. It’s enough to make one feel downright elderly. (Also, it’s much more socially acceptable to admit you watch cartoons when you are 11 years old.)

Now in the middle of a 12th season, “South Park,” like its audience, has changed dramatically since the airing of its first episode, the straightforward “Cartman Gets an Anal Probe,” in which Cartman … well, I’m sure you know what happens. I hesitate to use the word “sophisticated” in any description of this show, but creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone have guided “South Park” in an increasingly mature direction over the years, at least in the aesthetic sense, if not in content.

Episodes now feature complex, multi-plot story lines spanning numerous episodes, and contemporary computerized animation techniques are often used for gory, visceral effects — a major shift from the cardboard cutout stop-motion of the first

seasons, which looked about as outdated as “Looney Tunes,” even in the ’90s.

So the show no longer has the campy appeal of a crudely drawn Barbra Streisand Godzilla-robot wrecking a small town fashioned out of paper and glue, but can that be the reason for its recent comedic stagnation? If anything, the modernization of “South Park” forced Parker and Stone to focus on the show’s satirical strengths over anything else.

And that’s OK, right? If we’re the Fight Club generation of grown men acting like boys, isn’t “South Park” the ideal commentary on our national case of arrested development?

(By my math, those immortal fourth-graders should be halfway to college degrees by now). Our popular culture undoubtedly still provides ample ammunition for the skewering of current events that made “South Park” so great, so it doesn’t seem plausible that the creative well has run dry, even after nearly 200 episodes.

Simply put, in spite of the addition of flashy animation and more money than the creators ever dreamed they could make, “South Park” is a satire at heart, and satires live and die on the strength of their writing. And there’s no doubt the show’s writing has been pretty hit-or-miss of late. Two weeks ago, an episode featured a story line in which George Lucas and Steven Spielberg rape an unsuspecting Indiana Jones numerous times over the course of its 30-minute running time, in scenes that were pretty graphic even by the boundary-

pushing standards of “South Park.”

Because by releasing a fourth Jones movie, Lucas and Spielberg are “raping” the franchise for the money. Get it? That’s an expression someone might use when describing that movie! A figurative-turnedliteral conceit like that is a punch line at best; there’s just no way to sustain a plot on that kind of substance. It’s heavy-handed moments such as these that increase the cringe factor in an already cringeworthy episode.

That heavy-handedness has become the show’s biggest problem lately.

Parker and Stone are at their best when they keep things subtle — it becomes apparent they are making a commentary on such things as the American response to immigration or the absurdity of psychic detectives without them having to explicitly tell the viewer how to think about the issue. Now, it seems like they’re trying to teach everyone a lesson first, and if it happens to be funny, then that’s OK, too.

The success or downfall of “South Park,” then, rests on the respective egos of Parker and Stone. Maybe it’s an unavoidable result of making an obscene amount of money (I certainly wouldn’t know anything about that), but they need to keep their egos in check if they want to retain the core audience that has been with them since the beginning.

Comedy Central has the two locked in for at least three more seasons, so let’s hope they can find a way to channel some of the magic that got them to where they are today.

ON THE WEB Iowa Writers’ Workshop graduate Steven Sherrill returns to the UI campus tonight for a reading from his latest work, The Locktender’s House. Sherrill was nominated by his publisher for the Pulitzer Prize for his previous novel, Visits from the Drowned Girl.

Now a professor of English and integrative arts at Penn StateAltoona, Sherrill tells the DI that he’s always been a terrible student. Today, he said, he aims to “teach to the kind of student that

I was” and credits his time in Iowa City for improving both his fiction and his teaching.

The author of three novels, Sherrill said each features “single characters struggling with their environments — basically, one character fucking up.”

For the complete story on Sherill, his time at the Writers’ Workshop, and his latest novel — which centers on a woman suffering from the loss of her husband when he is killed in the Iraq War — visit dailyiowan.com.

READING The Locktender’s House Who: Steven Sherrill When: 7 p.m. today Where: Prairie Lights Books, 15 S. Dubuque Admission: Free

Another side of breast cancer In his new play, Coffee and Hope, Riverside Theatre cofounder Ron Clark puts a masculine voice to what is seen as a solely feminine struggle.

6C

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2008

String theory moves to the club scene

WEEKEND AGENDA

Thursday 4 p.m. Digest the entire 80 Hours. Then tackle the rest of The Daily Iowan, and then go consume some other news.

It’s time to be in touch with the media.

7:30 p.m. Tune in to the Chiara String Quartet by dropping by the Congregational Church.

Well-known for challenging the musical performance norms, the quartet gives a brilliant and unique classical show.

8 p.m. What else would you be doing? Go watch NBC’s “The Office” for more Scranton fun and laughs. Archives of the Arts staff’s “Office” opinions can be found at the blog, dailyiowanarts.blogspot.com.

The Chiara String Quartet plays classical music where most have never heard it before.

ON THE WEB Go to dailyiowan.com to watch footage of the Chiara String Quartet’s performance at the Java House earlier this week.

By CLAIRE LEKWA claire-lekwa@uiowa.edu

From the beginning, the Chiara String Quartet would not be confined to the walls of a concert hall. Yes, the members have graced the prestigious stages of Carnegie Alice and Tully Hall in dailyiowan.com New York GIVE A City; howevLISTEN er, they’ve also played Chiara String at a tiny Quartet North Dakota radio staLive at tion in the Newburgh middle of a beet field. Chamber Music And their Society, NY professional début nine Featured Tracks: years ago • “Beethoven, took place String Quartet in E not in a prim Flat Major, Op. 127, I. auditorium Maestoso — Allegro” but in a barn If you like it: in Germany, filled with See the CHIARA 1,200 people STRING QUARTET and the at 7:30 p.m. today at strains of the Congregational classical music.

United Church of T h e 30 N. Clinton Christ, award-winSt., $32 general n in g group is m ak ing admission or $15 for UI students. its mark in the classical music scene by playing outside of it. The quartet has received the most press in the past two years for its concerts in clubs, bars, and coffeehouses. Through these offbeat perf o r ma nces, th e mu si c i an s hope to reinvent the classical music venue. The Julliardtrained group, consisting of violinists Rebecca Fischer and Julie Yoon, violist Jonah Sirota, and cellist Gregory Beaver, brings its mission to Iowa City with two Hanchercoordinated performances this week, including a concert at 7:30 p.m. today in the Congregational United Church of Christ, 30 N. Clinton St. “We love the convention of the concert hall, but it’s very formal, and the experience is that it’s almost deafeningly quiet,” Fischer said. “We want the audience to be a part of the experience with us.”

The musicians of the Chiara Quartet have tested their philosophy at Caffe Vivaldi in New York, the Brick in Kansas City, the Hideout in Chicago, and for the first time in Iowa City, on Tuesdaywith a free performance at the Java 1 House, 211 ⁄2 E. Washington.

PATRICK LARKIN/THE DAILY IOWAN

UI art graduate student Emily Bowser (left) goes through a mid-semester critique with Abigail Mumpower in the old Menards building on Monday.

Bowser lost all of her power tools, a jigsaw, a power sander, and various pieces of art in the flood.

BENEFIT CONCERTS Graduate students in music

Lost past,

When: 7:30 p.m. today Where: Old Brick Admission: $10 in advance, $13 at door. Tickets available at the Chait Galleries, West Music, and COGS office.

frozen present

Greg Brown

COGS has established the Artists’ Recovery Fund in hopes of salvaging the careers of local artists. It has scheduled two benefit concerts thus far, which will raise money to help people replace tools and materials lost in the flood.

When: 7:30 p.m. Nov. 13 Where: Old Brick Admission: $25 in advance, $30 at door. Tickets available at The Chait Galleries, West Music, and COGS office.

ON THE WEB

By ELIZABETH TIMMINS

Third in a three-part series The DI takes a look at the stories of fine-arts students with lost or damaged possessions and the post-flood efforts to help these affected students recover, leading to the development of the UI Artists’ Recovery Fund.

Tuesday: UI violinist Kate Truscello Wednesday: Recent UI art grad John Hansen Today: The Artists’ Recovery Fund begins with two benefits concerts to help replace damaged and stolen supplies.

elizabeth-timmins@uiowa.edu

Stuck.

Post-flood, many of the fine-arts students’ possessions were stuck in the mud, destroyed beyond recognition in the mire that swirled into buildings on the old arts campus. Then they were stuck without a working space to call home. And when a handful of those students opened their old lockers and studios to find their valuable instruments and tools had been stolen, the last shred of hope vanished.

Stuck.

Immediately following the flood, the Campaign to Organize Graduate Students began trying to think of ways to help. Those efforts will begin to bear fruition today at 7:30 p.m. with a benefit concert featuring graduate stu-

Check out more photos of the fine-arts students still feeling the effects of the summer’s flood at dailyiowan.com.

dents in music at Old Brick, 26 E. Market St. Tickets may be purchased ahead of time for $10 at the Chait Galleries, West Music, and the COGS office or at the door for $13. All donations are tax-deductible, and they will benefit the Artists’ Recovery Fund, which was established through the Community Foundation of Johnson County.

“A whole cohort of emerging artists has lost a bunch of art and lost the ability to make art,” COGS President Mark Salisbury said.

Space stories “It’s all about space, basically,” said Lisa Leaverton when describing her play A Blue We All Know, which opens today and runs through Oct. 26 at 7:30 p.m. each day.

Appropriately so, because not only is the production being held outside of the Theatre Building — still not reopened after the summer flood — but rather in the limited upstairs space of the Deadwood, 6 S. Dubuque St. “For this play, I don’t really think I could have done it in the Theatre Building and have it come out the way my vision really was,” said Leaverton, a second-year theater graduate student.

“Every single stick of anything, I had to bring there,” she said later, remembering hauling 55 chairs upstairs — this being the limit on audience seating for each performance.

Leaverton has termed the play’s plot “experiential,” in both talking with the DI and in an official press release, and it deals with several subplots, all with the general idea of space as a commonality.

A Blue We All Know When: 7:30 p.m. today, Friday, Saturday, and Oct. 26 Where: Deadwood upstairs, 6 S. Dubuque Admission: $5 NOTE: Seating only available for 55 audience members at each performance.

ON THE WEB Navigate over to dailyiowan.com to see a photo slide show of rehearsal footage from A Blue We All Know, running today through Oct. 26 in the Deadwood upstairs.

JULIE KOEHN/THE DAILY IOWAN

There’s everything from an activist character who specializes in publicdomain cases becoming increasingly marginalized by the authorities to a whale lost on its way home.

“It’s about how human beings hold each other up in space, how we hold

ourselves together,” Leaverton said.

The play also includes several “live sound events” featuring original works by local musicians George Marie and Tackfu that the playwright describes as being “the center of the piece.”

A Blue We All Know was originally

5 p.m. This is what you should always be doing at 5 p.m. on Fridays. Listen in to KRUI 89.7 for “80 Hours on Air.” 6 p.m. Scoot on over to the Ped Mall for a Halloween parade and carnival. Pray there will be candy corn.

7 p.m. Sarah Vowell: journalist, humorist, writer extraordinaire. See her read from her new book, The Wordy Shipmates, live at the Englert.

9 p.m. Go buy some pumpkins and carve them to spook out your apartment for Halloween.

It’s a gooey, slimy mess, but nothing complements Oct. 31 like a candle-lit pumpkin on the porch.

SEE RECOVERY, 3C

PLAY

Seamus, an artist played by Sam Miller, prepares to leave his spot while fellow actor Beth Gansen sleeps during rehearsal on Sunday at the Deadwood.

Friday

submitted and chosen for University Gallery Production status, but upon the closing of the Arts Campus, Leaverton searched out her own space, eventually finding it in the Deadwood upstairs.

“I’ve been able to involve the community more, so actually some really good things have come out of the flood,” Leaverton said and chuckled.

— by Anna Wiegenstein

SEE QUARTET, 3C

80 HOURS ON AIR

ON THE WEB

D(EYE) ON ARTS BLOG

If you do one thing this weekend, it should be tuning into the KRUI 89.7 on Friday from 5-6 p.m. for “80 Hours on Air.” This week features the fall’s hottest hits for a FAC dance party hosted by the DI’s very own Jake Jensen and Ann Colwell.

Can you imagine a newspaper website on which new videos were posted daily? Checking out dailyiowan.com leads to a myriad of artist interviews, sports videos, spooky previews for Halloween, and cooking how-tos that might blow your mind.

If you’re bored in class or looking for something really legit online, navigate over to dailyiowanarts.blogspot.com. This week’s highlights include a never-ending hodge-podge of the latest fall fashions, the ultra-refined energies of one politics-obsessed reporter, a retrospective of one person’s favorite songs of the past four autumns, and a review of why the 1960s’ version of “Batman” ruled so much.

Saturday 10 a.m. Do you even give a knit? Munch on breakfast and knit yourself a scarf or accessory for fall at the Knitters’ Breakfast at the Home Ec. Workshop.

2 p.m. Take a class in Bollywood Dance. Take a friend and make it your goal to be flaunting your new moves later on Saturday night.

7 p.m. Give yourself a break and take a nap. Turn off your phone, stick in some earplugs, and do whatever it takes to catch up a little on your sleep.

11 p.m. Everyone’s talking about Alley Cabaret, a combo of dance, theater, and surprise, and it’s happening at the Englert. Be sure to enter through the alley entry.

Sunday 10 a.m. Get spooky and get sprinting at the Fifth-Annual Spooky Sprint at the Seamans Center.

1:30 p.m. Go see the play Coffee and Hope at Riverside Theatre and absorb the touching themes.

7:30 p.m. Try to snag a seat at A Blue We All Know.

The Daily Iowan - Iowa City, Iowa - Thursday, October 23, 2008 - 3C

dailyiowan.com for more arts and culture

80 hours

Concerts to aid artists hit by flood RECOVERY CONTINUED FROM 1C “That could have a pretty significant ramification for our whole community over time.”

As the waters receded, COGS placed an ad on Craigslist to create a forum for community members seeking help, and Salisbury said at least 50 students responded. Many of them went to the UI for aid as well, but, UI risk manager Donna Pearcy said, the university’s flood-insurance policy under FM Global only covers property owned by the school.

The plan does not include the finished pieces, drills, socket sets, sheet music, instruments, or any other objects belonging to faculty, staff, and students.

Initially, the UI Foundation established a flood-relief fund for any UI community member needing assistance. Salisbury said most of that money was earmarked for those with larger losses, such as homes, so

students who lost art materials were left without help.

In addition to the destruction of tools and materials, some students returned to the Art Buildings only to find that some tools were missing. Although Larry Langley, the associate director of the UI police, said there was no widespread looting on the Arts Campus, there were some reports of post-flooding theft.

Joe Kearney, an associate dean of Liberal Arts and Sciences, said he had heard no reports of widespread looting, either. The chaos that accompanies a natural disaster could have easily caused many items to be misplaced or thrown away, he said. Cleanup crews were the only ones allowed on-site as a safety precaution during the immediate recovery from the flood, he said, and the university allowed the affected faculty and staff to enter the buildings as they became accessible.

The scale and scope of the

evacuation was a success, Kearney said, and he sympathizes with people who lost items.

“I think we’ve learned a lot, but we’re still learning,” he said. “We’ll be more prepared next time.”

It’s nobody’s fault that the artists were left with such a financial burden, Salisbury said, but something should be done to help out the people who make Iowa City so distinctive.

“This is a town where the art and culture is a big draw for why people come here,” he said.

“There’s a good reason for that.

This place is an amazing and unique community. But it’s not a place where hundreds of alreadydeveloped artists move. It’s a place that grows its own artists.

People come here because they have an interest in art or because they get turned on to it as they are growing up here.”

So it’s only fitting that some of that homegrown talent will aid the recovery effort.

And Iowa City’s own Grammynominated singer-songwriter Greg Brown will perform at 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 13 at Old Brick to aid the cause. Tickets can be purchased in advance for $25 and for $30 at the door. Brown, whose songs have received critical acclaim and have been covered by, among many others, Willie Nelson and Carlos Santana, wants to help out the city that has been his hometown on and off for 30 years.

“I’ve lived various places for periods of time, but my ties to this community go way back,” he said. “So when the flood hit, I was just anxious to help out with the whole situation.”

Brown will play for free, and he is not the only community member moved to assist with the recovery efforts. COGS donated the office supplies necessary for promotion, Old Brick donated the performance space, West Music donated a sound system, Iowa Cultural Corridor agreed to

Out of the concert hall & into the club QUARTET

‘Because it’s so intimate, chamber music is more similar to that of jazz clubs. It shouldn’t be viewed as so different.’

CONTINUED FROM 1C The shows are not always glamorous. Fischer recalls playing a concert in the middle of winter at a bar in Denver with a broken heater. Bundled up in hats and coats, the quartet carried on through the cold for the few dive-dwellers who were still there.

“It smelled like stale, old beer and our fingers were freezing,” Fischer said.

No matter the circumstances, audiences have been intrigued, and the idea has grown into a trend in chamber music.

“Because it’s so intimate, chamber music is more similar to that of jazz clubs,” Fischer said. “It shouldn’t be viewed as so different.”

Chamber music, defined as classical music written for smaller instrument ensembles, originated in the Middle Ages as entertainment in private homes. Over the centuries, that intimacy was lost to accommodate larger audiences in concert halls.

The members of the Chiara String Quartet, who are artists in residence at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, were some of the first to introduce chamber music to a club setting. The movement has influenced other ensembles across the country, including the UI’s resident chamber

— Rebecca Fischer, violinist

CHRISTY AUMER/THE DAILY IOWAN

Cellist Greg Beaver (left) sings a Prince cover at the Java House on Tuesday.

Beaver has been a member of the Chiara String Quartet for 16 years. music group, the Maia Quartet, which played concerts last year at the Java House and the Mill, 120 E. Burlington St. “There’s always been a concern since I was a student that the chamber-music population is aging out,” said Elizabeth Oakes, the Maia Quartet violist.

Many musicians hope that branching out to unconventional venues will help revive interest in the genre.

“It reflects a trend in classical music of trying to demystify it, to make it seem less formal,” Oakes said.

The drive toward less formality requires musicians to look at performances with a fresh perspective. Compared with tonight’s performance, in which the Chiara String Quartet plans to play full pieces by Johannes Brahms, Béla Bartók, and Erich Wolfgang Korngold, gigs such as those in

the Java House call for a more varied set list of shorter pieces, broken up with casual talking and audience interaction.

“The people in the audience come away so invigorated because it feels like they were on stage,” Oakes said. “The trend is to try to get people feeling that proximity and excitement of being right up next to the musicians.”

Injecting some fun into a stereotypically stiff genre helps groups such as the Chiara and Maia Quartets reach younger audiences, who members are more likely drawn to a bar or coffeehouse.

“Did Beethoven ever imagine that his music would be played at the Mill?” Oakes said. “I don’t think he’d be disappointed.”

promote the efforts, and Tucker Burnes has provided his time and recording equipment. And students have worked to promote the event. UI music graduate student Amy Phelps created a Facebook group after the flood and posted information about the Artists’ Recovery Fund.

Even with support from students and community businesses, Salisbury said, the concerts will not raise enough money to help everybody.

“If we do it right, that will raise some funds, but we’ve been trying to ask some local organizations to help this effort as well,” he said. “[COGS members] just felt as though we are part of the larger Iowa City community as well as part of the University of Iowa community. We overlap all the time. So there’s no reason we shouldn’t be thinking about it in that way.”

Although he does not know the exact figure that needs to

be raised, he knows it reaches to well more than $10,000.

“We want to provide a substantial amount to make a difference,” he said. If the recovery fund raises more than necessary, the money will remain in the fund for future disasters.

Salisbury hopes to oversee some allocations in January, and he has worked to develop a simple but appropriate application process. He hopes to help out the affected artists as quickly as possible.

“They are supposed to continue in their coursework, in their fine-arts degrees, and they’ve been training and developing in this particular area,” he said.

“Well, not only do they lose all their old artwork, they can’t continue to make any art in that area anymore. But they still have to progress in their courses, because time moves on.

They are really stuck. It’s like losing your past and freezing your present.”