Heaven Gallery

Columbia College MFA Music Composition for
the Screen students accompanying silent films from the
late 19th/20th century $5 donation

THE ACTUALITY SHOW
Fundamentals of Cinema in Tracking Shots, Nature and
Kissing (1893 - 1905).

With live musical accompaniment by students of
Columbia College's MFA Music Composition for the
Screen program.

'Actuality film': the crude, unorganized footage of a
real place, event, thing, etc., generally referring to
the first decade of cinema's creation, when filmmakers
weren't filmmakers but "operators" who captured nature
and the modern world using hand-cranked cameras.
Hovering between the mundane (workers leaving a
factory) and the extraordinary (President McKinley
makes a personal appearance), these fragments often
reveal inadvertent truths about the manipulations
inherent to both documentary and fiction filmmaking.
Actualities are thought of as static, grainy, boring,
primitive (Gorky's "Kingdom of Shadows"); taking a
closer look, they contain the ambition of a modern
cinema that finds virtue in the simple observation of
the world's splendor (contemporary masters such as Hou
Hsiao-hsien and Abbas Kiarostami come to mind).

THE ACTUALITY SHOW takes a look at three phenomenon of
actualities from 1893- 1905: the invention of the
tracking shot by mounting cameras to trains and other
movable machinery; the unpredictable, astonishing
presence of nature and wildlife that found its way
into the early cinema frame as a testament to the
power of documentary; and the human kiss as an
electrifying presentiment of the potential of a new
art form to inspire love and change.

Original music composed and performed by:
Elon Arbiture
Jordan Balagot
Duncan Blickenstaff
Joseph Cooper
Mae Crosby
Andrew Edwards
Victor Hernandez-Sumpfhauser
Robert Ramos
Marjorie Rusche
Nathaniel Smith
Michelle Tyler

Program runs approximately 90 minutes with brief
pauses between films. DVD projection.

Saturday May 17th, 10pm:

Steve Fors, solo lap steel guitar

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Andrew Scott Young Ensemble (piano/bass/sax/cello/violin)

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Holsum (Jaimie Branch, trumpet; Jeff Kimmel, bass clarinet)

Heaven Heaven Heaven!
1550 N. Milwaukee Ave. 2nd Fl.
Chicago
(Blue Line to Damen)
10pm - $5 suggested donation

Saturday, May 31st at 10pm

Patrick Breiner, solo saxophone

www.myspace.com/PatrickBreinerMusic

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Breakway

Paul Giallorenzo, piano/electronics
Brian Labycz, electronics
Marc Riordan, drums

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Sonic Circus (East Coast)

Currently fixated somewhere along the East Coast, Sonic Circus consists of Dana Jessen (bassoon) and Michael Straus (saxophones). Dedicated to today's music, their combined individual efforts include the premiers of over forty new works with performances at New York City's The Stone, Boston's Jordan Hall and Washington D.C.'s Kennedy Center. Always looking to collaborate with non-traditional artists and musicians, they will be joined this show by turntablist DJ Dubble8. These three musicians, having all dabbled in the institutionalized world, hold graduate degrees in music from the likes of Harvard University, Johns Hopkins University and the New England Conservatory of Music. New music performed tonight will fuse electronics with live acoustic instruments and visual projections.

More Artist Info: www.mstraus.net, www.danajessen.com, www.dubble8productions.com

Heaven Gallery
1550 N. Milwaukee Ave. 2nd fl.
Chicago
(Blue Line to Damen)