ROCKPILE on the road

Amplified accordion, long black hair, orange, red, yellow streaked chiffon skirt, black tights  with zippers, polka dot socks and red Doc Martens, Terri Carrion joined the Thunderbird Poetry  Orkestra last night, her debut in the ROCKPILE performance tour and fun was had by all. And    lots of curious sounds from saxophone, glockenspiel, coronet and koto (see the performance  schedule for instruments and musicians), and more, the array of percussion exhilarating. I  performed “Still Life of The Imagination”, a challenge to deliver a journal piece as song, varying  line lengths, improvising line breaks based on music rather than “projective” notation already  established on the page, and drive the dynamics in such a way as to keep the audience moving  with me through time and the rain of percussion and brass After “Still Life” I followed up and  concluded with “Elephant in The Room for David” (for our very own David M), a melodic, lyric, more narrative poem, which opened with the blowing elephant didgeridoo and distant reply of coronet, a considerable change of pace and from “Still Life” and direct transition to David.

David began with introduction to and songs from No Eyes, with cello blues…

Thank you, Mark!

…and followed up with the majestic, hard core and sorrowful “Brother”, a minimal accompaniment from the Orkestra was poignant. As usual, David had the audience under his spell. He concluded with an exuberant and upbeat rendition of “Red Shoes”. I was dancing in my seat on the stage. The Orkestra was right on top of the shifting tones and modes and moods of David’s entire reading. What a pleasure and honor to work with them!

At the end of David’s reading applause broke out and then audience sat still. They didn’t want to leave. (Or maybe they were still waiting for the show to start!!! It’s hard for me to tell sometimes, what people are thinking or mean by what they say or do cause most of the time I’m freaking out about every minor detail as if it were the end of the world). No they didn’t want to leave, and so mingled long after Terri had unplugged her shiny electric accordion and the lights went down on the Outpost Performance Space stage. Gratitude to Jeff Bryan for organizing and Tom Guralnik for his generosity and for hosting this event!

–MR