I have friends, and some of them came with me to this High Zero concert. That's because the Saturday matinee is a unique show among these unique shows. It involves compositions... of course, ones that deal in experimental improvisation. This year's was comprised of two by local auteur Jenny Graf Sheppard. Both were hit and miss.
The first piece was titled "A Performance of Experimental Archeology by the Stone Carving Oraclestra". This involved five so-called "readings" by a quintet of veiled women dressed in white, ululating and moaning. They would culminate in a phrase made ominous by lack of context ("DO IT NOW") and splitting reverb. Then one would hit a rock with another rock, and hand it to the recipient of the reading. Between each reading a small group of High Zero musicians performed.
The performance, in addition to being overlong, suffered from a lack of focus. On one hand it strongly suggested a genuine attempt at divination and matters of the occult, but on the other there were more light-hearted elements that betrayed and muddled the presumed intent of the whole thing. Meanwhile, the vocalizations of the prophetesses were unimpressive in their experimental character. Some were more inventive than others, but unfortunately the main prophetess, who was also the loudest, was content with a small selection of whoops and moans. Also, the performance was riddled with minor but obvious goof, suggesting that the performance was not altogether planned very well. The better moments came during the group's interludes, however their music was not wholly different from the sets heard on any given High Zero evening. In the end, this piece was kind of asinine.
In order to prepare for the second piece, we were given an hour-long intermission. When we left the theater I wheedled my wife and friends into filling out their survey forms that were included with the programs. These get entered into a box, one is drawn at the end of the day's concert, and that person wins two copies of a special tenth-anniversary High Zero DVD. I wanted that DVD.
With lots of time to spare, we headed outside and around the way to an Ethiopian-operated cafe. We headed back with time to spare, and we used it hanging out front of the theatre at one of the High Jinx events called "Toys That Make Noise". Although it essentially consisted of a motorized singing doll (with a haunting resemblance to JonBenét Ramsey), I still wished I had brought a few of my daughter's kookier pseudo-musical toys and join in.
In time the theatre doors were opened, and we all quite literally entered into the second piece, "Threshold for Action and Sound". The need for such a long intermission was immediately clear: we were led through a gateway onto the theatre stage, which had been turned into a dining room by the placing of plastic-board tables, folding chairs and other atmospherics. Several musicians were scattered around the space, being clandestinely conducted by an unidentified man in one corner. We were going to have dinner, and our choices as we ate would determine the what's, who's and how's of the music. Two menus were offered, one vegan and one non-vegan, and they were segregated to stage right and stage left, respectively. As it happened, half our group went vegan and half went non. I went non.
We sat at a table with, as it turned out, several of the weekend's artists who were not performing in this piece. Across from me was Ms. Adorno, as well as others such as Bill Nace and Audrey Chen sat nearby as well. We were encouraged to pick the courses on our menu in any order, although we ended up simply going down the list. We had a bread and cheese course, servings of kimchi, deviled eggs, and finally tiramisu for dessert. I would like to point out that the food was not great, but I'll grant that its quality should be incidental to the success of the musical piece (also considering that this is a free meal at a shoestring performance event, one should not expect culinary excellence). Unfortunately, the music itself also became incidental, as unnoticeable as the humming of the ventilation system while we all ate, drank and were merry. It was a fabulous and unrepeatable experience, excitement and playful inhibition giving way to many shenanigans best left unlisted. The joy was in the time spent there, with like-minded folk. The music was ignored. And so it must also, like Sheppard's first piece, be deemed a failure. But thank you for a lovely time.
The drawing happened immediately after, in the lobby, and wouldn't you know it but one of my friend's name was called (actually, the one who needed the most wheedling). He gave me one copy of the DVD and kept the other. I felt as if I had just pulled of a bank heist.
By the time we were outside, another High Jinx was beginning. Someone read millennia-old Roman poetry, and attendees were encourages to move to the sounds. It was called "Latin Dance". We took the opportunity to bust a move or two.
Finally, it was time to go, and to say goodbye to High Zero for another year. As my wife and I walked back to our car, an audience member strolled ahead of us, intoning through a well-worn tuba. The spirit was in him, and now he was going out into the world, prophesying to all nations. I was comforted by that thought.
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