Will You Miss Me When I'm Gone?

Erik Friedlander at The Stone in New York City on June 14, 2009

Erik Friedlander probably didn’t realize that his childhood was so different than most kids his age. Spending 2 1/2 months every summer traveling around the United States in a camper atop a 1966 Chevrolet pickup truck was the norm. After all, it was his dad’s job, and dad liked to take the family on the road while he worked.

Lee Friedlander

But Erik’s dad isn’t like most dads. He’s photographer Lee Friedlander, and every summer, like clockwork, he took his children, Erik and Anna, and wife Maria on the road while he shot photos on assignment, worked at teaching gigs and made his own images on the road.

Erik’s parents told him the experiences were “enriching,” he explained last night to an audience at The Stone, John Zorn‘s music venue in NYC’s Lower East Side. While Erik didn’t get that while he was a kid, he said he finally understands and connects with the idea. It proved so enriching that it has become the theme of Block Ice and Propane, the new solo show Erik is developing in conjunction with experimental filmmaker Bill Morrison.

Erik and Bill was road-testing the show at The Stone last night. It grew out of Erik’s 2007 show at Joe’s Pub, where he played the music of his then-new album, Block Ice and Propane, while projecting a few of the images that illustrated things that inspired the pieces. But this new version has been expanded with additional tunes and more extensive use of family photos (many taken by Erik’s father, and some by his mother) and new films by Bill, who specializes in working with musicians.

Erik Friedlander plucks the cello with one of his father's photos projected in the background.

In this show, which Bill directs, Erik plays each tune with great intensity, changing the tuning of his early 20th Century instrument against its creaking protestations.

Here’s Erik’s description of his show:

I will be performing a new show this coming Summer and Fall starting August 1 at The Hopkins Center for Arts in Dartmouth. The new show, which will be directed by film-maker Bill Morrison, is an expansion of the Block Ice & Propane concert I experimented with first at Joe’s Pub in New York. At that performance I projected a few images from the family trips that inspired the music.

Bill and I will be workshopping ideas here in New York and then up at Dartmouth. Some of these ideas include using more projected images, a set, as well as the premiere of new pieces to go with the new program. The Block Ice show will be presented at The Hop in Dartmouth, PICA TBA festival in Portland, Ore., The Walker Arts Center in Minneapolis and the Wexner Art Center in Ohio.

There were bumps and missed cues in last night’s run-through, and Erik cautioned the capacity crowd in the airless former that they were witnessing a work in progress. But on the whole, the show was mesmerizing. While it’s only a start, the idea holds great promise.

Erik Friedlander picks up the bow.

Composer Todd Reynolds

Philadephia's Royal Theatre.

There’s an old movie house on South Street n Philadelphia that, while still in a state of elegant decay, comes back to life tonight and tomorrow night with a world premiere multimedia performance featuring a tune by violinist-composer Todd Reynolds, filmmaker Bill Morrison and projection designer Laurie Olinder.

Their work will fill the Royal Theater, entertaining audiences in temporary seating in what is an empty shell of a building.

The Royal was dubbed “America’s Finest Colored Photoplay House” when it opened in 1920, and was the first black-run theater in the City of Brotherly Love. The 1,200-seat Royal presented live acts, including Fats Waller and Bessie Smith, as well as movies.

Todd calls his composition Sounds for a New Royality. Network for New Music, one of Philadelphia’s leading advocates of contemporary composition, will perform Todd’s score live while Bill’s film and Laurie’s projections provide a ghostly presence on the theater’s walls.

Todd’s composition was deeply informed by his visit to the site and his conversations with people who remembered the theater in its heyday.

Says Todd: “As we walked into The Royal last year for the first time,  I felt immediately the vast, resounding emptiness of a building which used to be filled with image, with sound, with people. Yes, there was and is the decay we see around us which holds its own indescribable beauty as well.  There are many tales here as well, history here, even in the punch cards which still litter the office.

“I wrote a cinematic soundtrack, not for a film, but for an environment invoked by the rich media of Bill and Laurie. The music is made for a theater which, though decaying on the inside, is still strong and structurally sound, and which for these two days of this particular year, welcomes a community once again into its arms.

“My research for this piece included interviews with two local residents, Barney and Junior.  They are part of the lifeblood of this area, and spending time with them recalling their own experiences, listening to Junior’s deep voice and Barney’s citations of ‘history, history, history,’ provided a rich context within which I could write some sound.  If you stand just in front of the theater, Junior’s barbershop is just down the street to the right, and Barney lives just across the street to the left, that’s how close they are.  Our conversations were invaluable to me in garnering a feeling for what life might have been like back then and in imagining a new ‘Royality.'”

Todd gave me a preview clip of the piece. And, while it will obviously sound different played in the cavernous space played live, I think the clip offers a good sense of what the audience will be hearing. The driving, rhythmic piece is deeply influenced by his background in minimalism.  But is also clearly informed by his research. While not obvious, there are hints of urban life in the score, and I would swear I hear suggestions of theater organ at times.

Adds Bill: “We are interested in this notion of a ‘ghost theater’, a palace of dreams where time has in a way stood still. … [W]e are opening its doors again, winding up its projectors, and referencing the images that may have once graced its screen. We imagine finding a lost reel in its projection booth, threading it up and letting it spin its tale. The images still haunt us. But the context has changed, and so must the story and its soundtrack.”

Here’s Todd’s introduction to his part of the work, and a video clip, with a bit of his composition playing in the background:

Upon viewing, I realize that this is MUCH too serious. It might have been better with me in a smoking jacket with a pipe instead of my two companion basil plants… The point, however, is clear. Come on down to The Royal Theatre in South Philly for a mulitmedia event which will leave your ears and eyes humming.

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Performances are today and tomorrow at 8 p.m. at The Royal, 1524 South Street, Philadelphia, Pa. Tonight’s show is sold out, but seats remain available for tomorrow’s performance. Visit HiddenCity Philadelphia’s web site for tickets. $20.