symphony intro draft & a random essay question

First, my silly musing about a store I pass on the way to everywhere:

Essay Question:
If you were a plus-sized woman, would you buy your clothes at a tiny strip-mall store named JUST BIG? Why or why not?

(I thought that was the most raw-dog name of a store I have seen b/c when someone says you are JUST BIG, it is usually followed with the phrase "for no damn reason at all." That means people can't even believe your size much less approve of it.) My brother says it must be a men's store 'cause men don't care. I hope so, otherwise, they gone run their customers away! I mean, BIG BONED would even be a step up. I know, I know, it's random but I had to muse. *makes pseudo-apologetic face*

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Ok now for the more serious part of the blog. See below for a draft of the intro I will speak for the MLK Day program I am doing for the symphony on protest music. Imagine these words (or others, after some rewrites) voiced atop a beautifully haunting melancholy song played by a string quartet....

across centuries
through millennia
over oceans and mountains
in cities and townships and ghettos
in all places holding human life

from the hearts of those of us born
into a skin or gender or religion or way
devalued, despised, misunderstood, exploited
by moral tyrants
blinded by their own inadequacies
controlled by a small-hearted greed
for false and forceful power
tyrants who cut off their own hands
with the violence they choose to throw
upon us, upon those who spark their envy
by virtue of our soulful existence

there rises up and out of us a crythe age-old question
why and how did this oppression become our destiny?
who will save us and give us our due?

and always, the clenched fists
and grinding jaws we hide,
the exasperations and burdens we carry,
our frustrated tears and sobs turn into
our own answers to ourselves

in the form of a song
song - intersection of heart, soul, spirit, and justice.
we break down walls with our hopeful voices, our insistent rhythms,
our melodies of wisdom, our music

our music - strong enough to shake & silence the cruelest offender
our music - light enough to lift the lowest spirit

with our music, with our music
we have learned to sing up freedom
we have learned to sing up freedom
with our song

If you like what you read, come to the actual show on Sunday, January 18, 2009 at 3pm at the Levine Museum of the New South. We'll be singing, you'll be singing, it'll be a good time! This is part of the Bridging Musical Worlds series honoring Martin Luther King's birthday. And yup, it's free! For the full schedule, click below:

http://www.charlottesymphony.org/Specials.asp#Bridging

Have a creative day y'all,
Kalicious

Collaboration is the new Black!

I had a great meeting with my photographer/ artist friend Chad, and we have sketched out an awesome Pecha Kucha project for January, a commentary on the impersonal fakeness of conducting relationships only online. We started a storyboard and everything! I think our talents will go together well, with me doing the verbalizing and his pictures visually telling the story we want to portray.

I am also pairing up with David Crowe, a composer, percussionist, and teaching artist for a celebration on Protest Music through space and time for the Charlotte Symphony. The show is on January 18, 2009 at 3pm at the Levine Museum. David and I met for coffee and quickly drew up a tentative show based on our complementary talents.

A few months ago I decided to work with other artists more often. It is happening and feeling exquisite. So many dimensions are added when I can work with people whose vision and follow-through I trust. So I am grateful to be able to see and participate in my colleagues' brilliance, all the while shining brighter because of them.