March 2018 Short Takes

From the March 2018 issue of Improv Notes

MILE doc screening photo

MILE Camp 2016

….. IICSI student researchers Brian Lefresne and Kimber Sider have successfully defended PhD dissertations in the University of Guelph’s School of English and Theatre Studies. Dr. Lefresne’s dissertation Saturn’s Ark: The Improvised Archives, Politics, and Performances of Sun Ra, is now available online. Dr. Sider’s dissertation, Communicating in Silence: (Re)balancing Human/Animal Dynamics through Performance will be available soon. Kimber Sider’s 2017 documentary Musical Improvisation at Land’s End / Coin-du-Banc en Folie was an official selection at the 2018 Toronto Short Film Festival and can now be viewed in our online Research Library. Congratulations Kimber and Brian!

Gamelan Ensemble instrument

….. the School of Fine Art and Music at the University of Guelph presented the 2018 Creative Music Symposium from March 7-9. The CMS featured a jazz listening session with Howard Spring and Al Gorman, and workshops with Amanda Smith, and Tristan Tessari. Students presented their research projects, and pianist Adam Sherkin led a master class. The symposium concluded on Friday March 9 with a gamelan workshop presented by Maisie Sum and gamelan master I Dewa Made Suparta (University of Waterloo), a chamber ensemble presentation, and a jam session.

Billie Holiday, 1947. Photograph by William P. Gottlieb.

….. Eighty years after Lewis Allen and Billie Holiday wrote “Strange Fruit,” the American journalist Brandon Weber writes in The Progressive about the impact of this politically charged song on Holiday’s troubled career.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Improv Notes is edited and written by David Lee and assembled by administrative assistant Rachel Collins. If you have anything improvisation related that you would like included in the newsletter, please email [email protected].

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