A review of our show Cinema Vivant (Silent Film show) in Lynchburg, VA, 5/10/14:
Merci, mille fois, for dishing up the tastiest plate of French Fried entertainment this side of the Atlantic! Superb musicians, awe-inspiring animated films from those fertile years of earliest 20th century.
Clearly showing where Disney's ideas came from, and laugh-out-loud stand-up comedy that actually was a seminar in the history of world music...and such music! The amazing sounds of American jazz filtered through the Paris-based ears of Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grapelli, whose ideas were cooked up in the same delicious stew that created Picasso, Picabia, Stravinsky, Nijinsky, Balanchine and Gertrude Stein...all hanging out together in ateliers and salons along the Seine and turning life into high comedy instead of a tragedy! And there it all happened again last night at the Academy, with all the energy and freshness the originals must have offered to patrons of the Lapin Agile in its glory days; they were the punk rockers, the rappers, the grunge bunch of their day.
Everyone in my party (and it was a party!) agreed:
We all LOVED LE HOT CLUB DE SAN FRANCISCO!!!
All around us, people were literally dancing in their seats...and you could see the feet tapping across the aisle, responding to the hot jazz from haute composers these amazing performers offer.
These superb, multi-talented musicians were impressive not only for their mastery of multiple instruments and vocals, but also for the simple joy they exude onstage.
We talked - joyously - about this extraordinary evening all the way back home in the "limo"!
xoxo,
Betsy Holland Gehman
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDfc-NA-olA