Lakeshore Arts Festival, Featured Artist, Mary Lou Hess

The Evanston Lakeshore Arts Festival is 36 this year and we are celebrating with a fresh, new logo (to be revealed in a few weeks) and this amazing blog. In this space we will profile artists and vendors who will be featured at Lakeshore this year.

The first artist we are highlighting is printmaker Mary Lou Hess. Mary Lou has been etching and printmaking for 25 years. Mary Lou is a returning artist, and this year she will triumphantly return, having won in the Prints and Drawings category in 2007.

Inspired by the landscape of the Midwest and beyond, Mary Lou says that she "always see(s) space, shapes, and textures in nature. Landscape is an excuse for making an etching. To conceive an idea by seeing a commonplace thing, and make it my own by building or designing a picture is my goal." For those of you unfamiliar with the process, an etching is when a detailed drawing is created on a metal plate, usually zinc, by corroding it's surface with nitric acid. Once the plate is completely etched with a design, the plate is inked and run through a hand press. Because each print is run individually, no two etchings are exactly alike with each being an original print. Mary Lou works on a smaller scale, and each individual piece is a jewel of texture and color.

Mary Lou has a studio in New Albany, IN and sells her work online at mlhessetchings.com. Recently, she collaborated with author Diane Aprile on the book, “The Eye Is Not Enough”. Please come visit her booth at the Lakeshore Arts Festival at Dawes Park August 2-3, 2008.

Lamajamal – Traveling Gypsy Surfers

Lamajamal is riding the Michigan waves to Evanston this summer July 1st at Harbert Park for the Starlight Concert Series.

Lamajamal, made from the Arabic word for “beauty,” combines a wide variety of musical styles, instruments, and rhythms. A quintet of four men and one woman, they blend folk music from around the world, including the Balkans, Turkey, North-Africa, and the Middle-east, as well as a touch of '60's "Surf Sound." Influenced by everything from Manu Chao and Gogol Bordello to Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin, they play a variety of instruments including the clarinet, sax, oud and guitar.

Their latest album, "Gypsy Surf," blends gypsy and folk melodies with their traditional world music. Joey Spilberg commented on their new album saying “one challenging thing has been focusing the project so that we can describe to others what we play. I think our album, 'Gypsy Surf,' really shows what we're all about."

In 2006, Lamajamal took a trip to Paris, Bulgaria and Turkey where “they played shows, collected instruments, researched folk music, partied with gypsies, and studied with local musicians.” As a part of their musical philosophy, traveling around the world, learning the music of other cultures and sharing this knowledge with others is integral to their creative process. Lamajamal has even gone as far as to establish a foundation called Intercultural Music productions to help them with this task and are currently planning their next trip to Greece and Turkey.

In Chicago, Lamajamal has also made a name for themselves, playing many festivals and venues throughout the city including the 2006 & 2007 Chicago World Music Fest. To get a preview, check out Lamajamal at The Chicago Turkish Festival on May 28th – 31st at the Daley Plaza!

So what’s the bottom line?

Lamajamal is not just an amusing palindrome but also one of the most diverse and culturally rich folk bands in the Chicago scene today. The forerunners of the Gypsy Surf music, they are a talent you won’t want to miss. Experience the ride for free at 7:30 pm on July 1st at Harbert Park!

SuperBlogger,
Lauren

Haven't done any traveling lately?

No problem: take a two-day trip around the world July 19 & 20 at Dawes Park when the 23rd Annual Evanston Ethnic Arts Festival transforms this idyllic lakefront park into a global village.
Surrounded by the flags of more than 100 nations honoring the diversity of our planet, you can experience the colors, sounds, and aromas of world cultures. Every continent is represented in song, dance, spoken word, visual arts and food.

Come and you will enjoy live music on two stages, browse the art and craft of 125 juried artists, learn the folk dance of a far away country, and explore the intriguing spices and seasoning of new foods.

Wanda Jackson: Grand First Lady of Rockabilly

Born in Oklahoma, raised in California, nurtured on country and rock and roll beats and travelling from the United States all the way to Europe, Asia, and Australia, Wanda Jackson will be making a stop in Evanston, Illinois for the Starlight Concert Series on June 26th at 7:30pm to continue shaking crowds with her distinctive, saucy voice. For the past 50 years, Wanda's raspiness has been capable of hitting folksy traditional tunes, country twang, yodels, and suggestive ballads, keeping her followers and new crowds on their toes and trying to guess what could come next.

Some call her the first female rock and roll singer, though she started out doing the country thing. In high school she won the attention of singer Hank Thompson after winning a 15-minute Oklahoma daily radio show; she was enlisted to record with his band in 1954, doing a duet called 'You Can't Have My Love" with Billy Grey, one of Thompson's musicians, which subsequently was released by Decca records and reached #8 on the country music charts. Because she was still in high school, Capitol turned her down for a record deal, but Decca swept right in to adopt the obvious talent.

A year later at a country music fall festival Wanda met Elvis Presley and a whole new sound; she became an item with this not-yet-sensation who encouraged her to try out this new thing called "rock and roll," and to take a break from the country tinged gospel. Presley predicted it to be "the next big thing" and that Wanda's voice could send her for a ride with it. She took him up on his recommendations, though in disagreement, and signed with Capitol, soon after releasing the rock-country piece "I Gotta Know" which made it in the top 20 on the country charts. Wanda and her wild, growling sound had it.

From '56-61, she was at the height of her rock and roll prowess producing awesome rock and roll tracks. In '57 she covered a song by jump blues singer Annisteen Allen called "Fujiyama Mama" with references to the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki which, ironically, hit #1 in Japan:

Cause I'm a Fujiyama Mama and I'm just about to blow my top
And when I start erupting ain't nobody gonna make me stop

Wanda has had greater success in places outside the U.S. Perhaps it is because a "country girl singing rock and roll" was too "out there" for the conservative American public at the time. Her style fit her sound; on stage she would wear tight silk dresses, red lipstick, and high heels, wanting to add glamour and sex appeal to her image. Once she was not even allowed on stage at the Grand 'Ol Opry until she covered her shoulders.

She was described to be "ahead of her time," singing as an assertive woman years before the women's movement and before female rock singers were commonplace. One hit of hers was "Cool Love" where she portrays a woman who is stuck with a shy guy who cannot fulfill her needs:

Now don't you give me that cool love
Give me the kind I need
Start getting with it, baby
You're acting like a square to me

By 1961, Wanda shifted back to doing mostly country, with "Theres a Party Goin' On," "Right or Wrong" and "In the Middle of a Heartache," the latter two making it in the top ten country hits.

An impressive discography, a marriage with Wendell Goodman who became her manager, and two children accompanied her through the past three decades when she has recorded, toured, and accompanied sporadically, experimenting with both country and rock and roll-- both her claims to fame. She toured with rock and roll pioneers such as Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Buddle Holly, and Little Richard. She has been nominated for two Grammys, and has been awarded the Oklahoma Native Daughter Award. Wanda has been inducted into the Oklahoma Country Music Hall of Fame, the Rockabilly Hall of Fame, the International Hall of Fame, the International Gospel Music Hall of Fame, the Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame, and the German Country Music Hall of Fame, but remains absent from the Rock and Roll and Country Music Hall of Fames-- something surprising to her fans.

Go here to see more and to see the status of efforts by fans for her Rock and Roll Hall induction:
http://www.wandajackson.com/

And listen/ watch her here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0uq1vNHIUI