I'm overwhelmed, and other news

I haven't felt so good in a long time.  I work, and work, and work....and where's the payoff?

WELL...

Another festival has accepted A Zest for Life.  This one is in France.  In Cannes, to be exact, but let me be clear about this:  it's not THE Cannes film festival.  It's something completely appropriate, and I'm very pleased.  It's the Festival International du Film PanAfricain.  They've accepted us for their festival in 2013.  (By the time I applied, the 2012 festival entry period had already closed.

And even more good news: Peralta TV, a San Francisco bay area television station wants to screen Two Street and Adela. It will probably screen at the end of April or beginning of May. will try to keep you inform.

And I'm in the middle of planning my trip to Berlin for the festival there, where they'll screen A Zest for Life. I've bought my ticket but still I don't have a hotel. If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know.

And if anyone has even the slightest inclination of helping me out financially in this exiting but expensive endeavor, please go to LINK

OUR NEXT POST

Will be about more filming.

Moving forward on "Domino"

As I reported a while back, we've finished filming Domino:  caught in the crisis in the sense that I'm satisfied with it.  It's now coming in at 45 minutes.

This presents a problem.  It's now too long to be a short, and too short to be a feature.  It's also right in between the standard television lengths for a half-hour and one-hour program.

This means either I have to cut 15 minutes, or add 11.  I'm currently going for the idea of adding 11.

I've mentally created scenes to add these 11 minutes.  There'll be one more scene with domino players.  There'll be a scene in a near-by city called "el Puerto" (actually, Puerto de Santa Maria) with the son and his finacee.  And there'll be one more mini-scene with Luis, in which he and his son have a brief conversation.

On Thursday, I plan to go to el Puerto to check it out.  (Originally I was going to go on Tuesday, but my small camera has to be taken to Sevilla to be repaired, so I'm putting el Puerto off until Thursday.)  I need to find a location that's scenic (not hard) and that doesn't have too much wind (very hard).  Wind is a real problem when it comes to recording conversations with a microphone.

Plus I have to get the scene out of my head and onto paper, since the actors will have to learn their lines.

All things considered, we plan to do this filming in early April.  Plus I've already started to do some heavy duty thinking about background music.

OUR NEXT POST will be about our beautifully revised web site for A Zest for Life.

HOORAY! "A Zest for Life" has been accepted into a festival in Germany.

Ah, fame!  Ah, a little recognition for all the work I've been doing.

It feels nice.

The Black International Cinema festival of Berlin (Germany) has accepted A Zest for Life as part of its upcoming festival (May 2-6).  Do I plan to attend?  You bet I do.  After all, I'm in Spain and Germany is not all THAT far away.

That's not the only good news I have for A Zest for Life.  The material I've been waiting for all these months finally arrived.  I only needed about 30 seconds of it for the documentary, but these are important 30 seconds.  They give the documentary a balance I wanted, plus more of the Peruvian coastal countryside (where most Afro-Peruvians live).

A checo on the vine.

And even more importantly, one section of the video clip I used shows fine, and well-known, Afro-Peruvian percussionists playing the checo, an Afro-Peruvian percussion instrument made out of a gourd.

Now, you probably don't know all that much about the checo, but that's part of the point.  After watching A Zest for Life, you WILL know what the checo is and how to use it.



SO--thanks to the Museo Afroperuano de Zaña (and Sonia Arteaga), thanks to 1 Frame Producciones (and Gisella Burgo Polo plus Javier Exposito Martin), and thanks to the Black International Cinema festival in Berlin.

OUR NEXT POST will be about moving forward on Domino:  caught in the crisis.

Flamenco CD with cantaor/singer Antonio de la Malena

This is as good a time as any to announce to the world that we will soon finish production on a CD of flamenco cante (singing) by Antonio de la Malena, a singer known the world over.  He has toured throughout Europe, Asia, and North America.  He has sung in Egypt.  He has been to almost every place where flamenco is loved.

This will be his first, purely flamenco CD.  He has two other CDs to his name, but they are more flamenco fusion.  We are really excited, and feel privileged that he has chosen us as the producer.  We are partnering in this venture with the Spanish company, Jerez Puro, who will handle the CD's distribution in Europe.

Antonio de la Malena.  (photo:  Martin Guerrero & Casa Patas)

The title of the CD is Para ti mi cante, que es mi libertad.  In English, that translates as My singing is for you, my singing is my freedom.

I have to admit, it reads better in Spanish than in English.  I'll have to work on that one.

The CD contains 10 numbers, ranging from the lively and upbeat bulerias through the heaviest of all songs, the seguiriyas.  Antonio sings several numbers without guitar accompaniment, but most do have guitar, played by world-famous guitarists such as Manuel Parilla and Domingo Rubichi.

We should also mention that there is a taranto in which Antonio sings a short part mimicking his "uncle Jose," and then invites his brother Manuel de Malena (also a well known flamenco singer) to continue on and finish with a more traditional rendition. 

Bulerias fin de fiesta.  Right, standing=Antonio de la Malena

For the final number, the traditional "fin de fiesta" (ending party) bulerias, Antonio invites not only his brother but another four to six people to join in.  They each take turns singing, with Antonio singing first and also ending the session.  There is no guitar accompaniment.  It's performed as if they were, indeed, all at a party together and simply enjoying themselves.

OUR NEXT POST will be about our documentary, a Zest for Life.

The feet and hands as musical (percussion) instruments

As any flamenco dancer, tap dancer, dancer doing Afro-Peruvian zapateo, and dancer of many other forms of dance can tell you, the feet can and often are used as musical instruments.  It amazes me the kinds of sounds you can get out of using your feet.  Every time I think I´ve come to the end of the possibilities in flamenco, I see a performance in which new possibilities are offered.

Not just for walking around.  Also for making music.

 And many dancers add other parts of the body to the sounds made by the feet:  clapping hands, slapping your knee with your hand, and so forth.

It´s possible, and for some people (including myself), very pleasurable to spend long periods of time imagining different patterns of sounds you can make with your feet.  There´s a visual aspect as well:  if you hit the floor with the tip of your toe, it makes a specific kind of sound.  If you do it three times in a row, with your toe at a different angle with respect to the foot that´s on the ground, the sound changes AND the look changes.

In a later post, I'll include some feet rhythm sounds but for now, I want to introduce to you what can be done with hands beating on a table.  Sure, you've done it before, but this is done by a MASTER.



I remember when one of my kids was around 8 years old and told me he was interested in playing the drums.  He wanted me to purchase a full drum set for him.  I countered that he should play drums for several months before I bought him any.  I was perfectly happy to give him lessons (which I did) and buy him a practice head but didn´t understand why I should purchase a complete drum set before we saw how serious he was.

Inside my head, I was secretly thinking--if this kid loves drums so much, why isn´t he drumming on the table, and banging spoons together, and tapping the window with his fingers?  Because drumming is rhythm, and you don´t need a drum set to make rhythm.

Rhythm is an essential part of life.  We all know that our heart has its own rhythm.  That rhythm is something we hear so constantly that we rarely notice it.  Our breathing has a rhythm, which changes according to the level at which we´re exerting ourselves.  The change between day and night has a rhythm.  The movement from one season to another is a kind of rhythm.

Since rhythm is an essential part of life, deliberately using the feet and hands to make different rhythms is a natural response to the world.  It easily becomes a part of music.  It is, in fact, where music MEETS dance.

OUR NEXT POST will be about the CD we´re about to produce of flamenco cante (singing) by Antonio de la Malena.

Screening of Domino: Caught in the Crisis

About 10 days ago, on Jan. 26, we had a public screening of Domino:  Caught in the Crisis.  For those unfamiliar with the work, it´s a dramatic narrative film, still a work-in-progress, that I am shooting in Spain.  It´s about a middle-aged family man in Spain who´s been caught up in the economic crisis.  It´s being produced by my dba, Palomino Productions.

The screening took place in the Arlington Café in Kensington, and was part of the monthly screenings being presented by MAW (Media Art Works) in its EBMMSC (East Bay Media Makers´ Screening Club).  The next screening will be on the third Thursday of this month (February), so you might want to mark your calendars.

Bianca Beyrouti (project director for MAW) and Eve A. Ma (filmmaker) introduce the film.

The screening was a real pleasure for me.  It was relaxed and low key, with an interested audience that gave me plenty of feedback.  And they LIKE my work.

I have thought deeply about all the comments and now that I´m back in Spain, I´ll be make a few changes as a result.  It´s always a big help to see how people react to your work, for the simple reason that we make film/video in order to communicate, and so it´s important to see how well, or poorly, your work is communicating.

Part of the audience.

 So my thanks to MAW for giving me the opportunity to screen, and thanks as well to the audience--and the Arlington Café.

OUR NEXT BLOG will be about our really great CD of Afro-Peruvian rhythms...now available for purchase!  LINK   Or if you just want us to send you a free download of one of the songs on the album, go here LINK.