Since 1993, the Oakland Symphony Chorus has organized a really terrific summer singing program. Every Tuesday evening in July and August, the Chorus invites venerable local choral directors to lead members of the public in singing through masterworks of the classical repertoire accompanied by piano. The "Summer Sing-Ins" take place in a church in Oakland. Anyone can attend and attendees pay $10 for one event (or $50 for the entire six-evening series). The fee includes borrowing a score and intermission snacks.I attended the event for the fist … [Read more...]

The idea that language is an arbitrary construct, a manmade and sometimes haphazard system created to help us get through our days without too many terrible misunderstandings, is an old one. But it resurfaced in a conversation I had yesterday in an unexpected context.The conversation centered on the naming of a type of long-form improvisation known among improv circles as "The Harold." The Harold came into being in 1967 in The Bay Area through the efforts of the seminal but now long-defunct San Francisco-based improv troupe, The Committee. It's … [Read more...]

By far the best descriptor I heard regarding the Wanderlust Yoga and Music Festival which took place at Squaw Valley in Lake Tahoe this past weekend was "Burning Man for yogis."Now in its second year, the weekend long event attracted a couple of thousand or more blissed-out hippies. Their identity could only be told apart from the crowd that flocks to Black Rock City in the Nevada desert each summer by virtue of the fact that they were all carrying yoga mats.There also seems to be some crossover with Burning Man in terms of the kinds of … [Read more...]