Vancouver International Jazz Festival: Jun - Jul

Amazing looking lineup once again at this years Vancouver Jazz Fest. Most impressively two performances by Norway's Scorch Trio featuring the combined talents of Raoul Bjorkenheim (electric guitar, electric viola), Ingebrigt Haker Flaten (double-bass, electronics), Paal Nilssen-Love (percussion). Also percussion/keyboards section of the incomparable Supersilent in duo-form as Stronen/Storlokken. This Norwegian-heavy and Rune Grammofon label-specific lineup reminds me of the excellent 'Northwest Passage' touring festival of last year, where Supersilent, Maja Ratkje and Arve Henriksen all performed both in San Francisco and Vancouver.
Epic times. Which, these look to possibly recreate:

LINK TO VANCOUVER JAZZ FESTIVAL

Hayao Miyazaki's new film "Howl's Moving Castle"

Japanese filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki's translation of the British childrens book of the same name is another indescribable thing of cinematic beauty. 'Howl's' does come across as his imagination being a bit stilted by the source material, but a 'stilted' Miyazaki film is still something that can amaze and inspire like nothing else in modern cinema. Somehow he manages to always take a truly idealistic perspective in his storytelling and save it from being naive of oversimplistic. And as always, the quality of the animation from Studio Ghibli and its consistency throughout the film is incomparable - no one is making 2-D animation to this quality standard anywhere else on the planet.

Those living in Seattle, Boston, San Francisco or NY have the benefit of seeing it as his films should be seen : SUBTITLED (none of that crap Disney dubbing) - thanks to Landmark Theatres having the insight to get both prints through.

LINK TO LANDMARK SITE

Yumi Kori Installations at COCA: Jun - Jul

YUMI KORI "DEFRAGMENTATIONRED"



Went to the opening for a Yumi Kori installation piece at COCA last night and maybe for the first time in some 5 years was actually REALLY IMPRESSED with the pieces at COCA and the overall show - personally, I've had a poor run of show/experiences at COCA for years on end, but this made up for it. Nice *Sound* work as part of the installation by Bernhard Gal who has released some of these sonic installation recordings on the Durian label

LINK TO YUMI KORI INSTALLATION GALLERY

The particular piece that was featured at COCA:

LINK TO COCA INSTALLATION