South San Francisco, CA March 1, 2015 Submitted by LIVE AT MISSION BLUE
Kitka Women’s Vocal Ensemble celebrates Women’s History Month with three concerts featuring highlights from their new CD release
I will remember everything
Fri., MARCH 6 | San Geronimo Valley Community Center, San Geronimo, CA
Sat MARCH 7 | Live at Mission Blue, Brisbane
Sun., MARCH 8 | 30th annual Jewish Music Festival, Freight & Salvage, Berkeley, CA
“Kitka’s songs are hauntingly beautiful, simple, yet otherworldly. The rich sound these women produce resonates as if energized by the universe itself, as if it were calling all live beings and still matter into togetherness and unity.” – Ching Chang, San Francisco Chronicle
Kitka Women’s Vocal Ensemble celebrates Women’s History Month with special concerts including one at MISSION BLUE in Brisbane
OAKLAND, CA, February 18, 2015 – The Bay Area’s trailblazing and internationally acclaimed women’s vocal ensemble, Kitka, celebrates Women’s History Month with three concerts featuring highlights from their new CD release I WILL REMEMBER EVERYTHING, a lyric biography of “Russia’s Sappho,” Sophia Parnok (1885-‐1933), composed by Eric Banks. Also on the program is music by Meredith Monk; a set of traditional women’s lullabies, love ballads and labor songs; as well as several original works and arrangements by Kitka singers and Eastern European composers. Kitka’s 35th anniversary season Women’s History Month concerts take place Friday, March 6 at the San Geronimo Valley Community Center in San Geronimo, CA; Saturday, March 7 at Live at Mission Blue in Brisbane, CA; and on Sunday, March 8 at the Freight and Salvage in Berkeley, CA. All performances begin at 8pm.
“This year’s Women’s History Month concerts pay special tribute to the voices of Jewish women, historical and contemporary,” says Shira Cion, executive artistic director of Kitka. “Our program will take audiences on a journey that brings history, encapsulated in song, into the present, inviting listeners to contemplate themes that are, in many cases, as urgent today as they were decades and centuries ago.”
Foremost among the voices Kitka gives song to on this program is that of Sophia Parnok, who was Russia’s first openly lesbian poet as well as a Jew. Her long-‐censored love poems take on new life in I will remember everything, an evening-‐length work which premiered in June 2014 as part of the National Queer Arts Festival and New Music Bay Area’s Garden of Memory Festival. Commissioned from Seattle composer-‐conductor Eric Banks, I will remember everything offers a “lyric biography” of the poet told through the poems she wrote to the women she loved, including Marina Tsvetaeva, one of Russia’s most revered Silver Age poets.
Kitka’s complete recording of I will remember everything will be released March 6 on the Diaphonica and Terpsichore labels. Kitka has released eleven critically acclaimed recordings. Its last recording, Cradle Songs, was named “One of the Top Ten CDs of 2009” by NPR, and one of the “Most Memorable Internationally-‐Flavored CDs of 2009” by the Los Angeles Times. CDs of I will remember everything may be purchased online for $15 a piece at kitka.org/store/index.html. An audio download of the release will become available later this spring, and the disc will be distributed internationally by Naxos.
Kitka’s concert program will also include excerpts from two works by Meredith Monk inspired by themes from Jewish history. Monk’s wordless opera Quarry (1976) and her film Book of Days (1988) “speak to events in Jewish history in an abstract yet viscerally emotive and beautiful way,” explains Cion.
Rounding out the program is a collection of traditional Yiddish and Ladino women’s songs. Among these are “Mayn Rue Platz” written by Yiddish labor poet Morris Rosenfeld to commemorate Manhattan’s Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire of 1911 and “Nit Zog Keynmol,” composed by Dmitri Pokrass to a poem by Hirsh Glik (1922-‐1944). This particular song became the hymn of the United Partisan Organization in 1943. It spread to camps in Eastern Europe and later to Jewish communities the world over. Today it is still sung at memorial meetings for martyred Jews.
Kitka’s concert at the Freight and Salvage on Sunday, March 8 – which coincidentally falls on International Women’s Day – is presented by the 30th annual Jewish Music Festival. That evening also includes the Shofar Award Ceremony honoring Ronnie Gilbert of the folk music revival group the Weavers. At 88 years old, Gilbert has worked tirelessly on behalf of civil rights and a range of social justice issues.
ABOUT KITKA
Kitka is an American women’s vocal arts ensemble inspired by traditional songs and vocal techniques from Eastern Europe. The Oakland-‐based octet has earned international recognition for its distinctive sound, exploring a vast palette of ancient yet contemporary-‐ sounding vocal effects. The ensemble’s earthy to ethereal timbres evoke an astonishing range of subtle to extreme inner states, instincts, and emotions. Kitka’s commitment to presenting traditional song as a living and evolving expressive art form has led to adventurous collaborations with some of the world’s most exciting indigenous musicians and contemporary composers ranging from Le Mystères des Voix Bulgares to Meredith Monk. Currently celebrating its 35th season, Kitka began as a grassroots group of amateur singers from diverse ethnic and musical backgrounds who shared a passion for the stunning dissonances, asymmetric rhythms, intricate ornamentation, and resonant strength of traditional Eastern European women’s vocal music. Since its informal beginnings, the group has evolved into an award-‐winning touring ensemble known for its artistry, versatility, and mastery of the demanding techniques of regional vocal styling, as well as for its innovative explorations in new music for women’s voices. Kitka’s wide-‐ranging performance, teaching, and recording activities have exposed millions to the haunting beauty of their unique repertoire. Kitka is Kelly Atkins, Caitlin Tabancay Austin, Briget Boyle, Barbara Byers, Shira Cion, Juliana Graffagna, Janet Kutulas and Corinne Sykes.
FACT SHEET
WHAT: Kitka Women’s Vocal Ensemble celebrates Women’s History Month with three CD release concerts.
WHEN & WHERE
Friday, March 6, 2015 at 8pm (pre-‐concert talk at 7:30pm) San Geronimo Valley Community Center 6350 Sir Francis Drake Blvd. San Geronimo, CA 94963 Tickets: $28 -‐ $35 Reservations: brownpapertickets.com/event/1289699 More info: sgvcc.org/artsevents/centerevents.html
****Saturday, March 7, 2015 at 8pm (pre-‐concert talk at 7:30pm) Live at Mission Blue 475 Mission Blue Dr. Brisbane, CA 94005 Tickets: $15 -‐ $20 Reservations: liveatmissionblue.com/tickets
Sunday, March 8, 2015 at 8pm 30th annual Jewish Music Festival with the Shofar Award Ceremony honoring Ronnie Gilbert Freight & Salvage 2020 Addison St. Berkeley, CA 94704 Tickets: $12 -‐ $28 Reservations: ticketfly.com/purchase/event/748187 More info: jewishmusicfestival.org/events/kitka
CD RELEASE:
Title: I will remember everything: A lyric biography of Sophia Parnok
Labels: Terpsichore and Diaphonica (distributed by Naxos)
Price: $15
To purchase: kitka.org/store/index.html
Media copies: Please contact Shira Cion at shira@kitka.org.