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(05/02/07 12:00pm)
I put off writing my goodbye until the last possible minute, probably because I don't want to face graduation and don't like writing about myself. But, with my classes finished and the last Signal on the stands, I guess it's time to start saying goodbye.
First, I have to say farewell to Eickhoff, which fed me for two years and housed me for two more. I'll miss you dorm, though I won't miss the food all that much.
Bliss Hall, I want to thank you for housing me for my journalism, classics and literature classes, which I'm going to miss in the boring 'ole working world.
Brower Student Center, thank you for your tasty veggie wraps, your overpriced bookstore, your 500 entrances and your basement, where I spent more Monday nights than I care to think about.
Bye to Travers 8 and Ely 3, where I learned what it's like to shower with shoes on and walk down the hall in a towel.
Oh, wait. Isn't there a saying about people being most important?
Well, the obligatory gracias goes to Matt Fair for assigning my first stories as a meek, over-enthused freshman and dealing with me when I called obsessively over articles that didn't matter much. Without such a good editor, I know I wouldn't have stuck with it; so you can blame him if you hear me talk about The Signal too much.
I definitely need to give special props to my children, Allie and James (it's alphabetical, don't fight), who helped me get through my year of Arts & Entertainment with a support system I couldn't have done without. I wish you two the best and I know you will kick major ass; I did train you, after all. Being "boss lady" was so much easier with your sweet ass journalism skillz and you both made the job worth every second.
Obviously I can't name everyone, but I want to thank the Signal-ites for making it such a fun, but weird place to put together a paper. I'll never be able to get the ridiculous inside jokes out of my head.
Upper management, you make quite the pair, and the office would be a lot less interesting without you. Sarcastic, witty news duo, I am going to miss you for your humor and your pretty Page Ones. Sports boys and Features putas, I'll miss you! John, my Travers 8 floormate and Signal co-worker, it's been awesome knowing you for so long, I guess.
To the A&E writers, reviewers and copy editors (past and present), thank you for dedicating your time because without you, there'd be no A&E section.
While I'm at it, I want to thank some of the greatest people I've ever met in my life. My hooches, Annie and Jess, I love you and we will be taking the world by storm with our sexiness post-graduation, for sure. Heather, I expect that we will be spending a lot of our jobless summer touring North Jersey diners. Lauren, it was surely fate that we both registered for the same FSP; I'll be listening to you on the radio forever and ever.
Jon and Nate, we will always be neighbors 4 lyfe, even when we're all living in different states. It's going to be so weird not being the third roommate! I don't know what I'm going to do with myself when we no longer share a wall.
And finally, to my roommate Eve; thanks for being awesome. Talk about fate; I never thought that one train ride together would make us two-year roomies, co-workers, travel companions and fianc?es.
(04/25/07 12:00pm)
Globalpalooza, a multicultural and multi-organization event sponsored by the College Union Board (CUB), filled Brower Student Center with food, games and performers from around the world on Saturday.
The event, the first of its kind, featured 31 College organizations working in teams to represent 15 countries.
Filling both the atrium and the food court of the student center, each country was set up at its own table where students were introduced to different cultures. Some participating students dressed in the cultural garb of their respective countries, adding to the atmosphere.
In the food court, a row of tables was set up for buffet-style eating with offerings from every country represented. While some organizations' members prepared the food, others took their allotted monies and brought in catered fare.
Both Greek and non-Greek organizations took part and were paired together randomly. "The whole point was unity. (It was about) bringing organizations together and bringing countries together," Katerina Gkionis, CUB event coordinator, said.
Globalpalooza also featured multicultural performances including a belly dancer, a sword demonstration, Greek folk dancing and Irish step dancing. There were also mimes wandering the atrium, interacting with students. While some performers were students from the College (including Gospel Choir Ministries and the Japanese Club), others were brought in for the event.
The organizations picked their respective countries from a list and were required to provide decorations, an interactive game or event, and enough food to feed 300 people. For example, Delta Phi Epsilon Sorority, the College Republicans and the Classics Club, which represented Italy, set up a game of bocce ball outside of the student center. Other activities included Chinese calligraphy (Phi Kappa Psi Fraternity and the Asian American Association) and henna tattoos (Sigma Pi Fraternity and the Indian Student Association).
Gkionis first pitched the idea to CUB in December. This semester she partnered with event coordinator Annie Raczko. "It was hard at first to get the idea off the ground," Gkionis said.
The turnout for the event was larger than anticipated, Gkionis said: "When I saw that buffet line, I was shocked." She and CUB expected around 300 attendees but she estimated the actual attendance was between 400 and 500 people.
Globalpalooza is being planned for next year based on the success of the event. Next year Gkionis said she hopes to get more organizations involved, plus vendors and involvement from the Ewing community.
"This is what I think we really need at (the College)," Gkionis said. "We all need to come together."
(04/25/07 12:00pm)
What kind of person is famous both for narrating Thomas the Tank Engine and propagating the words you can't say on TV? George Carlin, of course. Thanks to Celebration of the Arts, Carlin performed two nearly sold out shows on Friday in Kendall Hall.
After a 15-minute intermission and a recorded message of Carlin urging the audience to buy the merchandise on sale in the lobby, Carlin walked onstage to raucous applause. Typical of Carlin, he started the show with a hearty "Fuck you!" after asking the audience how they were doing. "I figure it this way," he said. "I'm here for me, you're here for me and no one's here for you."
However, he did take some time in his routine to offer the audience some lessons. He taught the audience three jokes, some he had heard along the way, that he said were for the audience to learn "so you can pass them on to friends and family." He called them the most disgusting jokes he'd ever heard. "But they're family jokes," he said, "because they're about family."
All three gags were prefaced with warnings about their vileness, preceding them with lessons on joke telling. The lesson on a joke's surprise element was prefaced with a joke about a little girl in the bathroom with her father. When she asked him when she gets a penis, he said, "When your mommy leaves for work."
The element of surprise is a very important part of a joke, Carlin said. The surprise, he said, was that "you weren't expecting mommy to have a job, were you?"
"A lot of people moan and groan when they hear this joke because they want to seem like better people than they are," he said.
Carlin, who differentiated himself as an "old fuck" rather than an old man, used his time on stage to poke fun at the government, U.S. culture and, of course, being old.
Carlin also joked about the tendencies people have to make stupid comments. "When someone dies, people say, 'Hey, did you know Phil Douglas died?' 'Phil D? I just saw him last week!' Well apparently that doesn't excuse him from physical laws," Carlin said.
Parts of his routine were dedicated to political commentary and women's rights in the form of several jokes, including his description of former First Lady Barbara Bush as a "silver douchebag."
Though Carlin used his age as a catalyst for many cracks, he showed he is technologically savvy with references to digital address books and YouTube. One benefit of getting old, he said, is scratching the names of dead people out of his address book. Or, if someone uses a computer program, he said you could put your dead contacts in digital purgatory.
"You can put them in their own folder and move them around. Put two people next to each other who didn't get along in real life and have them work it out."
During the show, Carlin frequently referred to a sheaf of notes containing his routine. He said he was practicing the material, which he was still learning. The routine will, in some form, be used for an HBO special being filmed next year.
Opener Vance Gilbert, Carlin's special guest, played a set uncharacteristic of a comedy show opener, performing bluesy songs on an acoustic guitar. Gilbert also beatboxed and "played" several instruments with vocal imitations of a trumpet and harmonica.
"I'm gonna do this Acapulco," he said, before putting his guitar aside, stepping away from the mic and singing a cappella.
Gilbert changed his shtick slightly for the second show, adding a song about "nappy headed hos."
Tim Asher, associate director of Student Activities, said about 1,600 tickets were sold. Carlin was at the College 10 years ago according to Asher, when he also performed two shows in Kendall.
(04/18/07 12:00pm)
Who says communism is dead? Not Karl Marx, who came to the College in the form of actor Robert Weick in the one-man show "Marx in Soho," written by Howard Zinn. The performance, co-sponsored by All College Theatre (ACT) and the Progressive Student Alliance (PSA), was in the Black Box Theatre on Wednesday.
Pink Floyd's "Money" set the stage for this politically ideological monologue performance of Marx's life. Weick was bearded and dressed like the 19th century German philosopher, revolutionary and writer of the "Communist Manifesto."
In the play, Marx was given the chance to return to the Earth for a short time to discuss the state of the world and tell his life story, reminiscing about his wife, Jenny, and his children, as well as his difficult life as a poor man in the Soho section of London.
"You weren't put off by all those idiots who say Marx is dead, were you? ... Well I am, but I'm not. Now that's dialectics for you," Marx said, addressing the audience with his story, discussing both his life in the 1800s plus the current state of the world and his problems with capitalism.
He referenced a merger of Fleet Bank with Bank of America, in which thousands lost their jobs. However, stocks rose, which financially makes this merger a good thing. "And you call this progress," he said, also mentioning the beggars that sit on streets dirty, hungry and cold.
Weick's Marx also spent time clarifying some aspects of the real Marx's philosophies. "Yes, I did describe religion as the opium of the people," he said, "but no one reads the whole passage." He then read the passage, a section that also calls religion "the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world and the soul of soulless conditions."
The audience learned about his wife, who he called his toughest critic. "She said, 'Do you know why the censors allowed you to publish 'Das Capital'? Because they couldn't understand it.'"
His monologue also helped to differentiate between his communism, where there is no person at the head of the government and everyone has an equal share in governing, and the communism of Soviet Russia. "They claim that communism is dead because of the fall of the Soviet Union," he said, raising his voice in agitation. "Do they think that a system run by a thug who kills other revolutionaries is a communist?"
He spent time talking about other revolutionaries, including his wife and daughter and their interest in female emancipation and the Irish struggle against England.
He told the story of a Paris commune, in which a socialist government ruled Paris for slightly over two months in 1871 and ended in a massacre.
Weick's Marx expressed his frustration with the state of the world several times throughout the play, with a very convincing haranguing of the audience and the world at large. "People must get off their asses," he said. "Does that sound too radical to you? Remember, to be radical, people must get to the root of a problem. And the root is us."
Referencing a medical malady of his own, Marx advised the audience to "pretend you have boils; that sitting on your ass gives you great pain. So you stand up."
Weick contacted Dave Weinstein, president of PSA, directly to bring the performance to campus. Weick is friends with author/historian Howard Zinn, who is scheduled to speak at the campus on April 25. "After (Weick) contacted us, we got together with ACT to make it happen," Weinstein said.
Weinstein said he felt it went well. "There was a nice crowd and the performance was superb," he said.
(04/11/07 12:00pm)
Sometimes it's easy to forget that Broadway shows are not all music, flashy sets and elaborate costumes. "Talk Radio" is one of those subtle, musical-number-free shows where the message sinks in after the final, silent scene plays out.
Starring Liev Schreiber as a shock-jock in Cleveland, the play revolves around his final local broadcast before he goes national.
Set in the '80s, before national syndication was as easy as satellite radio, Schreiber's character, Barry Champlain, is an angry, bitter man who has a short temper with both callers and co-workers.
Champlain ridicules his many callers, ranging from a neo-Nazi caller who threatens to mail a bomb to the studio to a duller-than-dirt caller who complains about the traffic. (The latter caller provokes a rage-laced shout directed at his producers: "I'm getting a fuckin' gun. Kill them all!")
Addicted to profanity and cigarettes, Champlain is obviously not amused by himself and spends some time waxing existentially both on- and off-air about his position as the much-worshipped, yet cringingly acerbic, radio personality. "I despise each and every one of you," he says at one point during his broadcast. "The only thing you believe in is me."
Champlain is not afraid to get emotional, exploding into a number of outbursts throughout the play. At times he appears to be near-total breakdown, making the play feel even more like a taboo look into the production of his broadcast.
When asked how Schreiber is able to keep the emotions up for every show he attributed "Jack Daniels and an eight-ball."
While the play focuses mainly on Champlain sitting behind a microphone, responding to callers (voiced by actors offstage), there are times when the other people around him get a chance to share their feelings.
Monologues from his assistant and occasional lover/"girlfriend" Linda (played by Stephanie March of "Law & Order: SVU") and station manager Dan (Peter Hermann) serve to put focus on other characters, though you don't get to know them much beyond the monologues.
Each character describes what Barry means to him in an emotional turn directed at the audience, showing that though people can't figure out why, they're obsessed with him.
At times Champlain's outbursts seem frighteningly real and the show is far from a happy look into the life of a radio personality. However, it does well to delve into the psyche of a talk host about to take his angry rhetoric to the masses, particularly now, at a time when radio hosts have, in some cases, gained celebrity status and even notoriety. (Take for example the backlash against radio's Don Imus for his insulting descriptions of the Rutgers University women's basketball team.)
"Talk Radio" offers audience members the chance to take a second look at what it's like to go national when "going national" was a very unusual event.
The play's message is summed up in one of Champlain's tirades: "I'm here to lead you by the hand through the dark forest of your own hatred and anger and humiliation. You're afraid of the boogeyman, but you can't live without him. Your fear, your own lives have become entertainment."
The play, written for the stage by Eric Bogosian (also an actor who can currently be seen on "Law & Order: Criminal Intent"), has been on-stage before, wherein Bogosian played Champlain.
It was also made into a film, though the two endings are quite different. Bogosian, however, chose not to use the alternate movie ending. "We were doing a revival of the play," he said in a post-show interview.
"My primary interest is the individual and how he's trapped," Bogosian said of the play and its near-obsessive focus on Champlain's character.
"Talk Radio" runs for 1 hour and 45 minutes with no intermission, so don't expect to make any Milk Dud runs.
The intimate setting also means that getting there a little late, while not disruptive to the show, is a bit unsettling. However, it does add more gravity to the show, offering a voyeuristic view into what starts to feel like a real radio broadcast.
"Talk Radio" is at the Longacre Theatre on West 48th Street in New York. Student tickets are available for $26.25 at the box office two hours prior to curtain. Purchasers are limited to two tickets per student ID.
(04/04/07 12:00pm)
Again, an area college has been cursed with the tragic loss of a freshman. A year after John Fiocco Jr. went missing, Rider University, our neighbor in Lawrenceville, has to come to terms with the death of one of its own.
When someone is trying to console you, he'll often say that they "know how you feel." The truth is, you'll never know what it's like to lose a member of your community because no two situations are the same. At the same time, you can empathize with someone. We at the College don't know exactly what you're feeling at Rider, but we know the symptoms. I hope that maybe you'll be spared some of the parasitic media attention that we endured last year, and I hope that your school isn't subjected to overbearing new policies because of this tragedy.
I don't know what Gary DeVercelly was like or anyone who was friends with him, but I know that he was a student like us who made a mistake and suffered because of it. I know whatever comments the naysayers make when something like this happens aren't going to change the way college students live, nor does it make DeVercelly a bad person, an alcoholic or victim to an "evil" Greek system.
Though I never met him, I know that I believe every good thing I've read about him, because I'm sure they're all true. What I can't understand is the ridiculous information swarming around and how poorly the brothers of Phi Kappa Tau have come across in the news. But sadly, I have to believe the media is willing to do it because it happened here.
Students here at the College know full well what it's like to have to grieve in public and what it's like to be expected to offer a soundbite in the middle of a memorial service.
It's horrible to read about your school, or see it on television, and know that you're being misrepresented. Seeing your friends trying to escape from reporters and having to cringe because of every piece of misinformation in the news is a horrible feeling. It's not nearly as bad as the pain of losing a friend, a classmate and a brother, but it definitely doesn't make the healing any easier.
Just know that here at the College, we're feeling for you guys. You just have to take it in stride and watch what you say to the reporters swarming your campus. The public spectacle will fade with time and you can start to heal as a community and family.
(04/04/07 12:00pm)
The College Union Board (CUB) and organizations from four other New Jersey schools co-sponsored the New Jersey Music Festival, the first event of its kind in the College's history, held on Friday at Richard Stockton College.
The show featured hip-hop artists Common, Yung Joc and the BurnDown All-Stars and was attended by students from the College, Stockton, Georgian Court University, Rowan University and Monmouth University.
All three acts had one common theme: audience participation. While the openers, BurnDown All-Stars, relegated its interaction to security guards and audience-participation chants, both Yung Joc and Common had audience members onstage for parts of their performances.
Headliner Common interacted with the audience by coming up to the railing to sing into the crowd.
He asked for participation and gave the audience advice while expressing his beliefs.
"Our court system is really fucked up, you know that right?" he asked before launching into another of his poetic, introspective songs. "This is street radio for unsung heroes."
His performance was heavy on conscience, sensuality and percussion, utilizing his band for emphasis during songs.
"My favorite performer was definitely Common just because I've always been a huge fan of his," NJ Emenuga, senior biology major, said. "His music was great and he was very active onstage and he tried to keep the crowd involved."
Common invited a female audience member onstage, whom he danced with and serenaded.
He also invited an "aspiring emcee" on to freestyle rap with him.
He took some time out of his performance to pay homage to "the foundation of hip-hop" by giving DJ Dummy a solo in which he dominated the turntables for an awe-inspiring scratch of Rob Base's "It Takes Two."
His performance, which included spinning backward, using his head and singing along had even the concert security turning around from their stoic crowd-watching positions.
When supporting act Yung Joc took the stage, he scanned the crowd for a female to bring onstage with him, asking security to find him the "biggest, prettiest girl you can find."
The winner, Jamie Mann, freshman deaf education/sociology major from the College, rushed across the crowd to climb the stairs onto the stage while visibly shaking with excitement.
After getting a lap dance from a wife-beater-wearing Yung Joc, he asked if there was anyone she wanted to bring up onto the stage with her. Mann yelled for her friend, freshman elementary education/English major Tekeya Winstead.
Winstead said she wasn't nervous "at all" about being onstage. "I was really excited," she said. "I was all over the place; I almost fell going up the stairs to the stage. I felt like a superstar."
She also said she was thrilled when Mann called her onstage. "I owe her big time," Winstead said.
Yung Joc spent some time interacting with the rest of the audience as well, imploring people to sing along and cheer.
He also offered $50 to anyone in the audience who knew the title of his album and the day it was released, though no one was knowledgeable or vocal enough to win.
Yung Joc later pulled out his Treo and gave the audience his phone number, offering the $50 to the first girl to call.
"But she gotta be quick," he said, rapping the Atlanta-based number several times.
The "winner," however, walked away with nothing but the satisfaction of having been on display.
The BurnDown All-Stars, a Philadelphia band who has performed at the Rathskeller, opened the show with a 12-man crew including guitarists, a drummer and a DJ.
The rappers in the group exchanged rhymes and places, with different members coming on for various songs. The entire group was onstage only for the final song, "B.D.A.S." The band combined various song styles including rap, reggae and rock influences for a high-energy performance while students trickled into the venue.
Stockton had a security system that students here at the College were not used to, being told to leave all bags and cameras in the vehicles they came in.
Each student was subjected to a trip through a metal detector as well as a frisking from a security guard.
Broken up by sexes, students were required to line up before entering the A&R Sports Center and to pull anything remotely metal out of their pockets, including packs of gum.
"I was a little annoyed about how uptight they were being about bringing things in - I couldn't even bring my purse inside! I thought that was outrageous," Emenuga said.
The artists were not immune to the security measures either. They were required to wear passes, and many of the musicians were still sporting them during their performances.
After lackluster sales, CUB chose to give away tickets to the show, also offering a free bus ride to and from Stockton. In the end, CUB gave away 440 tickets and had two buses full of students. Some did choose to drive the hour-and-a-half to Stockton.
Even with the security and long-distance bus rides, Tara Conte, director of CUB, said the event was a success. "Everything went really smoothly and everyone seemed to be having a great time," she said. "I think CUB would definitely be open to doing another show. We were able to do something innovative and unique with a real sense of college community."
(03/28/07 12:00pm)
After sluggish ticket sales, the College Union Board (CUB) and the Student Finance Board have decided to make tickets to Friday's New Jersey Music Festival free for College students.
The tickets, which were $15, will be limited to two per ID and are available on a first-come, first-served basis.
They will be available in the Brower Student Center atrium until Friday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. unless tickets are exhausted.
The show, which features rappers Common, Yung Joc and Burndown Allstars, is scheduled to be held at the Sports Center at Richard Stockton College at 8 p.m.
"This is such a new and exciting collaborative event that we want to give all interested the opportunity to attend," Tara Conte, CUB director and senior English major, said.
CUB will also be offering free busing to and from the concert.However, there is a $15 refundable deposit to save a seat on the bus.
Students who are taking the bus will not receive their tickets until they get on the bus and will receive the $15 deposit in cash en route.
Any student requesting tickets after noon on Thursday will not be eligible for bus transportation.
Students who have already purchased tickets are eligible for a refund.
Those who were planning to drive themselves should go to the ticket table or the CUB office for more information on the refund.
The buses will leave from the student center at 5:30 p.m. on Friday.
Five schools are sponsoring this show: the College, Georgian Court University, Monmouth University, Rowan University and Richard Stockton.
"Five schools plus three acts equals one awesome time," Conte said.
(02/21/07 12:00pm)
As a part of the Black Student Union's (BSU) celebration of Black History Month, the organization showcased reproductions of artwork from famous black artists in L'Artiste Noir.
Sharna Scott, BSU Webmaster, said the event is "part of arts and entertainment week for BSU."
The pieces used were chosen and then researched by members of BSU. The event focused on artists from different time periods and different styles, Scott said.
The reproductions included photographs, images of sculptures and paintings.
The artists whose work was on display included James John Audobon, who was the namesake of the Audubon Society.
Audubon was an ornithologist and naturalist who painted, catalogued and described the birds of North America.
His 435-print collection, "Birds of America," is the standard for bird artists.
He was born in Haiti, the illegitimate son of a French sea captain/slavemaster and a woman who may have been a slave.
Another artist whose work was featured was Jean-Michel Basquiat, a Neo-expressionist artist born in Brooklyn, N.Y.
He started as a graffiti artist, but his later Neo-expressionist works made him a leading figure in contemporary art.
Basquiat also collaborated with Andy Warhol and painted together, influencing each other's works.
BSU's exhibit also showcased reproductions from Gordon Parks, a photographer who was well-known for his photography essays in Life magazine.
Parks was the first African-American to work at Life and the first to write, direct and score a Hollywood film. He was the director of the 1971 movie "Shaft."
Other works included reproductions of pieces by Selma Burke, Ernie Barnes, Elizabeth Catlett and Aaron Douglass.
(02/14/07 12:00pm)
Prolific composer Samuel Adler spent some time at the College last week lecturing, teaching classes and sitting in on a performance by Duo Fresco, which played one of his pieces.
The members of the chamber music-playing Duo Fresco, Brett Deubner on viola and Christopher Kenniff on guitar, played seven pieces, some modified for their instruments and some written expressly for the duo.
Duo Fresco performed "Into the Radiant Boundaries of Light," a piece written by Adler, who gave the performance a standing ovation. It was written in 1994 and, according to Adler, has been played many times before. After the performance, Adler said "they played better than anybody" he'd seen before. "I can't say enough about it," he said.
The songs performed by the duo are considered chamber music, which is a form of classical music written for a small group of instruments and traditionally played in a palace chamber or a small room.
All but one song that the duo performed had movements, or parts, that were each approximately two to three minutes long. Each movement is named separately and the titles generally refer to the speed and sound. "Duo Concertante," which was written in 2005 for Duo Fresco by composer Frank Ezra Levy, has six movements. It starts with "Con Moto," which means "with movement."
"It's a beautiful piece," Deubner said before commencing.
Duo Fresco also rearranged one of the pieces, "Canciones Espagnoles," which was originally written for voice and piano. "I took the voice (arrangement) and made it my own," Deubner said.
The duo also came back on stage for an encore in which they played a short piece by composer Siegfried Berlin.
The concert, held on Feb. 7, was the first time the members of Duo Fresco had met Adler, though they've spoken on the phone before. "He's just such a kind person, so supportive," Kenniff said of Adler. According to Kenniff, Adler is enthusiastic about a composition he wrote for Duo Fresco. The "Five Choral Scherzi" is written for the viola, guitar and a mixed choir.
The members of Duo Fresco have been performing together for four years. Kenniff was at a Halcyon Trio performance at Kean University where he saw Deubner playing. "I was looking for a viola player," Kenniff, who thought Deubner was perfect for a duo, said.
Duo Fresco's concert season mirrors the school year with festivals in the summer. Kenniff said the group's schedule varies, however. "This week, we performed five times," he said, "but other times we might not play for a month."
"Frankly, I'm addicted to concerts," junior music major Christina Merwitz said, when asked why she attended. "Music inspires music. I'm a composer and I benefit from hearing contemporary composers," she said.
Merwitz was also a student in one of the classes Adler guest-taught. He began her Feb. 8 orchestration class with a quiz on how to write for certain instruments and "how to think about them as composers and performers." Adler also compared pieces, discussing why each sounded as it did.
Merwitz also picked up information from Adler's lecture. "He advised that when composing for a specific instrument or performer, think as that instrument or performer," she said. "If you make composing personal to them and to yourself and love every single note you write down, your music will be fresh and captivate any audience."
She said this method influenced her and impacted her so much that she took notes on it. "Samuel Adler's passion for music is truly inspiring," Merwitz said. "He makes me feel very proud to be a classical musician."
Adler was born in to a Jewish family in Manheim, Germany in 1928 and fled to the United States in 1939, where he was educated at both Boston and Harvard universities. From 1966 to 1995 he taught at the Eastman School of Music until he retired. He is now a member of the composition faculty at the Julliard School of Music.
He has written "three seminal textbooks," according to James Lentini, the dean of the school of Art, Media and Music, who brought Adler and Duo Fresco to the College.
(02/07/07 12:00pm)
Guitarist and junior English major Kevin Kelly loves "Star Trek." Bassist Shane Callahan will be going to school to learn how to build guitars. Lead singer Dominic Lorusso is a graphic designer and "has some obnoxious sneakers." This is all according to drummer Lou Muzyczek, who has a motorcycle, but no one he knows thinks it's cool.
These are the guys that make up French Girls, a band comprised of students from the College and Rowan University. The band played its second show at the College last Friday after competing in a Battle of the Bands in Spring 2006.
The guys started the band in early 2006, after Lorusso, Muzyczek and Callahan, all roommates at Rowan, began jamming in their apartment. They "began playing around with song ideas that would later make their way into the French Girls repertoire," Kelly said. "I had played in a few bands with Dom in the past, so one day, he got down on one knee and invited me to start playing with them."
Lorusso writes most of the lyrics, while the music is a collaboration between the three other members.
"As for the music," Lorusso, from Cinnaminson, said, "It's usually one of us will come up with the skeleton of the song, and then once we bring in to practice, we'll flesh it out."
The band just finished recording a CD, which the guys are hoping to have ready by the spring. The album was recorded at Attic Studios outside of Doylestown, Pa.
Muzyczek, of Pennsauken, credits "television shows, movies, historical events and crack-pot theories about aliens and people living at the center of the earth" for the songs' unusual titles. Some titles include "Amateur Vampires" and "Bonesaw is Ready." "Occasionally they relate to the lyrics of a song, but, quite honestly, not often," Kelly said.
The sound of the band is a mix of various styles, including jazz, punk and Latin music. Lorusso described the sound as eclectic. "One moment you'll be hearing a dreamy Radiohead-esque part, then next it'll be a freak-out Mars Volta-inspired part," he said. "When we come up with a new song, it's no holds-barred. We'll play whatever and try to make a song from it."
"Our songs are asymmetrical - I think in a very positive way," Kelly said. "They play more like musical narratives than conventional, more formulaic songs, which might have distinct choruses and verses in predictable locations."
Callahan, from Medford, said, "We try to take our different influences and digest them, so we're not just spitting something out that sounds exactly like this band or that band."
The members of this South Jersey band all take some inspiration from the Philadelphia music scene, which Kelly described as "a very musically rich region."
Lorusso said the ethic of many Philadelphia artists has influenced the band. "Most bands from Philly don't have huge egos and act like rock stars. We try to go with that same sort of mentality," he said.
French Girls won second place in Rowan's Battle of the Bands and has played at other local venues, including the Circle Thrift in Philadelphia, which Lorusso and Callahan credited as their favorite place to date that the band has played.
"There is nothing like having a bunch of people in your face while playing music and just totally sharing the moment with the band," Callahan said. "To me, that is what playing a show is all about . one big giant sharing experience of the moment."
Though the band has not been on tour yet, it hopes to hit the road if the album is well-received and if the members can find the time between school and work. "I would like to see us go somewhere beyond a hobby," Callahan said. "Touring would be great. I have never been on tour and just look forward to the experience."
Many of the songs' lyrics are fantasy inspired. "They're mini-narratives that describe far away lands and humans who find themselves in epic situations," Kelly said. Though he hesitated to call the CD a "concept album," he said there is thematic continuity between the songs.
"Basically, we write songs about crazy stuff and it makes you want to shake it," Callahan said.
(01/31/07 12:00pm)
"You leave college the same way you went into preschool: stumbling around, clothes on backwards . and both times you're carrying a bottle," comedian Lee Camp said to the rows of students in Kendall Hall on Saturday night.
Camp and two other comedians, Amy Anderson and Retta, were on campus for the College Union Board's (CUB) "Welcome Back Weekend" show.
All three comedians stuck with relatively safe routines, touching on subjects like dogs in sweaters, Wal-Mart, the war on terror and dating.
Each comedian spent a significant amount of time making fun of discrimination, repeatedly impressing upon the audience the ridiculousness of stereotyping.
Camp drew laughs, some uncomfortable, from the audience when talking about Mr. Clean as an advertising image. "When I see a huge skinhead neo-Nazi, I think clean," he said.
Anderson, who was adopted from South Korea as a 5-month-old by a family in Minnesota, told stories about her childhood in which she was both picked on for being Asian and subjected to ignorant comments in her all-white neighborhood.
Anderson joked about the drive-by discrimination she's received, telling a story about teenaged boys who drove past her yelling "ching chong."
She could only assume it was meant to be derogatory, however, since she said she doesn't speak any Asian languages. "They could have actually been saying something, but I don't know," she said.
She also utilized her on-stage time to recommend a Web site to the audience. She found out about ratemypoo.com from a friend who she said spends too much time online.
Anderson said she found herself "judging the poo" on the site, rating each on a scale of one to 10. "Go ahead and judge me," she said, "but you're going to go back to your room and look it up."
Anderson also announced that she was having a baby, which elicited applause from the audience. "Strangers get really excited for me," she said about announcing her pregnancy.
The final performer, New Jersey native Retta, scanned the crowd early into her set before proclaiming, "I am not scared of a lot of things, but I am scared of a man with a mullet." What she found more frightening, however, is "a black man with a mullet."
Retta, from Edison, told the audience about a college show she performed in "Iowa, or Idaho, one of those useless things," where she was put up in a Super 8 Motel.
She walked into the bathroom and discovered the 2-by-1-inch bar of soap. "They expect this," she said, holding up a bar of tiny soap, "to wash all of this," gesturing at her larger stature.
At one point, she directed her comments to the females in the audience: "How many women think men should shave their armpits? Cuz seriously, this Don King in a headlock is not attractive."
When only a few people raised their hands, she thanked them for their honesty and told the story of her epiphany.
She was watching MTV Unplugged and L.L. Cool J. was performing. As he raised his arms, she said, "It looked like someone had crumbled a Double Stuf Oreo in there."
Though both Anderson and Retta said they don't change their routines unless required, they both said that jokes resound differently depending on the audience, even among college students.
At some schools they are required to take out the sex jokes and the profanity. Anderson said she asked members of CUB if she would have to take anything out, but was told she could say whatever she wanted.
Both Anderson and Retta said they thought the show went well. "I appreciate (being here)," Retta said. "I get to pay my mortgage this month."
(01/24/07 12:00pm)
Before you get too bogged down in classes, this is your chance to get winter break out of your system. Best of all, you can even get where you're going for free. Once again, New Jersey Transit is offering a free week of public transportation for students.
Go to njtransit.com, fill out the short (and really easy) survey and print out the free ride coupon to present to the train conductor or bus driver on any NJ Transit line. The promotion lasts until Sunday, Jan. 28 and started Jan. 22.
Here are some lesser-known places that NJ Transit can take you, as long as you're willing to be a bit adventurous.
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The Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York City is often overlooked when compared to its more famous "Museum Mile" companions, namely the Guggenheim and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
This weekend could be the perfect time to travel farther north on Fifth Avenue and explore the triennial "Design Life Now" exhibition, which honors ingenious design work by individuals and firms in every imaginable field from architecture and technology to graphics and fashion.
Apple's iPod and Google are some of the more recognizable examples of radical design that fill multiple floors of the castle-like museum.
One fascinating piece is the display from Hanson Robotics. David Hanson worked on Disneyland animatronics before creating "a patent-pending polymer 'skin' called Frubber." The material "moves the way real skin moves."
Layered over motors and artificial muscles, it allows a robot's face to appear eerily realistic.
Hanson's robotic Albert Einstein, on view in this exhibition, is "the first walking, talking robot with human expressions."
The mix of both familiar and cutting-edge design really illustrates the range of human creativity and industrial innovation.
The Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum is located on the corner of Fifth Avenue and 91st Street. From Penn Station, walk across town to the 33rd Street 4, 5, 6 subway station on Lexington Avenue and take any train (or the Madison Avenue northbound bus) up to 86th Street.
Student admission is $9. Visit peoplesdesignaward.org/designlifenow to browse all the design submissions.
- Eve Roytshteyn, Photo Editor
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With winter weather finally upon us, there is no better way to spend the first weekend back to school than by taking a trip to Mountain Creek Ski Resort in Vernon, N.J.
Since the temperatures have dropped below April flowers weather, the snow makers at local ski resorts are in action, offering trails for both the experienced boarders and skiers and those who are willing to fall a few dozen times on the bunny slopes.
Not only is it easy to get to, Mountain Creek is also good for beginner and intermediate skiers and snowboarders. It's big skiing for a small resort.
If you can't make it this week, you can always catch the bus to Mountain Creek on another weekend and use your receipt to get up to $10 off lift tickets.
To get to Mountain Creek, you'll have to take one of the many buses that go to the Port Authority terminal in New York City. Catch the 194 bus, which is an extension to the original route.
The bus only runs on Saturdays and you have to get there early: It leaves at 7:30 a.m. The bus leaves Mountain Creek at 4:30 p.m. It also stops at the Willowbrook Mall, so in case you chicken out you can always go shopping.
If it's your first time, check out mountaincreek.com/mountain_info/first_timers_guide/index.htm for hints and tips, plus other stuff in the area.
- Candida DeFonseca, Arts & Entertainment Editor
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If you want a night on the town and you're tired of the Ewing scene, take a trip to Hoboken. The Hudson County town has become a hot spot for young bar hoppers and concertgoers.
Maxwell's is a small venue where you can have dinner, get some drinks and listen to good music. Though it serves drinks, you don't have to be 21 to enter. But if you are legal, keep the drink specials in mind. There is a different one every night of the week. There are performers every night this week. The schedule is available at maxwellsnj.com.
Catch the Northeast Corridor NJ Transit train from Trenton or Hamilton to Newark Penn Station and get on the PATH train (for $1.50) to Journal Square for a transfer to the Hoboken train. From the PATH station, take a cab for $3, a bus that goes to Washington Street or go for a walk.
For in-depth directions, go to maxwellsnj.com/directions.html.
(12/06/06 12:00pm)
With Winter Break fast approaching, those of you who aren't working for the man might need something to do. While you could hang out at the local diner until 4 a.m., you could also grab a few friends and spend an evening having some cultured fun in New York City watching a Broadway play.
I was lucky enough to check out a new show on Broadway called "Spring Awakening." About a group of teenagers and their struggles during adolescence, particularly with their sexualities, the show is set in Germany during the 1890s.
However, don't let that fool you. Music by Duncan Sheik (yes, that Duncan Sheik), lyrics by Steven Sater and a contemporary script has made the play not only timeless, but easy to follow and even funny.
But don't get the idea that this is a comedy, because it is far from "The Taming of the Shrew." The story, while amusing in parts, and with funny, easily relatable songs like "Totally Fucked," covers very serious topics like teen pregnancy, depression and the pressures of trying to be perfect.
Living in an oppressive society, this group of 11 teens has to discover what to do with their hormones and their constant thoughts about sex (remember being 16?) when some don't even know what sex is.
The first scene even has Wendla, the main female character, discussing with her mother how babies are made. "Mama, I'm an aunt for the second time and I still don't know how it happens!" Wendla said, begging for an explanation.
Her mother, however, would offer only that when a husband and wife really love each other, they have a baby. This lie leads to serious consequences later in the play, more grave than you'd ever expect. Oh the suspense!
Wendla's love interest, Melchior, played by Jonathan Groff, is the protagonist of the story.
He starts off as the popular, attractive and intelligent "bad boy" who questions the doctrine of the authority figures surrounding the teens.
Sater said that one of the changes to the play from the original was the focus on Melchior's story, "creating a journey for Melchior. The first and last songs didn't even exist until we had his journey," Sater said.
The show, after being performed off-Broadway for six years, has finally moved up to the big stage at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre, as has one of its players. Lea Michele, who plays Wendla, has been with the production since it started, and has been playing the part since she was 14. "I don't think I'll ever get comfortable," Michele said about playing the role for so long.
She said both she and the material have changed so much. "I don't feel like it's the same show. It brings an air of excitement to every performance," she said.
The production team worked on the show for eight years, including its time off-Broadway, before bringing it to Broadway.
Director Michael Mayer discussed some of the ideas that went into this version of the production. "However the songs functioned, they needed to be different from a regular musical," he said.
Modern lyrics sung to a rock background (with the band onstage) have made this show different than any other on the stage now, and the songs nearly become central characters.
The actors even pull microphones from all sorts of secret hiding places for each solo, pulling away from the narrative and emphasizing the music.
Sheik refuted comparisons to "Rent" that have been made in the media. "But God, I would love for it to be as successful as 'Rent,'" he said.
Many songs have been added, and some cut during the production of the play, before the play made it onto a Broadway stage.
Producer Tom Hulce said at one point the show had a narrator, who was cut as the production moved away from the original written play.
Sater said the team was concerned about bringing the play to Broadway. "You want to push the envelope as an artist," he said, referencing how unusual the show is, but "the economics are really scary, though the audience responds well. With yet another Disney show on every year, I don't think they're ever going to leave," he joked.
(11/29/06 12:00pm)
Rocking Kendall Hall on Nov. 14, Guster, half of whom are from the Garden State and proud of it, played to a nearly full house. The band played the big fall show sponsored by the College Union Board (CUB) on the main stage at Kendall, supported by the New York City-based band Sam Champion.
Fifty percent of the band is from Jersey, percussionist Brian Rosenworcel said in an interview before the show. "We wonder if we should call ourselves a Jersey band," he said. Though they still say the band is Boston-based, the addition of Joe Pisapia, bassist from Rahway, has tipped the scales, according to Rosenworcel.
"I think you need to keep writing new material to keep the set fresh," Rosenworcel said, in regard to what he's learned in his years of touring. After touring for a while the material gets stagnant, Rosenworcel said, and the band members then enter the studio and record 12 more songs. "When you're in the studio, you itch for the road; too long with each one and you itch for the other," he said. "You've gotta keep a healthy cycle going."
The show started with some tension between audience members and police officers hired for security when students didn't want to sit during the performance. "This is such a bad way to start a show," Adam Gardner, lead singer, said with apprehension.
However, a compromise was reached and students stood in their seats, cheering relentlessly for the band. Between the second and third songs of the set, Gardner checked with those in attendance to be sure everything was resolved. The band had "never been so punk rock" as to have to stop mid-song, Gardner said. "The children want to stand!"
Fan favorites, including "Airport Song," got big reactions from the crowd. "Airport Song" was accompanied by ping pong balls tossed from the crowd onto the stage, an event that happens at every Guster show.
"Come Downstairs And Say Hello," an upbeat, percussion-filled song, was met with loud crowd approval, particularly from those in the balcony. Rosenworcel played with bare hands, accomplishing what no drumstick ever could.
It was obvious that Gardner did his homework before getting to the College. "Is it true that your mascot is a lion?" he asked the audience, mentioning that he looked up the College before getting here. "And is it true that his name is Roscoe?" Gardner said that after reading that, he had to stop because "everything after that wouldn't be as cool."
When asked what song he was most excited to play before the show, Rosenworcel said "'Ruby Falls,' in a nice theater, as compared to a college auditorium . Adam (Gardner) is still learning to play the trumpet solo" that's featured in the song. He said that Gardner only learned to play after the band needed someone to learn the solo. "When we record we never worry about how we're going to pull it off on tour because we always do," Rosenworcel said.
He took time between songs to share other stories with the audience, including an anecdote about the worst Guster show ever, which he said was at a prom in an urban school in Massachusetts. "There isn't a whiter band on this planet," he said.
After the main set, Gardner told the audience that if they clapped loud enough and for long enough, the members of the band who were from Jersey, "if any," would come out for an encore. After the cheers, Pisapia and Gardner came out, joined soon after by the other two members of the band. The band played two encores, the first with a song about Jersey to which Gardner added a line about Roscoe, the College's beloved mascot.
During the second encore, the band played an acoustic version of "Jesus on the Radio" at the edge of the stage. Pisapia played the banjo and Rosenworcel played the tambourine to a quiet audience.
"I had my share of doubts as to whether they could pull together an energetic show," Jake Voytko, senior computer science major, said. "But they sounded great and their front man was hysterical."
Opener Sam Champion, named after the weatherman from ABC's New York affiliate WABC, kept the audience engaged and was met with loud, appreciative applause. With a curly blond mop fitting for a china doll, the bassist, Jack Dolgen, shook his head in time with the crescendo of guitar played by Ryan Thornton. Rosenworcel chose the band as the opener, having produced their record.
"I think the show was absolutely fabulous," Katerina Gkionis, the Guster concert coordinator, said. "It was such a great feeling when the show started and everyone went crazy, and I saw everyone having such an amazing time ... we made people smile."
After the show, the band took a trip to an off-campus house for a game of beer pong, to be filmed for a collaboration between its record label, Warner, and YouTube to record Guster's New Year's Resolution to "spend more time with their fans - playing beer pong." The party at senior history major Jono De Leon's house, where both Sam Champion and Guster spent about an hour playing, was filmed for the Web site.
Their visit ended with broken glass, when someone had to bust the rear window on their rental car when the keys were locked in.
(11/29/06 12:00pm)
A cadre of talented music students filled Kendall Hall Nov. 17 with the smooth, soulful sounds of jazz as a part of the Music Department's Jazz Ensemble, directed by Gary Fienberg, assistant professor of music.
A final performance for students of the Jazz Lab class, taught by Fienberg, the students treated the audience of students and relatives alike to the pieces they learned through the semester.
The students played songs by jazz greats Duke Ellington, Benny Carter and Rich DeRosa, among many others. It was apparent that not only did the students know the songs, but they also loved the form, tapping their feet and nodding with the songs' rhythms.
Many of the songs were prefaced with a description and history, told by Fienberg. What interests Fienberg about jazz, he said during the ensemble, is "how it teaches us about ourselves, about America."
Jazz has its roots in a number of musical styles and is rich with history, taking elements of African music, blues, ragtime and even European marching bands, interpreted at the ensemble by students playing a variety of horns, a piano, a bass and an even an electric guitar.
Even without lyrics, the songs conveyed stories deeper and more heartfelt than most contemporary novels.
The emotions buried within the notes were released with the help of ensemble play and student solos.
The songs were a mix between older and more contemporary jazz, and some of the songs were amalgams within themselves. "One Note Samba," by composer Antonio Carlos Jobim, evolved from Brazilian dance music.
In the 1950s, Jobim became a star in Brazil, with his samba-influenced jazz piece, a calming song with some instrumental pyrotechnics that kept audience members' feet tapping.
Besides single solos by many of the students, and even one from Fienberg on the trumpet, there were dueling saxophones played by music majors freshman Stephen Voelker on tenor sax and junior Steven Cooney on alto during "A Blues for Dave," by Doug Beach.
The song also featured a trombone solo by junior music major Jeff Auriemma and a guitar solo from junior criminology and justice studies major Brandon Burke.
DeRosa's "The Funk Stops Here" added a funky twist to the night, with a song that combined elements of jazz and funk, keeping the song list fresh and unusual.
The last song was a '70s inspired romp, flooding the hall with jazz-tinged-soul in Bob Curnow's "Scorpion Dance." A trumpet solo accompanied it, played by Ben Krupit, freshman music major.
The show ended on a good note, or several good notes, as the song soothed and seduced the audience before they were deposited into the cold of that Friday night.
(11/15/06 12:00pm)
Friday night, the Mayo Concert Hall was filled to the brim with comedy enthusiasts vying for seats in the sold-out venue to hear Dat Phan, the first-season winner of "Last Comic Standing."
As part of the Asian American Association's Experience Asia month, Phan joked about racists, Asian stereotypes, his parents and his childhood.
Some people, Phan joked, are so racist they don't even know it. "Y'all Mexicanese, crossing the border on your boats," he said.
Making several jokes about his mom, he mentioned her thriftiness at the supermarket. His family grew up poor, so his mother was a "coupon mom." She would go to the register with $200 worth of groceries, pull out her "coupon bible" and be left with a $10 bill.
"My mom's so gangster at the supermarket, dude," Phan said, joking that he and his mother would get into the 10 items or less line with 20 items, "which we didn't pay for because of coupons," and she would give him 10 items, yelling to the cashier that she didn't know him. "She gave me the money to pay (and yelled) 'I don't know him!'"
He also commented on the new style in baby adoptions, with white celebrities like Angelina Jolie adopting children from Asia. "I want to be the first Asian guy to adopt a white girl," Phan said.
Phan also discussed his ex-girlfriends. "I think it's every son's job to bring home a good girl," he said. "I'm surprised she hasn't turned me gay yet," he said, explaining that his mother never approved of any of his girlfriends, most of whom were white.
"I know all you white girls are angry with Asian girls for taking your white guys. You know the way to get back at them: have sex with me!"
He said his interest in comedy started in college, when "I realized I was the only Asian who failed math, and what's worse, the five people who sat around me failed too."
He went to a two-year college "for seven years" and dropped out when he realized he didn't want to be a Spanish teacher, he said.
Opening for Phan was Chris Clobber, his co-writer and the one who cuts his material down, helps him modify it and make it funnier. "I call him my Yoda," Phan said.
Clobber called himself a "chubby chaser," expressing his excitement in coming from his hometown in Los Angeles to New Jersey, where females actually eat.
He also poked fun at the condescending slogans the police use to coerce people into following the law, such as "click it or ticket," saying that people should use slogans when confronted by the police. "It's our first offense, don't beat my friends," he said about being arrested in a group, and "Wear a smile, don't racial profile."
After the show, Phan and Clobber stayed around for a question-and-answer session with the audience, where they discussed how to prepare for a show, how Phan's mother responds to his jokes when she goes to his shows ("she just stares at me"), and even settled a bet. After someone in the audience directed a question at Clobber, Phan revealed that the two had bet each other a dollar that no one would ask Clobber a question. Phan won the bet.
(11/08/06 12:00pm)
With Guster coming to the College on Tuesday, Nov. 14 and tickets still on sale in Brower Student Center at the College Union Board table, it was time for a talk with one of the guys in the band.
Guster, based in Boston, met at Tufts University in 1991 during freshman orientation. Under the name Gus, the members of the band recorded their first album, "Parachute."
After signing with a major record label, they were required to change the name of the band because of another band with the same name, and so Guster was born.
Joe Pisapia, once a temporary Guster-mate but now the go-to guitar, keyboard, bass and banjo guy, spoke with The Signal about the band, black socks and New Jersey.
The Signal: So, are you a permanent member of the band?
Joe Pisapia: I am now. Originally, I'd been friends with these guys for a long time.
I was just going to come on to help launch the album "Keep It," to help arrange it . but the next thing you know we're writing songs that became a new record. It kind of became a new band after a while.
S: How long have you been with the band?
JP: Four years, pretty much.
S: Does anyone have any quirky regiment requirements before going on stage?
JP: One thing that's kind of interesting (is that) we get black socks on our (contract), which is nice. But last time they gave us those shorties, you know, and I don't go that way.
It's kind of that nice thing. Being on the road is all about socks and underwear. The more socks and underwear you have, the less you have to do laundry.
I think I can do this whole tour without doing laundry, granted it's only three weeks, but that's pretty impressive. I don't know, I don't think I'll really be able to, but we'll see.
S: Have you ever done a college show before? Have you done any on this tour yet?
JP: We've done many, yeah. This tour is relatively new; we just started about a week ago, so the answer would be no. We've done a festival, and a show, and that's about it so far.
S: What's your favorite Guster song?
JP: Favorites are a revolving thing. Lately I really like that song "Come On," which is off the new record. I just like the feel of it. It has a breezy, California-song feel.
S: What's your favorite song to play live?
JP: My favorite song to play is the "Airport Song." We did a crazy new arrangement to it, and it's so fun. It's in the spirit of Michael Jackson's "Thriller" - really fun to play. It's become my new stage favorite.
S: Are you going to be playing it at the College show?
JP: I'm 99.8 percent sure we'll play it. I'm pretty confident about it.
S: How would you describe your music?
JP: I've heard it described in a lot of different ways. Ryan (Miller, vocals/guitar) always calls it "wuss rock." I always think of it as pop in the classic sense of the word pop. As far as the melodies, they're rooted in rock sensibilities like the Kinks and the Rolling Stones. I would consider that pop. But Guster also has a folky edge to it.
S: Have you played in New Jersey before?
JP: One time we played in a big parking lot in Morristown for a record release party. Another time we played in this place called the Starland Ballroom (in Sayreville). And we played in Atlantic City not too long ago. Oh yeah, and this summer we played at the PNC (Bank) Arts Center (in Holmdel).
S: What's your favorite thing about the state?
JP: I really like the Delaware Water Gap a lot. I like the fact that Jersey has so many diverse little micro-topographical anomalies - like the Pine Barrens, they're the only pine barrens in the country. And you have the Jersey Shore; perfect together . Jersey's got a lot to offer.
S: And your least favorite thing?
JP: Just the traffic. The traffic and the congestion. I'm a Jersey boy; I'm not sure if you knew that. I grew up in Rahway. My dad still lives there, and my mom lives in Monmouth Beach, down the shore.
S: Where do you live now?
JP: I live in Nashville.
S: What has been the greatest experience so far playing with Guster?
JP: I would have to say one of the highlights is when we played with the Boston Pops Orchestra at Symphony Hall in Boston. Keith Lockhart conducted. He was one of those hot young conductors, very talented and esteemed for such a young age.
A couple of guys from the Pops actually did arrangements for some Guster songs. Then we went up there and played with a 96-piece orchestra. That was one of my favorites.
S: And the funniest?
JP: That's a tough one; there's just so much humor that goes on. It's kind of funny right now because our monitor engineer, Josh, is prematurely bald at the ripe old age of 25. We each paid him 20 bucks to not shave his hair from August to Thanksgiving. He has all these scraggy patches on his head, but he's sticking with it. I just saw him for the first time in a few weeks, and he looks so weird. But that's the kind of stuff we do for fun.
S: What is your favorite song of the moment?
JP: Lately there's this one song called "Aguas de Marco." It's an old Brazilian salsa song by Elis Regina. This song just kills me; every thing about it is perfect. I can't stop listening to it; I don't know why. Everything about it is just perfect.
S: What's your all-time favorite song?
JP: I'll just pick one of my five; it's not my number one. "I Don't Want to Fall in Love," by Chris Isaac. I think it's a perfect song: the production, the vocals, the instruments, everything. But it's not my absolute favorite; I don't think in absolutes. It's tough to pick just one.
S: Looking forward to anything specific about playing at the College?
JP: I've never been to where you are in New Jersey. It's in Ewing, right? I haven't been there before. I was looking for it on the map. I'm always interested in exploring the new places in Jersey that I haven't been. It's such a small state but there are so many different regions.
S: Yeah, we always have the North Jersey/South Jersey debates here.
JP: Ah yeah. So where do you consider yourself?
S: A lot of people say Central Jersey, so I guess I agree with that.
JP: Yeah, I would say it's Central. So I'm interested in checking out Central Jersey.
S: Any reason the College show isn't on your tour dates on your Web site?
JP: That would probably mean it's a closed show. We don't usually try to taunt the people.
S: Whose idea was it for the "Joe's Place" videos on your MySpace? What was the inspiration?
JP: Actually that would be our friend Dave Yonkman. He actually did a lot of the filming of our DVD, "Guster on Ice," and he wanted to document the recording process. That was a funny thing, because he was only going to be there for four weeks and he ended up staying for a few months while we recorded in my house.
S: Is it actually set at your place? I love the plaid couch.
JP: Yeah, hence the name, "Joe's Place." That was a good thrift store purchase.
S: So you do your own decorating?
JP: I do; I'm like a thrift store junkie. That's one of my favorite things about being on the road: checking out all the thrifts. I just got a $10 winter coat in Omaha. We were dumb and forgot to get winter coats.
S: Yeah, I guess it is getting pretty cold.
JP: We were in Minneapolis yesterday and it was snowing.
S: I was reading some interviews, and people tend to focus on the fact that most of the band is Jewish. Is this something that you guys really consider part of your band's identity, or is it just interviewers hyping it up?
JP: I think it's a little of both. But these are pork-eating, shellfish-eating Jews. It's not a big deal in the overall picture of the band.
(11/01/06 12:00pm)
With voices that give you goosebumps, the members of TCNJ Musical Theatre hit (and held) high notes and sang smoothly through challenging, complex lyrics from a catalog of Broadway tunes last weekend in the New Library auditorium.
The songs, from shows like "Avenue Q," "Miss Saigon," "Little Shop of Horrors" and "Wicked," covered a wide variety of topics including love triangles, freedom to pee, killer plants, prostitution and office romance. Each one was introduced with a description of the play it was featured in and the context of the song.
Many of the numbers included comical asides among the notes and choreography. "Alyssa, I'm not in your top eight anymore, what's up with that?" sophomore Andrew Timmes asked, leading into the song "My Boyfriend's Back," from the production "Jersey Boys."
Sung by the Broadway Night Ladies, Timmes played the "other guy" and James Introcaso stepped in as the once-absent boyfriend.
Besides clever lines and dance steps, several songs included audience participation.Junior Alida Liberman performed "When You've Got it, Flaunt It" from "The Producers." As Ulla, Liberman perched herself atop the piano (played by freshman Truc-Lan Vu) and sang in a Swedish accent.
Both she and junior Alyssa Phillips, who performed "When You're Good to Mama" from "Chicago," toured into the audience for their performances. Phillips, who played the warden of a jail, flirted with audience members.
"For me, the hardest (part) is that I can be fine before performing, but the split-second I go on, my heart is going a mile a minute," Phillips said. "But then, once I get into the song, I'm fine. You become a part of the song."
"The manly, brawny and totally hot guys of Broadway night," as they were introduced, performed "Canaan Days" from "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dream Coat" for the last song of the night.
The song, about a group of men suffering from hunger, involved the guys collapsing to the floor, leaning against each other and crying out in frustration.
"I'm all out of meal points," sophomore Vegas Lancaster cried out from the floor, waving his ID despondently.
Timmes said the best part of performing was "being out there, working and sweating under the lights and knowing that you're in it together with the audience."
(10/18/06 12:00pm)
Tartuffe, a con of the highest caliber, visited the Don Evans Black Box Theater in an All College Theatre production of the play with the same name written by Moli?re.
The performance was riddled with outstanding period costumes, outlandish wigs, challenging and creative dialogue, and a story about a con artist and the gullible man (and his mother) who invites him into the house.
The story centered on the con man Tartuffe (Tim Hinton), who charms Orgon, the head of household, played by Rudy Basso.
Orgon's mother, Madame Pernelle, played by Alyssa Phillips, is the only other family member who is taken by Tartuffe's wiles, telling everyone in the household that they should follow Tartuffe's pious example.
Orgon is so taken by Tartuffe that he even offers his daughter Mariane (Maddie Patrick) for marriage, despite her engagement to Val?re (Ray Fallon).
Of course, as with all comedies, wackiness ensues and the saucy maid Dorine (Alida Liberman) takes the initiative, hatching a plan to reunite the young lovers.
Similarly, Orgon's wife, Elmire (Lindsay Gelay) is determined to prove to her husband that Tartuffe has tried to seduce her, after finding that Orgon has signed all his property (and his daughter) to Tartuffe.
In the end, Tartuffe is revealed as a swindler just in time. Luckily, though he had gone to the king to take over Orgon's land, the king had seen through his lies and, with a satisfactory ending fit for a comedy, he is arrested and all is right with the world in the Pernelle estate.
The costumes, including full dresses and knee-length pants with stockings, set the mood for the play. "Some of them were heavy and hot," Basso said, "but they really made the show."
Gelay explained, "If you're truly in character, the costumes enhance your experience."
Basso said the wigs they wore for the performance, some more outlandish than others, were lots of fun. "I kind of want to keep mine," he said of his curly brown hairpiece.
The quick, comedic dialogue in the show was delivered flawlessly by all characters, with no rhyming couplet stumbled over. "There was a lot of time spent picking apart lines and understanding the character's thought process, then putting it all together," Gelay said.
Director Janet Quartarone said she was very pleased with how the show turned out. "Sept. 10 was the first read-through and here we are a month later," Quarterone said. "It was a short time to prepare for a very verbally challenging play."
"I thought it was great," Chris Walsh, junior philosophy major said of the show. "I read the play in high school, but I'd never seen it performed. It came to life on stage."