7 minute read
PROGRAM NOTES
ROCK MY SOUL FESTIVAL
OCT 30—NOV 22, 2022
The phrase “Rock My Soul” has a long lineage and legacy: It is the leading lyric of a traditional Black American spiritual about expanding one’s being in every dimension and direction imaginable. The song title was later utilized by philosopher and educator bell hooks, who communicated about the importance of understanding the pursuit of love, a sense of community, and commitment to continuous exploration. So for me, the sentiment of “Rock My Soul” isn’t an ethereal, intangible endeavor ... it’s a call to express yourself, engage with everything within and around you—and find enjoyment while doing it.
The Rock My Soul Festival with the LA Phil offers a diverse range of music with messages about historical recognition, liberation, and fierce self-empowerment; and highlights artists who speak to our need for accountability as a human collective.
When the LA Phil asked me to curate this festival, I was excited, because the artists that precede and surround me who identify as B/black, American, and women have deeply impacted my musical life. However, like many artists, I don’t want to be positioned, even if what I choose to share is geared in a certain social or political direction. That said, there’s no denying how strong bonds in personal relationships, claiming one’s identity, and reflecting and considering past and present circumstances, impact what art is made and offered.
Rock My Soul focuses on the connection, collaboration, and mutual support shared between artists—and celebrates voices who incorporate a vast scope of influences and inspirations in their work. —Julia Bullock
The Rock My Soul Festival is generously supported in part by Margaret Morgan and Wesley Phoa.
Curated by Mercedes Cooper, Senior VP of Programming for Ava DuVernay’s ARRAY, Rock My Soul Humanities programs include a performance by and conversation with Grammy® Award-winning musician and Queen Sugar composer Meshell Ndegeocello; the participatory event Movie Soundtrack Yoga, led by R&B Yoga founder Lauren Spearman; and a live performance by J’Nai Bridges, followed by the film Carmen Jones.
“We are proud to amplify the vast and very special artistry of Black women in collaboration with the LA Phil,” said Cooper. “This series seeks to rediscover and reflect on the abundant contributions made by Black women, past and present, across musical genres in relation to storytelling. Our hope is that this exploration through music, movement, and motion pictures conjures new imaginations for our future voices.”
The LA Phil’s Humanities programs are generously supported by Linda and David Shaheen.
To learn about upcoming festival programs, please turn to pages P2, P8, P19, and P23 or visit laphil.com/rockmysoul
Rock My Soul Festival Chaka Khan
Chaka Khan
SUNDAY
OCTOBER 30, 2022 7:30PM
Programs and artists subject to change.
The Rock My Soul Festival is generously supported in part by Margaret Morgan and Wesley Phoa.
CHAKA KHAN
Chaka Khan is one of the world’s most gifted and celebrated music icons. A singer, songwriter, actor, author, philanthropist, entrepreneur, and activist, Chaka has influenced generations of music creators during her four decades as an artist. A 10-time Grammy® Award winner, she has the rare ability to sing in a number of musical genres, including R&B, pop, rock, gospel, country, world music, and classical. She is revered by millions of fans as well as her peers for her timeless, unmatched vocal style and image. The late, great Miles Davis noted that Chaka “sings like my horn.” And none other than the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin, has said that Chaka “is a oneof-a-kind, premier vocalist.”
During her legendary career, Chaka has released 22 albums and racked up 10 No. 1 songs on the Billboard charts, seven RIAA-certified gold singles and 10 RIAA-certified gold and platinum albums. Chaka’s recordings have resulted in more than 2,000 catalog song placements. Still at the height of her astounding vocal powers, Khan is creating new projects and earning new honors. Her single “Like Sugar” from her album Hello Happiness (2019) earned high praise from tastemakers.
A native of Chicago, Illinois, Chaka began singing in local groups as a teen before being invited to join the group Rufus. Her fiery vocals on the group’s debut album caught the attention of music icon Stevie Wonder, who penned her first smash hit with Rufus, “Tell Me Something Good.” The single from the group’s 1974 platinum-selling album, Rags to Rufus, earned Chaka her first Grammy Award.
In 1978, Chaka blazed onto the music scene as a solo artist with the release of the smash hit “I’m Every Woman,” written by Ashford & Simpson. As she continued working with the late mega-producer Arif Mardin (Aretha Franklin, Bette Midler), her catalog grew with such hits as “Clouds,” “Papillon,” and “What Cha’ Gonna Do for Me.” It was during this time that Chaka began pursuing her love of jazz. She and Mardin brilliantly reworked the classic “Night in Tunisia” with the song’s originator, Dizzy Gillespie, on trumpet. Her crowning achievement in jazz was the Grammy Award-winning tune “Be Bop Medley” from the 1983 album Chaka Khan, which also won a Grammy for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance.
Chaka’s vocal intensity, soulfulness, and ability to work within different genres made artists in pop and rock take notice. She has worked with a who’s who of artists, including Miles Davis, Quincy Jones, Dizzy Gillespie, Stevie Wonder, Prince, Steve Winwood, Mary J. Blige, George Benson, Larry Graham, the London Symphony Orchestra, and countless others, earning awards and accolades along the way.
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
Clark Wilson, organ
MONDAY
OCTOBER 31, 2022 7:30PM
CAST
Werner Krauss Dr. Caligari Conrad Veidt Cesare Friedrich Feher Francis Lil Dagover Jane Olsen Hans von Twardowski Alan
Rudolf Lettinger Dr. Olsen
Rudolf Klein-Rogge Criminal
CREW
Director Robert Wiene Writers Hans Janowitz and Carl Mayer Producers Rudolf Meinert and Erich Pommer
Cinematographer Willy Hameister Production Designers Walter Reimann, Walter Röhrig, and Hermann Warm Set Decorator Hermann Warm
Costume Designer Walter Reimann
Print and license provided by Kino Lorber
Restoration: Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau-Stiftung
Michael Wilson is Walt Disney Concert Hall Organ Conservator.
Manuel Rosales and Kevin Cartwright are principal technicians for the Walt Disney Concert Hall organ.
Loosely used to define a new wave of artists that re-invigorated German art from the beginning of the 20th century to the rise of Hitler in 1933, Expressionism built on the work of post-Impressionist painters, who had themselves rejected Impressionists’ attempts to accurately reproduce visual reality in terms of light and color.
Demoralized after losing an unprecedented war that generated incredible loss of lives and capital—World War I—and in the middle of an unprecedented economic and emotional depression, German artists and filmmakers were pushed to develop an Expressionist cinema that would make use of the same highcontrast, twisted perspectives and subject matters that popularized German art before 1914. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920) is one of the earliest films to exemplify the strong influence of Expressionism on every major European art form during the early 1900s— theater, film, and architecture.
The most important tool for the revitalization of Germany’s film industry was created in 1917, when the government and the military created the notorious UFA (Universumfilm Aktiengesellschaft). Also designed as a developing site for state propaganda, UFA was able to monopolize Germany’s film market by closing the country’s borders to imports and by creating a federal law mandating that all films shown within the country be locally produced.
With the economy in ruins, Germany was easily able to sustain these radical measures; these were also perfect conditions to export newly produced movies at extremely competitive prices. Soon enough, German films were widely available in foreign markets, and their new aesthetics quickly dazzled audiences and filmmakers all over the world.
The overall sentiment of depression caused by World War I seemed to fit with the themes and visual style of German Expressionism. As a consequence, films like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari are darker than previous horror films, and their huge financial success happened in part due to their capacity to tap into Germany’s postwar zeitgeist.
Shot mostly in studios—and precisely designed to shock their audiences—these films brought a hitherto unseen level of integration between camera work and set designs and influenced many other film genres and movements—like film noir, horror, and sci-fi.
There is no doubt that films like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari permanently influenced the aesthetics and language of filmmaking. Their dramatic stories, stark visuals, and technical audacity transformed narrative cinema, pushing audiences and filmmakers to rethink their relationship to representation, storytelling, and the language of filmmaking.
