Zรณcalo TUCSON ARTS, CULTURE, AND DESERT LIVING / JULY & AUGUST 2018 / NO. 98
#SonoranSummer
Al Glann Studio D
Betina Fink Arts
Sculptor
Studio E
Phone: (480) 560-3243
Contemporary Landscape Paintings
AlGlannSculptor.com
Open Daily by Appointment: (520) 240-7461
Maria Arvayo Fine Art Studio E
“St. Francis” 60.5" x 12" x 11" Steel/Copper
Southwest Regional Landscapes: original paintings, pastels and prints Open by appointment: (520) 271-4668
• July 27 • August 26
3230 N. Dodge Boulevard • Tucson, Arizona In the Ft. Lowell Furniture and Arts District MetalArtsVillage.com
N Ft. Lowell
Alvernon
• September 24
Dodge
“Take Off!” 42" x 31" x 16" Steel w/ paint
4 ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com | July & August 2018
inside
July & August 2018
07. What’s New 09. Sustainability 11. Folklore 13. Look Back 17. Arts 19. Art Galleries & Exhibits 23. Desert 27. Food & Drink 29. Events 32. Tunes 43. Community 46. Poetry
Zócalo Magazine is an independent, locally owned and locally printed publication that reflects the heart and soul of Tucson.
PUBLISHER & CREATIVE DIRECTOR David Olsen CONTRIBUTORS Abraham Cooper, Jeff Gardner, Jim Lipson, Troy Martin, Gregory McNamee, Janelle Montenegro, Amanda Reed, Diane C. Taylor, Laura Reese, Hilary Stunda. LISTINGS Amanda Reed, amanda@zocalomagazine.com PRODUCTION ARTISTS Troy Martin, David Olsen AD SALES: frontdesk@zocalotucson.com CONTACT US:
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July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 5
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what’snew Z
The Shops are Open at MSA Annex THE VAST MAJORITY of shops and eateries at the new MSA Annex are now open for business and have become a perfect place to spend a cool summer evening. The MSA Annex is an expansion of the Mercado San Agustín, which brings 13 new locally owned small businesses, many women and minority owned, for a total of 26 along the Mercado District’s Avenida Del Convento. These 2 public markets combined provide a lively local shopping, entertainment, and eating experience on the West end of Tucson’s Streetcar, in the historic Menlo Park Neighborhood. The shops and eateries at the MSA Annex are housed beautifully inside modified shipping containers. The containers, designed by Tucson Architect Paul Weiner, are architecturally compelling and modern in nature. The juxtaposition of the Spanish Colonial style Mercado San Agustin and new modern MSA Annex together create a dynamic experience as seen in great cities around the world. Businesses include: MSA Annex Festival Grounds in partnership with Flam Chen, offers a state of the art outdoor entertainment venue for concerts, festivals, and events. Avenue Boutique, a locally owned specialty lifestyle shop focusing on high quality goods from independent designers and features an ever-evolving mix of clothing, accessories, home goods, select vintage and handmade items. Beaut Burger is a roadside tradition transplanted to the Annex and serving burgers, fries, and beer. All plant- based. Dust and Heritage is an interior lifestyle brand influenced by the Sonoran Desert. Offering interior design/styling, personal shopping, and event staging services, and selling curated vintage home goods and furniture.
Fletcher and Co is a husband and wife creative team established in 2007, who specialize in individual and family portraits. Their Annex space has a retail shop featuring minimalistic prints inspired by nature, a client lounge and workspace. Hermosa Coffee serves beautiful coffee and pastries to Tucson and surrounding communities. Isabella’s Ice Cream started out in the Mercado Community Kitchen and has since grown a successful Ice Cream distributor and retailer. The Annex is Isabella’s 3rd location. Luca Ryann is a curated line of vintage wardrobe staples with a modern twist. The line focuses on neutral tones and natural fibers. NOW or NEVER is a lifestyle destination offering modern home decor, gifts and natural skincare brands with the intent to deliver the best of the global design community to Tucson. Transit Cycles, which is currently located at the Mercado San Agustin, has expanded their awesome urban bike shop into the Annex. Westbound is a bar and bottle shop with a focus on craft beer, wine and spirits. Enjoy a drink from Westbound and bring in food from neighboring restaurants or pick up a bottle to take home. Why I Love Where I Live is a shop that develops products and experiences to inspire people to love where they live and engage in the local community.
READ MORE ABOUT THE MSA ANNEX ON PAGE 43 OF THIS ISSUE July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 7
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sustainability Z
Harvesting Monsoons By Jeff Gardner
JULY AND AUGUST hold special places in our desert. The sky tears apart with more thunder and lightning than any other point in time, and with that fury comes the majority of our rainfall. Tucson receives an average of 10 to 15 inches of rain every year. And despite the rest of the seasons being typically dry, Tucson turns out to be a pretty great place for rainwater catchment. Luckily for locals, rainwater catchment isn’t only environmentally beneficial, Tucson Water also offers up to $2000 in rebates for water catchment systems. Applicants can apply for rebates for both “passive” and “active” catchment systems, and for those in need of financial capital to start, Tucson Water also offers grant and loan programs to help. Passive catchment, or a rain garden, includes water distribution systems such as downspouts and ditches for more effectively using rainwater to aid a natural area. Active catchment, or a rain tank, includes directing water from a catchment area into a storage tank for controlled use. Both are beneficial and viable options, depending on the homeowner’s needs. After submitting a plan and passing inspection, residents can be on their way to that two grand. But there is one final – and educational – catch for receiving the rainy rebate: Attending a free rainwater harvesting workshop offered by a local nature institute, such as the Watershed Management Group. “We’re figuring out how to fix the problems we have here, not steal more water from somewhere else,” said Bill Wilkening, board president of Watershed Management Group. “You need good clean water, and you need it every day.” Watershed Management Group started here in Tucson to create communitybased solutions for environmental problems on both a local and global scale. They offer sustainability classes on subjects like green living, gardening, and of course, rainwater harvesting. “Tucson is such a powerful place for catchment because our storms are so localized and isolated,” Wilkening said. “We can make the most of them.” With a catchment system, for every 1000 square feet of roof, one inch of rain will generate 600 gallons of water. This can be harvested into a tank, or passively rerouted into a rain garden with the help of berms and swales lined with mulch. “The best part about passive systems is instead of building a tank, you let the ground be your tank.” Wilkening said. While active water tank systems require more work, they are also more
efficient. Passive systems, on the other hand, are easier to make over larger areas, but are less efficient. An active system of 1000 square feet on a roof has the potential for 6000 gallons of water annually, whereas a passive system of 1000 square feet in the landscape has the potential for 3000 gallons of water annually. “It’s a resource that we’re just allowing to flow away,” Wilkening said. Tucson Water gives rebates for up to 50 percent of the cost, or 500 dollars, for passive systems. This includes costs for labor, terraces, mulch and curb cuts. For active systems, Tucson Water will give up to 2000 dollars, depending on the tank size: 25 cents a gallon for 50 - 799 gallon rain tanks, and a dollar a gallon for 800+ gallon rain tanks. Contrary to what some might think, having a rainwater catchment system doesn’t entirely rob downhill areas of water. Properly caught rainwater pools to nurture plant life and replenishes the surrounding area, whereas normal rainwater in a city spreads out across concrete and quickly evaporates. “If you think that water is going to naturally flow through an urban environment and replenish the aquifer, think about it as if you were trying to dig a hole,” Wilkening said. “You want the water to go deep into the ground and be absorbed. Sure, you can thinly spread it over a large area, but it will dry up fast.” When water deeply penetrates soil, vegetation blooms and makes the area cooler. This leads to water being able to slowly trickle through a landscape instead of quickly flowing and evaporating. The natural plants mitigate heat island effect, add carbon to the soil and suppress evaporation, all while allowing for percolation. “We only need people to reduce their water use by ten percent,” Wilkening said. “And we’ll start to see little creeks popping up. This is one of the most important steps to having a sustainable community.” There are many ways to harvest rainwater, and endless best practice tips: Which kinds of piping to use, selecting collection tanks, using “first flush” systems, olla balls, overflow routes and more. But there are many local services right here in Tucson that offer education and even help set up water tanks. “Go outside when it rains,” Wilkening said. “And just see what’s going on.” For more information, visit tucsonaz.gov/water or watershedmg.org
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July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 9
CHILL-OUT
in
HISTORIC “OLDTOWN”
SILVER CITY, N.M.
S T AY
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dine
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Italian comfort food, traditional and modern 619 N. Bullard / www.ohmy.restaurant 575-597-6469 / info@ohmy.restaurant
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CREATIVE HANDS GALLERY
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WHY SILVER CITY?
• Cool, high mountain nights & warm, mild days • Walk from boutique hotels & lodging to dinner • Authentic “heirloom” (1800s) business district • Stroll the historic WNMU campus & museum • Walk to the Boston Hill trail network from town • Shop at our Oldtown Food Co-op (est. 1974) • Watch first-run and current films at the Silco • Tour Syzygy & see how clay art-tile is made • Saturday Farmers market by the “Big Ditch” • Local listening on-line at gmcr.org
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SILVER CITY, N.M.
All photography by JayHemphill.com
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DIANE’S
Chose from fine or casual dining & live music 510 N. Bullard / www.dianesrestaurant.com 575-538-8722 / dianesrestaurant@gmail.com
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Fine furnishings, jewelry, textiles, pottery 305/307 N. Bullard... Authentic everything 575-388-4426 / tmkgallery3@gmail.com
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folklore Z
City of the Golden Bells The Quest for the Iron Door Mine by Abraham Cooper
THE SOUTHWEST is a strange land filled with countless stories about hidden treasures, many of which are tied to the region’s extensive mining history, and the earlier endeavors of Spanish explorers obsessed with discovering gold. Arizona is home to one of the most famous of these legends: The Lost Dutchman’s Mine. According to legend, during the 1870s, a German miner named Jacob Waltz rediscovered a hidden cache of gold which had been left behind by the Peralta family when fleeing from an Apache raid, decades earlier. Waltz returned to Phoenix with several large pieces of high quality gold ore lending credence to his story. Only the few closest to Waltz learned of the treasure’s location before he died in 1891. People from all over the world have entered the Superstition Mountains in search of the Lost Dutchman’s Mine, only to return empty handed, or perish. Such legends evoke something irresistible, alluring gold hunters, historians and hikers alike. The thrill of putting to rest a century-long mystery, or the possibility of becoming instantly rich continues to inspire droves of curious people out into the unforgiving desert. A legend of similar mystique originated near Tucson, though perhaps not as widely known. During the 1700s, Spanish Jesuits presided over the Tucson village and its surrounding region. According to legend, they mined extensively for gold on the northwestern side of the Santa Catalina mountains. They constructed a small city which they used as a base for their operations which they named Nueve Milla Ciudad, or Nine Mile City. The fabled city was supposedly located on a nearly inaccessible plateau which had only two entrances. Such a wealth of gold was extracted from the mine that several golden bells were forged and installed into the city’s central church. When the Franciscans assumed power over New Spain and all of its posts along the frontier, the obstinate Jesuits quickly stored their enormous cache of gold back inside the mine, then blockaded it with an iron door, which was then covered up by large rocks in order to conceal its location. To further prevent the Franciscans from finding the gold, the Jesuits also obscured both entrances to the city. For whatever reason, the Jesuits never returned to the city, inspiring subsequent generations of gold hunters to look for the mine. On February 28, 1880, the Arizona Daily Star featured a story retold by one of its correspondents. The account was given to the reporter by two prospectors who had recently returned from a seemingly improbable journey to the hidden city in the Catalina Mountains. The men claimed they had discovered an ancient mine once operated by Spanish Jesuits. So outlandish was their tale, that it could hardly be believed were it not for several large pieces of gold which
they presented to the reporter. According to their account, the two prospectors were travelling through Sonora and were permitted to spend the night at the home of an elderly Mexican man and his wife. The guests conversed with the man at length about Arizona, and about mining. When asked if they had ever heard stories about the mine with the iron door, the prospectors said yes but that they doubted its existence. The Mexican man then presented a journal which he inherited from his grandfather who, he claimed, worked the famous mine. He said that the mine was located near a city built by the Jesuits called Nueve Milla Ciudad. The journal chronicled the daily life of the city and talked about the fortunes being extracted from the nearby mountain. It gave a detailed description of the iron door mine and how to reach it. This deeply excited the prospectors who hastily set out to find the mine. This is where the report enters the fantastical. The two prospectors supposedly reached the ruins of Nueve Milla Ciudad after a long and rather complicated journey, which involved scaling a steep canyon and, at one point, traveling through a cave. Once reaching the plateau, several more days were spent searching for the mine which was finally located a short distance from the city. Using old iron tools left behind by the Jesuits, the prospectors were able to obtain 100 pounds of gold nuggets which they later furnished to the Arizona Daily Star correspondent. There are varying versions of what happened after this. Some say the men returned to the mine but were never heard from again. Others say that one of the prospectors killed the other out of greed or that both men were murdered after showing off their gold to others in town. As is the case with so many legends, only fragments of the story are true while the rest has been utterly sensationalized or altogether fabricated. So long ago was this tale given to the newspaper, and longer ago still, when the legendary mine supposedly came into existence that it is nearly impossible to substantiate it. Evidently, this has not prevented the countless adventurers who have gone questing for the Iron Door Mine. The legend contains a framework for wonder, which is difficult to quantify and often needn’t justification. Seekers will continue seek as long as the legend continues to be retold. These stories thrive on mystery and grow stronger without conclusion. Heaven forbid the day that such treasures are found, for it would break the hearts of the world’s explorers. n
July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 11
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12 ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com | July & August 2018
Coyote Pause Cafe
photo: Phillip Harrington
lookback Z
Remembering Cactus Ed by Gregory McNamee
Edward Abbey in the desert in July 1969. EDWARD ABBEY never met a controversy he didn’t like. Barroom philosopher, champion of wilderness, critical gadfly: for fortyodd years Ed roamed the American West, a region, he wrote, “robbed by the cattlemen, raped by the miners, insulted by the tourists.” As he traveled, he stirred up trouble by, among other things, poking ungentle and sometimes dangerous fun at cowboys, Indians, women, Mormons, Hispanics, and above all the agents of supposed economic progress—realtors, captains of industry, car dealers. He was an equal-opportunity curmudgeon: Liberal and conservative alike felt his wrath, which seemed to grow as the years piled on. And he liked the fight. “Racial, sexual, cultural differences: forbidden ideas; we’re not supposed to think such things, much less say them out loud,” he grumbled in his journals, published in 1994 as Confessions of a Barbarian. “Yet it is fun to bring them up.” He’s been dead for almost 30 years, felled by a bad pancreas on March 14, 1989, but that shaken-hornet’s-nest legacy of his stands intact. You can start a debate—and even a fistfight—anywhere from Missoula to Mexico City merely by mentioning his name. By way of example, I once went into a bar in Rock Springs, Wyoming, to grab a soda for the long ride to Jackson. Not long before, Abbey had given a speech at the University of Montana in which, among other things, he said, “Suppose you had to spend most of your working hours sitting on a horse, contemplating the hind end of a cow. How would that affect your imagination? Think what it does to the relatively simple mind of the average peasant boy, raised amid the bawling of calves and cows in the spatter of mud and the stink
of shit.” Tough words in beef country, not guaranteed to win friends. A bullish cowboy at the bar took a look at my Arizona license plates and my long hair, pulled himself up, and said, “You from Arizona? You know Abbey?” When I said yes, he said, “Get out.” I did. Ed didn’t start out to be a scrapper, although he told me that his ScotsIrish ancestry and Appalachian upbringing predisposed him to disliking both authority and received wisdom. He wanted to be remembered as a great writer, not as an activist, and he wrote a few novels—Black Sun, The Brave Cowboy, Fire on the Mountain—that earned him esteem as one of his generation’s best authors. But somewhere along the line he decided that the West, to which he had moved in the early 1950s after doing time in the Army and New York City, had suffered enough at the hands of developers, loggers, miners, ranchers, and other instruments of civilization. He began to speak out—no, to bellow out loud and long for three decades, with the result that out this way he’s remembered more for his finely honed political rage than for his art. I first laid eyes on Ed sometime in 1981, if memory serves, at a rally in Tucson against visiting Secretary of the Interior James Watt, the great satan of the environmental movement. Ed was the guest star of the unruly event, and his presence had been heavily advertised on posters and in ads in the alternative weekly. Ed seemed not to take that duty too seriously. He showed up bleary and much the worse for the wear after what appeared to have been a couple of weeks of nonstop drinking, mumbled a few semicoherent words about the evils that Watt represented, growled, “God bless America—let’s save some of it,” and stumbled off into the night.
continues...
July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 13
lookback Z It turned out, Ed later told me, that he had in fact been drinking nonstop in the company of his “redneck radical” friends, planning and plotting the initial monkeywrenching actions of Earth First!, the environmental movement that, with Ed’s help and participation, would later give Watt and his successors so many headaches. The movement was inspired by Ed’s 1975 novel The Monkey Wrench Gang, in which a band of ecoradicals performed what he dubbed “unauthorized maintenance on big yellow machines,” the Caterpillar tractors and earthmovers then as now busily blading over the West. Abbey called the book—a version of which is slated to make the movie screens sometime next year—a “comic extravaganza,” but many of his readers and followers took it more seriously than all that. Certainly the FBI did: Ed’s file grew by several inches after the book appeared. I got to know Ed better when, asked by an editor to write an essay about Abbey’s self-professed anarchist politics, I decided to go straight to the source. Now, most writers at a certain stage of renown either guard their privacy jealously or slaver for still more publicity, but Ed did neither. Instead, he answered my questions courteously, pointed out flaws and overgeneralizations, and grumbled when my elegant theses about his anarchism got, well, too elegant. (He was right about that, and he would grumble in his journals that the essay I eventually wrote placed “too much stress on my politics, no mention of the love and humor in my books.” About which more in a minute.) For Ed, the story wasn’t himself or his politics, but the need for angry, direct action against the land rapists and developers, for rage against the machine. We quickly agreed that the kinds of conversations we needed to have about such weighty matters would better take place in a bar or greasy spoon than in a library, and over the next seven years we met regularly to talk politics or books or the latest assault on the landscape. When we went for the first time to a tony, now defunct fern bar in the unlikely heart of downtown Tucson, Ed walked through the swinging doors and bellowed, “Smells like lawyers in here!” It was a safe enough bet, given the bar’s proximity to the city’s courthouse and downtown’s countless law offices, and a dozen-odd carefully coiffeured heads turned toward the door in reply. But the lawyers quickly turned back to their drinks. They’d seen Abbey in action—everyone in Tucson, it seemed, had had an Abbey moment at one time or another—and they weren’t biting. At our meetings, Ed, grinning wolfishly, would produce letters that he’d written to such recipients as The New York Times, Ronald Reagan, The Nation, and Gloria Steinem, all of them raising pet peeves to the status of an ideology. “The fine art of making enemies,” he wrote in his journals. “I’ve become remarkably good at it.” Ms. Steinem was a favorite target, for he especially liked tweaking feminists, which may explain why he found so few women readers. (He would be booed at readings throughout the 1980s for reciting scurrilous erotic lyrics bearing titles like “Big Tits, Braces and Zits.”) Abbey’s harshest moment in the spotlight came at about that time, when he began to publish a series of letters to the editors and essays on the subject of illegal immigration. Noting that the subject, like abortion and nuclear energy, was almost impossible to discuss unemotionally, Abbey insisted that the border between the United States and Mexico be sealed off with electric fences and patrolled by the military—strange talk for an anarchist. He didn’t help his case, which, he said, was based on environmental grounds (the United States was overcrowded as it was), by insisting that the American way of life had to be protected against the Mexican threat “to degrade and cheapen [it] downward to the Hispanic standard.” Cowboys are one thing, he found, politically well organized ethnic groups quite another. For the rest of his days, Abbey would be accused of racism, and he didn’t try to defend himself. There wouldn’t have been much defense to mount. Just before he died, Ed published The Fool’s Progress, what he called his “honest novel,” one loosely based on his own life. In its opening pages, Abbey’s alter ego, one Henry Lightcap, takes off from his nearly empty Tucson home (its contents having just been removed by a disgruntled spouse) after shooting his
refrigerator, a hated symbol of civilization. Lightcap makes a winding journey by car to his boyhood home in the Appalachian Mountains of Pennsylvania, calling on old friends along the road, visiting reservations and out-of-the-way taverns, and reminiscing about the triumphs and failures of his life. Readers would be mistaken to view The Fool’s Progress as pure autobiography, but it looks deeply into his life and times and way of thinking. Abbey regarded it as one of his best books of fiction, and it’s full of wonderful moments—but problems, too. I had edited a twentieth-anniversary reissue of Desert Solitaire, the book for which Ed is best known, and Ed asked me to read the manuscript of Fool’s Progress before he sent it off to the publisher. I did, and I wrote him that while I thought the book entertaining, I was disturbed by some of the humor, which I thought strayed into the very racism that was causing him so much trouble. (“What’s the difference between Navajos and yogurt?” went one joke. “Yogurt is a living culture.”) I asked him whether he might reconsider not only portions of his book but his attitude generally. Do you want, I asked him, to be explained away years from now like Ezra Pound? Ed wrote back and said that of course he’d remove the offending passages. Then, over the next few weeks, little white index cards began to appear in my mailbox, scrawled in blue ink in his crabbed hand, keyed to pages in the manuscript, announcing that he’d keep this joke or that, that he’d say whatever he wanted to about minorities “devoted to drugs, crime, spray paint, ward-heeling politics, cars and the monthly welfare check”—and to hell with what the East Coast liberal elite might say about him. In the end, he kept his jokes, every last one of them. And I kept, and keep, my conviction that the book would have been better without them. Was Ed Abbey a racist? Yes, undoubtedly. Was he a paragon of virtue, a model deserving emulation? No: He had his demons and his paradoxes, this man who despised cattle ranching but loved hamburgers, who railed against environmental despoliation but drove a gigantic Cadillac convertible, who preached devotion and loyalty to causes but had trouble remaining faithful to his wives. Although he himself a theoretical anarchist and a practical democrat, Ed, who was born in 1927, was really quite conservative, with all the blind spots of a man of his time. The libraries of the world are full of little visited books by grouches and complainers. Why do we continue to read Abbey? Well, for one thing, because when he was on his game he wrote truly and beautifully: There are few modern novels as heartfelt as Black Sun, no book about the Western landscape more evocative than Desert Solitaire. We continue to read him because no one else has so well captured the essential freedom and beauty of the West, and of America generally. We read him because he remained true to what he believed: the need for wilderness, for open space, for a world outside the city. The last time I saw Ed, we walked by a construction site on the way to a nearby burger joint. He pulled up a survey stake and tossed it out onto the road. “Earth First!” he grinned. A week or two later he called to suggest that we have another meal. The night before we were to meet, my mother-in-law suffered a heart attack, and I called from the hospital to ask for a rain check. Sure, he said. A couple of days later, he died, his innards finally having given out after too many years of too much abuse. I now think that Ed knew he was about to leave the planet, and that he had wanted to say goodbye to an old friend who so often disagreed with him. Ed now lies under a cactus-studded escarpment somewhere in the desert of western Arizona. I think of him often, especially when I drive through cities like Tucson and Phoenix and Los Angeles, grim hives that are busily chewing up the desert surrounding them, growing cancerously at the rate of an acre an hour. The West Abbey loved is under assault every day, and things are getting worse. But still, reading Abbey’s books, we take hope. And I suspect that when the coyotes finally dig down to his bones thousands of years from now, the old controversialist will have had the last word. n
July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 15
STAY COOL WITH
HOT SOUNDS! CHRISTOPHER CROSS FRIDAY, JULY 20 IN THE DIAMOND CENTER Doors at 7PM | Show at 8PM
GARY OWEN SATURDAY, JULY 28 IN THE DIAMOND CENTER Doors at 7PM | Show at 8PM
AIR SUPPLY FRIDAY, AUGUST 3 IN THE DIAMOND CENTER Doors at 7PM | Show at 8PM
ULTIMATE 70’S TOUR
ORLEANS | POCO | PURE PRAIRIE LEAGUE
SATURDAY, AUGUST 18 IN THE DIAMOND CENTER Doors at 7PM | Show at 8PM
IT’S HAPPENING AT THE DIAMOND CENTER SAHUARITA. When it’s hot outside, stay cool to hear some hot sounds at the Diamond Center. Desert Diamond Casino Sahuarita’s Diamond Center is the best entertainment venue to see a show without being in the heat. Plus, the Sports Bar has drink specials, live entertainment and sports action for your viewing before and after the show. There is always something going on, so visit www.ddcaz.com for more entertainment and special events. SAHUARITA | 1100 W. PIMA MINE RD.
Where jackpots hit close to home. Must be 21 to enter bars and gaming areas. Please play responsibly. An Enterprise of the Tohono O’odham Nation.
arts Z
Cicada Song by Laura Reese
THE DEAFENING BUZZ of the cicada becomes the soundtrack of the Sonoran Desert this time of year. They sing their song when the humidity is heavy and clouds grow in the distance. “I’ve always thought cicadas to be the harbingers of the storms,” said local artist and blacksmith Zach Lihatsh. I met Zach on 4th Avenue in mid-June, on the afternoon of an early summer storm. We met to talk about Cicada Song, a public artwork he completed on Euclid just south of 7th Street. Across the street from Tucson High School, the piece is a 7 foot tall steel cicada with wings and limbs stretched out along a section of forged and fabricated fence-line. The piece is a boundary between the street and a wash down below. When charged with creating a piece so connected to a wash, Zach knew he wanted to incorporate a cicada, something he always associated with monsoon season. Arizona’s landscape and the animals within it have always been a draw for Zach. “There’s an aesthetic that hard to resist,” he said. To create Cicada Song, Zach studied the cicada insect. Pouring over photos and taxidermy specimens, he observed the different components of the insect to asses how to create it. He used a combination of metal working techniques, including metal fabrication, which he describes as “cutting and pasting together”, as well as forged metal, which involves pushing and pulling the metal. It was a combination of factors that drew Zach to apply for this particular public project: the fence, the wash, and the high school across the street. Zach’s journey as an artist has largely been defined by his exploration of boundaries, fences, and barriers. After studying at Northern Arizona University, Zach completed his Masters of Fine Arts at Southern Illinois University Carbondale with an emphasis in metals. As part of his studies, Zach’s thesis show consisted of steel maps and sculpture. One sculpture, a 40 foot steel fence, violently ripped open but in a manner depicting intention and beauty.
“I read the public call, and liked the idea of embellishing a fence. But not necessarily to keep people out. I wanted to bring attention to the wash below,” said Zach. “I never understood why washes in Tucson were walled off from the public. In other cities, water is generally where people gather and congregate. Not a place to keep people from.” Recently, Zach taught a series of classes where students explored the idea of ecotones. In nature, ecotones are the transition space where two biomes meet. They are the boundary between two very different systems that encourages new growth and life through biodiversity. “These ecotones, no matter where they are, tend to be plentiful, more diverse areas. Totally full of life,” said Zach. Southern Arizona seems to be full of fertile spaces of abundance at the intersections of difference. In nature, ecotones would lose their bounty if they were walled off from each other. It’s the overlap that creates the biodiversity. “Boundaries are inevitable, but reimagining them is important,” said Zach. When it comes to monsoons, the cicada sings the song in the space between oppressive heat and refreshing rain. The space between sunshine and cloud cover, dust and drops of rain. As the harbingers of this weather, cicadas seem to live exclusively in this in-between space of drought and drench. “Ecotones are spaces of interaction and invention,” said Zach. “I love the idea of taking spaces of division and subverting them to create spaces of connection.” Cicada Song lives at the boundary of Euclid St and the wash below. Does it function as a boundary that keeps people away from the wash? Or is it a boundary that welcomes people in to its abundance? This public arts column is provided by the Arts Foundation of Southern Arizona in partnership with Zócalo Magazine. n July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 17
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july & august
art galleries & exhibits Z
Geri Bringman, Rosa En Blanca - 20 x 16, at Desert Artisans
Desert Wanderlust by Alexandria Winslow, acrylic on gallery wrap canvas 36x24, at Desert Artisans
ARIZONA HISTORY MUSEUM Currently on view: History Lab. Hours: Mon & Fri 9am-6pm; Tues-Thurs 9am-4pm; Sat & Sun 11am-4pm. 949 E. 2nd Street. 520-6285774. ArizonaHistoricalSociety.org
ARIZONA STATE MUSEUM The Resiliency of Hopi Agriculture: 2000 Years of Planting, Life Along the River: Ancestral Hopi at Homol’ovi and Hopi Katsina Dolls are all on view until June 2019. For the Record: Exceptional Publications by ASM Faculty and Staff is on view until September 2019. Long-term exhibits include, Woven Through Time; The Pottery Project; and Paths of Life. Hours: Mon-Sat 10am-5pm. 520-621-6302. 1013 E. University Blvd. StateMuseum.Arizona.Edu
CACTUS WREN GALLERY Celebrate America, 9am to 2pm, July 14. Dog Days of Summer, 9am to 2pm, August 11. Hours: Daily from 9am-4pm. 2740 S. Kinney Rd. 520-437-9103. CactusWrenArtisans.net
CENTER FOR CREATIVE PHOTOGRAPHY
Longer Ways to Go: Photography of the American Road is on view to November 24. The Heritage Gallery is on view to January 12, 2019. Hours: Tue-Fri 9am-4pm; Sat 1-4pm. 1030 N. Olive Rd. 520-621-7968. CreativePhotography.org
CONRAD WILDE GALLERY Jessica Drenk: In Aggregate is on view through June 30 with a reception June 2 from 6-9pm. Hours: Tues-Sat 11am-4pm. 101 W. 6th St. #121. 520-622-8997. ConradWildeGallery.com
CONTRERAS GALLERY The Little Big Art Show continues through July 28 with a
DESERT ARTISANS GALLERY
Sonoran Scenery and Monsoon Mirage Miniatures are on view through Aug 5. A Trunk Show: Linda Baker, Linda Levine, David Thekan & Alexandria Winslow is July 7 from 10am to 1pm.In August, Over the Moon and In My Dreams Miniatures open August 7 with a reception August 10 from 5pm to 7pm. Alla Prima Demo: Judith Probst, Alexandria Winslow, Susan Meyer and Sage Boyd August 10 during the reception. Hours: Mon-Sat 10am-5pm; Sun 10am-1:30pm. 6536 E. Tanque Verde Rd. 520-722-4412. DesertArtisansGallery.com
THE DRAWING STUDIO Art of Summer Youth Art Exhibit opens July 28 with a reception from 5pm to 7pm and is on view to Aug 1. Hours: Mon-Thurs 9am-4pm. 2760 N. Tucson Blvd. 520-620-0947. TheDrawingStudiotds.org
ETHERTON GALLERY In the main gallery, From the Archive: Masters of 20th Century American Photography is on view through August 31. Hours: Tue-Sat 11am-5pm or by appointment. 135 S. 6th Ave. 520-624-7370. EthertonGallery.com
HOW SWEET IT WAS VINTAGE Art Party: Roy Harlan opens July 7 with a reception from 7pm to 10pm. Art Party: Joseph Valentino opens August 4 with a reception from 7pm to 10pm. Hours: Mon-Fri 11am-6pm; Sat 11am-7pm; Sun 12pm-5pm. 424 E. 6th St. 520-623-9854. HowSweetItWas.com
IRONWOOD GALLERY Becoming Animal Standing Witness for the Sentient Wild is on view through Sep 2. Hours: Daily 10am-4pm. 2021 N. Kinney Rd. 520-883-3024. DesertMuseum.org
reception on July 7 from 6pm to 9pm. In August, Fine Art Prints opens with a reception on August 4 from 6pm to 9pm and is on view through August 25. Hours: Weds-Sat 10am3:30pm. 110 E. 6th St. 520-398-6557. ContrerasHouseFineArt.com
JOSEPH GROSS GALLERY Nourishing: Craig Cully is on view to August 30.
DEGRAZIA GALLERY IN THE SUN The Way of the Cross and DeGrazia’s Hot
LIONEL ROMBACH GALLERY Untitled (Corridor) | Karlito Miller Espinosa is
Wax - Encaustic Paintings from the 1950s are on display through September 5. Hours: Daily 10am-4pm. 6300 N. Swan Rd. 520-299-9191. DeGrazia.org
on view to August 15. Hours: Mon-Fri 9am-4pm. 1031 N. Olive Rd. 520-624-4215. CFA. arizona.edu/galleries
Closing reception from 5pm to 6:30pm on August 30. Hours: Mon-Fri 8am-4pm. 1031 N. Olive Rd. 520-626-4215. CFA.arizona.edu/galleries
MADARAS GALLERY Desert Sun is on view throughout July. Christmas in August Party on August 2 from 5:30pm to 7:30pm. Hours: Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun 11am-5pm. 3035 N. Swan Rd. 520-615-3001. Madaras.com
July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 19
PETER CONNER PHOTOGRAPHY peterconner.com
On permanent exhibit at: Cactus Wren Artisans Cat Mountain Station 2740 S. Kinney Rd. Tucson, Arizona 85735 (520) 437-9103 cactuswrenartisans.net Open seven days a week
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520.622.5233 20 ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com | July & August 2018
Filmer Kewanyama
july & august
art galleries & exhibits Z Glow! Launch Party hosted by MOCA Sat. July 14.
MINI TIME MACHINE
Miniatures by Members of SAME and Scenes from Salvaged Scraps: Debbie Gill are on view to August 26. Hours: Tues-Sat 9am-4pm and Sun 12-4pm. 4455 E. Camp Lowell Dr. 520-881-0606. TheMiniTimeMachine.org
MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART Glow! Launch Party hosted by MOCA Sat. July 14. Fun, one-night outdoor art party. Pop-up installations, performances, and DJ sets by DJ Nightslip and DJ PU Stinky. 7-11pm. (at 2805 N. Triangle L Ranch Road) 100 Year Plan live art performance on August 11 and 18. Witness live and live-stream performance, immersive installation, HD videos, websites and wearables set to probe today’s existing conceptions of our physically and virtually hybridized world. 7pm to 8pm. $10 tickets. 265 S. Church Ave. 520-624-5019. MOCA-Tucson.org
PORTER HALL GALLERY Quilt for a Cause: A Garden of Quilts is on view to July 30. Hours: Daily 8:30am-4:30pm. 2150 N. Alvernon Way. 520-326-9686. TucsonBotanical.org
PHILABAUM GLASS GALLERY & STUDIO The Flame: Tom Philabaum celebrating nearly five decades of work is on view. Hours: Tues-Sat 11am-4pm. Call for glassblowing viewing. 711 S. 6th Ave. 520-884-7404. PhilabaumGlass.com
RAICES TALLER 222 GALLERY Arte de Descartes is on view through July 14. Chubasco (a monsoon exhibition) is on view July 21 through September 1. Hours: FriSat 1-5pm and by appointment. 218 E. 6th Street. 520-881-5335. RaicesTaller222.com
the Welcome Gallery and Queen of the Night on view through July 22 in the Entry Gallery. Sonoran Stories opens in the Main Gallery August 23 with a reception from 5:30pm to 8pm, and is on view through November 7. Hours: Daily 9am-5pm. 7366 N. Paseo del Norte. 520-742-6455. TohonoChulPark.org
TUCSON DESERT ART MUSEUM
Currently on view, Desert Hollywood: Celebrity Landscapes in Cinema. Ongoing permanent exhibitions include: The Dawn of American Landscape and The Weavings of the Dine. Hours: Weds-Sun 10am-4pm. 7000 E Tanque Verde Rd. 520-202-3888. TucsonDArt.Org
TUCSON MUSEUM OF ART
Arizona Biennial 2018 is on view July 6 to September 16 with an opening July 5 from 5pm to 8pm. James G. Davis: A Tribute is on view July 6 to September 16. Ongoing exhibits include the J. Knox Corbett House and the La Casa Cordova. Hours: Tues-Wed & Fri-Sat 10am-5pm; Thurs 10am-8pm; Sun 125pm. 140 N. Main Ave. 520-624-2333. TucsonMuseumofArt.org
UA MUSEUM OF ART Tinkerlab returns for the summer through August 16. Current exhibitions include: Richard Slechta: Cascades on view to September 9; Our Stories: High School Artists on view to August 26; Subject to Change: An Evolution of Women Printmakers on view through August 26. Ongoing exhibitions include, The Altarpiece From Ciudad Rodrigo. Hours: Tues-Fri 9am-5pm; Sat-Sun 12-4pm. 1031 N. Olive Rd. 520-621-7567. ArtMuseum.Arizona.Edu
SOUTHERN ARIZONA TRANSPORTATION MUSEUM Dinner in the Diner is currently on display featuring original china and silver service from the named first class Pullman trains. 414 N. Toole Ave. 520-623-2223. TucsonHistoricDepot.org
UA POETRY CENTER Selections from the Permanent Collection: Folded Books is
SOUTHERN ARIZONA WATERCOLOR GUILD
WILDE MEYER GALLERY Group Show opens July 1 and closes July 31. Sizzling
Young at Art (Student Show) opens July 19 and is on view to August 19 with a reception July 22 from 2pm to 4pm. Share Our Walls (Area Arts Organizations) is on view August 23 to September 30 with a reception August 30 from 5 to 7pm. Hours: Tues-Sun 11am-4pm. Williams Centre 5420 East Broadway Blvd #240. 520-299-7294. SouthernAzWatercolorGuild.com
TOHONO CHUL PARK
Continuing exhibitions include, Arizona Otherworldly through August 12; Permanent Collection | New Perspectives IV on view to August 12 in
on view to August 10. Hours: Mon & Thurs 9am-8pm; Tues, Weds, Fri 9am-5pm. 1508 E. Helen St. 520-626-3765. Poetry.Arizona.Edu
Summer Saturday Night is July 21 from 5 to 8pm. The Western Attraction is on view August 1 to 31. Hours: Mon-Sat 10am-5:30pm; Thurs 10am-7pm; Sun 1-4pm. 2890 E. Skyline Dr. Ste. 170. 520-615-5222. WildeMeyer.com
WOMANKRAFT ART GALLERY Waste Not Want Not is on view to July 28 with a reception July 7. Gallery closed in August. Hours: Weds-Sat 1-5pm. 388 S. Stone Ave. 520-629-9976. WomanKraft.org n
July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 21
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22 ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com | July & August 2018
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desert Z
Desert Winds by Gregory McNamee
July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 23
Z desert
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erodotus, the Greek traveler and historian, tells a strange story: 2,500 years ago, he writes, a Libyan army marched off into the Sahara to find and subdue the lord of the sandstorms, great gritty winds that would come along from time to time to bury cities and wipe out roads and farmlands. The expedition never returned, Herodotus adds, “disappearing, in battle array, with drums and cymbals beating, into a red cloud of swirling sand.” The deserts of the world are noted for absences and shortages: of water, of vegetation, of animals, of people. But they share one great abundance: wind, and lots of it. What makes them deserts in the first place is not so much the lack of water as the fact that ever-thirsty winds pull such scant rain as falls from the clouds back skyward before it can reach the ground; thus the virga rain phenomenon, where ghostly trails of falling water evaporate thousands of feet above the earth in the thermal-ridden air. In Bagdad, California, not a drop of rain fell on the earth for 767 days, from September 3, 1912, to November 8, 1914, the water kept from the earth by a constant flow of dry wind. A similar arid river blows across West Texas, so strong, local legend has it, that if it ever stopped all the cows would fall down. Strong winds are common in every desert of the world, for it is the uneven distribution of solar energy that drives them—and solar energy, of course, is in no shortage there. The winds blow steadily in the mild season, and come spring, when the earth begins to warm toward summer, they blow ever harder. One particularly stiff wind is the pampero, which tears across southern Argentina; as the naturalist W. H. Hudson’s 1917 memoir Idle Days in Patagonia relates, the currents of this haunting wind “sink and swell and are prolonged or shattered into compulsive sobs and moans, and overlap and interweave, acute and shrill and piercing, and deep and low, all together forming a sort of harmony, it seems to express the whole ancient dreadful tragedy of man on earth.” A similar wind, the simoun—the Arabic word for poison—shrieks over the Sahara. In the Sonoran Desert of North America, native people tell of water serpents that dwell in the boiling summer clouds, bringing rain to the dry earth not in nourishing drops but in great black undulating curtains of water, leaving floods and destruction in their wake. Those great storms, and their kin in other deserts, are unique, for they resist the tendency of all things to slip away into inertia and entropy. Instead, they swell, burst, spawn new storms, and eventually wander off elsewhere to cause new trouble. Such storms destroyed 24 ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com | July & August 2018
Ur of the Chaldees, in ancient Mesopotamia. They swallowed up that ancient Libyan army. They destroyed Jimmy Carter, whose presidency never quite recovered from the hostage-rescue debacle of 1979, when 19 elite Delta Force soldiers maneuvered their helicopters into a funnel of whirling dust over the barren saltpans of Iran and there met their end. In late November 2011, a huge dust storm swirled across the middle of Mexico’s Baja California peninsula, halting traffic and filling the air with grit. Dust storms are not unusual in that desert country, but they usually blow over quickly and are highly localized. What made this one unusual was that it was big and long-lasting enough to be captured by a passing satellite, allowing scientists at NASA to track its course out into the ocean, where it deposited tons of soil into the Pacific. That, at least, was a positive outcome, for that soil feeds phytoplankton, and phytoplankton in turn feed the whales that come to Baja from across the Pacific to give birth to their young. Earlier in 2011, in July, a vast wall of swirling dust, propelled by howling winds, engulfed Phoenix, Arizona. It was the product of a perfect storm of contributing facts and unintended consequences. A long dry spell meant that the ground was dry and susceptible to disturbance. Lots of construction and traffic, thanks to all those people, meant there was a lot of loose soil in the air anyway. Out in the desert to the south and west of the metropolis, down by Picacho Peak and over in the Harquahala Valley, farmers were plowing fields, preparing for the fall planting, adding more dust to the air. All that was left to stir into the mix were the fierce downdrafts from cooling air when the summer monsoons arrived—and so they did, a few days earlier. The result was a wall of dust more than a hundred miles wide and more than a mile high. When it arrived, it did so with a ferocious intensity, crackling chains of lightning announcing it, that wall of black and tan dirt swallowing up the sun, halting traffic across hundreds of miles of roads and freeways, and causing air traffic to be diverted to airports far from Sky Harbor. It was the largest dust storm recorded in Phoenix in more than thirty years, as large as those of the Dust Bowl of the 1930s. But every summer since 2011, a dust storm just as large has visited the desert. What was anomalous not so long ago, it seems, has become the new normal, driven by two trends. The first is that the already dry area, lying at the northern reaches of the Sonoran Desert to the south and the eastern reaches of the Mojave Desert beyond, is becoming measurably drier with a changing climate. And with that changing climate,
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the already hot area is becoming hotter. Mean temperatures are 2 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than they were in 1980, and projected increases by 2100 range from 5 to 10 degrees, depending on which model is used. One projected outcome of these ever more prevalent storms, epidemiologists warn, will be an upsurge in cases of valley fever, the common name for a cluster of diseases caused by inhaling microscopic spores. These spores are found in deserts around the world; some medical historians have even theorized that the storied curse of King Tut’s tomb is really a particular virulent form of the illness from spores that lay undisturbed for millennia within the pharaoh’s pyramid. After the dust storm of July 2011 in Phoenix, watchful medical personnel recorded more than 5,000 cases of valley fever, which is potentially fatal to those with compromised respiratory functions, especially among the elderly— which, considering the huge number of retirees in the region, was particularly alarming news. In 2011, just before that Phoenix storm, the American Geophysical Union announced that the amount of atmospheric dust around the planet has more than doubled since the beginning of the twentieth century. The relationship between this dust, most stirred up from the world’s deserts, and climate change is not entirely understood, but it is clearly a contributing factor to overall global warming. Atmospheric researchers have already observed that most models of climate change overlook the effect of natural aerosols such as dust, which, among other things, may mean that projections of temperature change are vastly underestimated. Those dust storms, crackling with electricity and energy, are an astonishment of nature. So are their smaller cousins, dust devils. If you drive from, say, Tucson to Los Angeles across the sandy lowlands of the Sonoran and Mojave deserts, you’ll count dozens of them on most hot, cloudless days of the year, miniature cyclones dancing to their own music alongside the interstate. As a young child, I once walked into one, thinking that it would take me off to Oz, a place I had just been reading about. I can now take seriously the Southwestern legend that whole flocks of barnyard hens have been swept heavenwards through a passing dust devil’s fancy. No one has personally seen this occur, of course, but then no one has seen another phenomenon that passes for fact out this way: It’s so hot in the Southwest that chickens lay hard-boiled eggs. The tallest dust devil ever recorded, spotted in Utah in 1961, stood about 2,000 feet tall, lasted for 7 hours, and traveled across the alkali desert for more
than 40 miles. Bigger ones still have been photographed on the surface of Mars. But none is so fierce as the low-pressure Washoe of the Sierra Nevada, to trust Mark Twain, who describes what one Washoe storm hid within its dust clouds: “Hats, chickens and parasols sailing in the remote heavens; blankets, tin signs, sagebrush, and shingles a shade lower; doormats and buffalo robes lower still; shovels and coal scuttles on the next grade; glass doors, cats and little children on the next; disrupted lumber yards, light buggies and wheelbarrows on the next; and down only thirty or forty feet above ground was a scurrying storm of emigrating roofs and vacant lots.” A cousin to the Washoe is the wind system called the Santa Anas. High pressure over Utah and Nevada causes air to spill off the Mojave Desert to the southwest, rushing over the coastal lowlands around Los Angeles. The coastal air is robbed of humidity by the thirsty winds and fills with static electricity, creating an atmosphere of impending doom. During their season, as Raymond Chandler wrote in his famous story “Red Wind,” “Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands’ necks. Anything can happen.” Anything can, and it usually does. Most heart attacks and strokes occur when the wind is blowing at force 4 or 5 on the Beaufort scale, or 11 to 21 miles per hour, about the average for a Santa Ana day. Statistics compiled by the Los Angeles Police Department demonstrate that homicide rates double when the desert winds are blowing. There’s a sociological component in all this: In the Gobi, the winds rush along at between 15 and 25 miles an hour for weeks at a time. Contemporary Mongolians don’t massacre each other daily, not as Americans do at any rate, but it’s easy to understand why the bloodthirsty Golden Horde exploded out of the high steppes a millennium ago, killing everything in sight. Just so, in colonial times, Spanish defendants could cite the wind as an extenuating circumstance in homicide trials: The dust devil, it would seem, made them do it. Poisonous gusts, murder, despair. Walls of sand. Why ever would anyone choose to live among these all-devouring currents of air? Perhaps because, eternal optimists, we desert rats remember the gentle days, the scent of birthing orange buds, days when the calls of birds and coyotes linger in the soft, still air. The desert winds are a mystery, and those of us who live among them are never quite certain of what the next subtle shift of current will bring: a scent from paradise, or a blast from the inferno. n July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 25
COCKTAIL BAR OF THE YEAR 139 S. EASTBOURNE, ACROSS FROM BARRIO BREAD OPEN DAILY TILL LATE, HAPPY HOURS TILL SIX
26 ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com | July & August 2018
photo: Maryam Sadeghian
food&drink Z
Growing Figs by Gregory McNamee IT WAS LOVE at first sight, at least of a kind. I was poking around in a lot full of trees over at Desert Survivors, forlorn and vulnerable-looking in their black plastic buckets, when one in particular, standing off a little to the side, beckoned to me. It was a little mission fig, its ancestors carried over from the Mediterranean coast across the Atlantic Ocean by Franciscan missionaries in the 1700s. We have the precise year, 1768, when the first of them was planted at the Mission San Diego de Alcalá—that is, in San Diego, California, in a climate that the tree must have found to be climate to be agreeably similar to that of its native Spain. That fig was tiny when I brought it home, not much more than a twig with a few green leaves. Five months later, it stood a little more than four feet tall, leafy and sturdy, having graduated to a large pot. Now, still in that pot for the moment, it’s taller than I am, and merrily producing fruit. I’m getting ready plant it out in the garden, now that the heat is on—for why dig a hole deep enough for a tree in sensibly mild weather? Here in the warm though not quite Mediterranean climate of southern Arizona, I expect that it will be producing both fruit and shade for many years to come, long after I’m gone. The mission fig (Ficus carica), also called the black mission fig because of its dark fruit, is one of many fig species. Almost all of them are hardy, and they require minimal care once they are established. Outdoors, figs are naturally adapted to full sun. They can grow riotously—but that comes with the territory. Generally speaking, a fig’s root system will be much larger than the spread of its branches, so that growers classify the tree as “greedy”; if other thirsty trees are nearby, they’ll compete with the fig for water, so that it’s best to plant figs apart from other trees and well apart from other figs. On that note, figs are thirsty but
not overly demanding trees. The fig tree will signal you if it needs more water by going chlorotic—that is, its leaves will turn yellow and fall off. When trees are well established, they tend to be less demanding, but like human children they need to be looked after until they reach maturity. And, as with human children, it’s possible to be too protective, to overwater them or otherwise tend to them too much. Remember that figs grow wild in their native habitat, and they do just fine on their own. A fig tree can grow to be very large, with some species reaching as tall as 50 feet, though most top out at about 30 feet. A healthy fig will also have stout, twisting branches that sometimes wrap around each other as they grow, giving the tree the appearance of a Gordian knot. This is as it should be, though it should be noted that even though the branches look sturdy, fig wood is really comparatively weak; if you’re looking to build a tree house or even to get a good climb in, you’d be better advised to look elsewhere. Fresh figs, by the way, are just about a perfect food for any dieter. They provide abundant fiber that, like that of an orange, tricks the stomach into thinking it’s eaten more substantially than it has. It contains potassium, copper, manganese, and other minerals, as well as vitamins B5 and B6. Figs have been shown to lower triglycerides and insulin levels, helping combat heart disease and diabetes. Oddly enough, recent studies have shown that figs help fight macular degeneration as well, a common malady of the eyes affecting a broad swath of the elderly population. Love at first sight indeed, that fig tree, and good for the heart, soul, mind, and body. No garden should be without one. n July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 27
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july MONDAYS IN JULY MAKE IT MONDAYS
Celebrate creativity with special guests from 3 to 6pm and a special admission price of $3. Children’s Museum Tucson, 200 S. 6th Ave. 520-792-9985. ChildrensMuseumTucson.org. July 2: Sonoran Glass School. July 9: Portable Planetarium – Animals in the Sky. July 16: Xerocraft. July 23: Tucson Gem and Mineral Society Inc. July 30: Schoolhouse of Rock – We’ve Got the Beat!
FRIDAYS IN JULY COX MOVIES IN THE PARK Free family friendly movies with entertainment, games, and a variety of food for purchase. 6pm, movie starts around 7:45pm. Reid Park DeMeester Outdoor Performance Center. Wonder Woman, July 6. Star Wars The Last Jedi, July 20
FRIDAY NIGHT LIVE! SUMMER JAZZ CONCERT SERIES Enjoy free jazz performances by talented local musicians every Friday evening through August 10. Validated parking in Tyndall Garage after 5pm. Performances begin at 7:30pm and last 90 minutes. Free admission. See website for lineup. Geronimo Plaza, 800 E. University Blvd. 520-622-8613. MainGateSquare.com
SUMMER SAFARI
Explore the zoo at night with cooler temps, live music, wildlife activities, animal biofacts, and food and drink specials. $10.50 adults, $8.50 seniors, $6.50 children ages 2-14, zoo members receive ½ off. 6 to 8pm. Every Friday through Aug 3. Reid Park Zoo, 3400 Zoo Court. 520-791-3204. ReidParkZoo.org
SATURDAYS IN JULY COOL SUMMER NIGHTS
Fun family friendly science activities, nocturnal animal encounters, and cooler evening temps along with stunning sunsets set this weekly summer event apart. Check website for details. Bring a flashlight. Regular admission rates apply. 5-10pm. Through September 1. Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, 2021 N. Kinney Rd. 520-883-2702. DesertMuseum.org. July 7: Creatures of the Night. July 14: Astronomy Night. July 21: Insect Insanity. July 28: Creatures of the Night
WEDS 4 DIAMONDS IN THE SKY CELEBRATION Celebrate Independence Day with live music by Rhythm Edition, an All-Star game by the Sun Belt College Baseball League and a 30 minute fireworks show after the game. Lots of kids activities such as face painting, an obstacle course, games, jumping castle and more. General admission: $4, Kids under 5 are free. 5 to 9:30pm. Kino Sports Complex, 2500 E. Ajo Way. 520-724-5466. KinoSportsComplex.com
SONORAN GLASS SCHOOL
A Fourth of July party with glass art activities, BBQ, water balloons, fireworks, hot glass demos and more! Enjoy a prime view
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of the “A” Mountain fireworks starting at 9pm, use one of their chairs or bring your own. $5 admission. 6-9pm. Sonoran Glass School, 633 W. 18th Street. 520-8847814. SonoranGlass.org
THURS 5
Free admission for residents of Arizona and Sonora, Mexico. Tucson Museum of Art, 140 N. Main Avenue. 520-624-2333. TucsonMuseumofArt.org
FRI 20 – SUN 29 LOFT KIDS FEST
ARIZONA BIENNIAL 2018
Celebrate and enjoy new works by Arizona artists at the opening night reception from 5pm to 8pm for Free First Thursday. Members Happy Hour is from 5pm to 6pm. Tucson Museum of Art, 140 N. Main Ave. 520-624-2333. TucsonMuseumofArt.org
THURS 5 – SUN 8
This summer, kids and their parents can enjoy some of the best family friendly films of all time along with games, activities, live performances, free popcorn, and giveaways (like a raffle to win a $50 gift certificate to Mildred & Dildred Toy Store). Free admission. Every morning at 10am (animated short plays before each feature). Doors open at 9:15am. Encore screenings at 11am on Saturdays and Sundays only. Loft Cinema, 3233 E. Speedway. 520-795-0844. LoftCinema.org
SPACEFEST IX
Space enthusiasts of all ages can enjoy panel discussions with scientists, authors, astronomers, and astronauts from around the world. See website for a list of programs, including a space art exhibit and a Saturday evening banquet, followed by a star party with telescopes. Starr Pass Resort, 3800 W. Starr Pass Blvd. SpaceFest.info
TAP & BOTTLE NORTH 1 YEAR CELEBRATION One whole year of good times and beer! All day celebration from 11am to close. Tap & Bottle North, 7254 N. Oracle Rd. TheTapandBottle.com
SAT 21 & SUN 22, SAT 28 & SUN 29
SUN 8 SECOND SUNDAZE
Find inspiration in the Arizona Biennial 2018 exhibit and try your hand at printmaking, cyanotypes, or a collaborative mural. 10am to 5pm. Free admission and activities for residents of Arizona and Sonora Mexico. Tucson Museum of Art, 140 N. Main Avenue. 520-624-2333. TucsonMuseumofArt.org
SAT 14 2ND SATURDAYS DOWNTOWN A free, family friendly, urban block party! Specials at local restaurants, street vendors, Art After Dark at the Children’s Museum from 5:30-8pm, free family friendly movie at the Southern Arizona Transportation Museum. See website for more details. Summer Hours: 5pm to 10pm. Downtown Tucson, Congress Street, Toole to Church Avenues. 520545-1102. 2ndSaturdaysDowntown.com
GLOW! LAUNCH PARTY
Join MOCA Tucson in collaboration with Triangle L Ranch for a fun nighttime outdoor art party. GLOW! and MOCA artists will present an interactive glow in the dark art treasure hunt across the landscape in addition to pop-up installations, performances, and DJ sets by DJ Nightslip and DJ PU Stinky. $10 suggested donation with food and drinks available for purchase. Suggested to bring a flashlight. 7pm to 11pm. Triangle L Ranch, 2805 N. Triangle L Ranch Rd., Oracle. Moca-Tucson.org
SUN 15 SECOND SUNDAZE
SAT 21
This month learn about the museum’s Latin American Folk Art collection with art-making stations that include collage molas and tin ornaments. Storytime in the galleries at 1pm and a performance by Mariachi Sonidos De Mexico at 3pm.
WATERMELON WEEKEND
Enjoy samples of sweet fresh watermelons or pick up your own. Guess the exact weight of the watermelon you are purchasing and you can have it for free. 8am to 5pm. Apple Annie’s Fruit Orchards, 2081 W. Hardy Rd. 520-384-2084. AppleAnnies.com
FRI 27 – SAT 28 MONSOON MADNESS PLANT SALE Over 30 local and national plant experts will offer special inventory to anyone curious about weird and wondrous plants. Free admission during the sale. Friday hours: 3pm to 7pm. Saturday hours: 8am to 1pm. Tohono Chul, 7366 Paseo del Norte. 520-742-6455. TohonoChulPark.org
SAT 28 BREEZE IN THE TREES
5K Run under the shade of the tall pecan trees on dirt roads. Race starts at 6:30am, day of race registration begins at 5:30am. All participants are $35 after July 1. T-shirt guaranteed if registration is received by July 19. The Green Valley Pecan Company, 1625 E. Sahuarita Ed. 520-820-6447. Taggrun.com
NIGHT WINGS
Explore the museum during the cooler summer evenings! Entire grounds are open until sundown. Screenings of the short film Earthrise! and educational activities will be offered. $10 for adults, members and kids 12 and under are free. 5pm to 9pm. Pima Air & Space Museum, 6000 E. Valencia Rd. 520574-0462. PimaAir.org
July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 29
Z events World Margarita Championship, Friday, August 10.
august SAT 4 – SUN 5
FRI 10
SILVER CITY CELEBRATION WEEKEND
WORLD MARGARITA CHAMPIONSHIP
Celebrate the one-year anniversary of the day Willem de Kooning’s Woman-Ochre was recovered in Silver City and returned to the University of Arizona Museum of Art. The heroes who located the painting, special guests, and museum staff members will host the event and recount the discovery and safe return of the painting to Tucson. Space is limited. Member price: $275, non-member price: $325. See website for program details. 520-6217568. ArtMuseum.Arizona.Edu
Southern Arizona Arts & Cultural Alliance and Tucson Original Restaurants have partnered together to bring you a cocktail competition like no other, with Southwest cuisine, margarita and tequila tastings, a raffle, and special hotel rates available for the night. Tickets: $55, day of tickets are $70 if available, ages 21 & over. 6pm. El Conquistador Tucson, 10000 N. Oracle Rd. SAACA.org
WEDS 8 - SUN 12
2ND SATURDAYS DOWNTOWN A free, family
SOUTHEAST ARIZONA BIRDING FESTIVAL Experience birding at its best! Workshops, free talks, overnight trips, Nature Expo, evening programs led by local and international experts, a Saturday Night Banquet with guest speaker, Bill Thompson, III and more. See website for full schedule and details. 520-629-0510. TucsonAudubon.org
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SAT 11 friendly, urban block party! Specials at local restaurants, street vendors, Art After Dark at the Children’s Museum from 5:30-8pm, free family friendly movie at the Southern Arizona Transportation Museum. See website for more details. Summer Hours: 5pm to 10pm. Downtown Tucson, Congress Street, Toole to Church Avenues. 520545-1102. 2ndSaturdaysDowntown.com
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Bad Gyal performs at HOCO Fest, Wednesday, August 29.
SAT 11 – SUN 12 METEOR MANIA Enjoy viewing the Delta Aquarids atop Kitt Peak during the height of this major meteor shower! Viewing from 10pm to 3am. Reservations required. Tickets: Adults, $49.95 or $55 by phone, Kids ages 8-16 $46.95 or $52 by phone. Tribal members are free. 520-318-8726.
THURS 19 TUCSON
BIRTHDAY
CELEBRATION
Happy 243rd birthday to our city! Enjoy birthday cake, live Mariachi, and a Proclamation by the Mayor. Free admission and parking. Noon. Southern Arizona Transportation Museum, 414 N. Toole Ave. 520-6232223. TucsonHistoricDepot.org
WEDS 29 – SUN 2 HOCO FEST
National and regional acts play all through Labor Day weekend at this fun annual event. Hotel Congress, 311 E. Congress St. 520-622-8848. HotelCongress.com
MONDAYS IN AUGUST MAKE IT MONDAYS
Celebrate creativity with special guests from 3 to 6pm and a special admission price of $3. Children’s Museum Tucson, 200 S. 6th Ave. 520-792-9985. ChildrensMuseumTucson.org. August 6: MOCA Mobile Museum. August 13: MOCA Mobile Museum. August 20: Planetary Science Institute. August 27: Pima County Parks and Recreation. September 3: Schoolhouse of Rock – We’ve Got the Beat!
SATURDAYS IN AUGUST
THURSDAYS
COOL SUMMER NIGHTS
Fun family friendly science activities, nocturnal animal encounters, and cooler evening temps along with stunning sunsets set this weekly summer event apart. Check website for details. Bring a flashlight. Regular admission rates apply. 5-10pm. Through September 1. Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, 2021 N. Kinney Rd. 520-883-2702. DesertMuseum.org. August 4: Creatures of the Night. August 11: Bat Night. August 18: Creatures of the Night. August 25: Creatures of the Night / Teacher Appreciation Night
ONGOING PLANETARIUM SHOWS
Explore the stars and beyond every Thu-Sun with a laser light show on Fridays and Saturdays. $5-$7, kids under 3 are free. See website for program times. Flandrau Science Center & Planetarium, 1601 E. University. 520-621-7827. Flandrau.org
SANTA CRUZ RIVER FARMERS MARKET Locally grown foods and goods with live music. 4-7pm. Mercado San Agustin, 100 S. Avenida Del Convento. MercadoSanAgustin.com
FREE FIRST THURSDAYS On the first Thursday of every month the museum is open late with free admission from 5-8pm, featuring special performances, live music, lectures, cash bar, and food trucks. For more information see website. Tucson Museum of Art, 140 N. Main Avenue. 520-624-2333. TucsonMuseumofArt.org
SUNDAYS RILLITO PARK FARMERS MARKET
Find veggies, citrus, fresh eggs, pasta, coffee, locally made soaps and a variety of goods at this open-air market. Open every Sunday from 9am to 1pm (Oct. – Mar.) and 8am to Noon (Apr. – Sep.) at the Rillito Park Race Track, 4502 N. 1st Ave. HeirloomFM.org n
MONDAYS MEET ME AT MAYNARDS
Southern Arizona Roadrunners’ Monday evening, non-competitive, social 3-mile run/walk, that begins and ends downtown at Hotel Congress, rain/shine/holidays included! Free. 5:15pm. Maynards Market, 400 E. Toole. 520-991-0733. MeetMeAtMaynards.com
July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 31
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What’s Live Buying Local (Vol. 2) by Jim Lipson
#SonoranSummer 32 ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com | July & August 2018
LAST SUMMER I devoted the July/August column to our wealth of local talent. As I prepare to do the same here, I’m reading a Facebook thread started by Alvin Blaine, multi-instrumentalist extraordinaire, that’s garnered about 50 replies within one hour. The long and short of it is about how great our local music scene is and how so much of it functions as a huge extended family; as supportive as it is diverse, and god help you if you rag on someone without damn good cause. I could go on but I’d rather offer my support in devoting these precious column inches to promoting the regular local gigs that never make the headlines and rarely get any press other than in the various listings sections of print and on-line publications. And yet these shows, sometimes well attended, and sometimes not, also reflect the true essence and heart of a scene we so often and so easily take for granted. What follows is an admittedly incomplete and completely arbitrary compendium of on-going local shows, almost all of which have a zero-dollar cover. So when you’re looking for something to do this summer, in-between complaining about your swamp cooler, a disappointing monsoon and how nobody interesting wants to play Tucson in July or August, go out patronize some of these venues and support these folks. Let them know you care because they sure ain’t doin’ it for the money. (This month’s Sound Alternatives column also celebrates local, reviewing five relatively new CDs steeped in various forms of bluegrass and Americana.) SUNDAYS Nancy Elliott and Friends, Monterey Court, 10 am-1 pm. Nancy is one of the artisans who whose fashion boutique has been gracing the Monty for almost as long as they’ve been open. Ditto for the informal brunch where she hosts any number of different singer songwriters, trading stories and songs. Hot Club of Tucson, Congress Hotel – 10:30 AM-1:30 PM – Nick Coventry, violin, Matt Mitchell, guitar and Evan Dain, upright bass, each a virtuoso on their own instrument, combine to play gypsy jazz. Every Sunday except when Nick is off gigging in LA with Black Market Trust or one of his other projects. Patio Sets at the Mint, 3-6 pm – look up the term dive bar and you’re likely to see a picture of the Mint. In temperate times music is out on the patio, but inside for summer heat. Singer/songwriter types looking to hone their craft through performance or to just play out find gigs here. Often a showcase for folk festival performers without regular gigs. July performers include Tammy West, Larry Armstrong & Copper Moon, Paul Charles Domingue, Widows Hill and Kristie Cunningham. The Sunday Sessions/Kevin Pakulis and Friends, Borderlands Brewery, 2-4:30 PM – This is now an official scene. Backed by Karl Hoffman, bass, Gary Mackender, drums, Clay Koweek, guitar and any number of other special guests, this Sunday bash is a tribute to vision, patience and the belief that if you play it, they will come. (Look for a review of the new Kevin Pakulis CD in this issue.) Wally Lawder and Acoustic Sky/Frank Manhardt & Friends, Monterey Court, 6:30-9:30 pm - – Wally and his gang, which includes the women of I Hear Voices—Suzy Ronstadt and Kathy Harris, have been holding down the second Sunday of the month for quite a while. They complete this run with their show in July. Come August, Frank Manhardt, of the Frank and Woody show fame, and his gang of friends will take over that slot.
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Freddy Parish, 2nd Thursdays at La Cocina
Heather Hardy, Chicago Bar, 6-9 pm - First Sunday of the month – this gig which had a successful run at the Boondocks, has made a successful transition to the near east side. This one has a small cover. Petie Ronstadt and Friends, Monterey Court – this last Sunday of the month event, never fails to deliver on a combination of strong material, performance and showmanship. This one has a small cover. (Look for a review of the new Ronstadt CD in this issue.) Cadillac Mountain,The Hut, 6-8 PM – One of Tucson’s great lesser known treasures, fronted by Joel Leland, guitar and Rudy Cortese, banjo. They are now also joined by Katy Carr, bass and Corrine Garey on violin and bass, but even as a duo, their sound is BIG. MONDAYS Bryan Dean Trio, Rockabilly Grill, 6-8:30 PM – Much like the Sunday Sessions at Borderlands, this scene took a while to gestate, but once it did it has created its own momentum having successfully transitioned from its original scene at the Boondocks. Dean is often joined by special guest/friends sitting in. Petie Ronstadt and Friends, Chicago Bar – First and Last Mondays of the month. Especially good for those who cannot make the trek west to the Monty. TUESDAYS The Tucsonics, Monterey Court – Each third Tuesday of the month Nick Coventry and Alvin Blaine and a rotating group of special guests deliver western swing and “Jango Jazz.” Bad News Blues Band, Wilber’s Lounge/Viscount Suites – with Steve Grams on bass, often joined by Danny Krieger on guitar, this is an early week blues fix. Deacon’s Blues Jam, Chicago Bar – Every town needs a good blues jam and this one does the trick for Tucson. Often joined by Bryan Dean. WEDNESDAYS Nick McBlaine and Log Train, Monterey Court – This is the bluegrass supergroup featuring Peter McLaughlin, Alvin Blaine, Nick Coventry and Evan Dain. No gig in July because the Monty is closed for vacation through July 5, catch them in August. Bad News Blues Band, Chicago Bar – Good for a mid-week blues fix in case you missed them on Tuesday. 7-11 pm.
Eric Schaffer and the Other Troublemakers, Monterey Court – Original Americana holding down most third Wednesdays at the Monty. (See a review of their new CD in this issue.) THURSDAYS Titan Valley Warheads, Monterey Court – Tucson’s oldest living bluegrass group, conceived in 1981 plays every fourth Thursday at the Monty. Still tearing it up. Freddy Parish, La Cocina – Freddy’s unique blend of Americana and alt country takes this stage every second Thursday of the month. Often joined by exceptional talent flying under the radar. Mitzi Cowell, La Cocina – Outstanding Blues Hall of Famer guitarist, Mitzi’s songwriting chops allow her to showcase as a multi-dimensional performer; playing third Thursdays of the month. FRIDAYS Lost Hombres, Hi Falutin – If you’re traveling to the north country fair… traditional and not so traditional bluegrass and folk at this North Oracle Rd. establishment by some slightly grizzled veterans of the folk scene. Greg Morton & Friends, La Cocina, 6-9 pm - – This year’s local headliner for the Tucson Folk Festival, holding it down for Bluegrass Friday, every Friday. Usually backed by Lex Browning on fiddle and other strings and Jim Stanley on bass. And often with special guests sitting in. SATURDAYS Mike & Randy’s 4:20 Show/Top Dead Center, the Hut – Tucson’s preeminent Grateful Dead cover band will often play as much non Dead stuff as Dead. Always a featuring a special guest soloist and a tweener group between sets. Outside when weather permits but summers are often inside due to heat and threat of the monsoon. Voted most likely place to catch a contact high. Key Ingredients of African Soul, Monterey Court – Perhaps Tucson’s most consistent draw for getting people out to dance. This mix of Afro-pop and HighLife packs the dance floor on the fourth Saturday of the month. Open Mic, Iron Horse Fabricators (9th St/4th Ave.), 6-9 PM – This acoustic open mic, recently relocated from the Roadrunner Café on the far north side of town, happens on the third Saturday of the month. Organized by Bobby Ronstadt who provides a PA and keyboard, interested parties to sign up in advance. 520.275.8530. n July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 33
7/6 welty wilson trio 7/7 PET-NAT RELEASE leila lopez 7/13 naim amor 7/18-7/31 tasting room closed for monsoon break
510 N 7th Ave
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tucson, az
sand-reckoner.com
520.833.0121
Sound Alternatives
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Making Americana Great Again by Jim Lipson
AS MUCH AS I TRIED TO, I could not resist using this all too cheesy play on words as the header of this piece. Americana…a term thrown around so often these days, any attempts at an actual definition are folly at best. However, to adapt what someone more learned than I once mused (a Supreme Court Justice I believe), Americana is like porn, you’ll know it when you see it, or in this case hear it. While each one of these five CDs reviewed, has its own character, voice and charm, they can all lay claim to a piece of that great
Americana pie employing their own original spins on various elements of folk, folk blues, folk-rock, country, country rock, country blues, bluegrass, old timey, traditional and gospel. There will be parts of these projects that will naturally capture more of your attention than others. And while you are encouraged to enjoy and cultivate your discerning tastes, I’m emploring you to scratch beneath the surface. There is a lot to like here. JL
Eric Schaffer & the Other Troublemakers Crazy Road Trip
FROM THE OPENING strains of “I Wanna Get Lost,” featuring guest fiddle player Nock Coventry, you can tell this is going to be fun ride. What you don’t know then is how much some of these songs may remind you of other people (who are really good) before Schaffer settles in and claims these tunes as his own. While the very first line of the next tune, “Beer Tastes Better in Mexico,” sounds a lot like Kevin Pakulis, the song quickly takes on the tenor and flavor of a John Coinman song, especially in the way the second half of the verses and then the full chorus are constructed. This is beautiful melody making, augmented by Alvin Blaine on accordion and Dante Rosano on trumpets. The next song, “Right Day,” has the feel of being sung by a vaudeville song and dance man. As the arrangement builds and more things come into play, including a clever lyric presented with a certain amount of whimsy, it was hard not to be reminded of the Dusty Chaps and their country swing opus, “Domino Joe.” Imagine Petey Mesquitey Gierlich (lead singer for the Chaps) singing these lines and you’ll see how well this comparison works.
By the time we get to “Even Now,” which has all the trappings of a big Springsteen ballad (think Darkness on the Edge of Town period), and then “I Need You” (Springsteen c. Nebraska period) you couldn’t blame one for wondering, well where is Eric? And then something happens when all of a sudden you realize these words, in fact, are Eric’s and that these are indeed his stories to tell. This continues with “Happy Birthday Annalise” where the tune, undeniably Schaffer’s, is made even more touching through the musical interplay between Blaine, now on mandolin and Coventry’s fiddle. Then, in “One Two Three,” Schaffer takes his voice almost completely out of the equation as he features the extraordinary vocals of Liz Cerepanya, late of the band the Long Wait and now of Big Grin. While it’s hard to imagine anyone else singing this song after Cerepanya’s treatment, it plays as if it was written specifically for her to sing. Schaffer closes the set with Love Wins, which plays like a bit of an anthem for our times. That song, recorded in Iceland, was the only tune not to be recorded by Duncan Stitt in his studio A Writer’s Room. n
Kevin Pakulis Holliday
WHILE HOLLIDAY is a great tune and serves this project well as a title track (more on than later), this album could easily have been titled, Kevin Pakulis: 2013-2018. This is the period of time this album represents in terms of how far back these tunes and these recordings go. As such, the list of players who contribute to the project is as long as it is impressive. Three bass players, four drummers and a slew of guest soloists and backup singers, all adding rich textures to a collection that features several tunes that are not rockers but more introspective, even melancholy at times, but still dripping with soul. Which brings us back to Holliday. This is one of several tunes that lean more towards being a western ballad than anything else, and after just one listen, (and then a second) you can see why he chose this for a title. There’s a story and a vibe here which Pakulis makes into a beautiful country ballad and with an especially affecting chorus featuring Joel Dvoskin (that’s a guess) providing a harmony.
There are at least three tunes here that go back to his Coyote Supper Club days. “Haunted,” “Stories” and “Sylvie,” all show that time to have been a particularly fertile period for songwriting. Without any annotated notes however, it’s impossible to say with complete certainty who is playing on what and when they were recorded. That said, these tunes all appear to have been given a fresh coat of paint with Gary Mackender on drums and Karl Hoffman, bass defining the rhythm section. “Stories” in particular seems to have been given the biggest facelift with the Augie Meyers Tex-Mex style organ playing against the accomplished country fiddle of Chris Brashear. Other highlights include an acoustic guitar intro reminiscent of an early 1970s Stephen Stills on As One, as well as “Your Love Song” which has the kind of soulful bounce that can make one think of a band like Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes. Expertly recorded at Bill Cashman’s Cavern Studio, the 17 different players who contributed actually sound more like a band than hired help which is a tribute to everyone involved. n July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 35
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Lee Greenwood
Kick off your Independence Day with this iconic country star! Hear “God Bless the USA” & many more hits!
21 JUL 7:30pm
Chris Isaak
First Comes the Night LOW TICKET ALERT! Gifted singer/ songwriter performs stunning new music and your favorite hits!
17 JUL 7:30pm
Billy Bob Thornton & the Boxmasters
JU L 23 7:00pm
American Idol Live!
Oscar-winning actor doing what he loves the most — making music with his American roots rock band!
This season’s Top 7, plus Season 8 winner, Kris Allen & “Boy Band” winner In Real Life!
Don’t Miss Our Classic Summer Films!
Wait Until Dark (1967) Godzilla (1954) King Kong vs. Mothra (1963) 7/7@ 7:30 PM Godzilla (1962) 7/22@ 6:30 PM 7/13 @ 7:30 PM 7/15 @ 6:30 PM
36 ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com | July & August 2018
EL PRESIDIO DOWNTOWN
FOXTUCSON.COM
SUMMER HIGHLIGHTS
3 JUL 7:30pm
MON-FRI 10-5
BOX OFFICE 17 West Congress 520.547.3040
ARRIVAL from Sweden 18 JUL 7:30pm The Music of ABBA The world’s biggest and most popular ABBA tribute band, right in time to get ready for Mama Mia 2!
28 JUL 7:30pm
Femmes of Rock
Hot “hard rock” violin artists Bella Strings, perform hits of Led Zeppelin, The Beatles, Queen & More!
Phantom of the 20,000 Leagues Opera (1925) Under the Sea (1954) 8/18 @ 7:30 PM 8/25 @ 7:30 PM
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something out of a time capsule, capturing a feel if not exact sound of rural America from what is clearly another century. There are of course flourishes of bluegrass here and there, but this album is a mosaic with many different textures and layers with Rolland making full use of an expansive musical palate. Her use of piano in “The Spirit,” “Standing Still” and “Letters and Photographs” is an unexpected delight, as are the appearances of clarinet on “Little Blackbird.” The cello played on “Looking to the Sun” and “The Mulberry Tree” is also exquisite as is the French horn on Letters and Photographs. In spite of these very non- traditional folk instruments, the overall sound is undeniably Americana. Aside from Ryan Green who plays guitar on “Looking to the Sun” and Dante Rosano’s mariachi style trumpets on “Standing Still,” most of Rolland’s cocollaborators appear to be folks from out of town, possibly also associated with the Homestead Monument. While some CDs play like a collection of stories, this record plays like a novel, requiring some time and energy to be fully absorbed but well worth the effort. n
Rebekah Rolland Seeds and Silo
ARTISTS WHO ARE a part of already established groups often find it important to cultivate other creative outlets. Some projects are done to scratch an itch or explore a whim. Rolland, a cornerstone of the accomplished bluegrass group Run Boy Run, has delivered something here that is eons beyond your run of the mill side project. Recorded with great care by Petie Ronstadt and co-produced with her husband Matt who plays mandolin and guitar to go along with his signature violin playing, Rolland presents ten different compositions that are more song portraits than simple tunes. The arrangements are sophisticated and at times complex, and yet Rebekah’s pristine vocal, so at home and sweet in the higher octaves, is the one constant throughout. This project, commissioned through a residency with the Homestead National Monument, a part of the National Park Service, sometimes plays like
Sonoran Dogs Navajo Rug
IT’S EASY to peg Peter McLaughlin as the lead dog in this busier than all get out bluegrass band. They seem to work all the time. But as good as he is—and he’s a national flat pick guitar champ—he’s but one cog in what is essentially a super group made up of four equal parts. Sharing vocals with McLaughlin, and trading off on almost every other song is Mark Miracle on mandolin. Aside from his virtuoso playing, you can also feel his rhythm playing without. In fact, it’s almost like having a drummer, so strong and well timed is his ability to provide a backbeat. Tyler James on banjo can also match each of these guys note for note, jam for jam while Brian Davies, on bass and harmony vocals, holds it all together. What makes this album special is that in spite how great an uber player everyone is, and there are plenty of slick solos to go around, this record is built more on the songs and the group’s ensemble playing.
“Salt Spring” is the instrumental that opens this collection and does well to introduce all of the musical voices. “Oh What a Crying Shame” then introduces Miracle’s vocal. Sounding like a cross between Loudon Wainwright, Tim Obrien and Sam Bush, in a mix that is perfectly balanced, each instrument gets exactly what it needs but not so much as to outshine any of the others. McLaughlin’s “Rough Road of Life,” is one of several moments he has to shine vocally in showcasing one of his originals while his vocal contrast to Miracle insures that none of these songs end up sounding the same, something even good bluegrass bands must always be mindful of. Be mindful this collection provides a different picture and sound from what this group occasionally displays when it plays out locally as a big 7 or 8 piece band. But as a quartet, lean and mean, they allow every one of these tunes t shine. n
P.D. Ronstadt & the Co Tucson Folk Festival, May 5, 2018 THIS SET, recorded live at this year’s Tucson Folk Festival within the intimate confines of La Cocina, does well to capture that stage’s closing set from Saturday night. If you were lucky enough to be there, you’ll remember what an exciting performance you were gifted. Opening with his tune “Bowl of Dust,” there are initial strains of the old gospel tune I’ll Fly Away. Incorporated into the tune, It works really well. It’s also a great song that his dad, gone almost two years now, never tired of bragging on how this was Petie’s tune. While most of these tunes have already been released on other recordings, this live set, mixed and recorded by Marshal Jones on the fly, catches the band in excellent form.
And what a band this was featuring Sabra Faulk on bass, Matt Rolland, fiddle, Bobby Ronstadt, accordion, Alex Flores sax and Brian Matyjasik, drums, who are all in great form. Their rendition of the elder Ronstadt’s ballad, “Canadian Moon,” being especially sweet. The Tucson Folk Festival which records every set, direct from the mixing board for the performers, is often a mixed bag in terms of the quality of the mix in these recordings as well as the performance itself. If you already like the Ronstadts, you’ll love this recording. If what they do is new to you, this is a grand introduction. n July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 37
Photo courtesy zosoontour.com
Photo courtesy foxtucson.com.
Z tunes
Billy Bob Thornton and the Boxmasters perform at Fox Theatre on Tuesday, July 17.
ZOSO: The Ultimate Led Zeppelin Experience performs at The Rialto Theatre on Saturday, August 11.
LIVE MUSIC
See web site for more information
Schedules accurate as of press time. Visit the web sites or call for current/detailed information.
311 E. Congress St. 622-8848, HotelCongress.com/club JULY Thu 5: Sustaining Sounds, featuring Born2death, Ryan Chavira, Sku:ulf03k, & Zachary Reid Sat 7: Moodie Black, Night of the Living Shred Sun 8: MRCH, Fringe Class, Sur Block, Infinite Souls Tue 10: Spindrift, Jesika Von Rabbit, Crystal Radio Fri 13: La Misa Negra Sun 15: Mary Lattimore, Julianna Barwick, Karima Walker Wed 18: The Artisanals Thu 19: Decker, Billy Sedlmayr, Gabrielle Louise Fri 20: Xixa, Burning Palms Sun 22: Boy Pablo, Mute Swan Mon 23: Save Face, Prince Daddy & The Hyenas, Sundressed Tue 24: Dent May, Shannon Lay Sat 28: Metalachi AUGUST Sun 12: Charlie Hunter Wed 22: Parsonsfield
Thu 12: Louise Le Hir Fri 13: Greg Morton & Friends Sun 15: Mik and the Funky Brunch Wed 18: Miss Lana Rebel & Kevin Michael Mayfield Thu 19: Mitzi Cowell Fri 20: Greg Morton & Friends Sun 22: Mik and the Funky Brunch Wed 25: Miss Lana Rebel & Kevin Michael Mayfield Fri 27: Greg Morton & Friends Sun 29: Mik and the Funky Brunch AUGUST Closed until August 13 Wed 15: Miss Lana Rebel & Kevin Michael Mayfield Thu 16: Mitzi Cowell Fri 17: Greg Morton & Friends Sun 19: Mik and the Funky Brunch Wed 22: Miss Lana Rebel & Kevin Michael Mayfield Fri 24: Greg Morton & Friends Sun 26: Mik and the Funky Brunch Wed 29: Miss Lana Rebel & Kevin Michael Mayfield Fri 31: Greg Morton & Friends
191 TOOLE 191 E. Toole Ave. rialtotheatre.com JULY Fri 6: Anarbor, Silent Rival Tue 10: Negative Approach, Dayglo Abortions, Sex Prisoner, Get A Grip Fri 13: Daedelus, Holly, Wiley Cable Thu 19: Reckless Kelly Fri 20: Jenny and the Mexicats Sat 21: Tribute of Decades, featuring Cowboys ‘n’ Hell, Faceless, Maiden AZ Mon 23: Car Seat Headrest, Naked Giants Tue 24: The Cadillac Three, 7Horse AUGUST Fri 10: OTEP, Dropout Kings, Ragdoll Sunday Mon 13: Knox Hamilton, Brother Sundance Thu 16: Beach Goons, King Shelter, Super Whatevr Wed 22: The Alarm Fri 24: Katastro Sat 25: Young Dubliners Sun 26: Flynt Flossy & Turquoise Jeep
BORDERLANDS BREWING 119 E. Toole Ave. 261-8773, BorderlandsBrewing.com JULY Fri 6: Mustang Corners AUGUST
CLUB CONGRESS
LA COCINA 201 N. Court Ave. 622-0351, LaCocinaTucson.com JULY Thu 5: Freddy Parish Fri 6: Greg Morton & Friends Sat 7: Nathaniel Burnside Sun 8: Mik and the Funky Brunch Wed 11: Miss Lana Rebel & Kevin Michael Mayfield
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CUSHING STREET BAR & RESTAURANT 198 W. Cushing St. 622-7984, CushingStreet.com Fridays: Pete Swan Trio featuring Matt Mitchell & Scott Black Saturdays: Jeff Lewis Trio
FLYCATCHER 340 E. 6th St. 798-1298, FlycatcherTucson.com JULY Fri 7: Red Light Cameras, La Cerca, Street Blues Family
FOX TUCSON THEATRE 17 W. Congress St. 624-1515, FoxTucsonTheatre.org JULY Tue 17: Billy Bob Thornton and The Boxmasters Wed 18: Arrival—The Music of ABBA Sat 21: Chris Isaak Mon 23: American Idol LIVE! 2018 Sat 28: The Tributaries—A Tribute To Linda Ronstadt AUGUST Fri 17: Pimpinela
HACIENDA DEL SOL 5501 N. Hacienda Del Sol. 2991501, HaciendaDelSol.com Nightly: Live Music on the Patio JULY Sun 22: Mr. Bing’s The Supper Club Experience
THE HUT 305 N. 4th Ave., 623-3200 huttucson.com Sundays: Acoustic Open Mic, with Cadillac Mountain Thursdays: Mockingbirds Saturdays: Mike & Randy’s 420 Show with Top Dead Center JULY Sat 7: The Jack Sat 21: The Dr. JJ Band
MONTEREY COURT 505 W. Miracle Mile, MontereyCourtAZ.com JULY Fri 6: Roadhouse Sat 7: ROH
Photo courtesy facebook.com/Greyhound-Soul-126372416778/
Photo courtesy vanillafudge.com
tunes Z
Greyhound Soul performs at Tap & Bottle on 6th Avenue on Thursday, July 5.
Sun 8: Nancy Elliott & Friends, Wally Lawder & Acoustic Sky Tue 10: Wicked Bad Girls & a Boy with the Holy Who Whos Wed 11: Don Armstrong & Earl Edmonson Thu 12: Touch Of Gray Fri 13: Tommy Tucker, East 2 West Sat 14: Bluesman Mike & The Blues Review Band Sun 15: Nancy Elliott & Friends, The Agave Ensemble Tue 17: The Tucsonics Wed 18: Eric Schaffer & The Other Troublemakers Thu 19: Virginia Cannon Presents Thursday Night Live Fri 20: Cochise County All-Stars, Sundust Road Sat 21: Little House of Funk Sun 22: Nancy Elliott & Friends, Wild Women Thu 26: Titan Valley Warheads Fri 27: The Amosphere Sat 28: Key Ingredients Of African Soul Sun 29: Nancy Elliott & Friends, P.D. Ronstadt & The Company AUGUST Wed 1: Nick McBlaine & LogTrain Thu 2: Corey Spector Fri 3: Erin Bode Sun 5: Nancy Elliott & Friends, Reed Turchi Thu 9: Touch Of Gray Fri 10: Giant Blue Sun 12: Nancy Elliott & Friends, Frank n Steel Thu 16: Virginia Cannon Presents Thursday Night Live
Vanilla Fudge appears at The Rialto Theatre on Sunday, August 12.
Sun 19: Nancy Elliott & Friends, Michael P. & The Gullywashers Tue 21: The Tucsonics
Tue 28: Ottmar Liebert & Luna Negra
RIALTO THEATRE
136 N. Park Ave. RockTucson.com JULY Sat 14: Summer Good Some Are Evil Tue 17: Middle Class Rut, Black Map, Gila Byte Fri 20: Silent Planet Sun 29: Reilly’s Beach Club AUGUST Sun 26: Reilly’s Beach Club
318 E. Congress St. 740-1000, RialtoTheatre.com JULY Fri 6: Grungefest, featuring Fooz Fighters, Sliver, Allison Chains, Oceans Sat 7: Mopar Bently, Never Say Never, Sorrows Ruin, Evasion, Sigils of Summoning, The Sindicate, Broken Sun 8: Panteón Rococó, La Sucursal de la Cumbia Tue 17: The Psychedelic Furs Thu 19: An Evening With JD Souther Fri 20: Desert Fish CD Release Party, Straight Villain, Something Like Seduction, Young Heart, Noah Rock Sat 21: Steve Trevino Fri 27: Boombox Cartel, YehMe2, Bailo, Barely Alive Sat 28: Nothing More, Bad Wolves, Eyes Set To Kill AUGUST Thu 2: Beach House, Ed Schrader’s Music Beat Tue 7: Stephen Marley Wed 8: Rebirth Brass Band Sat 11: ZOSO—The Ultimate Led Zeppelin Experience Sun 12: Vanilla Fudge Mon 13: Knox Hamilton, Brother Sundance Sat 25: Rodrigo y Gabriela Mon 27: Yelawolf
THE ROCK
SAINT CHARLES TAVERN 1632 S. 4th Ave (520) 888-5925 JULY Fri 20: The Exbats, Weekend Lovers Fri 27: Miss Olivia and the Interlopers AUGUST Visit Facebook page for more events
SAND-RECKONER TASTING ROOM 510 N. 7th Ave., #170, 833-0121 sand-reckoner.com/tasting-room JULY Fri 6: Welty Wilson Trio Sat 7: Leila Lopez Fri 13: Naim Amor AUGUST See web site for information
SKY BAR TUCSON 536 N. 4th Ave, 622-4300. SkyBarTucson.com JULY Thu 5: Eric Schaffer & The Other
Troublemakers Fri 6: Touch, Jahmar Intl., L3XX, Phox Tue 10: Tom Walbank, Steff Koeppen Wed 11: Open Mic Fri 13: Touch, Jahmar Intl., L3XX, Phox Tue 17: Tom Walbank, Dos Muñoz Wed 18: Open Mic Thu 19: Jacques Taylor and the Real Deal Sat 21: Eric Schaffer & The Other Troublemakers Tue 24: Tom Walbank, Steff Koeppen Wed 25: Open Mic Thu 26: War Twins, The Time Being Fri 27: Cirque Roots Tue 31: Tom Walbank AUGUST See web site for information
TAP & BOTTLE 403 N. 6th Ave. 344-8999 TheTapandBottle.com JULY Thu 5: Greyhound Soul Thu 12: N-Lightning and Leigh Lesho Thu 19: West Texas Intermediate Thu 26: Austin Counts and Tom Walbank Sun 29 Last Sunday Revival AUGUST All Thursday 830-1030pm Thu 9: Katie Haverly & the Aviary Thu 16: Louis Le Hir Thut 23: Rich Hopkins Thu 30: Little Cloud
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#SonoranSummer Zócalo Magazine is once again running a summer PHOTO contest. Submit your local Tucson and/or Sonoran Desert summer photos for a chance to win prizes and have your work published in the September 2018 issue of the magazine. Photos can be of any subject as long as they were taken somewhere in the Sonoran Desert. Enter as many times as you want. Just have fun, stay cool and be safe. Entries will be accepted from June 1 to August 25, 2018. To enter: 1) Follow Zócalo Magazine on Instagram @ZocaloMagazine 2) Post your photos and tag them with #SonoranSummer 3) ALSO be sure to tag @ZocaloMagazine on your photos or in your post so that we know you want to officially participate in this contest. More details are available on Instagram @ZocaloMagazine
FALL FUNDRAISER SURREALIST DINNER PARTY: FEATURING DAVID HENRY NOBODY JR. SEPTEMBER 8, 2018 7:00PM - 11:00PM MOCA Tucson’s annual fall fundraiser is the most bizarre, not-to-be-missed art party of the year! This year’s year theme is inspired by Les Diners de Gala, Salvador Dali’s surrealist cookbook. Dali’s legendary dinner parties were sensual, imaginative, and exotic—sex and lobsters, collage and cannibalism. For more information + tickets:
WWW.MOCA-TUCSON.ORG July & August 2018 | ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com 41
Z community
community Z
Open Containers Allowed by Hilary Stunda
A
t the base of A Mountain and across the street from Mission Gardens an older gentleman sits on a stool outside a single story ranchette. The windows of his house are covered in makeshift blinds made of newspaper. His driveway is cluttered with used appliances; broken objects. And statues of angels. The Menlo Park neighborhood is the oldest neighborhood in America. Historians state it has been continually inhabited for 4,000 years. The archaeology proves it. Mission Gardens is a testament to this fact. It’s an actual living agricultural museum where docents lead tours to garden plots representing the crops and edible plants that thrived here 4 millennia ago. Just ten minutes away on foot is the MSA Annex—a series of shipping containers stacked and set akimbo the color of the desert itself. Inside the organized tangle, like an unearthed dig, the find: 13 original and unique local businesses. It might have taken a few thousand years to perfect what the Tohono O’odham tribe knew about edible plants, but there you’ll find the perfect vegan burger. Among the array of speciality shops, including Beaut Burger, several of which are owned by women and husband and wife teams, is The Festival Grounds, a 10,000 square foot outdoor performance space anchored by a huge stage and scaffolding with a string of Carnaval lights. This is where the “new circus” company Flam Chen will show-case their blend of homegrown Fellini meets Cirque de Soleil. Fire arts, stilt acrobatics; mechanical creatures will take to the stage under Tucson night skies.
Photo left: Inside the new Why I Love Where I Live retail shop at the MSA Annex.
It’s been a decade since Jerry Dixon, chairman of The Gadsden Company, bought the 14-acre site that encompasses the nearby Mercado San Agustin and Menlo Park neighborhood with a vision to create a pedestrian-friendly neighborhood walking distance to a mixed-use outdoor plaza where one can enjoy a cerveza with friends. “We visited public markets all over the world for inspiration” says Kira Dixon-Weinstein, the daughter and partner of Jerry. “Mexico City, the Reading Terminal Market in Philadelphia; the Budapest Public Market,” she says. “We wanted the Mercado to have a strong Tucson identity. Since then, commuters and a few hipsters moved in to the new Menlo Park two-story Spanish Colonial and European style homes the color of burnt sienna and ochre. Hybrid cars line the narrow winding streets that mirror the canal routes dating back 3000 years. “It wasn’t long before we started to get requests from cool, small businesses to create a second phase to the Mercado,” she says. 200 yards south of the Mercado San Agustin the MSA Annex was born. 13 locally owned small businesses featuring a unique shopping dining and cultural experience. The eclectic, vibrant and unpretentious vibe embodies Tucson. “Rio Nuevo made it possible to do something special and out of the box,” says Dixon-Weinstein of their $2.2 million subsidy. “Otherwise the rents would have been exorbitant.” In addition to supporters such as Rio Nuevo and Mission District Partners, the business non-profit, BDFC, also jumped in to give a small business loan to one of the boutiques.
continues...
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Z community
MSA Annex
Beaut Burger 44 ZOCALOMAGAZINE.com | July & August 2018
community Z The concept for many of the businesses come straight from the heart. Why I Love Where I Live, is more than a business. It’s a philosophy; a movement. The concept for the store grew out of an Instagram account. When Kristen Tovar begrudgingly faced the reality of moving from Portland to Tucson at her husbands’ urging, she decided to work on cultivating a sense of appreciation. Posting pictures and discovering the charming and funky nature of Tucson, her attitude started to shift. Tovar sells Tucson-centric books, accessories and swag and generates experiences to inspire people to love where they live. Now a full-blown Tucson devotee who spearheads creative collaborations with other businesses, such as the Maynard’s Photo Walk, and generates community gatherings at the Annex. Swing by her store every Friday this July for her Monsoon Happy Hour. Because of the nature of the layout and design, the Annex is a natural hub. “Grab a cocktail like the Orange Rhumba or Boulevardier and look up at the clouds overhead,” says Rebecca Safford, co-owner of Westbound, the latest creation from the owners of Tap & Bottle. Rebecca and her husband Scott are no ingenues when it comes to serving libations and community fun. “When people ride in to get their bike fixed at Transit, then grab a Beaut burger and end at our space for a beer, it feels wonderful,” she says. “Once the heat breaks and the sun is setting, it’s perfect time to be at Westbound. We’ll have live music and friends spinning records.” Realizing many Menlo Park neighbors and commuters are coming and going, they decided to turn the entry of Westbound into a speciality beer, wine and spirit to-go shop. For Kerry Lane, co-owner of Beaut Burger, the location of the Annex was everything as well. “The proximity to the street car, the vibrancy at Mercado San Agustin; the bike path, the Cushing Street Bridge, and A mountain were all very appealing,” she says. Lane and her husband were hiking in British Columbia when they decided to take the leap and create a restaurant where “the veggie burger wasn’t an afterthought, but the primary purpose,” she says. “Neither my husband nor I eat meat,” says Lane. “We both missed that satiating experience of eating a juicy burger with great fries and a beer. So, we decided to recreate the quintessential burger experience using only plants. Place an order at the take out window of Beaut and eat at one of the hip orange and gray furniture stations. There’s something about eating a pure grain, no soy, vegan burger among a series of rusted shipping containers in the middle of the desert that tastes especially good. It works.
You would think anything having to do with steel and desert would be excruciatingly hot and hard-edged, but the design and layout of the Annex is anything but. Visually, the oxidized and repurposed containers seem to emerge from the raw landscape. Grey/black fabric hang along the walls of the container, softening the lines. The fabric seems to float independently from the containers, reacting to wind, subtlety revealing the solid steel beneath. Of course, the fabrics fulfill a crucial function. “They shade the containers, blocking 85% of the suns rays and increasing thermal performance by reducing heat gain,” says architect Paul Weiner. Built to withstand the extreme lack and abundance of water during the monsoon, the Annex sits on 12 inches of permeable gapped rock that directs rain and water flow to a storm drain system that heads to the Santa Cruz river. Drainage is key, especially when there are plans to hoist acrobats 100 feet in the air with torches in hand. “There aren’t many venues around that are equipped to showcase aerials or large spectacles,” says Nadia Hagen, the visionary and co-founder with Paul Weir, of Flam Chen, the Annex resident Theater company. “It’s a big deal for us to have a home,” she says. “Every time we want to have a show, we usually have to stick our round selves into a square box,’ she says. Now they have free reign. The more outrageous and spectacular the production, the better. Flam Chen was asked to create an installation at Arcosanti for Paolo Soleri’s 70th birthday. “The Heavenly Court of the Celestial Ling-Ling” involved flaming high flying trapeze, high butoh suspension, dancers inside enormous fire rings and a bungee jump from the 30 foot vault roof. Soleri loved it. Hagen and Weir have been the visionaries behind the wildly successful All Souls Procession every October since 1994, leading 100-150,000 thousand fully costumed and face painted participants through the streets of Tucson. Their spectacles lean toward the pagan and the sublime with surreal costumes and fantastical themes. Even the most passive onlooker will find themselves joining a torch bearing conga line to a distant pyre. They plan to book two large full-scale productions a year. As for the rest of the year, performances and ideas germinate throughout the Annex through a shared software program called “Gather” that fosters performance and booking ideas—as long as it’s family friendly and everyone approves. “Finally the community has a space to incubate their voice,” says Hagen. Now, lets find out what they have to say. n
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Z poetry
Before Dawn It’s four a.m. again, the rhythm of your breathing a familiar tide, the accumulation of our tethered years like a canopy. How can we have been married more than half our lives? Lately, the same dream: You suddenly vanish without warning, leaving nothing but air, your absence a yawning hole that swallows the room. Alone by your side I want to wake you but I don’t. In an hour the light will shine through, then the day. We’ll quarrel over trivial things, almost forgetting what’s to come.
Zócalo Magazine invites poets with Tucson connections to submit up to three original, previously unpublished (including online) poems, any style, 40 line limit per poem. Our only criterion is excellence. Simultaneous submissions ok if you notify ASAP of acceptance elsewhere. Email your submission to poetry@zocalotucson.com. Please include contact information: phone number and email address. Notification of acceptance or rejection by email. Zócalo has first North American rights; author may re-publish with acknowledgment to Zócalo Magazine. Payment is a one year subscription.
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– Barbara Atwood
Barbara Atwood is a professor emerita at the University of Arizona College of Law. She has published academic books and articles, but she also enjoys writing poetry, short fiction, and plays. For her, writing a poem is an effort to make sense of the world.
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Ochoa Court Condos - 594-614 S. Convent Ave., $218,000- $298,000
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