"600 words by Esther J. Cepeda"

Freedom from Frida: an interview with singer Lila Downs

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

Lila Downs burst into the big time after her star turn as the sultry singer who serenades Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera in Salma Hayek’s 2002 biopic Frida.

Her deep, sexy voice belted out many of the songs on the Academy-Award nominated movie soundtrack and put her center stage with Caetano Veloso for a performance of the Original Song nominee "Burn It Blue" by Elliot Goldenthal and Julie Taymor at the 75 Annual Oscars.

Like the haunting, primal sounds that accompanied the life story of the thickly-browed Kahlo, the thickly-browed Downs had been, until recently, haunted by her own resemblance to the famous artist.

Her peasant dresses, Mexican torch songs, and traditionally-braided hair were her signature for years, but if you’ve seen her lately, you probably didn’t recognize her. With the release of her newest CD, Shake Away, the 40-year-old songstress has let her hair down, pulled her hemlines up, and is making a case for Mexicans 2.0.

Shocked by her phoenix-like rebirth, and fearing for the feelings of the bluehouse girls who’d show up for her September 30 performance in Chicago at the Harris Theater for Music and Dance in Millennium Park – wearing green ribbons in their hair and dainty shawls only to be disappointed – I talked to her Wednesday about her new look and new outlook on life.

Q. I was sorry to hear you fell into a drinking depression upon finding out you’d never have kids. It spurred you to reassess your life and reinvent yourself into a mini-skirt wearing hottie who’s not so thickly-browed anymore. How have young women reacted to that, especially in light of living during a time when there is much pressure to Americanize because of the immigration debate in the United States?

A. First of all I still find it very important to adapt my traditional clothing on stage and I still wear my braids from time to time. I’ve always been into combining modern aesthetics with the traditional, but I did pluck my eyebrows – which was a big deal for me because [having natural eyebrows] meant protecting myself as a woman.

What has influenced me in the contemporary "look" is a sexier, "hip-hop" approach to being a woman. Generally we have had positive comments, but a few have criticized it.

But being always compared to Frida Kahlo has been difficult and even the braids are sometimes like a ball and chain.

I think we’re stimulated by the renovation of ancient archetypes depending on cycles of our society. I believe we have the need to express our sexuality sometimes more explicitly and sometimes it may be more ambiguous. And I guess I tune into the times the way many artists do.

Q. Setting aside the most outward signals of your rebirth – goodbye beautiful, iconic braids – your music is also screaming that much has changed. On Shake Away, the reggaeton motifs, the still-empowered but forward-looking lyrics, and your collaborations with new artists like Raul Midon – one of my very favorites – and Ruben Albarran of Café Tacuba, seem livelier, happier than your previous albums.

All that said, what I felt when I heard these songs was a great sense of honoring yesterday, today and tomorrow all at once. Tell me about being able to cherish the past while embracing the future.

A. I believe there are symbols – such as the snake – that can lead us to question our feelings about what they represent. In most cultures snakes are feared. But if we look into the reason we feel fear, maybe we can conquer it.

The future holds so many enriching, cross-cultural experiences! By nature we are curious about others – if we can lose our fear we can learn to appreciate each other in a more loving way.

Q. So you see fear and change going hand in hand…you certainly must have felt fear about being forced to change your view of yourself as a mother when you found out you’d never have any kids. I know how it feels to lose out on the dream to have a child, be left wondering what the point of it all is, and emerge from the experience changed. How did coping with all that change your life as an artist?  Does creating music and performance now hold a different emotional place for you?

A. Yes, I think everything I do is about the next step. You hold on to the lifeline, you celebrate as much as your body permits, and you sing to the river and the moon with every vibration in your bones, and you listen to your heart – trying to convey the strength that a loss gives you.

Q. Regardless of your clothes or your choice of musical style, you are a role model; a wildly successful Mexican-American woman who has walked a fine line between two cultures, between two different generations, between two languages and, recently, between two Lilas.

Aside from the personal loss, I think most Latinos in the United States – and certainly beyond our borders, too – can really relate to those dualities. It’s tough being immersed in American culture – and deeply desiring to be a full participant in it – while retaining our links to our parent’s land, especially now that there’s just so much simultaneous presidential vote pandering and immigrant hating swirling around.

We don’t all have curanderas with special teas to help us find our way. What is your message to all the young Latinos out there who haven't yet figured out how to balance it all?

A. Do not be ashamed of who you are! If who you are is not clear, be honest and be humble about learning your story.

Once you know more about who you are, and why you look the way you look, and why you feel the way you feel, be patient – you will find pride which will make you strong.

Experience Lila Downs live at the Harris Theater at Millenium Park September 30th

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

The Adler Planetarium’s star: Dr. Jose Francisco Salgado

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

Take a moon-entranced kid who grew up scarfing down Isaac Asimov and tinkering with music and video, give him the boundless resources of Chicago’s Adler Planetarium then add the creative spark that only Chicago’s funkiest band of violins, cellos, flutes, and tubas can bring, and what do you get?

The kind of sensual, visually-arresting cosmic journey usually reserved for Grateful Dead concerts – in the form of sumptuous interstellar images pas de deux-ing with the Chicago Sinfonietta’s elegant wall of sound under a summery dusk.

The kid in question is Dr. Jose Francisco Salgado, an Adler Planetarium Astronomer and Science Visualizer who is quickly making a name for himself around our humble globe as a choreographer of – not to – the stars. His video journeys through the galaxy visit such notable hangouts as the Eagle Nebula and the surface of Mars, and have been such a hit that they’re making their way to stargazers in Spain and Paris.

You don’t have to travel that far, though. After a series of incredible collaborations with the Chicago Sinfonietta – aka America’s most diverse orchestra aka the Joffrey Ballet’s pit crew – the gang is presenting a free encore presentation of Gustav Holst’s "The Planets" on the Jay Pritzker Pavilion stage at Millenium Park Friday August 22nd.

"In 2005 the Sinfonietta came to the Adler looking for a visual backdrop for ‘The Planets’ performances and basically [the Adler] asked me because of all my interests in art, classical music, and graphic arts," Jose told me this week. "I’d been looking for the perfect project and this was it."

I had the pleasure of experiencing his visual choreography during the Chicago Sinfonietta’s May production of Astronomical Pictures at an Exhibition, where Jose choreographed real space pictures and computer generated images from astronomical data to Modest Mussorgsky’s "Pictures."

"The visualizations themselves looked like works of art," Jose said, adding that he gets only the best pictures from his peeps at NASA, the European Space Agency. Some he creates himself with raw data from Adler’s databases. "[Leading the viewer] through the promenade passages, walking through the "gallery," was the perfect way of showing cutting edge images and visualizations. ‘Pictures at an Exhibition’ took about four months, ‘The Planets’ took about six."

If you’re the type who regards the constellations as greatly-jeweled chandeliers that sail through our night sky, a mysterious scattering of eternally circumnavigating planets, their many moons and countless stars continually scanned for their secrets, you’re not alone. For others, the very mention of the term "solar system" causes a reflexive yawn.

"‘The Planets’ is about planting the seed, about inspiring people to learn more about the solar system in general and hopefully grab a book, got to the planetarium or next time they’re switching channels and see a documentary to stop and watch it," said the guy who got interested in astronomy as a third-grade boy when he happened upon a book about the first moon landing his dad owned in their native Puerto Rico.

"Astronomy uses cutting-edge technology and data for scientific purposes but for education and outreach also, it’s a great way to engage audiences who are not science attendant," he said. "My interests are not only in science but in technology, graphic arts, photography – I even compose [music] a bit – I use it all to engage people."

And he does it in two languages! Ever so humble, Jose doesn’t go on and on about how few Latinos there are in the sciences, he just works to change it. As the Adler Planetarium's webmaster, he’s got a web page devoted to Spanish-language astronomy resources and is working to create educational resources, such as a planetarium show in English and Spanish, for nationwide distribution.

"’The Planets’ is a good synthesis of the things we have achieved in solar system exploration. It doesn’t cover absolutely everything but it’s a very, very good summary," he said. "What’s interesting is that many people will come out of the concert learning so much just from looking at the visualizations."

"It’s so exciting, to see the conductor synching the music to the visuals," Jose said, "and to see people coming out of the hall and saying ‘Wow I didn’t know that Jupiter had so many moons!’ It’s so very rewarding."

(full disclosure: I am a Director on the Board of the Chicago Sinfonietta, and as such I personally invite you to join us for this FREE concert, under the actual stars, in Millennium Park on Friday August 22nd. I hope you can make it!)

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

Latinos in the fine arts: Part One

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

Diversity initiatives usually make my blood run cold. There’s nothing more patronizing than being attractive to someone more because of the color of your skin than because of your talent.

But in some cases it’s just necessary to set aside opportunities for inclusion or else there would never be anyone of color "at the top." And what’s true for the boardrooms of corporate America holds true for its performance stages.

Though there’s no lack of rich artistic traditions – music, dance, literature, visual art – in any given ethnic community, rarely do members of those communities make it onto mainstream stages. And the converse is true: you can practically count the number of black or Hispanic ballerinas or orchestra conductors in America on one hand. Audiences are no different; few white faces at the folkloric dance shows and few brown ones at King Lear.

Of course, how performing arts organizations attempt to mix and match means everything – the difference between a hit and a slight depending on the intended audience and objective.

For instance, bless their hearts, but I just gagged when I saw that Chicago’s Shakespeare Theater – whom I love, love, love – announced they’d be putting on Shakespeare en Espanol – Romeo y Julieta. In Little Village, no less. (At least it won’t be in the dreaded Pilsen neighborhood where most white people assume all Hispanic people live, and where high school kids from the rich suburbs are bussed in weekly to ogle the locals like it’s a zoo.)

I know my reaction is indefensible. There’s no downside – free world-class Shakespearean theater in the native language of a community with little access to such universally high-brow entertainment. The opportunity to open new doors to a whole generation of kids and parents who otherwise wouldn't make their way down to Navy Pier for Bill Shakes.

But though that’s a great example of community outreach, with an eye toward developing future Hispanic audiences, my initial reaction was: "Why isn’t it good enough to go on the real stage? Many of the people in the audience dragged themselves to the U.S. from thousands of miles away and you don’t think they can get themselves to Navy Pier?! And if you really want to diversify why don’t you find some great Latino leads for the regular production?"

The flip-side of that coin is, to me, brilliant! Less a "Latino outreach" activity and yet more authentic. According to the New York Times, in February Arthur Laurents, the original author of the famed musical, will be staging a "bilingual" revival of my very favorite musical "West Side Story" on Broadway. It promises to be grittier, more urban and more authentic.

I've always loved "West Side Story," seen it performed by high school students and professional touring companies alike. Stop me on the street or even call me on the phone and I can sing any of the songs – at full volume – for you.

But I hate watching the movie, with its close-ups of obviously white but creepily orange-colored stars who are as Latino as Margaret Thatcher and dance with as much sabor as Andy Griffith. It’s an insult. But, really, where were the producers of that movie going to find properly trained Latino stars in that time? At least the story humanized Latinos at a time they weren't on anyone's radar, and on stage the actors are far enough away you can suspend disbelief.

No, the whole performance won’t be in Spanish – and the Jerome Robbins choreography will remain untouched! – it’ll be spoken only in selected passages where the characters would naturally speak in Spanish.

And very best of all Mr. Laurents said he intends on casting Hispanic actors in the roles of the Puerto Rican Sharks and in the role of Maria! Hallelujah!!!!!!

"I’m not about to go slap some dark makeup on her," Mr. Laurents said. "I think it’s important to have a Latina in the role for a very simple reason — I think they know what it feels like to be an outsider. If they’ve got Puerto Rican blood, they know what prejudice is. If they’ve got any kind of Hispanic blood, they know what prejudice is."

%%%  Tomorrow, Part Two: a spotlight on one Chicago company diversifying on stage for their core audience. But I’ve got to go for now, Broadway auditions will be announced soon and I have to go sharpen my rendition of "Tonight"…

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contacteejaycee@600words.com

Chicago columnists unite!

"Pregunta del Dia" by Esther J. Cepeda

"Pregunta del Dia" translates from Spanish into "Question of the Day" and today’s comes from K.C. (not of the Sunshine Band), a Lemont, IL reader who asks:

Q. I looked at your "events" page and so what’re you doing June 18?

A. Oh, K.C., bless your heart! Now I don’t have to contrive some way to plug this performance (and great timing, by the way).

Next Wednesday I’ll be moderating a pre-performance panel featuring my Sun-Times pal Neil Steinberg, the Tribune’s incredible Rick Kogan, Accessible Contemporary Music’s Executive Director Seth Boustead and The Moving Architects’ choreographer Erin Carlisle Norton.

You see, ACM and TMA are putting on two performances of "1,001 Afternoons in Chicago," a live, newly-composed music and modern dance piece interpreting a few of the stories of legendary Chicago newspaperman Ben Hecht.

Who?

Yeah, I didn’t know either, but Hecht was – during the 1920's – a writer at the Chicago Daily News who challenged himself to write a short story each day and publish it in the paper. Despite how ridiculously unlikely it would be that any editor today would allow such a thing – apparently back then newspapers actually printed more than five "column inches" on any given topic – Hecht’s stuff was wildly successful, spawning the "1,001 Afternoons in Chicago" column.

Was he "the Royko of his time?" Perhaps even better. Hecht was such a rock star in Chi-town he left for New York City, then to Hollywood to screenwrite movies (Scarface, A Farewell to Arms, A Star is Born) before being tarred, black-listed and…well you’ll just have to come to the panel Wednesday June 18 at 7:30 pm at the Music Institute of Chicago, 1490 Chicago Ave., Evanston to hear much more, but suffice it to say, the guy who once wrote this:

"Trying to determine what is going on in the world by reading newspapers is like trying to tell the time by watching the second hand of a clock."

was fascinating.

But never mind all that, the real star of the evening will be the collaboration of Accessible Contemporary Music’s sounds paired with The Moving Architects’ corporeal expressions mixed in with video, all telling a selection of Ben Hecht’s stories.

New music sometimes scares people but I find if I can listen to it a bit before I experience it onstage, which you can do at http://www.acmusic.org/concert_1001.html (read some BH stories, too), I can really get into it live.

If I could even begin to describe the music along with the movement, it would take me 1,001 words and I still wouldn’t do it justice. I could try to convey Seth and Erin’s enthusiasm but I might overload you with breathless quotes like: "This project celebrates the golden era of journalism, when the newspaper was part of everyone’s daily routine!" Oh, if only there were millions more Seths around to save printed newspapers from certain extinction.

Don’t fret if you can’t make it next Wednesday – or if you don’t need the geeky newspaper-lovin’ pre-performance fawning – just don’t miss this Saturday June 14 ‘s show. It’s at 2 pm in Curtiss Hall of the Fine Arts Building, 410 S. Michigan Ave. on the 10 floor. It’ll be a perfect afternoon of "Afternoons."

Esther J. Cepeda writes the “600 Words” & “Pregunta del Dia” columns, and is also a Director at the Chicago-based United Neighborhood Organization. Her reporting and opinions do not necessarily reflect those of UNO. “600 words” is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

Coming attractions

The link on the left takes you to my upcoming events:

Esther J. Cepeda is deeply committed to opening minds and broadening horizons through aggressive thought leadership and the dissemination of positive, analytical ideas.

That means she gives speeches/Q&A, moderates roundtable discussions/panels, shows up ready to rumble or rumba, take your pick.

Esther can rattle off statistics on population and migration patterns, speak passionately on topics as diverse as sports, culture, education, news, politics, economics and business, and, yes, if pressed she'll give you her take on immigration/diversity/all that jazz (oh yeah, don't get her started on that, she can belt out every song from the musical Chicago...don't ask unless you reallllly want to hear it).

The fun part is that you never know what's gonna come out of her mouth!

These people feel reasonably comfortable:

• May 28, 2008 Perspectives  South Loop Middle school annual graduation  (not open to public)

• June 5-7, 2008 ColumbiaUniversity Next Generation Project American Assembly: U.S. GLobal Policy and the future of international relations @ the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars (not open to public)

• June 10-11, 2008 Making Media Connections Conference "Ethnic Media & Beyond" According to recent reports, the ethnic news sector has audiences that are growing rather than shrinking. Learn how your organization can reach out to these audiences. Dee Daniels, Noir Woman News; Ray Hanania, Chicago Arab American Journalist Association; Glen Reedus, Chicago Daily Defender. Moderator: Esther Cepeda, 600words.com. (Register right this moment)

• June 18, 2008 "1,001 Afternoons in Chicago" - "an innovative collaboration between Accessible Contemporary Music and "The Moving Architects" based on the stories of legendary Chicago newspaperman Ben Hecht. During the 1920's Hecht, a writer at the time for the Daily News, challenged himself to write a short story each day and publish it in the paper. He succeeded and the result has been compiled and published as 1,001 Afternoons in Chicago. This collaborative piece explores 12 of the stories through music, motion and visual imagery. The Evanston performance will be preceded by a panel discussion featuring the Chicago Tribune's Rick Kogan and Neil Steinberg from the Chicago Sun-Times. The panel will be moderated by Esther J. Cepeda, "600 Words" columnist."

• July 26, 2008, UNITY 08 Journalism Convention "Bloggers of Color: The Top Five Reasons Why the Blogosphere is NOT Diverse and What You Can Do About It!" Bloggers have forced the mainstream media to investigate stories of interest to communities of color like the "Jena Six," "Genarlow Wilson" and "Shaquanda Cotton." Bloggers were instrumental to forcing retailer Abercrombie and Fitch to ditch their racial anti-Asian t-shirts. Bloggers helped the Latino community organize their pro-immigration rallies. Yet bloggers of color are woefully under-represented in the blogosphere. Bloggers are regularly invited onto radio and TV shows to provide an "alternative" voice on breaking news stories. However, many of these prominent bloggers are overwhelmingly white and male..." read more and register now.

Contact Esther if you want her to come spread her magic at your gig. Her rates are reasonable, but its extra if you DON'T want her to sing. (Not a wise choice...she's pretty darned good.)