Britton-René Collins headlined the night, playing two sets of modern concert percussion
MILLENNIAL
PHOTOS BY JIM LEATHERMAN
Orlando’s Timucua Arts Foundation celebrates landmark 1,000th show BY KYLE EAGLE AND MATTHEW MOYER
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The Timucua Arts Foundation, though, proudly kicks back against those trends, specializing in deep-dive cultural events and adventurous music for local audiences with a taste for things on the proverbial left side of the dial. Started in 2000, Timucua Arts Foundation has helped to both raise the bar and open up the possibilities for performances happening here in Central Florida. The Timucua house has consistently hosted programming and performances that prick up the ears of their hard-core audience and those blessed with the curiosity to see what’s happening in their city.
ouse venues, as a rule, generally don’t last all that long. The ecstatic creative highs often end up outweighed by the organizational, logistical and financial lows. But the Timucua Arts Foundation isn’t just any house, not by a long shot. Timucua, headquartered since 2007 in a custom-built residence-cum-grassroots performance space nestled among suburban homes on a quiet SoDo street, presented their 1,000th concert last week. That’s quite a milestone in a city where the theme park and resort industry casts a long shadow over the rest of the cultural landscape. 44
ORLANDO WEEKLY ● SEPT. 1-7, 2021
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orlandoweekly.com
Amazing turnouts with standing-room crowds are the norm more often than not to check out local composers like Jeff Rupert and Gerald Law II, jazz legend William Parker, avant harpist Zeena Parkins, or creative-music prime mover Karl Berger with renowned filmmaker Julian Benedikt in tow to document the performance. The list of Timucua headliners is illustrious: Grammy winners like David Sanchez; culture-jammers like Mark Hosler from Negativland; or Roedelius, a giant among electronica innovators. These names are but a few of the artists that have come to our small corner of the world to dazzle and
scratch the itch for compelling, unique live performance. “We had our first concert because we could not find anything happening midweek in Orlando in 1999. What was to be a one-time event instantly became a monthly event, then bi-weekly, then weekly, so that the following year, we presented 40 concerts,” Timucua Arts co-founder and householder — for this is indeed the home he shares with wife and fellow co-founder Elaine Corriveau and their children — Benoit Glazer tells Orlando Weekly. “It grew from there, organically, as it was filling a need that was obviously there, both for audiences and performers.” Twenty-plus years of full calendars later, Timucua is in a league with the region’s other heavy hitters like the Mennello Museum, Snap! Orlando and the Rollins Museum of Art (fka Cornell Fine Arts Museum). “When you consider that for 16 years Timucua was a volunteer-run organization, that Benoit and Elaine did this at great personal expense of time and money — it’s an amazing achievement to be able to celebrate this milestone,” says Timucua executive director Chris Belt. “Thousands of artists and tens of thousands of guests have experienced Timucua’s special combination of artistic excellence and intimate hospitality. And we’re growing the organization in such a way that the next 1,000 concerts will happen in a shorter timespan and reach many more people.” Intimate hospitality is an apt way to describe not only the venue, but the vibe in general at a Timucua event. There’s a welcoming warmth that one feels as soon as the doors open. Glazer, Corriveau, Belt and the foundation staff have set an inclusive tone bereft of pretension or elitism. Who knows, they might even be the ones pouring you a beverage from the ad-hoc bar. Intimacy comes into play even after the shows are over, in that one can mingle with those who moments ago were on the stage. (Though the pandemic has put a bit of a damper on that due to health and safety concerns.) Feeling that kind of creative energy at a close proximity is utterly priceless, let alone the freewheeling conversations that can be had. That conversational liveliness doesn’t just include the marquee talent, but extends deep into the crowd. Often in attendance are some of Central Florida’s best and brightest — curators, writers, musicians, professors, artists, civic and business leaders — as well as those up-and-coming trying to find their place in the arts world. One of those individuals is Matt Gorney.
