Gilbert Sun News; March 2015: Arts

Two Gilbert organizations up for Governor’s Arts Awards

BY LYNETTE CARRINGTON

Two Gilbert businesses are among the 65 organizations nominated for the Governor’s Arts Awards, which recognize outstanding contributions to culture and the arts throughout the state.

Art Intersection, Ballet Etudes and Ballet Etudes’ founding artistic director and Mesa resident, Sharon Seder Meko, are among the nominees. The award will be announced during a ceremony on Tuesday, March 24, at the Sheraton Phoenix Downtown Hotel.

Ballet Etudes is a nominee in the Arts in Education-Organization category. Additionally, Meko is up for the Arts in Education-Individual category.

and cultural issues and is intended to be a space that relays messages through the medium of art.

Fitzgerald is excited about Art Intersection’s first nomination.

“It’s quite an honor to sit there with all the other wonderful people who have been nominated,” Fitzgerald says.

“We have been nominated for the past several years,” says Kellan Meko, Ballet Etudes’ marketing and PR manager as well as resident choreographer and instructor.

Ballet Etudes and Sharon Seder Meko have received repeated nominations but have yet to win the award.

Art Intersection is nominated in the Business category. Alan Fitzgerald founded Art Intersection in 2010 for photographers and artists to learn, create and exhibit.

“It was an interesting combination of ideas about what we would do and who we would serve,” Fitzgerald says.

“The initial thought was it would be a place for emerging artists to have a place to work and exhibit.”

Art Intersection initially included three gallery spaces, a dark room for photographers working with traditional photography processes and a digital lab to support the latest technologies. A fourth gallery was added recently downstairs that is designed to be a place of social

The awards, in their 34th year, were founded by a group of folks who were part of an organization called Arizonans for Cultural Development, which evolved into Arizona Citizens for the Arts, according to Catherine “Rusty” Foley, the latter group’s executive director. Arizona Citizens for the Arts presents the awards in partnership with the Arizona Commission on the Arts and the Office of the Governor.

“A group of arts, community and business leaders got together and decided to help promote the importance of arts and culture,” Foley says.

“What was really needed was an event that recognized excellence on behalf of the organizations, individual artists and educators, and also those businesses and community organizations that were promoting arts and culture in the community. It was conceived as a public private partnership.”

Governor’s Arts Awards categories include Artist, Arts in EducationIndividual, Arts In Education-Organization, Business, Community and Individual.

“The Governor’s Arts Awards is really recognized as the most prestigious and really, in Arizona, the only statewide recognition program for excellence and achievement in the arts,” Foley says. For additional information about the

Commission on the Arts and its

visit www.azarts.gov.

BY CHRISTINA FUOCO-KARASINSKI

Conservatory of the Recording Arts graduate Darrell Thorp is about as modest as they come.

In February, the 1997 graduate of the Gilbert conservatory won three Grammys for his engineering work on the album “Morning Phase” by alternative rock singer Beck. A Tucson native, Thorp doesn’t seek attention for his prizes, but shyly speaks about them when asked.

“You know, I’m extremely proud, extremely honored,” Thorp says via telephone from his Studio 101 facility in Beverly Hills, California.

“What a crazy experience it was—it’s been, I mean. I had a great time. I got to take my wife, which was amazing.”

Thorp was part of the team that won Grammys for “Morning Phase,” including Album of the Year, Best Rock Album and Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical. Thorp, who served as the main recording engineer, did all of the tracking and overdub recording.

Thorp witnessed Beck as he accepted the Album of the Year prize. As he prepared to deliver his speech, Beck was disrupted by rapper Kanye West, who stormed the stage to protest the award not going to Beyoncé.

“It was mind blowing,” Thorpe says about West’s interruption. “I saw him do

it. I was in the back. I sort of saw some commotion going on, but I didn’t know what it was until after.

“In fact, I found this camera angle— there’s no audio to it—that shows Kanye going up and doing his thing and walking down of the stage and sitting down back on his seat on the edge.”

Grammys are nothing new to Thorp. He is a seven-time Grammy winner, having also earned trophies for Switchfoot’s “Hello Hurricane” album in 2010; OutKast’s 2003 collection “Speakerboxxx/The Love Below;” Radiohead’s 2003 missive “Hail to the Thief;” as well as Taj Mahal’s “Shoutin’ in the Key” from 2000.

He is one of 19 graduates the Conservatory of Recording Arts and Sciences who scored Grammy wins. They appear on 21 prize-collecting recordings. Thorp explains that Grammy day is a long nine-hour event.

“It’s a crazy day,” he says. “It’s a long, busy day. It starts at noon. Depending on what you’re nominated for, you get out of there at 9 at night. The Staples Center and L.A. Live are ginormous. There is a lot of walking. Your feet hurt at the end of the day.”

But Thorp wouldn’t have it any other way. He signed up to attend the school after a “brief, four-year stint in the U.S. Navy.”

“While I was in the Navy, I was deciding if I wanted to make the music business a full-time career,” he says.

“The conservatory seemed perfect to me. I had friends and family in the Phoenix area. After I got out of the Navy, I went back to Phoenix to go to the conservatory. When I graduated, I moved to Los Angeles and got a job at a studio.”

At the school, students get hands-on experience with “hired guns,” as Thorp calls them, who perform while the pupils learn how to set up microphones and all aspects of producing and engineering.

“When I was there, it was just doing a basic band in the sense of drums, bass, guitar and vocals,” he says. “I went by there and there were horn players coming in for a session. “

Lately, Thorp has been working with former Remy Zero guitarist/vocalist Jeffrey Cain and his new label in Birmingham, Alabama.

“After they (Remy Zero) broke up in 2005 or 2006, Jeffrey and I started to become really good friends,” he says. “He ran into a bunch of incredibly talented individuals. He started his own label.”

One of those acts is Shaheed and DJ Supreme, a departure for Thorp.

“I do a lot of rock, pop or singersongwriter- based stuff. To go into the hip-hop world is just exciting and new. It’s been great. I’ve been having a lot of fun working on things with Jeffrey’s label.”

Shaheed says via email that it’s a joy to work with Thorp.

“Working with Darrell Thorp is amazing,” says Shaheed. “He brings the best out of us and makes us better than we thought we could be. He is truly amazing and the best at what he does.”

Highland/ASU Jazz Festival features musical legends

BY LYNETTE CARRINGTON

Two legends will take the stage at two different concerts at the sixth annual Highland/ASU Jazz Festival at Highland High School. Phoenix native/drummer Lewis Nash, and composer and saxophonist Benny Golson will perform at the festival. They are making their first appearances there with Nash’s concert on Friday, March 27, and Golson’s show on Saturday, March 28. The two-hour concerts begin at 7:30 p.m. The festival runs Thursday, March 26, through Saturday, March 28.

“Having gone to school at Arizona State University, it means a lot to come back and play,” Nash says. “Any opportunity I get to play in my home state, I look forward to.”

The festival incorporates a variety of performance elements of the sultry music genre. Jazz bands will play and clinicians will be critiquing and working with student band members.

Nash also looks forward to talking to students.

“Being able to share performance-wise by playing with them and also to have a chance to speak to the students and talk about my career, demonstrate things and talk about my life in music,” Nash said. “I look forward to the educational aspect.”

The former Juilliard and Manhattan School of Music instructor and namesake of The Nash jazz club in downtown Phoenix is still busy with his own band the Lewis Nash Quintet and his most recent album is “The Highest Mountain.”

“I’m looking to get into the studio again hopefully this year for a new project,” says Nash. He also has a duo album with saxophonist Steve Wilson entitled, “Duologue” released last year.

Golson says jazz festivals are “never the same.”

“I’m always ready to see what one has to offer,” Golson says. “I’m there to play and I’ll do whatever they need.”

The prolific musician almost wound up in the world of 88 keys. “At 9 years old my first instrument was a piano,” Golson says. “I thought I wanted to be a concert pianist and I worked very hard until I was 14. I heard the saxophone and that’s when everything changed.”

Golson has composed and arranged music for everyone from Count Basie, Miles Davis and Ella Fitzgerald to Lou Rawls, Dusty Springfield and Diana Ross.

Golson also made a successful foray into writing scores for television and films. His work includes scores for “M*A*S*H*,” “Mission Impossible,” “The Partridge Family,” “The Academy Awards,”

and television specials for ABC, CBS, NBC and the BBC.

Golson said he “always had a desire” to write scores. He lived in the same building as his friend Quincy Jones, who also wrote scores. “He went out there and said, ‘Benny, you ought to come out,’ ” Golson says. After some coaxing from Jones, Golson went to Los Angeles and got involved in writing for television.

Golson singles out his work on “M*A*S*H* as one of his favorite jobs. The pursuit of Golson’s autograph was a part of the storyline in the 2004 Tom Hanks film, “The Terminal” in which Golson also had a cameo.

Festival guest artist Lewis Nash performs 7:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. Friday, March 27. Festival guest artist Benny Golson performs 7:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. Saturday, March 28. Tickets are $20 per person for each of the festival special guest artist concerts.

On Saturday evening, the judges’ pick for most outstanding high school jazz band will open the Benny Golson concert.

“This was a collaboration between ASU and Highland High School,” says Michael Kocour who co-founded the Highland/ ASU Jazz Festival with former Highland jazz instructor Lewis Nelson and Highland director of bands Kevin Bennett. Kocour is an associate professor and director of jazz studies at ASU and a sophisticated jazz pianist in his own right.

“There are two aspects of the festival. One is that bands from the state and beyond come in to perform and to work with experts from around the country,” says Kocour. “There will be a panel of experts that listen to them and one of those experts will spend an hour rehearsing with them. That will be going on all day Thursday, Friday and Saturday.”

There will be 50 bands performing

during the festival and this year’s festival clinicians include composer Don Owens, trombonist Andy Baker, saxophonist Glenn Kostur, bassist Tom Wakeling and trumpet player Alex Parker.

From 8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Thursday, March 26 elementary, junior high, high school and college big bands and combo jazz bands will be performing. On Friday, March 27, the festival features performances and musician clinics.

Jazz saxophonist Benny Golson will perform at the Highland/ASU Jazz Festival from 7:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. Saturday, March 28. Copyright Ibbob Music Inc.

Photo credit Oliver Rossberg

From 8:00 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. and again from 2:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 27 and Sunday, March 28, the festival again features performances and musician clinics.

The public is invited to attend jazz band performances for free although donations are welcome.

The 6th Annual Highland/ASU Jazz Festival will take place at Highland High School at 4301 E. Guadalupe Rd. Visit www.highlandjazz.com to purchase tickets.

KC Blues Band to perform at Downtown Concert Series

BY MEGHAN MCCOY

Kevin Casenhiser began playing guitar when he was 6 years old.

Influenced by artists like Stevie Ray Vaughan and Eric Clapton, the Mesa resident will perform tunes from those guitarists and other songs during Gilbert’s Downtown Concert Series.

Casenhiser and his band, KC Blues Band, play at 6:30 p.m. Thursday, March 19 at the Water Tower Plaza in Gilbert’s Heritage District.

There is no charge to attend the concert. Attendees are welcome to bring food and nonalcoholic beverages, as long as they are not in glass containers.

Casenhiser, a 2010 graduate of Primavera Online High School, said his inspiration doesn’t begin and end with guitarists.

“I really like Oscar Peterson,” he says of the piano player. “I will listen to him and then really want to pick it up.”

The idea for his band began when he was just 12 years old. Casenhiser was allowed to leave his choir class to play guitar in the auditorium at a grandparents’ day event.

Casenhiser met who would become his first drummer, Stevie Ray Ellis, that day. The duo hit it off.

“He was an older guy,” Casenhiser says of Ellis. “He became my first drummer. KC Blues Band started strong.”

KC Blues Band began as a three-piece band with guitar, bass and drums. The band expanded to include piano, saxophone and on occasion a harp player.

“We kind of got our own sound,” he explains.

Although different players have moved in and out of the band throughout the 10 year history of the band, they have all stayed part of the band’s family.

Casenhiser performs both solo acts and acts with the band playing such music genres as bluegrass, country, blues, classic rock and jazz. He is influenced by all of these genres. “I seem to gravitate towards the blues,” Casenhiser says.

Casenhiser says he is comfortable playing solo, but adds that playing is more enjoyable in the band.

“It’s a lot more fun being up there with all my band mates,” he says.

Although he has a few original songs, he says they are not on the set list because he

wants to keep the music to what they all know and play well.

“I’m pretty darn excited,” Casenhiser says. “Come out with your family and have a good time.”

The upcoming concert will be the band’s first gig of the year. KC Blues Band typically plays at family events, fundraisers and festivals in Arizona, Minnesota, Florida, Colorado and California.

Casenhiser says he enjoys performing because he likes making people happy.

“That is what music is all about,” he says. “I love it.”

WWE alum to appear at improvMANIA

BY CHRISTINA FUOCO-KARASINSKI

After 37 years in professional wrestling, longtime Gilbert resident Roy Wayne Farris has a story or two to tell.

Otherwise known as the Honky Tonk Man, the 62-year-old Farris will share those tales with fans at improvMANIA, 250 S. Arizona Ave., Chandler, on Saturday, March 7. For information about tickets, call (480) 699-4598. He’ll briefly meet with WWE followers, but next time, he’s hoping he’ll hit the stage.

“This particular time it’s just going to be an autograph and meet and greet with fans and people who come over for the evening,” Farris says.

He’s no stranger to comedy. He frequently does stand-up comedy, something he’s using to transition away from the ring.

“I work particularly off of the Q&A-type stuff, then I mix humor in with it,” Farris says. “Every story I have has some kind of humorous twist to it because the way professional wrestling and entertainment is intertwined. Some stories are believable, some not.

“After 37 years in that business, you have a vast amount of stories. That’s why I like for the audience to get involved. They’re the ones who can come up with the things they want to ask me. It then turns into a story. I didn’t take notes or audiotape anything. It’s all off the cuff.”

Longtime Gilbert resident Farris—who has two children, Megan and Roy, with his wife, Tammy—has lived in Gilbert for 21 years.

“I will never leave Arizona,” he says. “When I leave, I told my kids to take the urn out near Apache Junction and, when the Santa Ana winds blow, to toss me up and say, ‘Dad’s gone again.’”

Farris spent most of his wrestling career on the road, traveling from city to city for different television and house shows. So much so, that his kids lost track of travels. To his kids and their friends, he was just Mr. Farris. No Honky Tonk Man alter ego here.

“To the kids in the neighborhood, I was just Megan and Roy’s dad,” he says with a laugh. “They were just small children when I was on TV. By the time most of them had reached the age of watching television or wrestling, I was off of television.”

Farris’ last TV appearance was three years ago, although the WWE still shows clips of him occasionally. He also appears in the video game “WWE 2K15.”

Neither of his children is involved in wrestling. Megan is an ASU majoring in microbiology with the hopes of being a veterinarian, he says. Roy played golf on scholarship for MCC and now works at a golf course.

“I never pushed my children into

anything,” he says. “If they played soccer, they had to finish the season—same with tee-ball. If they didn’t like it after the season was over, they didn’t sign up again.

“I’m not a Disneyland dad. I don’t want to relive my youth through my children.”

No regrets

He has few regrets about his nearly fourdecade career. If he had any, it was that he didn’t document his career as well as he should have.

“I’ve met so many people throughout my career—and still do,” he says. “I never got any photos of them and things like that. If you’re really in the industry, you don’t say, ‘Oh gosh. Can I get a picture with you?’ I wish I would have.”

As a result, fans probably won’t see an autobiography by Farris.

“When it comes down to everyone doing autobiographies, it would have been much easier to get it all together if I took notes,” he says.

“Bret Hart, he did that. I didn’t know he kept notes. He did a book and it was a testament to himself. It was 600 pages. I don’t know if I’d read 600 pages of anything.”

By the same accord, he doesn’t watch “Monday Night Raw,” “Thursday Night Smackdown” or anything else related to professional wrestling.

“I don’t like to read 600 pages about something nor do I want to watch a threehour television show about something I’ve been involved in,” he says with a laugh.

“It’s easier for me to read the Internet reports every day. I can read websites and find out what happens, who got arrested, who did what, etc.”

For now, he’s focusing on his own career, which can be followed at www.facebook. com/HonkyTonkManOfficial.

“I want to do the comedy stuff when I can,” says Farris. “This event for improvMANIA will be a good way to start to transition.

“I enjoy the meet and greets because it’s less physical activity. You don’t get hurt too bad shaking hands, unless it’s one of those fellas who want to show how manly they are by how hard they can squeeze your hand.”