Riffs, Roams and Raves:
Riff: Sarah Jarosz
The Wimberley Valley Arts and Cultural Alliance, organizers of the “Stars over Wimberley’’ concert series, said every ticket for the November 22 performance of Sarah Jarosz at the Wimberley Playhouse sold out in under ten minutes. All 109 tickets available in the theater went on sale at 9 a.m. October 25 and were snapped up in seven short minutes. The Grammy-winning artist from Wimberley concludes WVACA’s hugely successful series produced in collaboration with the Wimberly Players that included Slaid Cleves, Ruthie Foster and Alejandro Escovedo. Kudos to Denise Renter and the rest of the people at WVACA and the Wimberley Players for their genius partnership.
Roam: Austin
This week’s roam took me to downtown Austin for the 40th Annual Viva La Vida Parade, the largest Day of the Dead event the city has to offer. The holiday celebrates the continuity of life while remembering those who walked the world before us. “Viva la vida” means “long live life.” The observance balances both sides of the life experience in a way that is respectful, loving, and wickedly funny. Far from Halloween’s focus on scaring us with the macabre, “Dia de los Muertos” is a wise and grounded acceptance of reality.
The parade kicked off at noon, with the route from Fourth street to Congress to Sixth street and back lined with spectators well before 11 a.m. Onlookers near me enjoyed an excited and amiable camaraderie while we waited for the first drums to announce the procession. With a blast of music from a marching Mariachi band, the calavera “Catrina,” meaning “Dandy Skeleton” appeared, dressed in her elaborate European-style hat and gown and skeletal makeup. Her escort, the “Catrin” appeared next to her in his top hat, black suit and cane with his face also painted to resemble a skull. The Catrina and Catrin, like many aspects of Day of the Dead ceremonies, poke fun at human nature or provide comic relief during otherwise serious occasions. In this case, an artist by the name of Posada etched the pair to ridicule Mexicans who emulated European culture during the years preceding Mexico’s revolution to oust Porfirio Diaz, who, interestingly enough, refused to leave the presidency.
Following them were a full 90 minutes of floats, dance troupes – some from as far away as Peru and Ireland – and musicians, as well as giant wheeled and pedaled butterflies, an owl, an eagle and, most notably, an armadillo rendered in the most astonishing detail. Each new group carried a banner that announced their presence with artwork entirely reminiscent of this cultural holiday. Like so much Day of the Dead folk art, many showed skeletons doing all kinds of things, like dancing, drinking, and doing yoga with a kind of deadpan approach that’s meant to make us laugh. Throughout the parade were “mojigangas,” twelve-foottall, wheeled figures, some pre-Columbian and some resembling celebrities like Frida Kahlo, Selena, and Cantinflas, Mexico’s beloved Chaplinesque film comedian. They, along with the giant pedaled animals, were amazing works of ingenuity.
Pre-Columbian performers and dancers from many of Mexico’s regions appeared in traditional dress and wore elaborate skeletal makeup. One particularly exquisite performer, a “novia de los muertos,” or bride, wore a diaphanous wedding dress and jeweled, shimmering makeup. In a class all by herself, she danced a hypnotic, ethereal solo to music only she could hear.
As the parade began to wind down, the low riders materialized. Cheeky, sly, and absorbing, these triple-jointed automotive creations entertained the crowd with the antics of their hydraulic lifts that comically elevated one side of a sedan over another or pivoted truck beds from their cabs. The crowd couldn’t get enough of them.
Rave: The Bell House Cooking Class Looking to tune up your repertoire of recipes before the holidays arrive? The Bell House at 300 River Road has a few spots left for a chef-led cooking class on December 9 featuring a fresh and distinctive fall menu geared to haul you out of any culinary rut in which you might find yourself. The menu includes the Graze Fall salad with kale, butternut squash, pecans, cranberries, and goat cheese; Duck Ragu with basil pappardelle; and Lemon Posset with Ginger shortbread. The lemon posset, similar to panna cotta, was reportedly the late Queen Elizabeth’s favorite dessert. Leading the class is Chef Doug George. He and his wife Tatia are owners of the Graze restaurant in Tomball, TX. George is a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, NY and studied at the Culinary Institute of America in Greystone and Le Cordon Bleu Paris. Before opening Graze, he had a 37-year career with ClubCorp, including working as the personal chef for the Dedman family, which founded and owned ClubCorp. For more information, go to thebell-housewimberley. com.