Doors at 7:30 pm; Benefit at 8 pm
Tickets are $20 - $100 Sliding Scale
All proceeds will help to pay for the legal defense of the Richmond Hills Initiative
In January 2017 the Richmond City Council adopted the Richmond Hills Initiative which permanently protects the beautiful open space hillsides of the El Sobrante Valley that border on Wildcat Canyon Regional Park. The Initiative represented the two year effort of dozens of volunteers who gathered thousands of signatures to qualify the measure. Now the city is being sued by developers and land speculators to overturn the initiative. The Friends of the Richmond Hills, working with the Sierra Club Foundation, needs to raise $15,000 in order to help pay for the legal defense of the Initiative. The developers have deep pockets. We have a wonderful community and hyper-talented, committed artists, working together to save our precious hills. Join us on Nov. 10! But if you can’t, please click HERE to make your tax-deductible contribution!
Some of the Bay Area’s most prominent artists have joined the effort to defend the beautiful hillsides of Richmond’s El Sobrante Valley. The benefit concert will feature:
Kitka: an internationally acclaimed women’s vocal arts ensemble inspired by traditional songs and vocal techniques from Eastern Europe. The women in Kitka are fearless sonic explorers, and you can hear their intrepid spirit in every haunting song. For nearly four decades, the eight-women Oakland ensemble has developed a vast, breathtaking repertoire of traditional songs from the Balkans, Caucasus and Slavic lands, as well as new material composed for the group drawing on those traditional vocal practices. Traveling to rural communities in Armenia and Bulgaria, Ukraine and Georgia, Serbia and Turkey, they’ve gathered songs and communed with elders who are often the last links to centuries-old traditions. The ravishing textures of the women’s voices, unearthly cadences, angular rhythms and unfamiliar languages make Kitka’s performances an enthralling experience.
Gamelan Sekar Jaya: Formed in 1979, the Bay Area’s award-winning Gamelan Sekar Jaya is one of the most heralded gamelans outside Bali. The 60-member troupe has four distinct instrumental ensembles and one dance troupe and has performed traditional Balinese gamelan music, in full instrumentation with colorful costumes and dancers, everywhere from New York City’s Symphony Space to remote village squares in Bali. During the group’s fourth tour to Bali (July 2000), it was selected to receive the Dharma Kusuma – Bali’s highest award for artistic achievement, never before given to foreign performers.
Keith Terry and Friends: Founder and director of the International Body Music Festivals. “A unique master of percussive motion” - SF Chronicle. Keith Terry is a percussionist/rhythm-dancer/educator whose artistic vision has straddled the line between music and dance for more than four decades. As a soloist he has appeared in such settings as Lincoln Center, Bumbershoot, NPR's All Things Considered and Morning Edition, PRI's The World, the Vienna International Dance Festival, and the Paradiso van Slag World Drum Festival in Amsterdam. His groups Ð Corposonic, Slammin All-Body Band, Crosspulse Percussion Ensemble, Crosspulse Duo with Evie Ladin, Professor Terry's Circus Band Extraordinaire, and Body Tjak (with I Wayan Dibia) Ð have performed in a variety of venues, including Joe's Pub, WNYC, and Lincoln Center Out-of-Doors (NYC), Grand Performances, LACMA Jazz, the Roxy, and the Skirball Center (LA), SFJazz, Vancouver Island MusicFest, Woodford Festival in Australia, and the Bali Arts Festival. In addition, Keith has performed with a wide range of artists including Charles "Honi" Coles, Turtle Island Quartet, Bill Irwin, Jovino Santos Neto, Barbatuques, Gamelan Sekar Jaya, Kenny Endo, Freddie Hubbard, Tex Williams, Robin Williams, and Bobby McFerrin. As a producer he has created 5 CDs and 4 DVDs for Crosspulse Media.
From 1998 to 2005 Keith was on the faculty at UCLA's Department of World Arts and Cultures, where he designed and taught a dozen courses on the relationship of music and dance; deep listening; synchronicity, time, and timing; and intercultural communication in the arts. In 2006 he conceived and directed the first International Body Music Performance Project for the Orff Institute in Salzburg. Keith tours extensively in the Americas, Asia, and Europe, where his Body Music performances, workshops, residencies and choreographic commissions are popular among professional performers and educators. Keith Terry is a 2008 Guggenheim Fellow and the Founding Director of Crosspulse, a 32-year old Oakland, California-based arts organization dedicated to rhythm-based intercultural music and dance. Keith is also the Founding/Artistic Director of the Crosspulse project, the International Body Music Festival (IBMF), an annual 6-day Festival which explores the language of body music from culture to culture.
The Hogan Brothers, with special guests Omega Rae & Luq Frank: R&B, Funk and Latin music from one of the Bay’s hottest bands. Steve (bass), Colin (keyboards), and Julian (drums) - are a jazz fusion trio based in Oakland, California. Their influences, while rooted in American styles such as Jazz, Funk, R&B, and Pop, are also informed by many international styles such as Timba, Tango, Gamelan, Highlife, Soukous, Afro-pop, North Indian Classical music and much more.
Born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, the brothers credit their parents (Jim & Maddie) for their diverse musical upbringing, exposing them to a plethora of international musical styles at young ages. They were fortunate not only to take advantage of the wide variety of excellent music programs available in the Bay Area (Berkeley High Jazz, Young Musicians Program, Cal State East Bay Music, UC Berkeley Ethnomusicology), but also had the opportunity to study internationally with master musicians in such countries such as Indonesia, Cuba, Ghana, and Brazil. The brothers are collectively involved in many projects and have performed extensively throughout the US and internationally (Brazil, Turkey, Indonesia, England, France, Switzerland, Italy, Canada, Mexico, Barbados). They have performed with many great artists/projects such as: James Moody, Hugh Masekela, Peter Erskine, Tommy Igoe, Larry Graham, Bob Brookmeyer, Roy Ayers, Josh Jones, Goapele, Maria Schneider, Bobby Brown, Evan Rachel Wood, Keith Terry, Victor Wooten, Latoya London, Dave Chappelle, Crosspulse, Dynamic, Adam Theis, Jazz Mafia, O-maya. The Hogan Brothers continue to perform and study internationally, always seeking to broaden their audience and sound.
