The band Lady Soal, of Ames, Iowa filmed this music video featuring a transgender man transitioning from female to male, in an effort to comfort and support those who are struggling with trans identity and courage.
Lady Soal wants the lgbt community to know that “there is support out there and it does get better.”
Folk-rock, lesbian singer/songwriter Melissa Ferrick to release first studio album in five years
by ELORA TOCCI
Melissa Ferrick has recorded 12 albums and shared stages with the likes of Morrissey, Bob Dylan and Ani DiFranco.
But when her sister calls and needs her help, Melissa is there in a flash. “She has three kids, so when she calls I’ve kinda gotta jump,” Melissa says.
Striking that balance between work and a personal life has always been a challenge for the singer-songwriter. She signed with a record label at the age of 20 and has been making music ever since. She works hard to create and promote her music and sometimes neglects to take care of herself physically and emotionally, which has led to exhaustion. “I put my well-being on the back burner, and I had to relearn that I can only do so much, which was really difficult,” she says.
But out of difficulty has come the folk-rock music into which Melissa pours her heart. She calls herself a “feel-based writer” and uses her own life experiences to guide her work. “I’m not a third-person writer,” she says. “I’m really interested in the human experience, and my writing comes out of the experiences I’m going through.”
While some of those experiences have been difficult, she finds inspiration in happier times as well. Her new record “Still Right Here“, which drops in September, features laid-back, happier music. Her music evolves naturally, coming not from a preconceived template of songs but from the course her life takes. Some songs in the last year and a half started and then fizzled out, but ten strong songs came together for her album.
The upcoming record boasts what Melissa believes is one of the lyrically strongest songs she’s ever written, “You Let Me Be.” It also features more melodic music. Melissa started working on her melodies on her 2006 album, “In the Eyes of Strangers,” and has developed them on each successive record. “It’s really nice to keep taking steps in that direction,” she says.
The sound quality on Melissa’s records has fluctuated throughout the years, as she bounced among producers. Her first album, “Willing to Wait,” was recorded with an established producer, but some of her records after that were made with indie labels or in garage studios, creating a much different sound. “The sound depends on how much money you’re allotted to make albums, and the sounds and machines and studios you’re using really affect what you can produce,” she says. But she counteracts the sound discrepancies by trying to keep her voice, guitar playing and writing consistent.
That consistency has translated into a loyal fan base for Melissa, who tours all across the country each time she puts out a new album. She meets fans all the time who tell her stories about the intersection of her music with their own lives and the role her music has played in their lives. “Those are some of the most interesting stories I hear,” she says.
She also makes friends with other artists, both in her home base of Boston and across the country, with whom she can collaborate and commiserate. “We all support each other with all the life things we go through,” she says. She adds: “You can’t put a price on that.”
That sense of community is reflected in the people Melissa’s music attracts. As an open lesbian herself, she estimates that 70 to 80 percent of her audiences consist of gay women of all ages. “But, while 70 or 80 percent identify as queer, the rest of the people in the audience who aren’t sleeping with someone of the same gender would identify as queer anyway,” she says with a laugh. “It’s mostly people who are hippies, liberals, open-minded. It’s a little bit of a ‘70s throwback – people who believe in freedom and want to be accepted for who they are.”
And Melissa wouldn’t have it any other way. “I just want people to love my music because they love my music,” she says. “I don’t care if they’re queer or not.”
She knew on a soul level before she even began making music that she was queer, and her sexual identity does not influence her music any more than a straight person’s identity does. And while higher ticket sales make paying her mortgage easier, she doesn’t need to sell out in order to make millions of dollars – in fact, she doesn’t need much more than her car, house and guitars.
“I just want people to come to my shows and like my music because it makes them feel good inside.”
Cuban-American filmmaker Anna Margarita Albelo has put a lot of herself into her new feature film, Who’s Afraid of Vagina Wolf? The main character not only has her name, but her identity as well. “Through the script-writing process, I’ve had many breakthroughs about my life,” says Albelo. “ I love filmmaking for that; it’s one of the best tools I’ve found to understand who I am and what I’m made of.”
The film is the story of a Cuban-American lesbian who hid from relationships behind her film career. On Anna’s 40th birthday, she decides to carpe diem and make her life-changing film—and, get the girl. An all-female version of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, Albelo’s cast includes Guinevere Turner, Tammy Lynn Michaels, Whitney Mixter, Bridget McManus, and Joel Michaely .
Tammy Lynn Michaels, who plays Chloe, a friend to the group of girls in the film, says she relates to her character in much the same way Albelo relates to the film’s Anna. Her character owns an art gallery, “which is exactly like my life,” says Michaels. “ I have paintings and drawings and crayola colorings scotch-taped to my walls all over my house.”
Albelo and actress Guinevere Turner have been friends since Turner appeared in Albelo’s documentary A Lez in Wonderland, where they discovered a love for Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? “What actor could possibly say no to the chance to play someone playing Elizabeth Taylor in that film?” says Turner. “The role of Penelope Greengrass was written for me.”
The film is being produced by Steakhaus Productions with screenwriter Michael Urban (Saved!) and cinematographer Alison Kelley. This amazing cast and crew has made over twenty award-winning films over the last decade.
The cast and crew have been hard at work raising money to fund the project via crowdfunding. Albelo describes it as “a way for people who don’t see themselves represented in the mainstream to stand up and be counted. In a big way, that’s why “likes” on Facebook and friend counts have become so important. The unfortunate side is that more independent voices need to break through to the mainstream.”
Donations are accepted online and incentives are offered for those who are generous, including signed film posters, DVDs, t-shirts, personal digital video thank-you from the cast, tickets to private screenings, script notes by Michael Urban, or coffee with Anna Albelo. If you’re feeling generous, or if you’d like more information about the film, cast, and crew, visit their Indiegogo site.
The New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) recently announced Geoffrey Chadsey as the recipient of its first John Burton Harter Fellowship.
Presented to a New York state visual artist selected through NYFA’s Artist Fellowship Program, the John Burton Harter Fellowship recognizes the work of a member of the LGBT community. This year, out of 3,692 applicants only 120 received Fellowships or were named finalists. The fellowship is an unrestricted cash grant of $7,000.
Chadsey lives in Brooklyn and received his fellowship in the category of printmaking/drawing/book arts. He received his BA in visual and environmental studies from Harvard and an MFA in photography and drawing from the California College of the Arts in San Francisco. He has had solo exhibitions at Electric Works Gallery in San Francisco, 2nd Street Gallery in Charlottesville, Virginia and The Contemporary Museum in Honolulu, among others. He is represented by the Jack Shainman Gallery in New York and the James Harris Gallery in Seattle.
John Burton Harter (1940 – 2002) was a prolific artist, equally skilled in drawing, painting, photography and watercolor. Born in Jackson, Mississippi, he spent much of his life in New Orleans. His work has been exhibited at the Leslie-Lohman Gay Art Foundation in New York, the New Orleans Museum of Art and Contemporary Arts Center in New Orleans, and Studios Plat du Jour in Paris, among many others. The John Burton Harter Charitable Foundation was created after his murder in 2002 to fund scholarships, exhibitions and projects relating to his lifelong aesthetic and philosophical interests and involvements.
The New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) was founded in 1971 to empower artists at critical stages in their creative lives. Each year NYFA provides more than $1 million in cash grants to individuals and small organizations. Artspire, a fiscal sponsorship program, helps artists and organizations raise and manage more than $3 million annually. NYFA Learning programs provide artists with professional development training. NYFA.org provides information about more than 8,000 opportunities and resources available to artists in all disciplines.
When California voters passed Proposition 8, ending the legalization of gay marriage in the state, straight ally, Peter Berube was devastated.
He wasn’t the only one. People nationwide, gay and straight, were disappointed. Discouraged. Heartbroken.
Some people took action, signing petitions and organizing rallies and calling lawmakers. But many people simply accepted the loss, sighing and wondering whether they would see the day when human rights were granted to all humans. Then they continued on with their lives.
But Berube couldn’t continue on so easily. “I felt this entire time, that as an ally, I had not done enough. That I was someone who was passionate about people having their civil rights and in so many ways, because I hadn’t done enough, I was partially responsible. So I needed to make a show … “. (See video below for complete interview.) He had thought that things like race and sexuality didn’t matter anymore, with the election of our first African-American president. But, as made evident by the California vote, these issues still existed, and Berube decided he couldn’t passively accept it anymore.
So Berube decided to take action. He thought about ways he could get involved in the gay rights movement, and decided he wanted to make a musical because he believes music has the power to inspire. So Behind Closed Doors: A 2nd Class Cabaret was born.
The musical will have its first workshop run on Friday and Saturday nights from July 15-30 at Your Theatre (The Hayworth) in downtown Los Angeles. It serves as an indictment of sorts of the current battle for civil rights by showing a futuristic, dystopian society in which people have lost their civil liberties. An underground cabaret operates as the haven for differences, the only place where people can be themselves.
The play features all original music and lyrics from Aaron Beaumont and is both dark and humorous, emotional and thought-provoking. The overall goal is to make the civil rights struggle relevant to all people, not just the ones whose civil rights are under fire.
“It’s easy to not involve yourself in civil rights when it’s not you,” Berube said.
But it is you, in one way or another. No person is truly free who lives in a world in which other humans are not. Behind Closed Doors aims to drive that message home through music, costumes and plot.
New Jersey artist, activist, and educator, Jennifer Braverman is working toward creating a series of educational coloring books. Her current book, Women Coloring The World, features 45 famous women across the globe who have made a difference in the world. Among these inspirational women are out comedienne, television host and actress, Ellen DeGeneres; and, television host, actress, producer, and philanthropist Oprah Winfrey.
Braverman would like to get the book printed and distributed to different organizations. On the project’s Kickstarter page, an “all or nothing” funding platform for creative projects, Braverman explains, “I plan to reach out to the Girl Scouts and the National Organization of Women among other groups.” 100 of the 500 books to be printed will go to schools in need.
On Kickstarter, “a project must reach its funding goal before time runs out, or no money changes hands” — as of July 5, 2011, Women Coloring The World has 32 days left to reach its goal of $3275 by August 6, 2011.
Braverman hopes to create a series of educational coloring books including famous children who have made a difference as well as LGBT icons. “I think there is great power in coloring books to bring awareness to social issues and personal heroes if created in the right manner,” says Braverman.
Most of her artwork revolves around social issues. In addition to being part of a collective Smart Artists: Artists for Social Change, she also founded BravestArt which is a collective of artists who create work to be discussed with a contemporary educational perspective.
Pledges can be made as little as $1, $5, $10 and more. Those pledging $100 or more can send a photo of someone they’d like to see included in the coloring book, and Braverman will “create a line drawing and spread of that person to be included in the book.”
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MORE OF BRAVERMAN’S ART
Braverman’s most recent painting, “Safe Space” features 18 children who lost their lives to bullying or hate crimes based on LGBT issues. A detailed description that she includes with the painting breaks it down by name of child, their stories and other layered metaphors (see excerpts below).
'Safe Space' painting by Jennifer Braverman.
“Fred Martinez- Martinez is considered a nadleehi, which in the Native American culture represents a male-bodied person with a feminine nature. This is considered a special gift in the Navajo culture. In America, Martinez was viewed as just transgendered and at age 16 became one of the youngest victims of a hate-crime. Martinez was murdered on June 6, 2001 in Colorodo.“
“In the courtyard you will find an illustration of a fence and red cardinal representing the landmark Matthew Shepherd hate crime as remembered through the play and film The Laramie Project.”
“By the door you will find a Keith Haring Poster. Haring was an artist and social activist who died from AIDS at the age of 31.”
Christine Gerity
Amanda James Dill
