Sue Harshe (of a superb local punk band Scrawl -- about Scrawl, see, for instance, <http://www.salon.com/weekly/sebadoh960923.html>) sang "The Ballad of a Soldier's Wife" from _Happy End_. The rest of the songs performed were mainly from _Threepenny Opera_: Marcy Mays (also of Scrawl) menacingly whispered "Pirate Jenny" ("You gentlemen can say, 'Hey gal, finish them floors! Get upstairs! What's wrong with you! Earn your keep here!' / You toss me your tips and look out to the ships / But I'm counting your heads as I'm making the beds"); Nick Mancini & His Friends did "Tango Ballad" and "What Keeps Mankind Alive" ("You gentlemen who think you have a mission / To purge us of the seven deadly sins / Should first sort out the basic food position / Then start your preaching, that's where it begins"); and so on. The audience, with the lyrics provide by Loren in hand, belted out "Mack the Knife" with Larry Marotta.
In-between the songs, there were a short play ("The Informer" staged by Greg McGill & Melissa Vartorella), performances, & poetry reading (Jacki Spangler reading "To Those Born Later"), and an experimental video featuring scrambled images of George W. Bush lip-synching David Bowie's version of "Alabama Song" ("Oh, show me the way to the next whisky bar / Oh, don't ask why / No, don't ask why / For we must find the next whisky bar / Or if we don't find the next whisky bar / I tell you we must die / I tell you we must die / I tell you, I tell you, I tell you we must die"). And much more!
The cabaret was well attended, with more than 100 young & not-so-young artists & activists packing a little downtown theater MadLab, the only place in town where the audience can drink & smoke while enjoying performance.
About MadLab:
***** MadLab is committed to expanding the parameters of contemporary performance. Through experimentation in style and subject matter, the company's goal is to revitalize live performance in the wake of a media saturated society.
From updating Euripides' Bacchae to the near future and staging it in a massive abandoned warehouse to producing a faux "get rich quick" seminar in a downtown Columbus hotel conference room, the company is more interested in providing its audience with a unique environmental experience than in presenting traditional realistic plays (although we do our share of that as well...).
The Lab is the organization's primary facility. Besides hosting performances by MadLab and other theatre troupes, the Lab is open to artists of all disciplines through the Live at the Lab performance series and through monthly art shows in its gallery space. From theatre to dance, spoken word to performance art, video and film screenings to DJ nights, avant-garde music to straight ahead rock and roll: the goal of the Lab is to provide a wide array of alternative entertainment, entertainment that largely is not offered anywhere else in central Ohio. *****
Check out the MadLab website at <http://www.madlab.net/>.
And support your local artists!
Yoshie