Singing from the bottom of the well

[Susan Alcorn (deceased)]

For those (perhaps very few) who might be interested, here is a video of a complete performance by Ember Schrag (voice, poetry), Erik Ruin (papercuts), and myself (pedal steel guitar) in Baltimore, Maryland, the first concert of a short tour we did this last September.

The theme of our project, "Singing from the Bottom of the Well" was misogyny as experienced by Pashtun women in Afghanistan; expressed in their anonymously written "landai" poetry. We tied this to the experiences by women as the result of certain strains of fundamentalist Christianity in the United States.

Ember thematically arranged the program in addition to reciting and singing translations of both Landai and her own autobiographical poetry.

Erik made the papercuts and manipulated them using overhead projectors.

I wrote the music (and improvised) for the program.

This video will most probably not appeal to everyone, but I hope some will enjoy it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ve6Lt-vVAq0

[Ken Campbell]

Inventive, honest, unique, well executed. Most impressive. I applaud your collective efforts. I encourage you to continue.

Best regards...

Kc

[Jean-Michel Giry]

always a pleasure to hear from you.

a+
jmg

[Paul King]

Susan, While am a country boy and like traditional steel music, I do appreciate and respect you for taking the steel into a different venue. What I hear you play is really nice and I encourage you to keep it going. Best wishes and Merry Christmas to you.