Greenlief & Raskin's 2 + 2: saxophones & poets
Phillip Greenlief - alto and tenor saxophones
Jon Raskin - alto and baritone saxophones
Claudia La Rocco - poetry, voice (New York)
Elizabeth Robinson - poetry, voice (Colorado)
Over the past two decades, Greenlief and Raskin have invited performers who play like instruments to join them in musical dialogues inspired by their graphic scores and free improvisation. The list of collaborations has covered every musical instrument family.
On this occasion, the bay area reed virtuosos invite celebrated poets Claudia La Rocco and Elizabeth Robinson to join the 2 + 2 project.
Claudia La Rocco is the author of THE BEST MOST USELESS DRESS (Badlands Unlimited, 2014), selected writings encompassing poetry, performance texts and criticism. She edited I DON’T POEM: AN ANTHOLOGY OF PAINTERS (Off the Park Press, 2015) and DANCERS, BUILDINGS AND PEOPLE IN THE STREETS, the catalogue for Danspace Project’s PLATFORM 2015, which she also curated. Her work has been presented by such organizations as The Kitchen, The Drawing Center, The Poetry Project, San Francisco’s Center for New Music and Tokyo’s Dance New Air Festival. Her current collaborators include the choreographer Michelle Ellsworth, the performance company Findlay//Sandsmark and the composer
Phillip Greenlief. La Rocco’s first novel has been commissioned by The Chocolate Factory Theater, where it will also have its premiere performance in December 2015. She has had residencies at Arizona State University, Headlands Center for the Arts and the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. Based in Brooklyn, she is a guest lecturer at Stanford University this spring.
Elizabeth Robinson is the author of many poetry collections, most recently Counterpart from Ansahta Press and Blue Heron from the Center for Literary Publishing. Her mixed genre book On Ghost (Solid Objects) was a finalist for the Los Angeles book award. She works at a day shelter for homeless people in Boulder, Colorado.
Cost: $10 - $20, sliding scale