Created in Birmingham

Intrepid reporter that I am, I went along to the Fierce Start Party last week to see what Laura and Harun, the new artistic directors, are planning for the next 12 months.

If you’re not familiar with Fierce they’ve been responsible for some of the most weird, wonderful and worrying live art presented in Birmingham over the past… well, ever.

The event was covered by this is tomorrow who’ve collected together audio, video and some photos, including this interview with Laura McDermott:

and this general summation of the whole thing:

Strikingly, the artistic-directors do not know the content of the next festival, due to commence in February 2011. Over the next ten months audiences will be able to follow the development of these projects as they emerge in response to a series of visits to the city. The fruition of these journeys will culminate in the festival.

The Fierce Festival Caravan of Artists 2010-11 (as they’re calling it) includes Eitan Buchalter, Sheila Ghelani, Stan’s Cafe, Plan B, Lundahl&Seitl, Quarantine, Jeanne van Heeswijk, James Webb, Kira O’Reilly, Dominic Johnson, Manu Luksch & Mukul Patel, Denis Tricot and EXZYT.

A nice touch was the loyalty cards they handed out to everyone who attended. Some super sleuthing tells me that dates for forthcoming Fierce events are:

• 24-26 April 2010 – Fierce Interrobang 1: Regeneration
• 24-26 September 2010 – Fierce Interrobang 2
• 11 November 2010 – Fierce Countdown
• 22-27 February 2011 – Fierce Festival

And if you don’t know, now you know.

New CiB thingy alert – on Wednesday 21 April we’re launching CiBmail.

[pause for applause]

It’ll be a weekly email that will come out mid-afternoon every Wednesday and will feature:

• News about what CiB is up to (online and in the shop)
• A brief summary of the past week’s posts
• FREE stuff (competitions and the like)
• Suggested upcoming events

If you’ve got any stuff you want us to give away competition-style (tickets, CDs, swag, etc) then get in touch. Likewise, if you’re interested in advertising via the email give us a shout.

It’ll probably be a bit rough and ready to start with but we should get into the swing of things soon enough. If there’s anything you’d like to see in just such an email then it’d be good to get some suggestions.

Those that are signed up by mid-afternoon today will get a quick taster to see what it’s all about. Give it a go. If you think it looks like a waste of time you can always unsubscribe again. Sign up by adding your details here:

Some monthly poetry workshops starting this week and carrying on to the end of the year.

Making Poetry are responsible, they cost up to £18 per workshop (with discounts available) and the Shakespeare Memorial Room (at Birmingham Central Library) is where it’ll all happen.

This is what they’re doing:

• 17th April – Getting it Out There – Preparing work for publication, sending out, putting together a pamphlet with Jacqui Rowe
• 22nd May – Serious Play – Masterclass  with Mario Petrucci, aiming to release the imagination into fresh realms populated by the unexpected, and an incisive language with which to meet it.
• 19th June – Painting the Picture  with Jacqui Rowe.  Ekphrastic poetry, including a chance to visit Birmingham Art Gallery
• 17th July – ShadoWork – Writing and Performance as group activity. Masterclass with Mario Petrucci. Participants will explore Mario’s “co-vocal” approach to writing and performance, culminating in the performance of a short piece formulated on the day.
• 14th August – Finding the Form with Jacqui Rowe – choosing the form for a poem, including a look at some specific forms such as haiku and sonnet
• 18th September – Ideas in Things with Jacqui Rowe  and Meredith Andrea – using objects as an inspiration for poetry
• 23rd October – The Mapmaker’s Workbox  with Jacqui Rowe and Meredith Andrea – a re-run of last year’s popular workshop on the theme of maps and journeys
• 13th November – Windows and Icebergs – Masterclass with Mario Petrucci.  Observation, the senses, personal memory, reflection, imagination, other people’s work – all of these are potential paths into new and exciting writing.
• 11th December – All The Ages We Have Ever Been: writing poetry for children and adults equally -Masterclass with Philip Gross. Qualities of playfulness and sensual delight in sound and form and image, and direct access to astonishment and real emotion.

Details on the Making Poetry website.

More fun happening in the shop on Saturday. Cue blurb:

INKwell are graphic designer Rik “THE FOX’ Cooper and screen printer Dave ‘GIGANTE’ Springer. We have 5 brand new designs we will be showcasing at the Created In Birmingham store on 17th April. We are also giving you the opportunity to come down and print your own garment. We will be selling t-shirts or you can bring your own garment as we can print onto pretty much anything, hoodies, jeans, bags, pillowcases etc.

Just come down and have a go, it’s informal, fun and free.

Saturday 17th April
11am – 5pm

Thursdays have been pretty stuffed with lots of good activities recently but there’s a biggie going on tonight over at AE Harris.

Fierce are hosting the Fierce Start Party with all sorts of things going on.

• 3-9pm – food, installation, performance
• 7pm – words
• 9pm-late – post-party with music

What, you may be asking, is a Start Party?

It’s the beginning of an exciting journey. What will be there? Fierce Festival artists sharing tasters of their work. When’s the next festival? We’ll tell you the shape of Fierce’s next year

Exact details of what’s happening are being kept under wraps but what we do know is that this is tomorrow will be on hand to capture proceedings, bITjAM will be providing audiovisual goodness and Mama Feel Good will be providing tunes. The latter also let slip this:

I’ve heard rumours of vodka soup – lord a mercy

Indeed. Fierce party’s are usually pretty legendary and this is open to all, so don’t miss out.

All Consuming Love (Man in a Cat) is one of the short films commissioned for Digishorts. Louis Hudson, who makes up Dice Productions‘ animation team, is now hard at work turning a preview/trailer into a fully fledged film.

What’s interesting is how he’s using a YouTube channel to upload little work-in-progress snippets so you can see how he works and how the piece is coming along. Hoping he can keep this up.

In other Digishorts news, three of the filmmakers are looking for producers for their commissioned films.

Munchbreak have a music video for ‘Television‘, created by Skyhook TV.

Contains some fruity language, a man in a bath tub and ninjas. Also, mild peril.

Such Tweet Sorrow launched the other day; a retelling of Romeo & Juliet via Twitter. Telling stories via Twitter isn’t a new thing particularly, but the size and scope of this effort is what sets it apart. The RSC are behind this after all, and from what I gather rehearsals and workshops for this have been going on for aaaages.

Oh aye, and the Birmingham link is the involvement of Mudlark as producers, Substrakt as the website designers and Kate Beatty as the photographer responsible for the shots of the cast.

Exeunt omnes. Divers alarums.

Sounds Friendly are not for profit promoters of live music based in the West Midlands. They’re bringing some tunes to the CiB Shop over the next few weeks starting tomorrow (Wednesday) so come on down or wander over after work.

Here are the descriptions we’ve been given for what’s planned:

Weds 14th April
5.30-6.30pm
A Touch of Klez

One of the many smaller groups born from the primordial soup of talent that is the 40-strong Birmingham Conservatoire Folk Ensemble, A Touch of Klez is klezmer with a twist. Led by clarinettist Katie Stevens, and featuring violin and (unusually) cello, expect an improvised whirl of Yiddish rhythm that’s sure to get your toes tapping.
—————-
Weds 21st April
Tbc…(Watch this space)
5.30-6.30pm
—————-
Weds 28th April
5.30-6.30pm
Lluis Mather Trio

Led by talented young saxophonist and composer Lluis Mather, one of the most promising performers produced by the renowned jazz performance course at Birmingham Conservatoire, this trio showcases the seductive voice of Holly Thomas and inventive pianist Matt Radcliffe. Forthcoming gigs for Lluis include a set at the Barclays Cheltenham Jazz Festival 2010, and obviously, playing in the best shop in the Bullring.

Bit late on this one, but I’d like to send some sincere thanks to the new CiB Supporters who are helping to keep this website going (and the shop, for that matter):

• Bareface Media

As well as helping to support us, those people are also taking advantage of one of the cheapest advertising deals in town. If you want to do likewise then go to this page for details.

• Election debate for creative industries – 20 April at the Hippodrome
  Ed Vaizey (Con), Sion Simon (Lab) and Marc Reeves (thebusinessdesk.com) talk creative. Spoiler – it’s really, really important but cuts are going to have be made. Might be fun to ask Sion about the Digital Economy Act if you’ve been following that
• “Look you f..king idiot” « John Mostyn’s Blog
  John’s eventful first day at Endale Associates, tour bookers for the Sex Pistols, happened to be the day after ‘that’ Bill Grundy interview
• Birmingham Has No Music Scene by @JeffStuka « The Blue Whale Blog
  In which the author states the opposite. Well said, in that sweary kind of way
• Tom Lennon’s First Standup on Vimeo
  Via Pete Ashton – “My good friend Tom went on a stand up comedy course which culminated with his first ever gig. Here’s the audio”
• An Endless Supply Street Team
  “An exciting opportunity has arisen in the world of independent publishing: An Endless Supply is offering a part-time voluntary position within our distribution department”

There’ something poignant about Record Store Day coming round on 17 April with two of Birmingham’s independent record shops about to call it a day. With Tempest and Swordfish on the way out the only ones left vaguely near the city centre (that I know of) are Hard To Find Records and The Diskery. Oh, there’s a few things in the CiB shop too.

HTFR and Polar Bear are the Birmingham record shops taking part in Record Store Day.

I can’t mourn Swordfish and Tempest too much as it’s a while since I’ve bought anything from either of them (although over the years I’ve spent a large amount of money I didn’t have in both of them). Still sad though.

While we’re talking about closed down music-related places, the Academy has (presumably) done quite well by being relocated to Bristol Street while last year the planned works on Martineau Galleries were put on hold. The Oasis shopping centre has had a 5 year stay of execution. It’s hard to imagine who might step in and make use of the Academy over the next few years.

If anyone’s got any smart ideas then the letting agent is Alder Grimes and Gooderham and they’re on 020 7836 7826.

Yesterday we had Shady Bard playing in the Created in Birmingham shop. Here’s 26 minutes of their set (before the batteries in my camera ran out…)

Matt Murtagh was on hand with his camera.

Thanks loads to Shady Bard for turning our shop into a venue for an hour.

Two installations were installed at the CiB Shop yesterday. First off the Art Detection Services set up their workshop and offices in our Strange Little Room At The Back. Here’s head Art Detector Matt Moore hard at work.

Matt will be scanning Art that is brought in to test whether it is Good or not. If it is Good it’ll go on the walls as part of the Good Art Gallery.

The not-very-Private View of the gallery will be on Friday 23 April at 6pm. Go follow on Facebook to keep in the loop.

(The upstarts at More Canals scooped us on this with a feature on the Agency. What can I say, some of us have a shop to run.)

Later on that afternoon the costumes that had been haunting our stock room somehow made their way into the upstairs gallery.

These are costumes and props from the Birmingham Royal Ballet that were created in Birmingham and are on the road as part of their 20th birthday shenanigans. Explanatory documentation to make this clear will be following shortly. Meanwhile the headless people are watching you shop…

• Things we learned by hosting Popcorn Comedy – Dice Productions
  I’m a sucker for this kind of thing. Lessons here from putting on a stand-up comedy/short film night in a pub
• Six Birmingham nominations for the RPS Music Awards
  Big ups to BCMG, Oliver Knussen, Andris Nelsons, CBSO’s Igor Fest, Colin Matthews and Birmingham Opera Company for nominations in the RPS Music Awards
• Forthcoming residency at The Lombard Method | fizzPOP
  This is a Good Thing, in my mostly humble opinion
• Birmingham Hippodrome Brochure April 2010
  The forthcoming summer/autumn/winter programme from Big Theatre. A whole heap of dance (esp IDFB and BRB) and musicals with a dash of opera
• Creative Survival in Hard Times « D’log
  “Creative Survival in Hard Times is a new report from New Deal of the Mind, commissioned by the Arts Council. It explores policy options for supporting young creatives in the UK, and the key useful suggestions are…” Click the link to read on
• Desperately seeking Desk Space… – ragearts’s posterous
  Rage Arts are looking for some desk space for their graduate intern. If anyone can help then get in touch with them
• Birmingham Pride – 29/30 May
  Dates just announced for the UK’s biggest LGBT party