The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.corrr Friday, September Mildly terrifying, yes. But the music? Quite goo Riding off into a great album Opera visualized Genius Grant-winning Shen Wei kicks off China Now theme year $y MERYL SCHWARTZ his first staging of a Chinese opera. In a state- Daily Arts Writer mert on the artist's website, Shen Wei credits the "rich music and singing rather than the Renowned Chinese choreographer, dancer, story line" to his interest in "Empress." His painter and designer Shen Wei is known for lead vocalists are certainly up to the difficult dynamic contemporary performances. His task: the production's four lead performers are staging of "Second Visit to the Empress," this widely considered the most luminous of the weekend at the Power Conter, exhibits his Beijing opera world. command of dance's vocabu- Joseph Lam, professor of music in the Schtol lary - and traditional Chi- of Music, Theatre and Dance, said audiences nese opera to boot. Second will grow familiar with the melody during the The Shen Wei Dance Art's course of the performance, since traditional production - for which Shen Chinese opera music consists of standardized Wei choreographed and Empress structures with variations on the same melody. directed as well as designed "once you get to know it, it's very-easy listen- the costumes, makeup and Tonight and ing," he said. sets - showcases both con- tomorrow at8 And then there are the dancers: 12 charac- temporary dance and a p.m., Sunday terless perfformers using movement to interpret canonical Beijing opera. Per- at 4 p.m. the music. David Rolston, associate professor formances will run today of Chinese language and literature, summed though Sunday. $20/$48 . up the dancers' roles in the production: "'They There are distinctions At the Power work like the vizualizers on a computer when between a Western under- Center you play a CD," he said. "The dancers embody standing of "opera" and the the dynamics of the music, when it's soft, when broader understanding of an it's loud - that is what the dancers do for me." Eastern theatergoer. While Chinese opera cer- The dancers' movements are carefully cho- tainly stresses music - the Chinese word for reographed, despite appearances of relaxed "theater" is translated as "play-song" - Chi- arms and legs or improvisation. Moreover, nese opera regularly intersperses dance, mar- gestures are strongly physical without sur- tial arts, action sequences and speaking into rendering fluidity and suggest a delight in the performances. exploration of every limb. "Empress," though, is an atypical piece in in the strange and beautiful world of the its sheer volume of music, its challenging score production, danc rs and singers co-exist but and its marked lack of action. Because of these do not interact. " 'ere are two shows happen- idiosyncrasies, there has been no change in ing at the same time," Lam said. " Shen Wei staging in the last 200 years, despite the work's uses traditional music alongside very modern standing as a pillar of the Chinese opera reper- content." tory and a necessary stop on a student's road to Rolston went a step further and attests that opera stardoni. there are actually three shows happening But Shen Wei, who has studied Chinese simultaneously, when one also considers Shen opera since she was 9, attests that it was, in Wei's careful costuming, staging and visual fact, "Empress's" musicality that drew him to design. By CAITLIN COWAN Daily Arts Writer Les Savy Fav's first album in six years, Let's Stay Friends, breaks through with a big, bossy, face-melting track titled "The Equestrian." The song's video isn't a high-powered production but fan-submitted footage of a little blond girl, no older than 5. The girl turns on her Hello Kitty boombox, grabs a plastic microphone and starts lip-synching Les Savy Fav in perfect time. She Let's Stay head bangs, Friends makes her plastic horses French Kiss gallop across the screen and rides her stuffed pony into the floor like a rock- star. The video is an apt charac- terization of Les Savy Fav by all accounts. And while there are many things about the New Yorkindie rockers thatseemlo- fi, do-it-yourself or even cutesy from the outside, after listening to their music, this accessible indie fagade turns out to be just that: a cool, cozy front for their polished, angular and brilliant music. After starting out with the ecstatic high of "The Eques- trian," it would seem impos- sible to follow its first single on Let's Stay Friends. But Les Savy Fav is a versatile band, and the album skillfully oscil- lates between sweat and strain on tracks like "Raging in the Plague Age" and style and sass on mellower songs like "Brace Yourself" "Patty Lee" is one of the best songs on the album. The track explodes with a shout- ing chorus, high-pitched gui- tar line and an amazing bridge that melts into a cool, echoing refrain. The video for the song -awkwardly shot with a hand- held camera - features ayoung woman dancing to the song in what looks like an audition setting. But it's real. Here we see again the band's incredible dichotomy of looks and sounds. It's unions like these that are "Second Visit to the Princess" is directed by one of opera's most diverse minds, Shen Wei. It goes on at the Power Center and runs through sunday. "Empress" is merely the first of many upcoming University events that encourage reflection on the East-West dichotomy. In con- junction with its ChinaNow theme year, at least six other Asian-inspired productions are about to hit a University Musical Society stage. Rolston, for one, is glad that Chinese theater is being incorporated into the yearlong event. "A modern, economic perspective on China is too narrow, we need to also study history and humanities," he said. Added Lam: "It's a challenge for the audi- ence to think about the East and the West, old and new, but that is the fun part." most representatvve oft is ented band. Thanks t oit efforts, Les Savy F n, : urnspoiled. Ever ytl my,,, the album art orn tln in - a colorful accour 1 anianis in the Gardein turning on Aslnrnm arnsd l's bared teeth - to it's rec :1s and distribution is s s s group's control. This year the Lst based band Jetplane L'td t released a song called 'Vh 11 No glory, but the band definitely wins. They Never Play Les S n on the Radio?" While tl' s timent is sure to elicit a si of "I know, right?" from listening to the sharp lyri- tracks like "Pots & P