Standing Room Only for Sunday 12 June 2022

12:16  The Jolt Dance Company prepare for a busy time in the UK

Jolt must be just about the busiest dance company in the country at the moment, with live shows in the UK, a biennale featuring all its dancers, and two projects with Chamber Music New Zealand - a tour, and a new music programme called The Big I for people with intellectual disabilities.

The UK trip was actually supposed to happen in 2020.      It will include performances and a short film called Sam that'll be presented at the end of this month in London.  It's part of the Amici Dance Theatre Company's 40th anniversary production: One World.

It was Amici, which includes disabled and non-disabled performers, that inspired Lyn Cotton to set up Jolt in Aotearoa 21 years ago.  Now, well over 100 dancers with intellectual disabilities make up the Christchurch-based company.

Joining Lyn on the UK trip is Carl Te Tone Huia.  He'll be performing "Takiwātanga", an autobiographical work that speaks to his whakapapa, wairua and lived experience of autism.  He's performing the work at New Zealand House for the Ngātai Rānana London Māori Club Matariki Ball.

Lynn Freeman talks with Lyn Cotton and Carl Te One Huia, as well as Cathy Irons from Chamber Music New Zealand.

To help raise money for the UK trip, Jolt dancers are performing at a fundraising event at 4pm today at the Shirley Boys' and Avonside Girls' High School Auditorium.  The Big I will be presented in Dunedin, Nelson, Wellington and Tauranga later this year..
 

12:36  Wind instrument repairer, Jennifer Weigel

Time for the next in our occasional series on repairers of musical taonga.   Today it's the turn of wind instruments - which include flutes, clarinets, oboes and bassoons. 

And this interview is very timely   Wood instruments can swell when they get damp so the rainy winter months are particularly hard on them.

Jennifer Weigel knows all too well.  She's repaired many over her years as a specialist repairer and restorer of  woodwinds, brass instruments, and orchestral strings.

Jennifer brought her specialised skillset to Aotearoa from America and has worked at KBB Music in Auckland for more than a decade. 

Lynn Freeman asked her about the most common damage to woodwind instruments.

We're keen to chat to some other repairers including silversmiths, those working with stained glass, embroidery, typewriters and antiques of all kinds.

Do let us know if you know of any.  Contact us at standingroomonly@ rnz.co.nz  
 

1:10 At The Movies

Simon Morris reviews British period drama Mothering Sunday, a horror film from Finland called Hatching, and the first movie from Bhutan to be nominated for a Best International Film Oscar, Lunana: A yak in the classroom.

 

1:31  An exhibition of the late potter Ross Mitchell-Anyon

The day before he was due to received his ONZM at the Governor General's house last month, potter Ross Mitchell-Anyon passed away.

His niece Milly Mitchell-Anyon is a curator at Whanganui's Sarjeant Gallery.  She was already working on an exhibition of the pottery that he'd given his parents over five decades, much of which has now been gifted to the gallery.

The exhibition is called The Pool Room -  named after a scene in the family's favourite film, The Castle.

Milly's curated another show for the Sarjeant that's opening at the same time.  Testing Ground looks at the future of craft, working with a range of contemporary craft artists.

But Lynn Freeman starts by talking about The Pool Room, and Milly's connection with her Uncle Ross's pottery:

The Pool Room and Testing Ground open at the Sarjeant Gallery in Whanganui on the 18th of June.

 

1:46   The sacred harbour island, or Motutapu

Pacific nations often have a Motutapu, or sacred island, positioned at the entrance of their harbours.

Aotearoa has Motutapu Island in Waitematā Harbour in Tāmaki Makaurau, and there are others in Tonga and Rarotonga too. 

Long-time friends, and now collaborators, artist Benjamin Work and photographer Brendan Kitto became fascinated with these islands with which they have deep family connections.

So over four years they visited all three sites.  And that work has just gone on show in an exhibition called Motutapu, at Te Uru in Tamaki Makarau.

There's also a book of their images and some accompanying essays.

Lynn Freeman first asked Brendan and Benjamin how they first met:
 

2:06 The Laugh Track - Jacqui Hooper

Last weekend saw Auckland host the belated annual Raw Comedy Quest Grand Final - a combined 2021, 2022 event thanks to last year's lockdowns.  

The winner was Kura Turuwhenua, who we had on the show a few weeks ago.  The runner-up may have surprised a few in the audience.  Her name's Jacqui Hooper, and it's her day job that helps make her stand out.

She's a zoo-keeper - the Senior Primate Keeper at Auckland Zoo, to be precise.   And Lynn Freeman has to ask - going from apes to comedians, is it a step up or a step down?

Jacqui's picks include Jimmy Fallon and Will Ferrell, Saturday Night Live, Ricky Gervais, and inevitably, Not the Nine O'Clock News's "Gerald the Gorilla"!

 

2:26  Short story writer Michael Botur turns to horror

The Devil Took Her: Tales of Horror is the first time Whangārei-based short story writer Michael Botur has dipped his toe into this popular genre.

He's written 12 stories, leading us, as he descibes it,  "to the dark extremes of human behaviour".

For example, when a couple of high school introverts bond after skipping school, it descends into something unexpectedly frightening.   There are unexpected repercussions for a teen prankster who plays a vicious joke against her tutor.   While a woman trapped in a coal cellar finds she must die a little, to live.   

One of the stories  'Test of Death,'  won last year's Australasian Horror Writers Association Robert N Stephenson Short Story Award.

Lynn Freeman asks Michael why the switch, from often unnerving short stories to pure horror?

The Devil Took Her: Tales of Horror, by Mike Botur is published by The Sager Group.

 

2:40  Popular podcast ArtCurious explores some intriguing questions 

Was the woman featured in Vermeer's "Girl with a Pearl Earring" really a maid from his household, as portrayed in the Scarlett Johanssen movie?  Are there hidden messages in Leonardo's "The Last Supper"?  Did Van Gogh really only sell one painting in his lifetime? 

Exploring the unexpected, the slightly odd, and the strangely wonderful in Art History is the raison d'etre of the long running American podcast, ArtCurious.

One of the most intriguing proposition they explored recently was whether Leonardo da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" was actually a self-portrait in drag?

ArtCurious is now into its 11th season.  Lynn Freeman spoke to its host, contemporary arts curator Jennifer Dasal:

 

3:06 Drama at 3 - Still Waters by Sarah Delahunty

A comic drama about a woman whose life is changed by a television soap opera, Still Waters stars Alice Fraser, Peter Hambleton and Bruce Phillips as the "Still Waters" narrator.

 

 

Music played in this show

Artist: Bobby Boris Pickett and the Crypt-kickers
Song: The Monster Mash
Composer: Capizzi-Pickett
Album: These Ghoulish Things
Label: Ace
Played at: 12.12

Artist: Alan Price
Song: I put a spell on you
Composer:  Hawkins
Album: Geordie Boy
Label:  Castle
Played at: 12.35

Artist: Harry Belafonte
Song: Zombie jamboree
Composer:  Maugee
Album: The Essential
Label: RCA
Played at: 12.58

Artist: Nouvelle Vague
Song: Bela Lugosi's dead
Composer: Ash-Haskins
Album:  Bande a part
Label: Peacefrog
Played at:  1.07

Artist: Cramps
Song: I was a teenage werewolf
Composer: Interior-Riorschach
Album: Songs the Lord taught us
Label:  IRS
Played at: 1.42

Artist:  Warren Zevon
Song: Werewolves of London
Composer:  Marionell-Wachtel-Zevon
Album: A quiet normal life
Label: Asylum
Played at: 1.58

Artist: Theme
Song:  The Addams Family
Composer: Mizzy
Album: Halloween hits
Label: Rhino
Played at: 2.05

Artist: Nick Cave & Kylie Minogue
Song: Where the wild roses grow
Composer: Cave
Album: Murder Ballads
Label: Mute
Played at: 2.38

Artist: Kate Bush
Song: Hammer horror
Composer:  Bush
Album:  Lionheart
Label:  EMI
Played at: 2.58

Artist: Toy Love
Song:  Bride of Frankenstein
Composer: Knox-Bathgate-Dooley
Album: Toy Love
Label: Deluxe
Played at: 3.05

Artist: Mike Oldfield
Song: Tubular Bells
Composer: Oldfield
Album: Tubular Bells
Label: Virgin
Played at: 3.58