Pianist, composer and visual artist Scott Kirby launches into his program March 8 with "Main Street Farewell," an original composition coupled with original paintings depicting imaginary main streets.
Kirby often stepped out from behind the piano to share a narrative providing historical facts and humor to explain the photos on the screen. It added just one more element to his multi-media presentation.
Scott Kirby adds music behind locals sharing stories of times long ago and present times in the valleys. On the screen, Sidney and Jody Wills share about their time on their ranch in Potomac.
SWAN VALLEY – Audience members watched as their neighbors and familiar places appeared on the big screen at Swan Valley School March 8 as part of Scott Kirby's Main Street Souvenirs presentation. Kirby captured the Blackfoot Valley around Potomac, up the Clearwater through Seeley Lake and north to Swan Lake in his multi-media stage performance. He artfully combined live music, narration, historical and modern photographs, paintings and video clips to tell the story of the gathering of small-town America and the historical and visionary dimensions of the American Great Plains.
Kirby said he often researches his location ahead of time and gets some suggestions from the hosts. However, other times he does his research enroute.
"I have a very strong intuitive sense for finding local stories, local history and local culture," said Kirby who set the groundwork for his multi-media project "Main Street Souvenirs" in 2005 while living in France. "I've gotten really good at it."
Kirby arrived Thursday night. He spent two days filming and a day and half of editing to produce the two-hour performance as part of 2 Valleys Stage concert series. Because of all the video included in the production, this is more extensive than other shows where he has produced six Main Street Souvenirs in six days.
For the first half of the show, Kirby integrated the local content into the thematic content of his existing show highlighting gatherings in small town America.
Timed perfectly with the rolling presentation, Kirby accompanied on piano and narrated the various chapters that portrayed small town America. Telling the story through chapters about local gatherings, ragtime, big bands, baseball fields, transition of technology in music and the dance halls, Kirby integrated photographs of historic and current gathering places in Potomac, Seeley Lake and Swan Valley and video clips of local historians Anne Dahl, Dixie Meyer and Ron Cox, logger Neil Meyer, ranchers Sidney and Jody Wills and the Seeley-Swan High School Leos Club sharing stories of times past and present.
The second half of the presentation, Kirby took the audience on a journey through five chapters of the American Great Plains. Through his original compositions, photography and paintings he captured the beauty and reverence in the open spaces, stark contrast between the distance, sounds and vertical structures in the horizontal landscape and the dance with Mother Nature that she always leads and is never forgiving.
"I hope to capture the character and value of each town that I go to," said Kirby. "I want to reflect back some things that people know but maybe some things that people don't know about their town."
Kirby will leave a CD with the images and video clips he captured with 2 Valleys Stage as well as one chapter from his presentation.
The final concert for 2VS 2019-2020 season is Stringfever April 28 at 7 p.m. at the Seeley-Swan High School Auditorium.
Reader Comments(0)