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February 10, Friday, 7:30 pm
April Hall, voice
Tim Ray, piano
April, a Florida native, has roots steeped in southern tradition, music
and culture. Her deep roots in southern gospel and blues combine with urban
soulfulness and sophistication,
to create music that’s pure, gutsy, and unmistakably authentic.
April’s voice is an instrument of astonishing beauty
and versatility,capable of ranging from the subtlest nuance to the most powerful
soul-drenched belting with equal ease and mastery. But her focus is always on
singing
the song, in the tradition of classic singers like Joe Williams, Nat King Cole,
Ray Charles and Tony Bennett.
In 1993 April graduated from Berklee College of Music,
where she received the prestigious Louis Armstrong Performance Award. She has
done projects for Atlantic
Records under the direction of Arif Mardin and for the
likes of Melissa Manchester, Bette Midler and Chaka Khan and appeared on stage
with artists such as Al Jarreau, Jim Ed Brown, Helen
Cornelius, Rosemary Clooney, Dinah Shore, and Livingston Taylor.For the past 12
years, she has been recording and performing with New England's finest
musicians, including Gray
Sargent, Tim Ray, Marshall Wood, Kenny Hadley, Dino Govoni, Jon Damian, Less
Harris Jr., Bruce Gertz, Tom Hall, Bob Neiske, Jerry Bergonzi, John Lockwood,
Marty Balue and New
Orleans's Amadee Castenell, just to name a few.
Her graceful looks and powerful presence have
captivated audiences at every conceivable venue, from night-clubs like The
Regattabar and Scullers Jazz Club to the fine ballrooms of the
Copley Plaza and Ritz Carlton, to the mansions of Newport, from intimate parties
on the Vineyard to Boston's infamous Hatch Shell.
April is also an award winning songwriter, and her
music has been featured on Boston's "Women in Music" series and on "The
Coffeehouse” and featured on Boston’s Premier
Jaally syndicated "Jazz After Hours" with PRI's Jim Wilke. In addition to her
ongoing performances, Hall also continues to work with students across the
country holding master classes in modern vocal techniques and on the subject of
"Songwriting in a Free Society". Her web site:
www.AprilHall.com
$10 donation
Elegant wine reception to follow concert
For Directions:
50 Burroughs St, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130
Taylor House Directions Link
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Artist's Statement – Silvina Mizrahi
Painting and sculpting are my keys to the secret garden, my way down the
rabbit hole, my magnifying glasses.
My work can be divided into five different series:
 - Daily Magic
Objects
Daily tools like spoons, can openers, forks, keys, give up their utility
character to become part of an artistic purpose. Using epoxi to fuse the
different pieces, the magical figures are born, hiding the inner lifeless
character of each separated object. Examples of this period are Curious,
Virtual State, Knotbird.
- Ethereal Figures
Created in wax and organic materials (orange peels, twigs, buds, etc.) and
finished by c asting
in bronze, these fine elongated figures dance as a way of praying, searching
for the sublime.
- The Myths
Primitive mythological figures from the north of Argentina are mixed with
different objects, like pebbles, crashed eggs, candles, creating a collage
where our unconscious and our reality, our past and our present, are fused
in a timeless moment. Examples of this period are Ancestral Dreams,
Ancestors Dance, the Roads of Time.
- Recycles and Organic Sculptures
Objects to be disposed are rescued and transformed into conceptual pieces.
An empty bottle and broken toys are suddenly metamorphosed into a riding
soul. Can we use measurement systems to understand the un-measurable? This
is my challenge.
- Child World
Recently I discovered some childhood drawings: simple, crayoned patchworks,
imaginary figures, that resonate deeply in my paintings. Inspired and
invigorated by a renewed sense of continuity, and awed by the mystery of how
creation occurs, I am now adding to my work richly varied colors I never
used before, my daughter drawings and some discharge toys, exploring as well
many different techniques such as pouring the paint, glace and draw over the
same surface.
* For examples of all these series, please visit my website:
www.silvinamizrahi.com
 Bibliographical
notes
Born in Tucuman, Argentina, lives now in Boston, MA. She has received her
Degree in Fine Arts at the University of Tucuman, in 1991. Following her
Degree, she trained in sculpture under the supervision of different artists,
such as Prof. Antonio Pujia and Prof. Antonio D'aniello. She has been
specialized in different techniques like Lost Wax (Bronze), Engobe (Native
Indian Clay), Valencian Sculpture, and others. She has been trained in Dance
and Theatre as well, participating in courses from Moira Chapman (Buenos
Aires), Marta Graham School (New York), and Marta Bercy (Cuballet), among
others. In 1996 she has been awarded with two prizes in the National
Biennial for Small Format, in Argentina. In 2000, while living in Israel,
she was selected for two solo exhibitions, in the Jerusalem Municipal
Gallery and the Jerusalem Center for Performing Arts. In addition, she was
awarded with the Israel National Fellowship for New Immigrants. She has been
selected for a solo exhibition in the Equator Gallery and two group
exhibitions in the Copley Society Gallery, both in Newbury St., Boston. In
2002, she was elected Full Member of the Copley Society Boston, and awarded
with the Nathaniel Bushward Award in the Spring Exhibition of their Gallery.
In 2003, she has the opportunity to represent Lati n
America as a solo sculptor in the Northeastern University Artist Festival.
As well, she was selected for a Special Exhibition in the renowned Rice-Polak
Gallery of Art, in Provincetown. She has exhibited as a New Artist in the
Aronow Gallery of Art in San Francisco, and selected to participate in De
Cordova Museum Art in the Park Exhibition in Lincoln. As well, she has been
Invited Artist in 2006 and 2007 in the Institute of Contemporary Art in
Boston, and one of her pieces was selected to be exhibited in the Boston
Convention Center. More recently, she was selected for a Solo Exhibition at
the Argentinian Consulate in New York City, a Solo Exhibition at the JP
Public Library in Boston, she was Artist in Residence at the Taylor House
and the Liberty Hotel, Selected Artist for the Boston Ahts Festival, and
Invited Artist at the Timoteo Navarro Museum in Argen tina.
Her work is part of several collections from Argentina, Uruguay, Israel and
private collectors in USA.
"Mizrahi approaches a kind of human condition from the figure, without
meaning a reproduction, an imitation, neither a process of mimesis. Her
delicate figures denote a marked expressionism, and their characteristic
deformation, talk about this condition."
La Gaceta, Tucuman, Argentina 1997
“Mizrahi takes us on a journey into her world. Hers is a figurative work of
delicate sculpture--people flung about in a frency of dance, figures frozen
in a static embrace, images of love and emergence. This work is at once
mystifying, and grounded in human experience.”
Daniel Lahoda, Curator, The Equator Gallery, Boston, 2001
“Silvina also studied dance with, among others, the Martha Graham School and
is an accomplished dancer and choreographer. This interest is clearly
evident in her lovely figurative sculptures, executed in bronze employing
the lost wax method. Her attenuated figures literally dance and float on
their pedestals.”
The Rice/Polak Gallery, Provincetown, Massachusetts 2003
“Mizrahi summarizes in all her art her ancestral past, her dance experience,
her ingenuity, her love, her harmony with nature, and specially her unique
relationship with Dalilah, her daughter, who transport her to a simpler
world”
Claudia Epstein, Director Visual Arts, Ministry of Education, Tucuman, 2011
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