Contratopia coming to Decorah, Jan. 22, 2011

Well actually half of Contratopia is always in Decorah. But next weekend we've succeeded in enticing our Better Half to make the winter journey down for a dance and a rare concert performance. These events will take place at the Elks Lodge in downtown Decorah with the short concert beginning at 7:00. This will be followed by a teaching session and a full-blown contra dance with caller David Kirchner at 8:00. The ending time is a little open-ended at this point, probably sometime between 10:30-11:00.

It turns out that our appearance in Decorah coincides with the 2nd annual Oneota Film Festival that will be taking place next weekend at Luther College. While the concert and dance will cost you $7 to get in, the film festival is free (donations are encouraged). You will want to go to the festival web site and register if you want to learn more.

Long time Contratopia watchers will know that it is extremely rare for the band to perform in a concert setting. Sometimes if we are featured at a music weekend we will play a short concert set and there have been two or three other instances where we played have performed in a quiet room without dancers, but not very often. So this afternoon we will be having a rehearsal before our dance in Minneapolis to come up with an interesting program of music that we don't normally get to play. It should be a lot of fun.

Erik and I (and maybe more?) will be playing live and talking with Jeni and Tim on the KDEC Artist Direct radio show next Friday morning at 8:15 to advertise this event. We did this once last summer for a different local event and had a great time. If you're not in Decorah you can listen online at the KDEC website. Hopefully I will be able to keep my foot out of my mouth during the interview portion of the show.

Before anything happens in Decorah next weekend we first get to play a dance at Tapestry in Minneapolis tonight. And have a reunion with Ted Hodapp as well. I hope we'll see you at one of these events.