[ East Bay | Metroactive ]

Urban Guide Listings to plan your week by The Oakland Opera Theater presents Queen Clara. Queen Clara When was the last time you've been to the opera? Months ... years ... never? Not surprising. Once known as the entertainment of choice of the highbrow and famous of the late 1800s, the opera has become somewhat of an underappreciated cultural institution of this new century. Enter The Oakland Opera Theater, a group of artists who produce original operatic works geared for the pace of the 21st century. Now in effect for well over a decade, The Oakland Opera Theater has been creating works that address issues relevant to modern life, while making waves by highlighting per-formers from various cultural and racial backgrounds, and using the latest in digital technology to create the opera of the future: one that's accessible to all of the ages and cultures that represent Oaktown. Their latest production, Queen Clara, tells the story of Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross. Blending classical opera, and spiritual and Gospel stylings, the story of Queen Clara unfolds to reveal a |remarkable woman who fought against sexism during the Civil War and went on to revolutionize the profession of nursing. The score is composed by Oakland's very own Mary Watkins, with a libretto by Lance Belville, and Susan Swerdlow conducting. Thu/25-Sun/28, 8pm. Oakland Metro, 201 Broadway at 2nd St. near Jack London Square, Oakl. $10-15. 763.1146; www.oaklandopera.org. (CS) What exactly's going on here? It's Uberkunst at the Harsh Music Festival. Harsh Music Festival Noise, sound's ugly stepsister, is a derivative of the Latin word for nausea. But those at the Harsh Music Festival would have us believe that noise, not soothing sound, is the immediate future of music. Forget that stale old verse-chorus regime. Forget tidy beats, normal instruments, and nice music with pretty lyrics. Instead, yield to an evil reign of pain as the Harsh Music Festival sacrifices pop music at the altar of cool. Curated by Taylor Coz of The Mass and Saint of Killers, and presented by the visionaries at 21 Grand, the Harsh Music's headliners make their own sonic brew out of jazz, academic exper-imental, metal, and anything that when dropped, kicked, or beaten makes a sound. Witness the chaotic spect-acle that is Uberkunst, a gothic army and creep show not above catapulting fake guts at the crowd, and sicking the Noise Instrument Analog Device on onlookers. San Francisco's unsung harsh hero, Thomas Dimuzio, makes ambient-industrial music out of a modified 10-speed bike. The experimental XOME rudely sound processes the sweetness out of any and every source possible. Compomicro Dexall tightly synchronizes free jazz, punk, grindcore, and 20th century classical just to play the arrangement all wrong on stage. Musically maniacal Stimbox and Pedestrian Deposit are self-professed freaks. And finally the trio Saint of Killers believes that ugliness breeds beauty. You can always walk out. But then again, they'd like that. Sat/27, 6pm. 21 Grand. 21 Grand, Oakl. $5. 444.7263. (EP) Celestial Visions: Bay Area filmmaker Antero Alli's post 9/11 drama, Hysteria. Hysteria Daring, experimental, and fiercely independent Finnish-born Bay Area artist Antero Alli is at it again. Known as the curator of the Nomad VideoFilm Festival and creator of films ranging from cyber-noir tragedy to esoteric documentary, Alli has ventured into new territory with his latest work, Hysteria: a self-billed "post 9/11 drama" audacious enough to say something original. Based in a small Oakland apartment building during October of 2001, at Hysteria's core is a love triangle formed by two Persian sisters and an ex-Croatian soldier. The sisters -- reunited after the September attacks when Manhattan club girl Peri (Anastasia Vega) flees back to California to live with her older and more reserved sister Marian (Atosa Babaoff) -- both develop an interest in Ikar (Jakob Bokulich), the new tenant across the hall -- a devout Catholic haunted by flashbacks of his experience in the Serb-Croatian War, and visited by images of the Virgin Mary. Delving into issues of religious fanaticism and cultural responsibility, not to mention love, politics, jealously, family, and good ol' O-town, Hysteria is a brilliant contemporary filmmaker's response to September 11th. Check out a rare screening of Hysteria at a convenient East Bay location this Saturday, and meet Alli in person. Sat/29, 9pm. Tuva Space, 3192 Adeline Street, Berk. $7. 464.4640; www.verticalpool.com/hysteria.html. (EL) Picks by Eve Lotter (EL), Erica Pedersen (EP), and Cicely J. Sweed (CS). [ East Bay | Metroactive | Archives ]