The Joshua Light Show will team up with a diverse series of experimental musicians for six groovy shows at the Skirball Center
NYU Skirball Center for the Performing Arts
60 Washington Sq. South
September 13-16, $20-$68
212-998-4941
www.nyuskirball.org
www.joshualightshow.com
A key figure in the psychedelic movement of the late 1960s, the Joshua Light Show created dizzying, kaleidoscopic, all-too-groovy projections at the Fillmore East, Woodstock, Carnegie Hall, and other venues, where their liquid lights exploded in a vast array of colors behind Janis Joplin, the Grateful Dead, Jimi Hendrix, Pink Floyd, Jefferson Airplane, and other legendary musicians. Over the last several years, JLS has returned with a vengeance, performing at Lincoln Center, the Hayden Planetarium, the Hirshorn Museum, Art Basel in Miami, and the recent Transmediale festival in Berlin. This week founder Joshua White and his talented crew, which still primarily uses analog techniques to mix their creations live, will be at the NYU Skirball Center for six performances over four nights, beginning Thursday, when they are joined by Scottish percussionist Dame Evelyn Glennie and master harpist Zeena Parkins. Friday night features the minimalist father-and-son duo of Terry Riley and Gyan Riley at 7:30, followed by the inspired quartet of John Zorn, Lou Reed, Bill Laswell, and Milford Graves at 10:00. On Saturday night, MGMT cofounders Ben Goldwasser and Andrew VanWyngarden will play two shows, with GlobalFest closing things out on Sunday with the Boston-based Ethiopian-American Debo Band and the New York-based Brazilian-American Forro in the Dark. Each performance will last approximately one hour, with JLS onstage improvising alongside the musicians; the JLS team includes White, photographer and installation artist Alyson Denny, experimental composer and vocalist Nick Hallett, filmmaker and musician Seth Kirby, Ana Matronic of the Scissor Sisters, live cinema artist and designer Brock Monroe, painter and comic-book artist Gary Panter, production manager Doug Pope, performance artist and director Bec Stupak, and sound designer Jeff Cook.