Rita Houston is back for the sixth season of FUV Live at Zankel (photo by Lynda Shenkman Curtis)
Zankel Hall, Carnegie Hall
Fifty-seventh St. at Seventh Ave.
Indigo Girls: Saturday, October 23, $42-$48, 10:00
Series continues through April 8
www.carnegiehall.org
www.wfuv.org/event/zankel
True New York City institutions Carnegie Hall, WFUV, and Rita Houston are teaming up again for their sixth season of FUV Live at Zankel, which in the past has featured such performers as the Cowboy Junkies, Shelby Lynne, Suzanne Vega, Rosanne Cash, Richie Havens, and Jorma Kaukonen playing intimate gigs at Zankel Hall. The series is curated by longtime radio host and FUV music director Houston, who selects the acts by thinking, “Who’s going to sound really good in this room?” Making its first appearance ever at Carnegie Hall, the Indigo Girls will play the downstairs listening room on October 23, followed by Martin Sexton’s Solo Holiday Show on December 11, the indefatigable Richard Thompson on March 19, and Edie Brickell introducing her new band, the Gaddabouts (with Steve Gadd on drums, Pino Palladino on bass, and Andy Fairweather Low on guitar), on April 8. The diverse group offers a good idea of the range of artists who can be heard on Fordham’s sixty-year-old station, home to such programs as “Woody’s Children” with Bob Sherman, “The Grateful Dead Hour,” “Sunday Breakfast” with John Platt, “Mixed Bag” with Pete Fornatale, “Vin Scelsa’s Idiot’s Delight,” and “The Whole Wide World with Rita Houston.” Get your tickets now to these Zankel Hall shows, because they will sell out.
After the breakout success of BORN TO RUN in 1975, Bruce Springsteen became embroiled in a lawsuit over control of his music that prevented him from going into the studio to make the highly anticipated follow-up. Springsteen found himself at a crossroads; “You didn’t know if this would be the last record you’d ever make,” he says in the revealing behind-the-scenes documentary THE PROMISE: THE MAKING OF DARKNESS ON THE EDGE OF TOWN. Combining archival footage of the DARKNESS sessions shot by Barry Rebo with new interviews with all the members of the E Street Band in addition to producers Jimmy Iovine, Jon Landau, and others, editor and director Thom Zimny melds Bruce’s past with the present, delving deep into Springsteen’s complex, infuriating, and fiercely dedicated creative process. “I had to disregard my own mutation,” Springsteen says at one point, regarding his battle to avoid getting caught up in the hype that came with BORN TO RUN, so he decided that his next album would be “a meditation on where are you going to stand.” Rebo captures Springsteen and the E Street Band — from a bare-chested Bruce to a bandanna-less Steve Van Zandt — rehearsing and recording alternate takes of familiar songs as well as tunes that would later wind up on such albums as THE RIVER and TRACKS, opening up Bruce’s famous notebooks and examining his intense creative process, which included throwing away dozens and dozens of songs that he believed just didn’t fit within his vision of what DARKNESS should be. Two of the most fascinating parts of the THE PROMISE, a recent hit at the Toronto Film Festival, involve Patti Smith discussing “Because the Night,” which is about her waiting for her boyfriend at the time, Fred “Sonic” Smith, to call her, and Toby Scott talking about mixing the DARKNESS record to get the sound pictures in Bruce’s head onto vinyl. THE PROMISE: THE MAKING OF DARKNESS ON THE EDGE OF TOWN is screening Wednesday night at the CMJ Film Festival (and will be followed by a Q&A with Zimny moderated by Q04.3 deejay Jonathan Clarke), which opens Tuesday with CIRCUS MAXIMUS (Thomas J. La Sorsa, 2010) and also includes such films as GAINSBOURG AND HIS GIRLS (Pascal Forneri, 2010), PASSENGER SIDE (Matt Bissonnette, 2010), FIREWALL OF SOUND (Devin DiMattia, 2010), and THE CHILD PRODIGY (Luc Dionne, 2010); select showings will feature introductions or postscreening Q&As with the filmmakers, performers, and others.