Even the landscape is against us.
Anyone remember last year's Santa Fe Summer Bandstand drama? It was a smidge awkward, as, in what seemed like a good-hearted attempt at incorporating a wide range of local performers, organizer David Lescht (director of the non-profit Outside In) invited some rather left-of-center musicians to be a part of the schedule.
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Subsequently, self-described "avant-garde punk" musician Jack Clift played an improvised set that reportedly drove everyone off the Plaza. Artists who play in a similar vein were removed from the Summer Bandstand schedule and replaced by more, um, palatable performers, and great anger, defensiveness and controversy ensued.
This year, without the threat of fisticuffs, the Bandstand series has passed under the radar a touch, which is a shame. As an ambitious series, sponsored partly by the City of Santa Fe, still helmed by Lescht and Outside In, the Summer Bandstand simultaneously (and perhaps contradictorily) serves as an example of the vast improvement local institutions have made in recognizing local music, and as a case study for the crossroads at which our city stands.
The good aspects of this series are several. To start, rather than scheduling a smattering of performances throughout the summer, the Bandstand folks have blanketed the Plaza in music several times a week-two bands every Monday through Thursday evening (starting at 6 pm), lunchtime every Tuesday and Thursday (starting at noon). That's a lotta music. And that's the only way it could work: A once-or-twice-a-week show would be weak, confusing and watered down, but the scheduling has allowed the Summer Bandstand to establish a presence.
That presence's secondary effect is that it's given plenty of space to local musicians. The lineup has been, to say the least, expansive. Pared down, sure, from last year's far-reaching list, but, damn, we've seen something that's more reflective of the Santa Fe music scene than, frankly, one would expect from a city-sponsored event. Seventy-eight performances. Almost 50 bands, ranging from classic honky tonk to traditional Hawaiian music to jazz, from traditional Latin groups and mariachi to indie pop and blues. Drum ensembles. Alt.country. Hip-hop. Bluegrass.
Crowd reaction has been varied: Some nights, a few dozen folks can be seen really digging the scene and getting funky (this is especially fun to watch on Santa Fe's public access Channel 8, as often the shaky camera work ends up with a close-angle shot of the butts of aging hippies and camel-toed tourists). Other nights it's a bit lackluster. But generally, folks seem to get it. Suffice it to say, the choice of performers cuts a wide but accesible swath. Almost every segment of the Santa Fe music population is represented: the sweet teenaged Warehouse 21 types, the guy who makes his living playing largely ignored in hotel lobbies, the El Farol blues stalwart. Except-no improv in sight. The wild-eyed denizens of High Mayhem seem to be the only unrepresented group.
Ah, but it's this latter business that remains the purple elephant on the Plaza, and the one that reminds us again of some inescapable facts: It's that damn nexus of outsider tourism on which we depend too much and a subculture of rascally artistic upstarts, the heirs to a legacy of Bohemianism and charged creativity that brought those turquoise-sucking tourists here in the first place. The heirs-with their drugs and crazy music and sweaty intensity-kinda scare everybody now, and thus have been exiled to the margins of the city.
The thing is, blaming the marginalization on the need to cater to tourists is not entirely fair. There always has been tension between the tradition of artistic (and by that I mean all types of art, not just visual) kook-ery and the older traditions Santa Fe is known for. In some ways the tension remains pretty understandable: Even our legendary landscape forbids stepping outside certain bounds. The mountains, the desert sand, the sagebrush-these things do not exactly scream "avant-garde punk." Nor do they scream "indie pop," or "experimental" or "electric guitar," for that matter. In fact, they don't scream anything, but rather whisper, "Western country music, torch and twang, maybe some low-key blues," if anything at all. Amidst the mountains and adobe, the giant quiet starry night skies and pine-scented breezes, it's a wonder we have such an expansive musical selection at all, much less a strangely thriving improv/experimental scene.
And yet we do. It's that other tradition that keeps mucking it up, the thread of people like Will Schuster and so many others who have blazed into this town, or blazed through all their lives here, and done crazy, Dada-ist things, and have somehow managed to fit as round pegs into the square hole of this town.
So the question remains: Do folks like that belong on the Plaza?
Some say no-the more "out-there" acts can play at other places. There are plenty of spots-house parties, High Mayhem, Half Rack Studios, to name a few-for them to show their stuff. Why chase people outta the Plaza with music many deem offensive to the ears?
But that's missing the point. The Plaza, weary, battle-scared, and fought-over as it is, still is Santa Fe, and to say some musicians don't belong there is like excluding them from the city limits entirely. Those who experiment with the edges, with the sometimes ugly, with the aesthetically difficult, are essential. They keep us just afloat, our heads barely bobbing above banal waters. It can't always be pancakes and face-painting, people.
Still, let's not forget what's occurring right here and now: The summer Bandstand series is still kicking ass, still to be commended for its scope and still worth heading downtown for, so check it out. While you're there, maybe let the powers that be know what other bands you'd like to see next time. And maybe tell 'em we could use a couple of hot dog stands too.
