52nd City

The Business of Fancy Dancing ... and Hashkali

This Sunday is the 16th Annual Kathryn M. Buder Pow Wow, held on the Wash U. Campus. Growing up in the Southwest I ended up going to a lot of of powwows, but usually the smaller ones held in community centers with sawdust floors; I'm looking forward to seeing a large-scale multi-tribal event. The same day, right in nearby Forest Park, Gitana Productions is holding their first annual Roma Music Festival. If you went to the Gogol Bordello show this week at the Creepy Crawl, you owe it to yourself to check out Eastern European music, from the source and unplugged. Most of the Roma musicians and dancers are St. Louis residents ... and they could probably use some encouragement in light of all this Republican campaign-stumping-in-disguise that is the "immigration debate."

Cinematic substitution for those who can't go: "Smoke Signals," and "Time of the Gypsies," with Goran Bregovich's amazing soundtrack.