Moving Body
Salons
JOIN the Moving Body Salon Live on Zoom!
Sat, Jan 30
6 pm – 9 pm (EST)
Donation: $25 suggested, all amounts large and small are meaningful
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Once you send your donation with your email address, you will receive link info to join view our most recent Salon!
Our Moving Body Salon performers are expanding with old favorites and new brave hearts sharing their creative talents on January 30th via Zoom, hosted by Mary Abrams!
Performers include: Leo Schaff—singer/songwriter, Alvin Eng—playwright/performer, Lillian Stamey—dancer, Norman Salant—singer/songwriter, Liz Koch—writer, Jennifer Maeve Moloney—dancer, David Belmont—writer/musician, Bobbie Ellis—writer/poet, John Bianculli—Jazz pianist and Melanie Athena & V. Jeffery Smith — Musicians/songwriters! See photos and bios below.
Each performance lasts apx. 10 min. with 5 min. of audience exchange. From the comfort of your home, you can join us Salon-style with beverages and noshes of your desire. Join the whole event, come and go as you please…..the more the merrier to celebrate this new year and support MBR with an evening of inspiring music, dance, poetry, prose, song, and communion!
Once you send your donation with your email address, you will receive Zoom info to join the Salon!
PERFORMER BIOS
Leo Schaff—Songwriter, singer, actor, and teacher of Shakespeare at the 92nd St. Y. His work has been seen and heard from Carnegie Hall to CBGB’s to the steps of the U.S. Capitol, where “Give Us Hope” — the signature song of the Young Peoples Chorus of New York, which he co-wrote — was performed at President Obama’s Inauguration in 2009. For a live clip of the eclectic Leo, look here: https://youtu.be/D98esH_0WWM
Alvin Eng—is a native NYC playwright, performer, acoustic punk rock raconteur and educator. His plays and performances have been seen Off-Broadway, throughout the U.S., in Paris, Hong Kong, and Guangzhou, China. Eng promises to perform from HERE COMES JOHNNY YEN AGAIN (or How I Kicked Punk) which received a 2020 Workshop Residency at Dixon Place, NYC. This work explores the impact of opium on the Chinese Diaspora with NYC’s punk/counterculture, and Eng’s own Grandfather’s opium overdose on the streets of NYC’s Chinatown. https://alvineng.com/ (photo: Ann Yoo).
Liz Koch is an international teacher and author with 43 years of experience working with and specializing in the psoas. Educating both laypersons and professionals around the world, Liz is recognized by colleagues in the movement, wellness, and fitness professions as an authority on the “core muscle” of the human body. Stalking Wild Psoas is her passion and changing the language of body is her mission. https://coreawareness.com/
Norman Salant—is a NYC singer/songwriter whose songs are an attempt to put a face on the most moving elements of life. They are songs for today, melodious, intricate, with lyrical wordplay and larger themes, poetic imagery and abstract impressions; above all honest. Deceptively complex Norman’s songs reconstitute all the music he’s ever heard from the Beatles to Coltrane to Dylan to Philip Glass, into something fresh and new. Pop songs, yes, but radically different than any particular genre might produce. www.normansalant.com
David Belmont—David Belmont is a mixed media artist and community organizer living in New York City. He writes memoir, short fiction and poetry, as well as instrumental music. His work has appeared in The Poeming Pigeon, Wildflower Muse and FishFood Magazine. World Gone Zoom, a collection of his poems, will be published by The Poetry Box in May, 2021. He is currently co-music director of the Castillo Theatre. He has been a professional musician for 50 years. His publicly available recorded output since 1999 can be found on Spotify, iTunes and amazon. You can find his blog at: https://davidbelmontwriter.wordpress.com
Jennifer Maeve Moloney is a dancer and Somatic Movement Therapist who explores the sensory movement experience of emotions with her clients. She loves to study people, medicinal uses of plants, the ancient medicine of pelvic hydrotherapy steam and quantum biofeedback technology. For Jennifer, not a day goes by without dancing or singing in some way, shape, and form.
Lillian Stamey is a lover of all things movement. She is a dance maker, teacher, performer, and creative enthusiast. As a somatic movement facilitator, she offers guidance for individuals to explore inner learning through movement. Lillian lives in Brooklyn where she spends most of her time zooming, bouldering, and playing with her cat Blossom.
John Bianculli is a lyrical and soulful pianist, composer and recording artist. John’s dynamic original music is a unique blend of jazz, Latin, Brazilian, rhythm and blues, and world music. His original music can be heard on Telarc and Dream Box records. His song “Bittersweet” made the Contemporary Jazz Charts top-ten list. His music can also be heard on “Jazz Showcase,” a major internationally released CD that is a compilation of Telarc’s greatest jazz recordings.
Melanie Athena & V. Jeffery Smith, bring you diverse perspectives and musical backgrounds with their unique partnership that conjures up intense creative energy in their new release The Paradigm Shift. This duo mixes a Bahamian African American master musician born in Harlem bred in Brooklyn, with the heart and soul of a Greek Italian born to classical musicians raised in the mountains. Melanie playing bass late in life, quickly found herself in the inner circles of NYC’s musical community with some of America’s greatest musicians—The Neville Brothers, Will Lee, Hiram Bullock & Night Music, B.B. King, The Meters, and Les Pauls’ band. V. Jeffrey Smith is a musical phenomenon whose career spans more than 4 decades as a master musician, multi-instrumentalist, singer, writer, and producer, playing on countless gold and platinum records.
For 35 years Bobbie Ellis has been deeply committed to inquiring through the wisdom of the body, yoga, Continuum, expressive movement therapy, and the creative process. She has been a poet and writer since she was able to talk. Among her influences are Mary Oliver, Rebecca Elson, and Davie Bowie. www.somactr.com