A little tap will do you

I made this video in November of 2012 and set it aside. After the tragic events that took place in Boston, MA this month I decided to post it so it could bring some cheer back into our lives.

Enjoy the moment,

Leo
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Music: Oscar Woods – Don’t Sell It Don’t Give It Away – In the Public Domain
Video and Film Clips:
Gregory Hines – Let the man dance
Bill “Bojangles” Robinson – Cafe Metropole, Deleted Scenes
Savion Glover – Live Performance, at ABC show
Bill “Bojangles” Robinson – Stormy Weather

Audio MIx & Special Effects: Leo Bar
Digital Art – Photography: Leo Bar

Aromas de Tango

Created a superimposed atmosphere of imagery and locales to highlight a very stylized tango dance and the accompanying music. All photos and imagery are from Buenos Aires and Montevideo and many represent traditional tango bars.

The group Bajofondo represents a new modality of music called neotango or electrotango. Some of their music is outstanding.

Music: Perfume – Bajofondo :: Remixed by Leo Bar

Special thanks to Paul Holman for the use of portions of his video Milonga de Milongas. See more of his videos at youtube.com/user/paulrholman

Pianoforte

The art of piano making and art paintings  Music: Dexter Britain :: http://www.dexterbritain.co.uk

Murgas and Carnaval – Curtidores de Hongos 100 years

The murga “Curtidores de Hongos” made its first appearance in Montevideo, Uruguay in 1912. In 2012 they celebrated their 100th anniversary. In this video you can hear their “Retirada”.
Enjoy the show! – For more info and background see my blog ::
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A traditional murga group is composed of a chorus and three percussionists and this is the type of murga performed on stages at Carnival. The singers perform in polyphony using up to five vocal parts. Vocal production tends to be nasal and loud with little variation in volume. The percussion instruments, derived from the European military band, are bombo (a shallow bass drum worn at the waist and played horizontally), redoblante (snare drum) and platillos (clash cymbals). The two most important pieces of the performance are the opening song (saludo) and the exit song (retirada or despedida). Murguistas dress in elaborate, colourful, jester-like costumes. Staging is sparse with minimal use of props. The singers tend to be foregrounded with the percussionists at the back or off to the side of the stage.

Murga is a form of popular musical theatre performed mostly in Uruguay and some in Argentina during the Carnival season. Murga groups operate in Montevideo and at the Buenos Aires Carnival, though to a lesser extent than in Montevideo. Uruguayan murga has a counterpart in Cadiz, Spain from which it is derived, the chirigota, but over time the two have diverged into distinct forms.
The Murga is performed by a group of a maximum of 17-20 people, usually men. In the months prior to Carnival, which takes place from late January to early March in Uruguay, each group will prepare a musical play consisting of a suite of songs and recitative (heightened speech) lasting around 45 minutes. This suite will be performed on popular stages in the various neighborhoods  known as tablados, throughout the Carnival period. Groups also vie against one another in a prestigious official competition.
Lyrical content is based on a particular theme, chosen by the group, which serves to provide commentary on events in Uruguay or elsewhere over the preceding year. Consequently, murga lends itself well to being used as a form of popular resistance. For example, during the dictatorship in Uruguay in the 1970s, groups like Araca La Cana became known for their left-wing tendencies, subversive commentary and positional stance.

Background and Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murga; http://www.curtidoresdehongos.com.uy/letras/2012-documental-medio-bicentenario.php; http://www.lasmurgas.com/html_07/principal_general_07.php

Hanukkah – Festival of Lights

As a way to celebrate the upcoming festivals and holidays, I decided to construct a video about Hanukkah. The holiday is a celebration of  lights and the miracle of renewal. As such I chose to go backward and show candelabra (hanukkiah – hanukkiot pl.) dating all the way back to the 15th. century, working my way up to the modern era. Some of the oldest lamps can be found at the Museo Sefardi - Sephardi Museum in Toledo,  Spain dating to the era preceding the expulsion of the Jews from the Iberian peninsula by the Spanish Inquisition.  Many others come from humble beginnings in the 17th. and 18th. centuries from little villages of Eastern Europe and the Near East. The modern pieces are displayed at The Israel Museum together with many older from around the world.

Eventually, I had to forgo many beautiful examples due to the time constraints, so it’ll be for another time… Together with the imagery, I created an oil painting and used different digital compositions to enhance the feeling of light, miracle of fire and sequence of nights.

The intention was to combine the traditional with the modern and thereby reflect the many changes this holiday went through the centuries. The music was my remix using portions of a flute solo;  Desert Sunset by Saregama – Jamendo CC BY NC and a calabash drumming recording from Africa, (author unknown.)

Hope you enjoy the show and that the Holiday Season is a bright one for you and your family and friends,

Leo

~ ~ Special thanks to:
The Israel Museum – Jerusalem, Israel
Museo Sefardi – Toledo, Spain (also inside scenes)

Tango Sureño

This dance is a Milonga danced to milonga music – a cousin of the Tango. Enjoy the sow!
“In a book published in 1883 Ventura Lynch, a noted contemporary student of the dances and folklore of Buenos Aires Province, noted the influence the Afro-Argentine dancers had on the “compadritos”, who apparently frequented the Afro-Argentine dance venues, “the milonga is danced only by the compadritos of the city, who have created it as a mockery of the dances the blacks hold in their own places”.
Milonga uses the same basic elements as Tango and requires a greater relaxation of legs and body. Movement is normally faster, and pauses are not made. It is rather a kind of rhythmic walking without complicated figures, with a much more “rustic” style than Tango”. {Source: Wikipedia}
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Photography:
CB1985IFY – Palermo; Omar Guebel – Photos of La Boca :: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ohgg/collections/72157600270319242

Leo Bar :: http://www.flickr.com/photos/leobar-pixinmotion/ 
Music: Reliquias porteñas – Francisco Canaro – - (November 26, 1888 – December 14, 1964) Uruguayan violinist and tango orchestra leader.

 

 

DNA dance

The essence of life DNA and its twisted dance (double helix)

 

Fascinating science behind the essence of life. Decided to construct this production from the inspiration while reading and watching how symmetrically and delicately is the DNA double helix held together. It felt like a dance, especially when it came to see animations of its replication. I have used these animations as backgrounds or foregrounds to the human body in motion to accentuate the dance aspect of this vision. The mathematics and architecture behind this complex structure are gigantic. It’s an amazing  realization that this complicated stream of chemicals are organized in such lockstep and are part of all living beings. A real miracle!!

Enjoy the dance of life,

Leo

Related articles

• Pioneer DNA Researcher Dies (the-scientist.com)
• Biologists Describe Details of New Mechanism for Molecular Interactions (bnl.gov)
• Dna (iaspreparationonline.com)
• DNA with a Twist (the-scientist.com)
• DNA dance performed at Science Museum (telegraph.co.uk)

Kol Nidre – All Vows

Kol Nidrei (all the vows) is an Aramaic legal declaration recited in the synagogue at the evening service on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.  This legal formula and its melodic accompaniment has been part of the services since the 6th. century.

Music: Kol Nidrei – Composer Max Bruch – Played by Pablo Casals (Remix – Remastered by Leo Bar)

Painting: Yoram Raanan
Photography & Digital Art: Leo Bar

Graphics – Fonts: From a 19th. century Jewish holiday prayer book (machzor)

Tango Poetico

This work is dedicated to all great Argentinian and Uruguayan writers and poets.

Music: Confianzas by Gotan Project Edited and remixed by Leo Bar
Subtitles and Translation: Leo Bar
Contains 2012 newsreel clips of protests in Buenos Aires
Photography: A Cabrera Esteve – http://www.flickr.com/photos/cabrera-esteve/; Fotografovolante – http://www.flickr.com/photos/ruggeroarena/; http://www.flickr.com/photos/simba_tango/; Leo Bar
Mario Benedetti Oil Sketch: Andre’ Cortellini
Digital Art and Paintings Leo Bar
Dancers: Sebastian Achaval and Roxana Suarez

Nine is Fine

This one was done for pure fun. Enjoy,

Leo

To overcome the boredom caused by the U.S. political party conventions, I decided to build this work.

Inspired by a video ::  https://vimeo.com/48765246 by Mike Kobal using numbers as graphics.  Some of the websites I researched to build this little piece below:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gematria

http://www.numerology.com/

Music: Starbud by 4our5ive6ix :: http://www.myspace.com/4our5ive6ix/music/songs/starbud-5958662

Enjoy the show, math, stay awake and don’t blink.