Checklist for Saturday

Saturday is almost here and we can't wait! Everyone is so excited for what will be an excellent day of local, handmade shopping. For this holiday event we tried to keep it really local, over half of the fifty talented vendors live in West Philly, and the rest in the Philly area. We really do have something handmade for everyone on your list.

Don't forget to bring your:

Tokens - The Rotunda is a short walk from the L, the 40th St trolley hub and on the 21 and 42 bus line. If you are going by car there's metered parking on Walnut St, and a pay Parking Garage across. Free parking can be a little tricky in that neighborhood, but not impossible!

Cash - While many of our vendors accept credit cards, not all do. Did you know when you pay by credit card to a small business they're losing valuable dollars per transaction to a huge credit card company...? We're happy to take your cards, but we like cash much, much better!

Your Holiday Shopping List - We bet you won't go away empty handed!

A Babywearing Device - Last year people were glad they did!

Friends -  chances are you'll run into someone you know, but it's nice to bring some friends along and make a day of it!

Your Sweet Tooth - With gift items and gourmet pops from The Lil Pop Shop and Weckerleys Ice Cream it'll be hard to resist something. Black Orchid Foods will also be there with veggie snacks, lunch and handmade organic extracts.

Unlike last year we'll have select vendors outside and upstairs in the balcony. More shopping for you and the chance to see the space in a different light.

Can't wait to see you all there! Stop by VIX Emporium and As the Crow Flies & Co's tables, right as you walk in to say Hi.

GO WEST! Featured Performer: The Citywide Specials

In 2001 a weekly bluegrass picking session started in a bar above an Ethiopian restaurant in West Philadelphia. This quickly turned into a hodge podge of mismatched instruments and musical anarchy featuring as many as 4 frontmen. A few years later they looked around & realized their line-up, sound, and sensibilities had changed almost completely.  The band re-branded themselves The Citywide Specials. With a ratio of about 600 gigs to 9 practices, Eliza Hardy Jones, Nikolai Fox, Larry Maltz, Jim Kydonieus & Kevin James Holland have sculpted & polished their sound without being vulnerable to accusations of slickness. The "Citywides" continue to perform weekly in their eleventh year at the same venue (Fiume at 45th & Locust) as well as weddings and private parties. Presenting songs and tunes on fiddle, dobro, string bass, guitar and mandolin, the band draws from the well of traditional American country music, including a healthy dose of originals (written by Holland) which lose themselves easily amongst the old favorites.

Performing at the Fest at 1pm will be Kevin Holland, Nikolai Fox, Larry Maltz, & Jim Kydonieus. Stage names are (respectively) Spitey James, Clem Miller, Cuss Ozwald, & "The Reverend" Elmore Delmore.

GO WEST! featured performer: Perseverance Jazz Band

per·se·ver·ance [pur-suh-veer-uhns] -noun
1. steady persistence in a course of action, a purpose, a state, etc., especially in spite of difficulties, obstacles, or discouragement.
2. a hot young band bringing traditional New Orleans Jazz to the Philadelphia area.

Perseverance Jazz Band started in a West Philadelphia living room in the fall of 2010, where leader/bassist Jonathan Davenport convened some leading lights of the Philly music scene (including members of, most notably, the popular Balkan Brass Band the West Philadelphia Orchestra) to play some of his transcriptions of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band. As the months passed, members of the band dug deeper into the tradition and history of jazz, and discovered a wealth of great music that is glossed over in Jazz conservatory, and just generally doesn't get played all that much. Along the way they also discovered new friends and band mates who had long ago fallen for this irrepressibly fun music. They have also developed relationships with older players who have shared their knowledge out of a desire to keep the music alive. 

Soon enough, after many rehearsals and late night bar gigs, they stumbled across traditional jazz's natural ally: dancers! PJB is now emerging as local favorite of the Swing and Lindy Hop dance community for providing live music for dances.

PJB plays the 1st Monday of the month at Fiume Bar at 45th and Locust, the 3rd Monday of the month at the Porch at 30th St Station, and supplies music for a wide variety of private events, weddings and dances.

They will perform as an acoustic trio at 12 noon at GO WEST! Craft Fest at The Woodlands, 40th & Woodland in West Philly, September 29.

Visit them at www.perseverancemusic.com!

GO WEST! Featured Performer: Jay Sand

We are thrilled to welcome Jay Sand back to GW!CF. Jay is the founder of All Around This World, a wonderful international music program for children aged 0-8. In Jay's classes, children explore the rhythms, songs, stories and dances of many different cultures, one region per 11-week session. Jay does exhaustive research in each region's traditional songs and customs, then interprets them into fun and engaging musical activities, dances and games, often involving a multitude of percussion instruments and props like scarves and costumes.

Jay began by hosting classes in his home in West Philly, which he still does. Now All Around This World has spread all around this city, with classes in Fairmount, Fishtown, South Philly and Center City, taught by some of Jay's former apprentices. This Fall, his West Philly classes will explore Latin America, Africa or South / Central Asia while other locations will do West Asia and the Middle East. Classes are forming now and begin September 12, so check out the schedule if you are thinking of signing up.

Jay will perform at the Fest at 2pm, September 29 at the Woodlands, 40th & Woodland in West Philly. Bring any young music lovers you know for some FREE hand-clapping, singalong fun!

Featured Artist: Corina Dross

West Philly artist Corina Dross has been showing her work at GO WEST! since the very beginning. (Here is her interview on this blog for last April's Fest.) She reproduces her meticulous line drawings on notecards, magnets and patches, and also does wood block prints and oil paintings. Three years in the making, her Portable Fortitude deck of illustrated playing cards, a series of 54 characteristically quirky images, was completed in 2010.

Corina's latest offering is another collection of images, 12 of them in fact -- a wall calendar. Inspired by the Mayan prophecy that the world will end in 2012, "The Last Calendar You'll Ever Need" was created in collaboration with her sister, painter Josie Mosser. They spent the summer channeling spectacular, oracular visions of the end times, like a slow loris stalking a sleeping city, crows dismantling prison towers, the oblique stare of an urban polar bear, and many more scenes from the coming year of mayhem and magic.

This amazing and extremely limited-edition calendar, along with the rest of Corina's creations, will be offered at this December's GO WEST! Craft Fest. But its official debut will be at the official launch party, "Magic & Mayhem" at VIX Emporium on Saturday, November 12. You are warmly invited to attend from 6-9 pm at the Emporium, 5009 Baltimore Avenue, to help us ring in the beginning of the end. Both artists will be in attendance to discuss their prophetic visions and enjoy some pre-apocalyptic revelry. We hope you can join us!