The next Transperformance?

This evening, I picked up a quartet of students from Logan airport and on the way back, one of them commented to me on the curious nature of my mix CD that was playing in the van's stereo. Mix CDs I make for myself tend to be eclectic as I love following a serious, moody masterpiece like Nick Drake's "Way To Blue" with Burl Ives' "Holly Jolly Christmas" or a Chopin nocturne with something by Pat Benatar. Anyway, when Tchaikovsky's sprightly "Dance For Six" was followed by a two-minute Buzzcocks blast of punk, this student asked, "How could you put those two songs back to back? Are you bipolar?" But then it occurred to me-as different as those two pieces of music are from each other, I noted to this particular student, who is openly gay, that both composers were openly gay as well so there was at least that much in common. And that reminded me of one of my Transperformance ideas that I've submitted to Bob Cilman, the director of the event.

As you may or may not have known, two of the last four Transperformance theme ideas came from a SFTD member. They used my "All in the Family" idea two years ago and the plants/animals theme of four summers ago came from Ken. Anyway, the latest theme idea is the following and I think it's an idea whose time has come:

GLBTransperformance

ROCK & POP:
Elton John
George Michael/ Wham!
Queen
Culture Club
David Bowie
Melissa Etheridge
The Go-Gos
Lou Reed/Velvet Underground
Janis Joplin
Judas Priest
Pet Shop Boys
N-Sync
Village People
Jethro Tull

ALTERNATIVE ROCK/PUNK:
Green Day
Sinead O’Connor
R.E.M.
Husker Du/Bob Mould/Sugar
Buzzcocks
Bjork
The Smiths
B-52s
The Breeders

FOLK & COUNTRY:
Joan Baez
Indigo Girls
Kd lang
Ani DiFranco

EASY LISTENING/POP/JAZZ/CLASSICAL:
Johnny Mathis
Lesley Gore
Cole Porter
Tchaikovsky
Billie Holiday
Dusty Springfield
Benjamin Britten
Noel Coward
Rodgers & Hart
Stephen Sondheim


Can't you just see/hear Lord Russ as Freddie Mercury? Kim Zombik tearing into a Billie Holiday set? Those Us boys taking on Green Day? Drunk Stuntmen doing Pet Shop Boys? Maybe the latter is a stretch but I can hear them blazing through some of those Jethro Tull warhorses.

As for SFTD, in my wild imagination, I see us putting on makeup and dresses and bopping out a trinity of Go-Gos hits. It might be hard convincing Henning to dispense with his guitar and become Belinda Carlisle but if we could arrange key changes to accomodate my limited vocal range, I'd volunteer to get out there up front and do her famous dance with the swoopy arms. What about Culture Club? Would Henning consider being Boy George?