It was an interesting concert — and that was before Jack Skellington showed up.
But allow me to take a few steps back. A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the hidden gem I found in Downtown Hartford called Hartford Live. It’s a series of free music performances that happen at the Old State House. After the outdoor concert, the festivities travel a little less than half a mile away to Infinity Music Hall, where a free afterparty takes place.
Last time, your humble reviewer was too tired to take in both the main event and the afterparty. This week, I took a nap and headed straight to Infinity Music Hall to see Bella’s Bartok perform.
And boy, am I glad I took that nap.
To call Bella’s Bartok, a band out of Amherst, Mass., high energy would be an understatement. Their website describes their performances as “theatrical,” and that almost encapsulates it.
Listening to Bella’s Bartok felt like the aural equivalent of attending your child’s birthday party: the giddy, raucous energy and excitement of the spectacle only barely veils a certain existential melancholy. In the quiet moments of the party, you realize that your child has gotten one year older, and that all those yesterdays that aging represents are truly gone. That’s how I felt when the music stopped between songs. We were dancing to songs with some heavy meanings, and I had to stop and think about them in the quiet parts.
Bella’s Bartok’s high-flying style isn’t simply a form of stagecraft. It’s a core component of their message of finding joy in a cruel and often hypocritical world.
Their headline piece of the evening, “Sticks and Stones,” tells the story of the Covid-19 pandemic and the sadly lacking response of government and other leaders. Consider a section from the lyrics of the song:
Whoa, it’s over now
The world keeps turning
I’m still burning out
Yeah, the time has come but
I’m still here, and you’re just having fun
It’s the juxtaposition of the inevitable — death, sadness, loss — with the will to rage against them that makes Bella’s Bartok’s sound so irresistible. Their rage doesn’t take the form of anger or bitterness. It’s the rage of stubbornly holding onto a moment of happiness even in the darkest moments. It infected me, moving up through my tapping foot. Before long I was lost in the music with the rest of the crowd, jumping from here to there and allowing the sounds to radiate throughout my body.
That’s when my boy Jack Skellington showed up.
Of course, it wasn’t the Jack Skellington, as copyright prevents that. But the dancing skeleton was yet another example of the ways in which humor and the macabre often occupy the same space. By the time the show ended, I felt cleansed. I was able to stare into the abyss of hopelessness and despair, and I chose to dance.
NEXT:
Infinity Music Hall hosts So Good: The Neil Diamond Experience on Sept. 9th.
Jamil heads out to Dunkin Donuts Park to take in America’s pastime.
