Eugene Weekly : Calendar : 1.18.07

Art, when it makes the abstract concrete, has a way of touching people across all lines of faith and belief. Spread out on the UO's Memorial Quad between the Knight Library and Lillis Hall (and stretching all the way to the EMU), next week's Iraq Body Count Memorial should be a visually devastating work. The project was installed at the University of Colorado—Boulder last fall (pictured above) with 100,000 white marking flags, each representing six to seven Iraqi dead, and 3,000 red flags for U.S. dead. Black flags, representing WMDs found in Iraq, were nowhere to be seen. Now the show hits the road. The idea is for the memorial to be passed from university to university, adding more flags to the project each time until all of the estimated 655,000+ human beings pronounced dead in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion are represented. Show your support by attending the general planning meeting tonight at 7 pm at 146 Straub Hall or showing up at 10 am on Sunday at Lillis Hall to help set up the display (usually requiring a full day and a half of effort). The memorial will be on display through Jan. 28, with a dedication ceremony on Thurs., Jan. 25 at the EMU. See Calendar.

For a President who ignores his military advisors, his constituents, his former secretary of state and even his own political party in his zeal for an escalation of Middle East terror, Bush may need a swift kick in the ass. The KickAss Angel Choir (singer Kimberly Cullen pictured left), performing at this Saturday's "Instruments of Peace" benefit concert at Church of the Resurrection, may be up for the job. A year in the making, this evening of music, dance, poetry, political satire and visual art will raise funds for Oregon PeaceWorks, one of the state's largest peace, justice and environmental activist nonprofits. Aside from the KickAss Angels providing much-needed folk songs from the international community, there will be premieres of new protest songs from event organizer Nina Celeste and Finnish-American fusion composer Steven Johnston. If you can't make it to the 39th and Hilyard event, the same night sees a Dept. of Peace Musical Benefit at the Spiritual Growth Center at 390 Vernal St. You want peace: You have options. See Saturday Calendar.

It seems a tad superfluous to name an event the Oregon Jazz Festival, what with our well-known lineup of stellar jazz festivals packed throughout the spring, summer and fall months, but then again we can never get enough of that cool jazz sound — especially in these bone-cold months. The two-day festival kicks off with the simultaneous blitz of the UO and LCC Jazz Ensembles combining forces for a full-force fusion freakout at the LCC Auditorium, while at the same time percussionists Charles Dowd and Tracy Freeze (pictured below) perform a duet for vibraphone and marimba at the UO's School of Music. Rounding out the festival is a performance from hallowed jazz saxophonist Rich Perry at the LCC Auditorium. See Friday and Saturday Calendar.