Arts Immersion Salon
Arts Smackdown
May 2012

The genesis:  Frederic had been playing his unique “Classical Smackdown” concerts for the past year all over the world in which he plays one great composer against another very different one (in this case Debussy and Prokofiev), with the audience voting and offering written comments on each “round”.  These concerts generated so much interest and engagement that we decided to expand the idea to our Arts Immersion Salon.  Using the Smackdown concept to embrace the music, art, film, performance and culinary arts created one of our most immersive, engaging multi-sensory salons of 2012.  In addition to Frederic’s Smackdown concert, we presented:

• Performance: 2 poets from CT’s Youth Poetry Slam team, One Word, sat amongst the audience and spontaneously began slamming before the concert.  Their intense & personal work was riveting. Audiences were asked by the poets to “score” them in preparation for a National Competition.
• Art: All the art was chosen or created by participating artists after listening to pieces by both composers and choosing one that connected with their work.  Audiences voted on which “body of work” they preferred – those associated with Prokofiev or Debussy.
• Film: Five filmmakers – some young and some established – created short films using Prokofiev’s Toccata or Debussy’s Reverie as the soundtrack to their original films.
• Chef Daniel (Lanzilotta) created 3 incredibly delicious, competing pairs of appetizers for the audience to eat and vote on – and voting continued through wine, dessert and even coffee!