Art Hounds: Ten minute plays, Korean adoptees and an African pop band born in a refugee camp

Rehearsal photo from "MISC Amendments," one of the 12 plays in Bedlam Theatre's Ten Minute Play Festival (Photo by Farrington Starnes, courtesy of Bedlam Theatre)

This week the hounds have their eyes on two one-person shows from the adult Korean adoptee perspective, a festival of ten minute theater pieces, and a cadre of refugee musicians from Sierra Leone who've become one of the most joyous live acts around.

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St. Paul composer Mike Croswell will be camped out at the Cedar Cultural Center in Minneapolis this Tuesday, June 5th, waiting to get a dose of joy and hope. Mike says Sierra Leone's Refugee All Stars, which mixes reggae, West African traditional music and pop, and rhythm and blues, formed in a refugee camp in Guinea in the late '90s. He says the band is a testament to music's ability to transcend human suffering.

Having been a performer in Bedlam Theatre's annual Ten Minute Play Festival last year, Minneapolis multi-media performance artist Kelley A. Meister would now like to celebrate it as a fan. Kelley says the festival, which runs through Sunday, June 3 at Mixed Blood Theatre in Minneapolis, promises a wide-ranging, eclectic performance showcase on stage, with 12 ten minute blasts of theater each night.

Twin Cities theater educator and actor Stephanie Lein Walseth predicts "The Origin(s) Project" will provide a fuller picture of the Korean adoptee experience in Minnesota. It matches the talents of two Korean adult adoptee artists, Sun Mee Chomet and Katie Hae Leo, in two one-person shows about their search for family and identity as adults. On stage at Dreamland Arts in St. Paul through June 9. For more Art Hounds' recommendations, check us out on Facebook and Twitter. Art Hounds is also available as a podcast on iTunes. Art Hounds is powered by the Public Insight Network.

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