Page 8 GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE March, 1989

March, 1989 GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE Page 9

by Brynna Fish

Who would have believed it? Olivia Records celebrated its 10th anniversary in 1983 at Carnegie Hall.

I remember my housemates packing their fanciest dyke clothes and setting off for the long drive to Manhattan. The concert sold out months in advance.

I didn't even know what Olivia Records was. Yeah, sure, I had heard of Cris Williamson, but I didn't put it together. In fact, in 1983 I had put very little together about women's music and the women's community.

But in the summer of 1987. I and some other Oven-ers were in Bloomington, Indiana, at the Association of Women's Music and Culture conference, which ran simultaneously with the National Women's Music Festival. Judy Dlugacz was there. She is the president of Olivia Records. I'd been in Oven Productions for almost four years by then, and I had figured out what Olivia Records was, along with Icebergg Records (distribution for Casselberry/Dupree and Heather Bishop), and Redwood Records (Holly Near and sometimes Teresa Trull or Linda Tillery or Nancy Vogl), but that is another story. And, I had figured out the dozens of independent labels which exist so women's music can be born and bred for our audiences. And, I had been around Oven and this community for a few years. And, I had started to crew at festivals and meet women from other women's communities and other women's production companies. And, I figured out that Cleveland has something special-Oven Productions and a loyal, close-knit

"FOOLS

and, yes, diverse community. And, I had figured out that when Judy Dlugacz started to talk about how to celebrate. Olivia's 15th anniversary, I knew Oven and Cleveland needed to be involved. Ten months later, this vision came true for Cleveland and for Olivia, as we kicked off the first of a four-city tour celebrating Olivia's 15th anniversary.

Remember the saying we repeated over and over: Why Cleveland? Judy even remarked from the stage the night of April 23 when we took over the Great Hall of the Civic, just 100 short of selling out the 1,475 seats.

I answered dozens of "why Cleve-> land" questions to media throughout our preparation for the show. The answer seemed clear to me--because of Oven and the unique women's community we have here. Because of our history. Because of the work of Susan Woodworth, Rita Coriel, Debra Hirshberg, Judy Rainbrook, Mary Ann Huckabee, to name only a few whose efforts to organize our community and promote women's music and lesbian culture began when Olivia began--15 years ago.

I believe that this same answer seemed clear to the audience that filled the Civic that night and sat in enjoyment through the four-hour show. We later called the show "the concert that ate Cleveland."

As in all concert production, the work is hard, the workers few, and the task sometimes unbearable. It was a hard show to put on. We had more than 70 volunteers the night of the show. We had to build a stage addition. We had to find community housing for performers, interpreters and roadies: more than 20

FOR ART"

BENEFIT AUCTION

Saturday, April 1st

Perkins Gallery, Gardner

Student Center, University of Akron

TO SUPPORT:

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Multi-County AIDS Network, Peer Services, KGLF and GLSR

Buchtel Mall/Ave

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6 pm-8 pm Gallery Open 8 pm-10 pm

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hosted by the Gay/Lesbian Student Resource, U of A in cooperation with the Student Art League, U of A and Kent Gay Lesbian Foundation

* works donated by regional student, & professional artists

The Gay/Lesbian Student Resource and the Student Art League are registered student organizations of the University of Akron. Registration shall not be construed as approval, endorsement, or sponsorship by the University of Akron of the student organizations' publications, activities, purposes, actions or positions.

Olivia Record$5th Anniversary

From the Civic to Carnegie Women's Culture Goes on Tour

people. And, believe me, we had to look hard for enough places without cats!

We wanted the show to reflect the politics of our community, and this was a challenge. As I toured that spring with Olivia to the other three cities--Boston, San Francisco and Los Angeles --and then in the fall when I crewed the finale Carnegie Hall show, I came to appreciate more and more the transition of our culture. Not a single show stood up to Cleveland from the perspective of community.

And, all along the way I asked myself, and others on the tour: So, does it matter about community? Does it matter that the community produces the show, that the community houses the performers, interpreters, staff? Does it matter that the community volunteers to cook and drive and usher and take tickets and sell tickets? Does it matter that the organization, the blood and guts and money behind the event, is from the women's

Chris Will

in Cleveland

and Dian

CLEVE IND

Susan Schnur

by Tracy Miller

Susan Schnur has been a resident of Cleveland for the past 11 years. But before settling here, she lived in several other areas of the country. Raised near Cincinnati, she moved to Kent after high school to attend Kent State University. In college she primarily studied "partying and women."

After residing in Kent for three years, Sue moved to Arkansas to live with the Wimmin on Land collective. During this period she lived as a lesbian separatist, an ideology she now considers "good for

Photo by Mary Baldo

community? And, does it matter that the money from the event stays in the women's community? The answers varied.

Boston: two sell-out shows in an 1,800-seat hall. Pretty amazing number of lesbians! The reception the night before was a bust. So was the one here. In Boston, there were maybe 100 women, twice the number that came to the Friday evening reception here. It was awkward. Not a single person knew anyone else there except their (?) date. At our reception, everyone knew everyone--community here. That blew me out of the water in Boston, a reception with 100 women and no one knew anyone else! OK, Boston is a large community, but still...

Then the show. I arrived at 11 a.m. to prepare the sound check. By 11 the day of the Cleveland show, the Civic had been bustling for hours with dozens of volunteers. In Boston, an empty hall. Not

1

even coffee was set up, and there were no women volunteers. This was a mainstream production. It was a good production, but for me, it lacked the spirit of the women's community. Maybe there isn't a community in Boston which could pull it off like we did? Certainly, there was an audience.

I started to ask the artists if they could tell any difference between the two shows, and the answers were consistent: From the stage, there was no difference. From everything else, there was a difference, but this difference seemed hard to name.

San Francisco: sold out again. I believe it was 2,200 seats. Olivia produced it, as after all, San Francisco is Olivia's home. It started to feel more like Cleveland when I showed up for a 9 crew call, and the Olivia staff was there setting up. Okay. So now we have Olivia staff, but still no volunteers from the women's community. No women's production

growth, but not the solution for ending le experience involved a lot of lesbian oppression." She stayed inles and struggles in order to get it Arkansas for five months before moving ther, but the victory at the end was to Cleveland, a choice she still sees as ah it." While working at a metal stamping

smart one.

Soon after coming to Cleveland,pany, a job she held for six years, Susan went through a period of noninvol-n attended Cuyahoga Community vement which, she explains, helped her lege, where she received an associate to get her "personal stuff" together. Sheee in humanities in 1984. For the began to get more politically active five years she has been a driver for around 1980, thanks to the election of Community Responsive Transit

Ronald Reagan. Participating in anti-sion of the Regional Transit racist and anti-Reagan events was a big ority. She is an active member of the focus of her attention during the early in (ATU 268), and really enjoys her

1980's. In 1981 Susan became a member

of the Workers World Party, a socialist or over two years Susan has been group dedicated to fighting oppression ved with the Lesbian-Gay Hotline based on sex, race, and sexual orientavolunteer. She firmly believes voluntion. Susan believes oppression and ware can make a difference, and espestem from economic inequalities, and enjoys being involved on the grass sees liberation as possible only through level. She works one night a week, an economic revolution. In 1984 she says she likes it because she can be worked with the Rainbow Coalition, anrectly involved with helping the comexperience which significantly raised her unity as well as being able to make new awareness about racial issues. iends. Currently, Susan is also working

One event which greatly impacted he Pride '89 committee, which is Susan, as it did about everyone who at-larning for this summer's Stonewall tended, was the March on Washington verts. for Lesbian and Gay Rights in 1987. She helped organize the Cleveland commit tee, and was highly involved in transpor

When asked about what the future

hold, Susan says she plans to con-

nue living and improving my racquet-

tation planning. As she recalls, "theme." She also hopes to see the

company either. Yes, a strong sense of women working, women's energy, women creating, but no signs resembling Oven here.

Los Angeles: much the same as San Francisco. The hall, which seats 1,800, was just shy of selling out. There was a glorious reception in the hall after the show, which several hundred women attended. And, the show was produced by Olivia with the help of the Olivia staffand Tam Martim, a promoter and artist booker, who lives in L.A. So, no signs of a cohesive women's community here, in terms of leadership, but I was starting to get a sense of something else--the sense of a women's community on a national level.

Now it's the fall, Thanksgiving weekend in the Big Apple, to be exact. I have an 8 a.m. crew call and know I will work straight through the day, the show and the ball at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. I know I will not be free until 5

Indians have a winning season sometime within the next three decades. In a moment of self-disclosure, Susan revealed her "weird fantasy": to compete in the next Gay Games. On a more serious note, she believes that the future is going to be exciting and full of potential. ▼

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a.m. the next morning. I am weary before the day even begins.

I know the show. I know the players. I know the anticipated hassles. I know it will be hard for me to take the time to take care of myself, to eat, to breathe, as I run around making sure the sound checks run on time, the artists are where they are supposed to be, that the equipment is where it is supposed to be, and that the other members of the crew, the producer, the stage manager, the associate producer, the ticket coordinator, are all happy.

The day starts out slowly. Everything is running on time and in place. I arrive as the union fellows are unloading sound equipment from trucks parked at the stage entrance to Carnegie Hall. Here I am in New York, and somehow it feels like the Civic all over again.

Soon, the caterer arrives, a local New York woman who caters at Carnegie all the time. The next night she was catering for an Arlo Guthrie concert there. Then the rest of the production staff arrives, and by 11 a.m we are at the Drake Hotel, alias "Olivia Central," for a production meeting.

It felt like an Oven meeting. There was excitement. We all knew each other.. This was the national women's community in action. I, Patrice Perkins (Port Chester, N.Y.), Barbara Lau (St. Louis and Washington, D.C.); and Myrna Johnston (Boston) had been to all four spring shows, and now here we were in New York City.

The Olivia staff and several other women from the New York area, inclu.ding women's producer Virginia Giordano, were among the production crew. We were family for a day. We gathered from around the country to pull off a rather large political and social state-

ment about women's music and culture and to pull it off at Carnegie Hall, no less. And, the show was sold out!

As the day wore on, I began to feel the Olivia tour had taken on a shape of its own. It started where it belonged, in Cleveland, celebrating 15 years of Olivia in a community tight with culture, with politics and process, and which still has a viable women's production company in Oven, and even more with Bluefish, Headstrong Prodyketions, Happy Feet, Hag House and so on,

And the tour ended up in the hall of all halls, Carnegie Hall, celebrating the strength we have when we pull many women's communities together to form a national family. One show was not better than another. It was part of a journey, part of defining our work and our cul-

ture.

And, I trust it will not stop here. There will be a 20th Olivia anniversary, and a 20th Oven anniversary, and the growth of the new Association of Women's Music and Culture, a 3-yearold organization striving to pull together all of the players who participate in promoting and creating women's music and culture. And we will sit back and smile and say we were there.

I wish now that I had gone to New York with my housemates in 1983 to Olivia's 10th, but it will have to be enough that I was at the 15th and that I was at Michigan at the day stage this past summer when Dianne Davidson said in her marvelous southern drawl, "Hey, how many of you saw me at the Cleveland Olivia show?" I swear more than 500 women raised their hands and cheered. I stood up to see who you all were and felt proud.▼

Gay doctors form group

Cleveland Association of Physicians for Human Rights is a new group for lesbian and gay physicians and medical students. The organization provides personal and professional support, promotes preventive care in the greater Cleveland lesbian and gay community, and advocates rights to health care that recognizes and responds to sexual, racial and economic differences.

CAPHR is currently working with the Lesbian-Gay Community Services Cen-

Anton F. Feo Clinical Psychologist

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Meetings and social events are held regularly. For more information, call Linda Post, M.D. at 371-0488, or Doug Van Auken at 281-7418. ▼

Ph.D.

"Dedicated to your personal growth and development"

20325 Center Ridge, Suite 520 Rocky River, Ohio 44116 331-3399