'Potpourri' a rousing success

Friday night started out with a taste of soul and r&b. Then I was treated to a great interpretive dance performance in the African tradition. To top everything off, I was then taken to church, as I heard some great choral and southern gospel music. I got to hear all of this in two and a half hours, as the African American Arts Institute put on their annual Potpourri of Arts Friday night at the Buskirk Chumley Theatre.\nThe evening got off to a great start, as the IU Soul Revue took the stage to thundering applause. This crowd was pumping from the very start, and once the group began performing, there was no going back. The Soul Revue played classic R&B and Soul songs from the seventies through today. The band's rhythm section of bass, keyboards and percussion was backed by a very talented horn section, and the vocalists who fronted the Soul Review were sublime. Though they only played for 45 minutes, there was no mistaking the fact that the Soul Revue had the crowd in the palm of their hand.\nThen, after a short intermission, we got to watch the African American Dance Company perform interpretive dances that really were moving. The group of performers caught our eyes from the start and didn't let go, especially during the performance of "I Thought I Was Free", from an unfinished original choreographic piece called "Once Upon A Rural South". I'm not a very emotional person, but the desperation of the vocalist combined with the emotional performance by the dancers almost moved me to tears. If the whole piece is this moving, it's sure to be a success.\nThe African American Choral ensemble then took the stage, in order to "take us to church," as director James Mumford put it. There's no denying that he was right, not after hearing all this great music. The songs performed alternated between straight choral arrangements and reworked small group renditions of more well-known contemporary pieces. The full 80 member ensemble knocked the audience for a loop while performing "Rockin' Jerusalem," while small group God's Progress stole the show with their performance of "He Reigns", as performed in the past by Kirk Franklin. The only downer during this section of the show was the performance of "Tomorrow" by the small group Soul-ACE. This group seemed as though their song was just a chance for a bunch of longer solos, the blending of which never really succeeded. The song didn't sound like a group arrangement, but rather just a series of mismatched solos. But that surely didn't put a damper on the evening.\nI can't think of anything more entertaining on Friday night than the Potpourri. These students all have worked hard to put on performances in the African tradition, and they did an admirable job in the process.