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In the fall of 2004, Jamez Terry and
Kelly Shortandqueer began planning a show that would mix education
with entertainment, make transgender issues more fun and less
intellectual, build bridges between marginalized communities,
and concentrate on transpeople without focusing solely on their
genders. Each year, the Tranny Roadshow compiles an eclectic cast
of artists, each one self-identified as transgender. Performers
and artists for the 2010 season are listed below. Staff bios available here.
Previous performer bios can be seen here: Roadshow
2009 ~Roadshow 2007-2008
~ Roadshow 2006 ~ Roadshow
2005
Jamez Terry |
Jamez Terry (alias
Vermicious Knid) is a zine-writing, fiddle-playing,
story-telling, circus-loving historian and radical organizer.
He moves as often as possible, in order to keep wreaking
havoc in new parts of the world, and is currently living
in Farmington, ME. He has published more than 50 zines in
the last 10 years with writings that include politics, fiction,
poetry, personal stories, and humor, and, in 2003, he co-founded
the Denver Zine
Library. Jamez has worked in multiple queer activist
settings, providing trans education at conferences, schools,
churches, and nonprofits around the country. In organizing
the Tranny Roadshow, Jamez has found a way to unite all
of the things he loves best - travel, zines, performance
art, and queer/trans activism.
Ryka Aoki
de la Cruz is a
writer, composer, chemist, black belt, and moonshiner who
has recently been featured at the National Queer Arts Festival,
the National Gay and Lesbian Theatre Festival, Ladyfest
South 2007, Atlanta Pride, UCLA’s OutCRY, and Fresh
Meat. In 2005, Ryka was the inaugural performer for San
Francisco Pride’s first ever Transgender Stage. She
has also worked with the American Association of Hiroshima-Nagasaki
A-Bomb Survivors, and two of her compositions have been
adopted by the group as its official “Songs of Peace.”
Ryka has been honored by the California State Senate for
her work with Trans/Giving, LA’s only art/performance
series dedicated to trans, genderqueer, and intersex artists.
She was formerly head judo coach at UCLA and Cornell University,
and is a professor of English at Santa Monica College.
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Ryka Aoki de la Cruz
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Liam Bechen |
Part-time poet, activist, Mainer, guitarist,
radical queer, parent, advocate for non-violence, alien-abduction
fanatic, survivor, deconstructionist, opera singer, and
elementary-school-playground Spanish speaker, Liam
Bechen walks barefoot between moments. He plays
the geetar and sings sometimes in a rockin' band project
called A is for &, which also includes Jamez Terry and
his violin. Liam is the founder of Gender
is Not Binary: Queering the Gender of Social Networking,
and he believes, more than anything, in the blueness of
the sky.
Performer/author/musician
solidad decosta is an uppity Portuguese
woman who isn't afraid to claim her black Latina maternal
ancestry. Equal parts street journalist, storyteller and
crone-ta-be with Leo moon credentials, her work encompasses
the why and where of life outside the boxes in a label obsessed
world, and the what, when, who and how of everything else.
solidad has performed at a variety of venues throughout
the US, including St. Marks, Antioch University, Pitzer
College, Bumpershoot Literary Stage, SomARTS and Brava!
Center for the Arts. Her work has appeared in Shampoo, Mirage#4/Period(ical),
ALLiance, P!, Angry Poet, Street NOTES and the San Francisco
Bay Guardian. In addition, solidad has facilitated writing
and performance workshops at Cell Space, STARC, Dancing
Tree, SF Juvenile Hall, Alameda County Youth Facility and
Pitzer College. She holds an MFA in Writing from California
College of the Arts, and was the 2008 recipient of the Kari
Edwards Scholarship at Naropa University's Summer Writing
Program.
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solidad decosta
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Red Durkin |
Roadshow veteran Red Durkin
is one of the only openly transgender stand-up comedians
in the United States. In her time, she’s performed as a
poet, a rapper, and a story teller, but her true passion
is comedy. She’s performed at Camp Trans, clocked more time
with the Tranny Roadshow than almost anyone else, and hosted
events all over the country. Red has made it her mission
to bring levity and irreverence to a community that too
often has little to laugh about. A North Carolina ex-patriot,
she now resides in Oakland, CA. Check her out on Youtube:
www.youtube.com/daedsider
Originally from Albuquerque, New Mexico,
StormMiguel Florez is a Mexican aMaricon
singer/songwriter, QueErotic performance artist, and live
tranny sex show producer. Sometimes he does these things
all at once. StormMiguel currently lives in the Bay Area
and has performed his music and spoken word across the US.
He co-founded, co-produced (with seeley quest) and performed
in the pornarific cabaret Trans as Fuck in San Francisco
and West Hollywood (2004, 2006, 2008). Trans as Fuck received
a Queer Cultural Center grant and showed at the 2008 National
Queer Arts Festival. His first paying gig was at the age
of 10: He was a proud extra in the made-for-TV movie, Police
Woman Centerfold. StormMiguel is also an occasional leader
of queer ritual, he is learning how to integrate trans and
POC activism with sexiness and connection to Mama Earth.
Check out his music, and very random vlog here: http://www.stormflorez.com
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photo by Cindy Emch
StormMiguel Florez
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Geppetta |
Inspired by classic fables
and myths, occult symbolism, street art, and surrealism
infused with a pension for social/ environmental activism
and transfeminist sensibilities, Geppetta
presents art/performance as a whimsical, yet politically
aware language that is imaginative and enlightening. In
addition to the Tranny Roadshow, Geppetta's work has been
featured with the Femme Show, Puppet Uprising, and Fresh
Meat Productions among others. www.stitchingtentacles.wordpress.com
Modern Day Pinnochio
is the Creative Identity Project of Activist, Artist, and
Queer FTM Rocker A.J. Bryce. MDP's tunes flow from Dirty
Chords to Rhythmic Progressions and smooth grooves, while
his art is maximalist at its best. He performs the Art of
Sound Tech, as well as the rare occasional performance,
where you will see what MDP means when he says "He
likes to Flo" (Liquid Dance) and "Rock the Revolution."
As Organizer of the Trans-Genre Project, he is excited to
announce the Release of Trans-Fusions
II, a compilation featuring nearly 25 Transgender Artists
and Musicians from around the world, available exclusively
at the Tranny Roadshow merch table (and online). For more
info, check out Modern
Day Pinnochio.
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Modern Day Pinnochio
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Kimothy Shaughnessy |
Kimothy Shaughnessy will
probably make you a little uncomfortable for several reasons.
Always eager to put himself in the line of fire, Kimothy has
appeared on stage, television, radio and in many classrooms
as a queer spoken word activist for over seven years. He’s
done his thing in venues and events across Canada including
the 2006 CBC Poetry Face-Off, OutTV, countless other LGTBQ
Pride events and was a member of Vancouver’s winning slam
team at the 2005 Canadian Festival of Spoken Word. Kimothy
co-organizes the annual Queer Slam in Vancouver and is the
author of several chapbooks. He gets his biggest satisfaction
out of co-coordinating and facilitating queer and trans workshops,
discussions and community development projects such as Happy
Tranny Day, Switch and various queer narrative writing/sharing
workshops. Kimothy leads a quiet East Van life of nesting
and conversation with his queer tranny love of five years,
Evin, and believes in living well as a subversive act. www.myspace.com/kimshaughnessy
Shawna Virago
is a celebrated transgender songwriter and activist. Her music
twists together punk roots rock and insurgent country, creating
anthems for a new generation. The SF Bay Guardian called her
“elegant, edgy and elegiac.” The SF Bay Times said Miss Virago
is a “transgender songwriting goddess who manages to channel
Joe Strummer through a Candy Darling-like persona.” She is
the Director of Tranny Fest, the nation’s first transgender
film and video festival. Her new album Objectified is available
at www.cdbaby.com. Her
most recent writing is in the trans/gendervariant anthology,
Gendered Hearts. www.shawnavirago.com.
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Shawna Virago
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Nathen Wurzel |
Nathen Wurzel, aka Fag/It,
is a juggler, a musician, a writer, a talker, a cyclist,
a street performer, and probably a whole lot of other things,
known throughout the New York City Subway system (and much
of the rest of the country) for his colorful costumes, and
socially-aware, often politically-incorrect ranting and
rhyming. He is a proud tranny and gender abolitionist who,
despite having made appearances in a number of folk music,
burlesque, and theatre circles with queer-themed songs and
poems, has never performed in a queer-specific setting...until
now! Obviously, he is beside himself with glee and feels
incredibly fortunate to be a part of this amazing ensemble.
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Local Performers
& Traveling Art, Pacific Northwest Tour
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Rosco Kickingstone
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Rosco Kickingstone, a two-spirit, chican@
mutt, with mixed blood of conquest,
has been slinging a six string for the past twelve years,
and has been gender fucking since birth.
It takes life experiences, ancestral knowledge, pissed at
the system, bits of its culture, one good ear,
and every song it's ever heard to strap-you-on a wild ride
through melodic, orchestrated chaos,
via guitar and oral whoop-lash.
This ain't yo grandpappy's folk sing-ah!
Rosco is a former outreach worker for homeless GLBTQ youth
on the streets in Seattle,
it wrote music and performed with a queer, fantasy metal
band called Doomhawk,
and began learning drums to start a Tranarchist@ punk band
called the "Witch Kromosomes"
It is currently playing guitar and singing in a Seattle
based punk band called, Los Villan@s (formerly the Villans).
Everett Maroon is a storyteller,
trans advocate, humorist, former government wonk, and baking
experimenter. He was a founding member of the DC Trans Coalition,
which helped to install the most comprehensive protective
regulations for transgender people in the country. A member
of the Pacific Northwest Writer's Association, Everett waxes
philosophic and funny over on trans/plant/portation, and
is a contributor to the popular culture blog, I Fry Mine
in Butter.
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Everett Maroon
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Russell Melia
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Russell Melia is a mandolin
fury, occasional poet, critical theory dilettante and huge
queen. He has released two albums with the Open Face Records
collective as Pegasissy, and will release another one, Several
Other Friends, this spring. His fiction and poems have appeared
in Silo, The Interrobang, and, most recently, Knockout.
Russell received his BA from Bennington College, where he
studied literature and ceramic art. He is a native of Oregon,
where he currently lives and works and knits and bicycles
and writes. He fears garbage trucks, but has never met a
bottle of bourbon or eyeliner he didn't like. His music
is available at pegasissy.bandcamp.com,
and he blogs his gender transition at marginalpass.blogspot.com.
since beginning to write poetry at eleven
and starting to slam at eighteen, tash shatz has
found a voice from the heartplace through words. tash hopes
that within hir fabulously transfeminist genderfunky anti-oppression
wonderment you’ll find something that speaks to the places
inside of you that haven’t yet seen rainbows or those places
that really need a hug. committed to community organizing,
tash is dedicated to building beloved community as a trans
genderqueer survivor and activist for racial, economic,
disability, and reproductive justice. tash believes that
we can do it all without leaving anything out. continuously
learning about self-love, tash is a fan of singing off key
and being naked in the sun. (a blog is in tash's near future,
but for now you can find some of hir work here: www.youtube.com/user/tashatz)
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Tash Shatz
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Sam Thorp
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Traveling Art: Sam Thorp
is classically trained in anatomy and fine art techniques,
displaying provocative imagery dealing with personal conflict,
and androgynous beauty. The artwork deals with many LGBT
issues and the idea of blurring the line between male and
female to find a “whole” beauty. Sam exhibits locally in
Pittsburgh and internationally with collectors across the
world. More work can be seen at www.graphicanatomy.com
As well as other special
guests...
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