About This Event
Live your fantasy and embrace the stranger side of life with Bella’s Bartok. A band known for raucous theatrical performances and an outspoken political message of finding hope in a world beset by cruel uncertainty. With utter joy, they seamlessly blend a rich cacophony of sound and soul into their music with influences ranging from Punk to Folk and Pop to Americana. Let your freak flag fly high, fiercely and free, throw your societal inhibitions to the wayside and seek comfort in the warm sonic embrace of Bella’s Bartok. We are the night and you are bound to boogie.
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In just a few years, Cuban-born, Nashville-based quartet Sweet Lizzy Project has gone from its members never having been in an arena, to mesmerizing an audience of 20,000 people when opening for their idols, Heart and Joan Jett. Along the way, the anthemic rock band earned a prime performance broadcast for PBS’s Havana Time Machine, an artist profile on NPR’s “Weekend Edition”, and a cover story in the Miami Herald.
SLP defected to the U.S. from Cuba in late 2017, just as the border doors were set to close once again. Prior to relocating to Music City, Sweet Lizzy Project became the “it band” around Havana City clubs. SLP also won several music prizes, including two nominations for Cuba’s closest equivalent of a Grammy. However, everything changed for the band when they were spotlighted on Havana Time Machine, which also featured traditional Cuban artists and iconic American roots-rockers, The Mavericks. During the making of the documentary, The Mavericks’ founder and lead singer, Raul Malo, became inspired by Sweet Lizzy’s music and story and signed SLP to his band’s record company.
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Artists
Bella's Bartok
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“Live your fantasy and embrace the stranger side of life with Bella’s Bartok. A band known for raucous theatrical performances and an outspoken political message of finding hope in a world beset by cruel uncertainty. With utter joy, they seamlessly blend a rich cacophony of sound and soul into their music with influences ranging from Punk to Folk and Pop to Americana. Let your freak flag fly high, fiercely and free, throw your societal inhibitions to the wayside and seek comfort in the warm sonic embrace of Bella’s Bartok. We are the night and you are bound to boogie.”
Bella’s Bartok’s newest release, Sticks and Stones, tells a story leading up to and through the Covid pandemic and the responses thus by individuals and the US government at large. The intent behind this song evolved over its lengthy writing process. The verse is the oldest part, dating melodically from late 2017 and lyrically from early 2018. It tells the tale of the dissolution of a long-standing romantic relationship, conjuring imagery of industry and failed emotional infrastructure.
Rust, rot and loss give way to the pre-chorus with the repeated call and response refrain of “We’ll work it out.” This section came about shortly before the pandemic, in November of 2019. More than a plea, the lyrics are an admonishment of despair, a reminder that hope does truly spring eternal — for both the individual and the community.
The key to this song is its chorus. Written in the deepest, darkest period of the pandemic. Rather than wallow in misery, the lyrics confront the certain doom of Covid, the loss and utterly inept response of government in trying to contain the disease. Like any good tongue-in-cheek political commentary, existential crisis can be defanged and declawed by taking the wind out of its sails. The world keeps spinning, even through the hypocrisy of those in power.
