Congress of Starlings is Aerin Tedesco and Andrea Bunch, joined by Greg Nergaard (bass), Janet Cramer (drums) and Lindsay Weinberg (keys, guitar, vocals). Longtime Chicago favorites, they’ve been called “two of the most beautiful noises on the planet.’ Andrea is a musician and doctor of physical therapy. She’s the founder of Vital Body Wellness, where she teaches music and movement to all kinds of folks in livestream classes and private sessions. aerin is a musician and passionate birder. She has recorded many solo albums like Birthmark and Faun Songs as well as Albedo with CoS.

CoS has played hundreds of shows in the Eastern and Midwestern US, written music for documentaries, and collaborated on projects like Little Queens, a Tribute to Heart, and Every Shiny Thing, a tribute to Joni Mitchell.

Dr. Andrea Bunch is a physical therapist who helps women over 50 move and exercise in the way that’s best for their bodies at Vital Body Wellness. She’s also a musician, songwriter, and music teacher with 26 years of experience teaching singing, guitar, and piano.

Stay tuned for Andrea’s next classes! Come write, create, and perform your own songs in a warm and supportive community. Everybody join!

LINKS
Congress of Starlings Bandcamp
Andrea’s Music
Exercise for Women over 50
Vital Body Wellness
Covers for Cover
About Face Theatre

Joanne Cunningham (Just Joey) is a Philly-based actor, writer, producer, and drag musician. She is passionate about advocating and fundraising for the LGBTQ community, and subverting capitalism in any way she can. Joanne will definitely come to your house show, and is always on the hunt for donuts.

Instagram: @anxietyvarietyshow

Richelle Gordon is a digital media pioneer who served as the first online director for The Miami Herald and launched a Master's program in digital publishing at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. She came out as a transgender woman in 2023. Her band, Queer Country Bandwagon, plays regularly in Chicago, performed at the Americanafest festival in Nashville in 2025, and is currently recording their first two singles.

(he/him) is the Drag King persona of (AFAB) visual artist Ruthie Fudge (they/he). He is new to the world of Drag; however, he is a seasoned visual artist and performance poet who has graced stages and galleries across the US. In 2006, Soupy took a break from public shows and writing to raise two fantastic humans. In 2016, Ruthie briefly emerged to perform stand-up, then relocated to Germany in 2022. Since then, Soupy has been committed to using art as a spiritual practice to cope with aging, illness, disability, and his ever-evolving Q, T, and A identities.

You can follow Soupy on Instagram as @soupyfischel

Jenny Magnus is a writer, performer, composer, musician, director, and teacher who is a founding co-Artistic Director of the Curious Theater Branch, now in its’ 37th year. In 2014, Observations of an Orchestrated Catastrophe: Plays and Performances, 9 plays and performances produced over 25 years, was published by Jackleg Press and had a 2^nd printing in 2021. Magnus has released 17 albums of music with various ensembles, including the recent The Times We’ll Have with The Crooked Mouth. She was inducted, with artistic partner Beau O’Reilly, into the Chicago Theater Hall of Fame in 2024 by New City Chicago. She was Resident Playwright at Chicago Dramatists in 2025.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jemlunar/

Website: https://www.jennymagnus.com/

Rhinoceros Festival: https://rhinofest.com/

Curious Theatre Branch: https://curioustheatrebranch.com/

The Crooked Mouth: https://www.thecrookedmouth.org/

Rose Freeman is an award-winning stage director, teacher, writer, and producer of theatre and opera. Freeman’s direction has been lauded as “virtually flawless” (Chicago Classical Review) and Operatic stage direction credits include Sonheim’s Sweeney Todd at Opera Idaho, the 2023 revival of Spears’ Jason and the Argonauts for Lyric Opera of Chicago, Puccini’s La Boheme with LOON, Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor and Elisir d’amore at Gulfshore Opera, (Johann) Strauss’ Fledermaus with Opera Mississippi, Mozart’s Magic Flute with Harrower Opera, Viardot’s Cendrillon with City Lyric Opera, (Richard) Strauss’ Die Liebe Der Danae at Pittsburgh Festival Opera, Hildegarde’s Ordo with Chicago City Opera, Fizz and Ginger at Chicago Fringe Opera, Stravinsky’s L’Historie Du Soldat at Temple University, and Weber’s Der Freischütz.

Zie co-founded Third Eye Theatre Ensemble, which the Chicago Tribune called “one of the greats.” At Third Eye, direction credits include Han Lash’s Beowulf, Kamala Sankaram’s The Infinite Energy of Ada Lovelace, Juliet Palmer’s Stitch, Daniel Crozier’s With Blood With Ink, Nico Muhly’s Dark Sisters, Mohammed Fairouz’s Sumeida’s Song, as well as Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Medium and The Consul. A Wolftrap Opera Directing Fellow 2020-2022, Freeman had the honor of working on Floyd’s Susannah, Verdi’s Traviata, Bologne de Saint-George’s L’Amant Anonyme and Holst’s Savitri and Viardot’s Cendrillon while also directing the studio artist scenes program in 2020. World premieres include Four Lost Santas with Opera Orlando (of which zie is co-librettist), Elisabeth Rudolph’s Petticoats and Sliderules, Alexandra Enyart’s Witness, Evan Kassof’s Ganymede 5, and Eric McDonnell’s Cosmic Ray and the Amazing Chris.

Freeman has spoken on panels and led seminars for Opera America, the National Opera Association, and the Chicago Theatre Symposium, and has participated in the 2012 DirectorsLabChicago and the 2017 La MaMa Umbria Intl. Symposium for Directors. Freeman’s production of Stitch was named Best New Opera Production, and Third Eye Theatre Ensemble was nominated for Best Opera Company by The Chicago Reader in 2019. The Medium (2014) and Sumeida’s Song (2015) were both named top 5 operas by NewCity. Zie is a recipient of the National Opera Association’s 2024 First Place Opera Competition (Temple University, Producer) and 2020 JoElyn Wakefield-Wright Stage Director Fellowship and the city of Philadelphia’s 2022 Illuminate the Arts Grant.

Freeman received an MFA in Directing at Temple University through the inaugural Music Theatre Collaboration program, where zie collaborated with Spicer Carr to write the musical, Chance the Snapper. Four Lost Santas, was hailed by the Orlando Sentinel as deserving to become “a festive new holiday tradition.” Freeman’s poem, Bad Sailor Poetry was featured at WHYY’s Collective’s MIXT: A Living Gallery in Spring 2025.

Freeman brings great innovation and a diverse artistic background to their work, having created national fine art shows for M Gallery of Fine Art, served as managing producing director for Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre, worked as a stage manager for 10 years, and production managed a national tour for Feld Entertainment’s Monster Jam Monster Truck Show. Zie regularly tours Italy performing with Teatro di Viti’s production of Eva.

Zie has directed many plays, space-generated theatrical events, burlesque events, nationally touring hip-hop concerts, and workshops of new musicals and operas. A passionate advocate for the shepherding of new musicals, Freeman has had the honor of working on the directorial staff for Polyphone New Musical Festival for five seasons, working on Crimson Lit, TL;DR: Thelma and Louise Dyke Remix, and Marie in Tomorrow Land, among others.

Freeman is currently the Program Director of Opera and Assistant Professor at Roosevelt University CCPA and was previously on faculty at Temple University, having previously served as the Interim Head of Opera Production. Academic directing and teaching work includes Mannes School of Music, Southern California University, Columbia College Chicago, and the University of the Arts. Zie is a Member Emeritus for the DirectorsLabChicago Steering Committee and a Mercury Store Lead Artist. Freeman is a Marvel Artist. www.rosefreeman.org

Honey Marie is a Portland based artist moving through the world in grief, mess, beauty, and joy. Honey’s work will pull at your heartstrings and encourage a collective curiosity. Honey’s movement exists in the space between the world we’re in and the world we deserve. Honey studied movement and choreography at Columbia College and has performed with various artists, including Peter Carpenter, David Rousseve, Kendall Loyer, and Amanda Timm. She is the producer and founder of Pink Hanky Productions, founded in 2014 in Portland, OR, bringing queer, Black, POC, and disabled artists to the stage. Honey is always working to take her space while making space for others in a world that demands smallness and silence. In this world, our most powerful weapons are creativity and bodies; let’s use them!

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/honeymariepdx/

Episode 5: Yvette Baltazar aka Millie May

Named after her beloved grandmother but powered by pure chaos, Millie May has been shaking her shimmy all over Chicago since 2010.

Taking campy bump-and-grind to a full comedic frenzy, she puts the oooh in buffoonery. With high-energy tassel twirling, fearless physical comedy, and a sparkly stage presence that refuses to behave, Millie May has become an iconic Chicago staple and a beloved multifaceted force of fabulous nonsense.

Whether she’s putting you in a trance with her tassel twirling or stealing hearts (and occasionally diginity), Millie May guarantees an experience that will leave you wanting for more!

IG: https://www.instagram.com/milliemayburlesque/

“Victoria Libertore is one of the most original and subversive solo performers that I have ever met. She is the lovechild of Bert Williams and Marlene Dietrich.”
Rebecca Feldman, Creator & Tony Nominee, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee & writer for Transparent

“The world she creates is slightly askew, sometimes eerie, but always strangely real and profoundly funny.”
Scott Morfee, Off-Broadway Producer Killer Joe, Bug

​“I was utterly blown away by Victoria Libertore. She’s inspiring as all hell.”
Holly Hughes, Obie-Award-Winning Performance Artist
Photo by Chris Jon

Victoria Libertore’s work includes nine theatrical solo shows, performance art, variety, burlesque and improv. She has performed her work throughout NYC from Coney Island’s boardwalk to Off-Broadway, including venues such as Barrow Street Theater, Carolines on Broadway, Joe’s Pub, Joyce Soho, PS122 as well as in Boston, Chicago, Montreal, Philadelphia, Provincetown, Toronto and Washington D.C. Victoria emcees in theaters, comedy clubs and at events impersonating Liza Minnelli in which she utilizes her improvisational skills to make “people laugh so hard that their faces hurt.”

Libertore is passionate about encouraging other artists to create their own work and has curated dozens of artists with backgrounds in performance, variety arts, burlesque, music, comedy, and dance with a focus on LGBTQ+ and BIPOC artists. In addition to facilitating her own performance and writing workshops, she has taught at Otterbein University and Hastings College. She was a Humana Festival Finalist, has received a Young Alumni Award for Research and Creative Achievement from Otterbein University, and is a recipient of the Doric Wilson Independent Playwright Award given by the NYC Innovative Theatre Awards. Victoria has received support through artist residencies, space grants, funding, and retreats from Brooklyn Arts Exchange, Dance New Amsterdam, Dixon Place, Earthdance, and New Dance Alliance.​

She has a BFA in theater from Otterbein University and has studied various approaches to acting, including Grotowski, Chekov, Viewpoints, long-form improvisation, and Balinese mask. In Los Angeles, Victoria has performed her original work at The Victory Theater and at the LA LGBT Center and appeared in Flaming Match, a short film by Alan Natale. In Los Angeles, Victoria has performed in The Good Little Widow, The Prodigal Son, At the Wedding, and Great God Pan.

The Doyenne is a podcast by, for, and about women/trans/nonbinary/afab artists over 40.

Elizabeth Herlitz Cortés is an opera singer, producer, and strategist known online as “Soprano Big Sister.” With over 25 years in the arts and 15 years in fundraising and policy-adjacent work, she translates complex systems—power, money, and policy—into plain English for everyday audiences. Her work sits at the intersection of art and civic life, grounded in the belief that artists are not decoration, but essential interpreters of the human condition and guardians of the public sphere.

Find Elizabeth:
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sopranobigsister
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sopranobigsister
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sopranobigsister
Linktree: https://linktr.ee/sopranobigsister

Let’s start with the “givens”. So, you have been making art for a while and have had some success in your discipline. Maybe you have a degree or two in some art form* and haven’t fully figured out how to earn revenue from it. It is likely you have a day job that supports that work, and you’re kind of cobbling together time in between. And maybe during one of your recitals, gallery shows, or readings, someone (a well-meaning sort, most likely) came up to you and said something to the effect of, “WOW! That was AWESOME! Have you ever thought about getting a grant for your work?” And you thought, “Wow. Good idea!”

*I’m a BFA (Sculpture, minor in English)/MFA (Interdisciplinary Arts and Media), myself. I used to joke that I was “going to use my poetry to support my sculpture work”.

So off to the Googles you went, trying to figure out how to get a grant. Maybe you found some newsletters and felt frustrated when they only sent full listings to paid subscribers. Or maybe you identified a grant and spent hours writing it, only to realize that you needed a 501(c)(3) to even apply. Perhaps you got to the end, submitted it, and were then rejected.

We’ve all been there.

Last week, I submitted six grants for three clients—including two Creative Capital grants, a 35-page municipal grant for New York City, a Vermont Arts Council grant, one for a dance funder in NYC, and one for a national residency program. Along the way, I realized some things about the grant process, and I’d like to share them to save you time and offer my expertise as an arts fundraising expert with over two decades of experience.

First, ask yourself, “Do I have enough time to do this?”
It is very easy to think that this will be a quick process. It is not. There are many details to attend to, and it is a lot of work. Back up the process by a week or two from your estimate of how long it will take. Make sure you have the time to set aside. This is not meant to be discouraging, but if you want a snowball’s chance in hell of getting a successful grant to a funder, you need time on your side.

Make sure you and your work REALLY fit the guidelines
This might seem SUPER obvious, but it’s really easy to get dollar signs in your eyes, gloss over the details, and get going on something that’s a “near fit” or “almost there”. Read through the guidelines thoroughly. Make sure your work, genre, and location fit the guidelines. Make sure you know who it’s for (sponsored organization, 501(c)(3), individual artist) and that you are that kind of person/organization. And if those things align, ask yourself if you’re not creating something new or stretching your ideas to fit the guidelines. (Yes, I realize that your dance work could be a part of a large-scale opera, but would your choreographic submission stack up well against every opera company in the country?)

Check to see if you have everything you need to apply
After you’ve read through the guidelines and confirmed you fully meet the requirements, check the attachments to make sure you have, or have access to, everything they require. Incomplete applications will get tossed out. Make sure you have access to clear, good copies of your work samples. Are they asking for letters from collaborators? Get those in advance. Have you created a budget for the project? If not, make one. Do you know where the money will come from if they don’t fund you? A lot of funders ask for that, so take some time to figure it out.

Use an outline, tabs, or bookmarks, and set up your document for success
This is extra important when you’re working on a lengthy grant—I’m looking at YOU, City of New York Department of Cultural Affairs. Take a bit of time to set up and organize your grant proposal. Download the form, then copy the text over to a working document. Divide the document into sections using tabs in Google Docs or bookmarks in Word. Put the questions and word/character limits at the top of each section.

A tiny sidenote and fun with online portals
Online grant portals are mostly just form fields you have to fill out by pasting copy into them. For the most part, they do not recognize standard document formatting, such as italics and underlines. For that reason, it is important to make sure all of your work and show titles are either in all caps or in quotation marks.

Limit your use of AI, or get a great proofreader to wade through the Word Salad
Sure, ChatGPT is kind of fun, and it might sound good on the first read, but for the love of all that is holy, limit your use of it when describing your work. What funders often look for is the special sauce you bring that makes your work unique. If you use AI to try to write a description, it may be inaccurate, it may sound like a lot of impressive words that don’t add up to much, and it definitely won’t be in your voice. (And in the worst-case scenario, it could sound like every other project out there that’s also trying to use AI to write their proposal.) Just write it yourself, and if you need another set of eyes, find a trusted friend to read and edit it. If you MUST use it, use it generatively or with a set of bullet points about your work, and specifically instruct it not to make anything up, to keep it in your voice, and to make it a smoother read. Then CHECK IT.

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Use Anne Lamott’s method “Shitty First Drafts” as a guideline to create your first draft
This grant does not have to be your masterwork, especially in the first draft. Let yourself just write. Respond to the question using stream of consciousness or freewriting. Let yourself meander all over the place, don’t judge it, and let it say whatever it wants to say. Sometimes, you will take a while to get to the point. Don’t let your inner critic or imposter syndrome keep you from just getting it down. Then EDIT, EDIT, EDIT.

After you write the whole narrative draft, re-read the questions and check:

• Word/character counts: Is anything over? Edit it to express your idea concisely.

• Have you answered the question?

• Is there something in one question that might be better answered in another?

• Have you answered the question in somewhat plain and straightforward language?

• Does it make sense? Is the process/concept/timeline clear?

• Is it free of jargon that a layperson might not understand? If not, rewrite.

After you have a draft, ask a few trusted friends or colleagues to proofread it. Have them answer the questions above and send you any comments or questions. Let them redline or suggest changes. While they review, gather all your attachments in one place.

Attachments!
When you’re assembling the attachments, make sure everything is in the right format. If you’re submitting video work on Vimeo or YouTube, make sure it’s public and not behind a paywall or password. Ditto with press reviews. Check that all photos are submittable in their electronic format (does the funder accept only PDFs? Just JPEGs? What is the maximum file size?). Do you have all the collaborators listed? What year was it made? How does it relate to the current application? If it’s a video, what timecode should the funder start at, and is that the best place to start? How long will they be looking at the work? Just comb through all of the attachments carefully, so you’re putting your best foot forward.

Once it’s all proofed, run spellcheck on it a few times and check the word and character counts one last time (I know I keep harping on it, but it sucks SO MUCH to get to the end of the process in the portal with the deadline breathing down your neck and realize that you’re five sentences or like 800 characters over the limit and the portal has cut off your narrative. Or not notice at all, and have the most important parts not even make it into the narrative.)

OK, you’re ready to submit. Give yourself a few hours (I like to finish a narrative one day and submit the morning of the next, either the day before or the day of a deadline) to complete this task. Once everything is pasted into the portal, you have attached all the attachments, and you have proofed it ONE MORE TIME, hit “submit”.

Congratulations! You have submitted your grant request. Now you just have to wait and see…

Future how-tos will include what to do when you get the grant, how to get feedback and stay positive when you’re rejected, and other topics related to fundraising.

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JT Newman, CFRE (they/them), is a writer, artist, seasoned fundraiser, and development professional with 25 years of experience growing revenue for arts organizations and individual artists. In this new series, they will offer practical advice to artists on raising money for their work. You can find out more about their professional work here and listen to their podcast, The Doyenne, here.

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Photography: Ronit Bezalel Photography
Film Work: Ronit Films
IG: Ronit Photos

Ronit Bezalel is a writer, photographer, and filmmaker based in Chicago, Illinois. Her work focuses on the underdog, the marginalized, and those living outside the mainstream.

Bezalel began her career at the National Film Board of Canada, where she directed the documentary When Shirley Met Florence. After moving to Chicago in 1994 to study film at Columbia College Chicago, she embarked on a 20-year project documenting the demolition of the Cabrini-Green public housing development and the displacement of a Black community from the city’s North Side. Her two award-winning films on this subject, Voices of Cabrini: Remaking Chicago’s Public Housing and 70 Acres in Chicago, have screened worldwide and served as catalysts for discussion on affordable housing issues. For this work, she was named one of Newsweek magazine’s “Top 10 Women of the 21st Century.”

Her photography has been featured in Modern Luxury Magazine, Block Club Chicago, Chicagoist, Gaper’s Block, Hyde Park Herald, and Windy City Times. She has also exhibited at The Center for Photojournalism, Chicago Fine Arts Salon, Everybody’s Coffee, R. Public House, and the PO Box Collective Gallery in Chicago.

Episode 1: Cristal Sabbagh

Bio: Cristal Sabbagh is a 54 year old Chicago-based interdisciplinary performer, dancer, art educator and mom. She is the founder and curator of Freedom From and Freedom To, an improvisational jam with dance and movement artists and live musicians paired by chance. She is also a member of Baltimore-based Move Move Collective.

Find Cristal online:

IG: cristalsabbagh, freedom_from_and_freedom_to
Web: https://www.ffftchicago.com/

Mentioned in the pod:

Butoh Artist Nicole Legette: https://www.3arts.org/artist/nicole-legette/
Butoh Artist Sharkey: https://www.3arts.org/artist/nicole-legette/
Butoh Master Diego Piñon: https://www.facebook.com/diegopinon.brm/
Move Move Collective Founder Peter Redgrave: https://www.peterredgraveperforms.com/
Nejla Yatkin: https://www.ny2dance.com/
Elastic Arts Foundation: https://elasticarts.org/

Creating something new excites me at first, but if the project lacks a clear end date, I often lose momentum and interest as time goes on. This cycle can make it challenging to complete creative work, especially when balancing personal ambitions with practical concerns, like eating or buying gas for my car.

This struggle intensifies when I try to turn my creativity into income, especially now that I’ve been laid off from my job at the Large Philadelphia Performing Arts Company (LPPAC) that I moved to Philly for. I now find myself at a crossroads, figuring out how to support myself through both creative work and fractional fundraising work.

This preoccupation seems extra huge, given that everything, and I mean EVERYTHING, has practically doubled in price since this time two years ago. And this time, six years ago? Fuhgetaboutit. I remember living on about $200 per two weeks in Brooklyn back in 2019.

Was that a super comfortable life? Not really. Was I, at 45+, rooming with two girls in their 20’s? Yes. Was it cute? Well, I was making it work. Half-price sushi at the Park Slope Food Co-Op FTW. We lived about 50 feet from the co-op—35 steps from my stoop to inside their front door. “100 Park Slope Food Co-op Walking Score,” I always said.

Speaking of Brooklyn, my girlfriend and I were lucky to be able to head up to NYC last weekend for Queering the Canon, the series by NewFest, the LGBTQIA+ film festival (one of the oldest and largest in the nation), to see a screening of a 35mm print of Waiting for Guffman. While we were there, we also caught up with some of her oldest family friends, marched in the No Kings Day march in my old stomping grounds in Park Slope, and walked across the Brooklyn Bridge and back, stopping for a live country music brunch in DUMBO at Superfine on the way back. (Superfine being, unbeknownst to us, a lesbian-owned restaurant that was founded by a few women with roots in New Mexico, which is my love’s old stomping grounds.) It was a dreamy, perfect weekend, and then a quick plunge back to Philly and all the things.

I would love to sit down and write every morning, interview women artists over 40 in the afternoon, and spend my days cooking, walking my dog, editing podcasts, and eating raspberries. That makes for a lovely life. And there’s a part of me that feels like “Well, make it, and they will come. You’re creative, and you have success at things. You are interesting and engaging and know lots of cool artist ladies over 40. And you love interviewing people.” And then the “mean part of my brain” that definitely wants to make sure I have things to eat is like, “Well, what if you don’t find an audience? Then how will you afford raspberries?”

Raspberries, btw, are my new obsession food. Having been diagnosed with diabetes in December (that’s another element to my current situation—losing my health insurance at the end of April isn’t super awesome for someone who’s just been diagnosed with a disease that requires medication, medical equipment, and regular medical checkups), berries are about the only thing I can eat now that’s sweet that satisfies the sweet urge.

But back to reality (ha. My brain just thought, “snap back to reality, ope, there goes gravity…” THANKS, EMINEM).

This week, I wrote four grants for clients, and two more are due soon. I applied to the Harkness Foundation for Dance, Creative Capital, and NYC’s Department of Cultural Affairs (a 35-page application). Focusing on this paid work distracts me from the slog of job hunting and keeps me going. After yesterday’s rush, today feels oddly quiet.

So here I sit, reflecting on all of this.

At this point, I remind myself that writing—and rediscovering my voice—are healing processes after the past few difficult years. The evolving idea about a new podcast and newsletter ties back to what’s brought me joy: making community with women/trans/NB/AFAB artists who are GenX and older, immersing myself in the arts (so central to my career and life), and uplifting women’s voices over 40. That feels particularly necessary right now.

I started on Tuesday with Ronit Bezalel, a photographer who began as a documentary filmmaker and with whom I was friends in my early 30s when she launched a really cool website for lesbians in Chicago called dykediva.com. I have the clearest memory of her at the Dyke March that year, standing with a Radio Flyer wagon, handing me a flier for Dykediva, and me desperately wanting to get involved. I did, I was their advice columnist, which led to one of my first paid freelance writing gigs, Ask La Princessa, where I answered questions from young lesbians for the local nightlife rag, Nightlines. Ronit has a relatively new photography practice (mostly portraiture and events), and she’s now taking some of the loveliest photos, putting her documentary skills to use to tell stories through images.

On Wednesday, I talked to two women from different times in my life who share a thread of burlesque: Victoria Libertore, an actor and performance artist living in Los Angeles. We originally met through friends when I was performing in a butch burlesque show at the Stonewall Inn in the 20-teens, and we knew each other from my time in Brooklyn. She has a Liza Minnelli solo show that integrates her intuitive work as a Reiki, archetype, and intuitive listening coach, and she also does theater and other acting alongside it. I also talked to Millie May, a burlesque performer who was my student sixteen years ago, who reflected on her long career in that form, what it’s like to perform in the Chicago scene today (better pay and great community are among the qualities), and what it’s like to be a “glamour professional” and entertainer in your 50s.

Then yesterday, I spoke with Cristal Sabbagh, an interdisciplinary performance artist and dancer, whom I’ve known since I was 19. We were undergraduates together at the University of Illinois. I remember watching 120 Minutes with her and a group of hipster friends in her dorm room. It was such a delight to bump into her again in my 30s during my grad school program at Columbia College. We talked about her project Freedom From and Freedom To, a music and performance/dance jam featuring diverse musicians and dancers from all facets of those fields, paired for improvisational work through chance.

And then I wrap up my week this afternoon, recording a pod with Honey LeFleur, a dance artist who lives in Portland. Way back in the day, when she was tiny and I was young, she was also one of my burlesque students. But more recently, she was the reason I got into podcasting. She used to have a podcast with a somewhat famous Portland drag personality, and when they got too busy to record with her anymore, she asked me to join her as co-host. From there, I launched the short-lived Lez Eat (queers and food).

Honey was famously The Girlie-Q Variety Hour’s loyal stage kitten for Naked July, a series of midnight shows we did at National Pasttime Theater in the 2000s. And she played The Sugar Plum Fairy in our demented holiday show Delight before Christmas, where the main character, a mall elf, was trying to find the True Meaning of Christmas on Craigslist and encountering all manner of characters (including Glenn Beck, who was waging a War on Christmas) along the way. The Moral of that Show’s Story? “The Spirit of Christmas” is in community and in the connections you make with the weirdos/queerdos you meet on the road.

What I love about Honey—besides her willingness to participate in whatever crazy idea I had back in the day—is her sassy “fuck yeah” attitude, the way she has kept creating work and engaging her dance practice through all phases of her life, and how she has grown from the “straight” youth I knew in the 00’s to a queer person living her best life in the Pacific Northwest. I’m really excited to catch up with her.

I guess the next right thing to do is just keep doing all I’m doing. If you’re reading this, I’m reaching my audience. And if not, well, this was a good writing practice anyway. Thanks for reading. I appreciate you more than you know.

Watch this space for The Doyenne podcast, launching this weekend (earlier than I thought!) with my interview with Cristal Sabbagh. Please reach out if you have a creative project I can help with, need fundraising coaching, or need a grant written and submitted (I’m especially strong with big municipal grants and budgets). And Happy Easter to all who celebrate.

And if you want to support this work, I’m accepting donations on Buy Me a Coffee and offering subscriptions for bonus content and a cute tote bag!

Buy me a coffee!

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That is my favorite question to ask people. All people. At all times. I’ve started more than a zillion conversations/interviews/podcasts that way in my long career as a curious person.

Who am I and what do I do?

There are a lot of ways to answer that. I contain multitudes. And I’ve had a lot of jobs and avocations over the years as a scrappy artist with multiple lives.

Here’s a quick story to “nutshell” it: Over the years, I have worked mostly in the arts and mostly in fundraising for a variety of different organizations. I would say that I have mostly been in the service of organizations run by men (with a very few exceptions) in their 30’s to 50’s. I would also say that while I appreciated the opportunity to make money and support myself as a fundraiser (and to be close to the art, in most cases, which is one of my most valued experiences in life. I live for art and performance of all kinds), I have not had much experience with working primarily with women artists. We are largely underrepresented and nearly always under-financed, which means most of us can’t afford to hire a seasoned fundraising professional.

Most of the times I’ve worked with women/trans/nonbinary folks have been at tiny nonprofits who are scrambling to make ends meet, live creative lives, raise kids, and just generally survive. And the number of times that I see a woman’s experience, expertise, and knowledge of best practices in her field being discounted or undervalued are too numerous to list. When I got laid off from my most recent Big Performance Company Job, I onboarded a number of clients—mostly women with mostly tiny companies—and realized that this is how I’d like to spend more of my time. I’d like to be speaking with and being inspired by the woman/trans/nonbinary artists over 40 who are in my life and who are doing interesting work in all genres and media. I know so many of you and you’re all doing such cool things. I want to hear from you and share your stories with the world.

A doyenne is a woman who is a respected expert in her field. What I’d like to do with this space is highlight women (or trans/nonbinary folks) who are experts in their field and elevate their voices and their work. What you can expect is a podcast interviewing cool 40+ woman/or trans/nonbinary artists about their work and about art in general, some writing and curation of “things to do” in various cities, based on my network and research, and general musings about life and art from yours truly.

I can’t promise with what regularity these things will manifest (I’ve had a lot of experience with starting things with gusto! and then just petering out when I get busy or start a new job—Something I hope will come to fruition at some point in some way), but I can promise at least once a week, you will hear from me in some way. Keep your eyes on thedoyennepod on Instagram or watch this space for more.

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The Doyenne

Arts & culture by and for women (and trans/assigned-female-at-birth/nonbinary women-identified people) over 40

By JT Newman