Musicians, poets, and baton twirlers put on a show Thursday night for coffee drinkers at the Laughing Goat coffeehouse for C.R.A.B, a monthly variety show put on by the Boulder Fringe Festival.
C.R.A.B. features new work from artists from around the Boulder community. The show is presented in a variety-show format, allowing each act five minutes of performance time. After each act, the artist is given the opportunity to talk about their performance and their art.
The name stands for “Constantly Risking Absurdity, Baby,” a reference to a Lawrence Ferlinghetti poem.
“C.R.A.B. is a really important way to keep the artists talking to each other and networking and aware of what everybody’s working on and it’s really there for the artists and the community to stay creatively involved,” said Alana Eve Burman, the Fringe Festival director. “The essence of it is that you should always be putting yourself out there, being silly and going for it.”
Molly Mactravel, an eight-year-old majorette, otherwise known as a baton twirler, was among the performers in this week’s extravaganza.
“I was in the Fringe Festival in Scotland and my mom got an e-mail saying that they were going to have one here,” Mactravel said.
Mactravel has been baton twirling for four years and said she thinks she is the best in her class even though she is the youngest. Her mother has written two books about her and her baton twirling endeavors and they were for sale at the event.
Jon Sousa, a guitarist and Naropa student, was also among the performers.
“I heard about the Fringe Festival through Naropa and the community. I was asked to write music for a play that was being performed in the Fringe Festival about two years ago,” Sousa said.
Along with playing the guitar, Sousa is passionate about traveling and includes his many travels in his original songs.
“It’s a goal of mine to leave the United States once a year to go to another country. I’ve been to Ireland, France, Denmark, Holland and West Africa in the last three years,” Sousa said.
