Maas Upstairs Space Is Now In Use

you can double-click this image and it opens up as a panoramic

So we've basically finished the 3rd Maas Space.  "Finish" is a strong word around here, but it's close enough for now. We put it up on a few Philly Space listserves and have been booking it now for shows and rehearsals. Who knew there was a demand for old trolley shops?


There is also now a website for The Maas Building.  It just seemed necessary to have the calendar live somewhere official.  So now that there's stuff going on in the Maas space, people sometimes ask "what is the difference between The 5th Side and the Maas Building? Good question*.  The 5th Side got it's name from the fact that the building is basically divided in two equal halves, and we used to call them "The 5th Side" and "The Randolph Side" when referring to where in this great big mess something was.  We've now got a wall that divides the building along these lines, basically making The 5th Side, Hi 5 Studio** and our house one entity, and the other spaces (New Paradise, Subcircle, and the Maas Rehearsal Space) are Maas Building.  


* Answer #2: "What's the difference between the 5th Side and The Maas Building?" Heat! Of course, our house and space are still full of junk and kind of chilly.  Maas renovations took priority for obvious reasons.  Hopefully NEXT winter won't be as cold over here...


** Oh, did we mention that we've started a separate blog about the studio? Now it's all about 2x4s and caulk but hopefully it will eventually be a blog about actual music projects.

Subcircle Moves Into The Maas Building

On January 1st, Jorge and Niki Cousineau, the media/theatre group Subcircle, moved into the 2nd downstairs studio space.  We met them originally through friends, and it turns out that they often collaborate with with New Paradise Laboratories - (now their neighbors in the building).  We couldn't have asked for a better group of people to work with here.  Oh, and it turns out that Jorge was just voted "Theater Artist of The Year" by The Philadelphia Weekly.  Here's a pic of some of Jorge's multimedia theatre installation work.  

Multiplicity: George Seurat (Jeffrey Coon) shedding animate copies
of himself via Jorge Cousineau's videos in the Arden's 
production of Sunday in the Park With George.

Check out the full PW article here.