Dorothy McCuistion, "Seeing Art through Rosemary-colored Glasses." Image courtesy Two Vaults Gallery.

Dorothy has made a delightful print of my spiral-bound, featuring a pair of rosy-pink shades sporting speech bubbles with phrases from my reviews. (I'm so glad someone reads them!) Beneath is a tiny red toy bicycle (ode to my cycling exploits?) and the whole icon is surrounded by cheery sunshine. I can't quite work out the bluebird in a toy cage--some biting reference to my soul? Or just decoration? And I'm not sure about some of those words... did I really write "art salad?" (Maybe that referred to Dorothy's co-op gallery.)

But oh boy, I so *totally* want those sunglasses: pink with paisley patterns. And a red bike: mine's boring gray, really.

So thanks, Dorothy. Who, by the way, has a neat set of bike-themed prints pegged up in Impromptu Gallery just down the road from Two Vaults--monotypes riffing on the theme of bike wheels turned lime-slices turned manholes...

ICON-cepts is up for the summer, it seems. It's not all great art, but some of it's very clever--like chalk-mad R.R. Anderson's "Icon for the Iconoclast," a blank chalkboard triptych--and it deserves far more space than the two small walls it's been allocated.

Two Vaults is at 602 S. Fawcett St, Tacoma.

Starring silent film swoon-man Douglas Fairbanks (“The Mark of Zorro,” “The Thief of Bagdad”,) “The Black Pirate” was the second full-length feature shot in Technicolor, and tells the story of a nobleman who disguises himself as a pirate to avenge his father’s murder. Like many other silent movies, it had its own orchestral accompaniment, sometimes reduced for theater organ. Lost for decades, the film was restored in the 1970s, and in 1988 Dennis James restored the score and re-premiered it on organ with the Indianapolis Symphony.

It’s the kind of thing James, who’s lived in Tacoma the last six years, has spent nearly his whole life doing. The 57-year-old began playing for silent movies when he was 16; since then, he’s amassed a repertoire of 36 scores for organ and orchestra, hundreds in preparation, and several thousand for organ alone. He’s the regular organist at the Paramount Theatre’s “Silent Movie Mondays” series, and tours the world for concerts and film festivals.

And now he’s playing the Rialto, thanks to the First Night folks, who are organizing the show as a fundraiser for the New Year’s Eve arts celebration. Unlike new compositions or improvisations, this silent movie music is original: just what Fairbanks and Mary Pickford would have heard.

So what’s the music for “The Black Pirate” actually like?

“It’s firmly in the 19th century Romantic opera tradition,” says James, “like Richard Wagner. Each character has a theme, a leitmotiv—the captain, the ship, even the monkey has one. It’s rooted in the tradition of melodrama.”

Since the Rialto doesn’t have an organ, James will play a digital replica of a theater pipe organ, complete with sound effects like birdcalls and surf noises.

Being a pirate movie, what happens for cannon noises?

“It’s a cluster of bass drum, timpani roll, cymbals and low pedals all played together,” explains James. “What we in film music call ‘The Grand Crash.’”

“The Black Pirate” screens 7 p.m. July 6 at the Rialto Theater, 310 S. 9th St, Tacoma. Tickets are $15, and can be purchased from LeRoy Jewelers, Glenna’s Clothing, King’s Books and the Broadway Center box office (Sunday only.)