A tale of two festivals

As Bayou City Art Festival hits 40, Kim Stoilis seeks bigger challenges as iFestdirector

iFest has been a Houston institution since 1971
Photo via Houston International Festival/Facebook
Kim Stoilis is the new president and CEO of iFest
Photo by Anthony Rathbun
The theme for iFest 2011 was "The Silk Road: Journey Across Asia"
Photo by Shelby Hodge

When Kim Stoilis resigned as executive director of the Art Colony Association, which oversees the Bayou City Art Festival, with apparently little warning and much fanfare in late August, we were all left wondering where she would take her talents next.

But the answer came a few weeks later: Stoilis is the new president and CEO of The Houston Festival Foundation (organizers of iFest).

"iFest is bigger in scope and bigger in reach," Stoilis said. "This is a really great opportunity for me to, again, do what I consider a personal mission of mine, which is to promote Houston — within Houston and outside of Houston."

James Austin retired as director of iFest in November of 2010, after leading the organization for 24 years and molding the festival into the event it is today. Rick Mitchell has served as interim director since Austin's retirement, and will return to his position of director of performing arts and education programs with Stoilis on board.

CultureMap spoke with Stoilis about her new venture, and she seemed enthusiastic about the challenge.

"[My new position with the Houston International Festival] is a different direction, but both organizations produce large-scale public events," Stoilis said. "With the art festival, there is obviously a focus on the arts, and with iFest — well, it's a bigger canvas with more color on the palette."

Moving from one non-profit festival to another, Stoilis feels that the transition will be a natural one.

"There are a lot of moving parts [in each organization]," she said. "iFest is bigger in scope and bigger in reach. This is a really great opportunity for me to, again, do what I consider a personal mission of mine, which is to promote Houston — within Houston and outside of Houston. And bringing culture to a larger community is very compelling to me."

During her 4-1/2-year Art Colony tenure, Stoilis upped festival attendance and earned multiple awards, both for the Bayou City Arts Festival and for her own leadership. Was she worried about leaving the organization a few weeks before this weekend's 40th annual downtown event? Not one bit.

"They have a really amazing team that I was integral in putting together," Stoilis explained. "Planning doesn't start two or three weeks before the event, it's a year-long process. I'm really excited to attend as a patron, and I'm confident that it will be successful."

Bayou City Art Festival board member Joe Pogge, who is heading up the search for a new director, praised Stoilis for increasing the festival's profile. "Kim took us to a new level," Pogge said. "To have other festivals come to us to find their people is very complimentary. She has a huge challenge (as iFest director), but if anyone can do it, Kim can do it."

Until a new permanent director is hired, Pogge said the Bayou City Arts Festival is in good hands under interim director Kelly Kindred. The festival takes place this weekend in downtown Houston, celebrating its 40th anniversary.

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super duper

Quirky Houston DJ drops genre-blending mix CD inspired by video games

Photo by Dustee Torres

DJ Squincy Jones

If you’re the type of person who has dubstep, Southern hip-hop, and Koji Kondo’s iconic “Ground Theme” from Super Mario Bros. in your streaming-music library, then Squincy Jones has created the perfect playlist for you..

Photo by Dustee Torres

DJ Squincy Jones

Super Nintendub is the name of the mix where the Houston-born-and-bred DJ mashes up all those aforementioned music genres. A capella bars from Houston heavyweights (Megan Thee Stallion, Paul Wall) and other Dirty South MCs (Three 6 Mafia, 8Ball & MJG) gets laid over grooves from underground dubstep artists (Numa Crew, Blay Vision, Hamdi). But we also get music from various Nintendo (Castlevania III, Ninja Gaiden) and Super Nintendo (Super Mario World, Final Fantasy VI) games. Jones also throws in audio samples from commercials and gaming-heavy movies like WarGames, The Wizard, and the Adam Sandler-produced Grandma’s Boy.

Needless to say, Jones has always been a gamer. He’s had his run of game systems: NES, SNES, Sega Genesis, even the old-school Atari 2600. He recalls his days blowing the dust out of such cartridges as Contra, Double Dragon, and Duck Hunt. In the past, Jones has released a series of mashup mixes – titled Blend Pack – with cover art that resembles/salutes classic video games.

“I'm a huge fan of all the eight-bit and 16-bit stuff,” says Jones (government name: Shane Rector), 41. “I play a lot of the new games, or I have played a lot of the new games, but not as much anymore. You know, being a parent and having a full-time job – you don't really have time for video games anymore.”

Super Nintendub is a sequel to Nintendub, a dubstep mix he played during a party way back in 2008. “I added some a capellas, [like] a Bun B a capella,” he recalls. “I had some other Dirty South tunes from the time. I layered them because they're at the same tempo as dubstep. Another friend that does music gave me a folder of Nintendo songs. So, I just randomly layered it on top and kinda slowed down the Nintendo music, and it sounded cool as hell to me.”

The mix picked up fans overseas when he dropped it online. “I've always wanted to make a follow-up to it because I got so much good feedback,” he remembers. “People from all over were writing about it."

Jones decided to release Super on compact disc, sold in rectangular keep cases – packaging that’s very familiar to gamers – with double-sided artwork also by Jones. (A digital link is available upon request to those who buy the CD.) While the limited-edition disc is available for purchase on Jones’s Bandcamp page, the CD mix shouldn’t be confused with the Super mix that’s currently playing on the page.

“I wanted to have them in the mix as well,” he says. “But I'm not entirely, you know, confident with my production skills. So, I just kinda had it on the side to go along with the release of this mix.”

Since releasing Super in September, Jones says he’s gotten good feedback from those who’ve bought a copy. “Because it looks like a video game,” he says, “a lot of people are like, ‘Oh, cool! Is it an actual game or an actual DVD or whatnot?’ But it's always hit or miss because some people are like, ‘Oh, man, I don't have a CD player’ or "Wow, you actually printed a CD,’ because everything's, you know, digital.”

He’s looking into playing a big-screen version of Super, where videos of the rap songs are spliced in with video-game footage and other retro clips, somewhere around here. “I was thinking like either a movie theater or somebody mentioned Aurora Picture Show, or maybe Wonky Power, to do like a viewing or showing or whatever – kind of have a party for it.”

Even though Jones enjoys merging gaming and music – his dual obsessions – he still prefers to be known as more than a video-game DJ. A veteran of the Houston DJ scene for a quarter of a century, he continues to do gigs like his upcoming monthly residency at Eight Row Flint.

“I do open-format DJing,” he says. “I've done raves and dubstep parties. I've played on the radio. I've played at Mid Main, where it’s a mainstream crowd. In this day and age, everybody has their branding or whatnot. I just love video games, so I just kind of take that as my branding, I guess.”

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