Gossip Should Have No Friends

[October 12th, 2005] SCOOP DU SOLEIL That French-speaking, eh-saying Canadian crew of acrobats Cirque du Soleil is extending the tour of its spectacle Varekai to include circus-starved Stumptown this spring. Dates won't be confirmed for another couple of weeks, but keep your eye on the sky for a sign from this tumbling troupe; Varekai's hero makes his first entrance falling from a height of 40 feet.

INDIE SOCCER! Four days after slaying a sold-out crowd at Dante's on Sept. 30, the men of the National and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah put down their cigarettes, departed their tour vans and battled it out in a muddy soccer match at Col. Summers Park in Southeast Portland. The Brooklyn bands were on a southern swing toward Eugene after an Oct. 2 show in Vancouver, B.C., and chose our fine city as a place to exercise their bottled-up rage on each other. The National defeated Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, 7-5 .

GLOBAL FOOTWORK Local dance outfit Solo Flamenco 's queen of stomp Laurena Marrone , left, is getting props for her fantastic footwork—in Korea ? That's right: She's all the rage in Seoul. Dr. Joon Kim (a Korean "Flamencologist," no less) has published two books about Marrone since they met in 2001, when the pair combined traditional Korean music and fiery dance for the first time ever in a Portland Center for Performing Arts performance. In December, Marrone will travel to Seoul to perform at the Haman Cultural Center, where she will be honored for making the Flamenco-Korea connection .

ROCK-'N'-ROLL READER Add rock queen Patti Smith to the City of Books' booster list. "Whenever we're laying out a tour and they've missed Portland, I'll say, 'Can you call up the Crystal Ballroom and see if they'll take me, because I have to go to Powell's,'" the musician-author told the capacity crowd at a Powell's reading of her new book of poetry last Saturday.