5/3/14 - Marfa, TX, Crowley Theater, "Cinemarfa Film Festival''

5/3/14 - Marfa, TX, Crowley Theater, "Cinemarfa Film Festival''

Setlist (incomplete):
Satisfaction
The Moon
Sea Of Love

This is the 18th performance of the year and the 17th solo performance of the year. 

Just 2 weeks before the start of an 8-date run of concerts and festival appearances in Europe, Chan makes an appearance at this film festival for a special performance. Chan plays music to accompany a showing of the 1928 silent classic, "The Passion Of Joan Of Arc''. This is a free concert. (and man, I wish I could be at this...)

Many Cat Power fans will probably know that Chan has done this before. The heavily circulated recording of her 5/14/99 concert in Washington state is a well-known example. 

From Chan's 5/14/01 Kindamuzik Interview:
"When I got back from the 'Moon Pix' tour, I was so much hating what I was doing... that I was so happy with all these new songs that I been playing, all these covers. So I called this club in New York, and I said I wanted to play there. "Can I play there on Sunday?" They said "No, 'cause it's our filmseries night". An old friend of mine from Atlanta, who was in a band called Smoke but passed away last year, he told me that I should really play along with 'Passion of Joan Of Arc'. He told me: "You would like it." Mostly, when people tell you that, you don't listen to them. But when people you care about tell you something, you always remember what they said. So they said it was their filmseries night. "So what if you got this movie 'Passion of Joan of Arc' by Dreyer, can you get that on reel to reel?" And they said they could do that. I had never seen the movie. So I show up at soundcheck, I'm looking at the film, they are playing it to make sure they got the angle right. So I just play all my songs, watching the movie, people are watching the movie. I felt really comfortable because they weren't looking at me. It was really a great experience and the movie blew me away."

The NY club that Chan mentions is most likely Tonic, and I believe forum member tumbleweed was at one of the 2 shows that night. Here is a (probably incomplete) list of shows Chan performed with the film - 

3/15/99 - NYC, Tonic (solo) (2 shows) + Film
5/11/99 - San Francisco, CA, Bottom Of The Hill (2 shows) + Film
5/12/99 - Portland, OR, Berbati's Pan + Film
5/13/99 - Seattle, WA, Crocodile Cafe (2 shows) + Film
5/14/99 - Bellingham, WA, Western Washington University, Viking Union Hall + Film
5/15/99 - NYC, Knitting Factory + Film
5/16/99 - Chicago, IL, Lounge Ax (2 shows) + Film
5/17/99 - Toronto, Canada, Horseshoe Tavern (2 shows) + Film
6/3/99 - Atlanta, GA, Echo Lounge (2 shows) + Film
12/11/99 - Meredith, Australia, "Meredith Music Festival"  + Film

So, now some 15 years later, Chan will again marry her songs to this powerful film. However, I was surprised to learn in my research, that there have been quite a number of bands connected to Chan who have also played music for the film. 

Here is a brief list - 
8/27/95 - Nick Cave & Dirty Three, London, England, National Film Theater
10/2/13 - Body/Head (Kim Gordon & Bill Nace), Augusta, GA, "Westobou Festival"
+ Loren Connors (who played a show with Chan on 10/7/99) also provided a soundtrack for the Blu-Ray release of this film. 

To watch or download the film, in its 1985 restoration, which I believe was probably the same one that Chan used in 1999, go over to here 
https://archive.org/details/DreyersThePassionOfJoanOfArc

And another link to the film - 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3Q6FVhqLY0

A great article on the most recent restoration - 
http://film.thedigitalfix.com/content/id/76120/restoring-joan-the-making-ofblu-ray.html

One final note... a number of Chan's ''Joan Of Arc'' concerts were recorded. Specifically, I know of the following:

5/13/99 - Audience
5/14/99 - Audience
5/15/99 - Video
5/16/99 - Soundboard (2 shows)
5/17/99 - Audience
5/19/99 - Audience
6/3/99 - Video

Unfortunately, I only have the 5/14/99 recording, which was made on cassette and has some edits in it. I would love to have any or all of these sources (particularly the soundboards which are said to be A+) if anyone out there could help me out. It would be a fun project to sync one of the complete, unedited audios along with the actual film and make an mp4. 

5/15/99, Kingsport Town:


5/15/99, Satisfaction:

Pictures
https://lesleybrownphotography.wordpress.com/2014/05/07/cat-power-marfa-texas/

Some comments from this tumblr:
http://rutabagaparsnip.tumblr.com/

''Then the lights came up, and she stood awkwardly. The whole audience crashed to its feet in a standing ovation while she grinned and said, “Wow, ya’ll, I’m crying.” I gave her a little wave from my seat, and she waved back.''