Hide the Cashmere: The Moth Project Is Coming to Dallas’ Wyly Studio Theatre

Anyone who forgets to properly pack away the sweaters at the end of the season might have a less-than-generous opinion of moths.

As the butterfly’s pesky little cousins in the Lepidoptera order, moths may have gotten a bad rap over the years, but musicians Peter Kiesewalter and Whitney La Grange find a strange sort of beauty in these often-colorful insects, one they are happy to illustrate Feb. 12 at the Wyly Studio Theatre at the AT&T Center.

The two musicians spent a pandemic summer at Kieswalter’s family cabin in Canada with his three children and his brother, an interpretive naturalist. As they watched moths circling a campfire, the Grammy-nominated and Emmy-winning producer started to wonder why the insects do what they do.

“My brother is an interpretive naturalist; he takes people on nature hikes,” Kieswalter says. “He told me why moths go to the flame, which science isn’t completely 100% in agreement with. I thought that was cool of them and started to do homework on moths. In Western culture, they get a bad rap. They’re associated with bad things like death and destruction, but the indigenous modality paints them in a cooler light. They’re the guardians of Dreamtime and the bridge between the living and the dead. If a moth visits you in a dream, it’s a good thing.”

The duo started to take pictures of moths, and Keisewalter discovered that some naturalists are as passionate about the species as birdwatchers. After reading the book Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, the producer decided to create something in the book’s spirit of reciprocity and shine the spotlight on the natural world through the lens of these creatures.

“My kids could name 1,000 corporate logos, but they couldn’t name six trees,” Keisewalter says. “There’s something very wrong with that.

Kiesewalter, who has worked with Jane Siberry and the East Village Opera company, enlisted his musical and life partner, Austin native La Grange, who’s played violin with Natalie Merchant and Billy Joel, to create a song cycle honoring the creatures, blending their original music with pop hits.

“I wanted to do something lean and mean and easy to travel with,” Keisewalter says. “The last band I toured with was 12 people and two crew buses. I wanted to make something the two of us could go out on the road with, and I very much wanted a visual component. The videos we got from an etymologist were stunning. We thought we’d stand in front of a big screen and wear white and disappear into projections.”

The hardest part was writing songs about moths, which “sounded stupid” to Kiesewalter’s ears until he decided to delve into metaphor and allegory. Moths have more in common with humans than their love of luxury wool.

“It’s not entirely about moths, but it is when you scratch beneath the surface,” says Kiesewalter, the son of survivors of Nazi Germany who immigrated to Canada. “The life cycle of moths is exactly what human beings go through – there’s a narrative arc. I tell of my family’s immigration from Europe to America through the portal of a moth life cycle.”

Launching The Moth Project two years ago in their current hometown, New York, the duo soon found there was a surprising appetite for the intersection between art and science. Their first major public performance was at a naturalist conference in Cleveland, where they served as the opening night entertainment, and the audience of 1,200 scientists loved every moment.

“More than a few came up in tears, saying, ‘Oh my God, this is exactly what we need because no one pays attention to us,'” he says.

The duo refined the show to include 12 tunes they play over 75 minutes, including covers from Joni Mitchell to a Bernard Hermann film score. They turn the Kiss song “Beth” into one called “Death,” based on an essay by Virginia Woolf called “The Death of the Moth,” It was a “no one wanted, but here it is anyway,” says with a laugh.

A Kafkaeske Experience

Original tunes cover moth-related subjects. “Pheremones” is about the substance female moths emit to attract the males and “Emergence” is a song about that whole metamorphosis thing.

“It’s insane,” Kiesewalter says. “They spend the majority of their lives as caterpillars blending in, just like my immigrant parents. Then, one day in the middle of their lifecycle, they annihilate themselves on a cellular level, turn into soup, and emerge as these fabulously colored winged adults. To me, the whole process felt like a coming-out song. A person has spent the majority of their life blending in at one point before exiting their literal and metaphorical cocoon and saying, ‘This is who I really am.'”

Another tune explores the migration of the black witch moth, which was born in the Rio Grande valley. Because it’s too hot and moths don’t have AC, they move as far north as Canada to survive – something we all should probably consider at this point.

With its multi-layered approach that blends political commentary and science, visuals and music, The Moth Project does some heavy lifting with a lightness that audiences of all ages are responding to. Millennial and college-age fans are particularly passionate, and Kiesewalter says he was surprised to see audience members actually dressing like moths to attend their shows.

Still, his biggest goal has yet to be fulfilled – to change the perception of moths from pesky little sweater thieves to a recognition as the most efficient pollinators in the natural world. Yes, even above our beloved bees.

“I would like for people to leave the theater with a renewed sense of awe for the natural world,” he says. “This show is not preachy. I’m not scolding people. It’s not like the Al Gore movie. It’s a beautiful look at what we have. It’d be great [if the audience left] humming a tune or buying a T-shirt, but honestly, if you come knowing nothing except moths go to the flame and eat our socks, I’d like you to get an appreciation for the incredible creatures they are.”

The Moth Project will perform at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 12 at the Wyly Studio Theatre at AT&T Center, 2400 Flora St.