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Tony Frankel
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Los Angeles Dance Preview: MALPASO DANCE COMPANY (part of CUBA: ANTES, AHORA / THEN, NOW at The Music Center)
THE RYHTHM OF CUBA COMES TO THE MUSIC CENTER FOR ONE DAY ONLY Cuba: Antes, Ahora / Then, Now is a celebration of the art of Cuba, and Angelinos will get the chance to experience the country’s dynamic arts from November 30-December 2, 2017. Among the more than 48 world-class Cuban musicians, dancers and visual…
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Los Angeles Music Preview: CHRISTMAS CHORAL CONCERTS (Los Angeles Master Chorale at Disney Hall)
OUR MASTER CHORALE’S CHRISTMAS CHORAL CONCERTS AND CAROLS With the indefatigable Energizer Bunny of conducting, Grant Gershon, at the helm, Los Angeles Master Chorale (LAMC) can easily be labeled one of the best choirs on earth, and you have a chance to see four separate holiday programs at Walt Disney Concert Hall. Naturally, you can…
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Los Angeles Concert Preview: A MICHAEL FEINSTEIN HOLIDAY CELEBRATION (Valley Performing Arts Center in Northridge)
IT’S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE FEINSTEIN Charismatic, appealing, boyish, excited, and eager to please, Michael Feinstein will bring his off-the-cuff, friendly, intimate style to the gorgeous Valley Performing Arts Center on Friday, December 8, 2017. For this one night only, the man who has single-handedly reinvigorated the American Songbook for the 21st century, will celebrate the…
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Theater Review: SOMETHING ROTTEN! (National Tour reviewed in Los Angeles)
SOMETHING SILLY; NOT QUITE ROTTEN BUT HARDLY FRESH What is it about William Shakespeare that inspires lesser authors (namely, everyone else) to try to take him down? George Bernard Shaw spent his life seeking to supplant or at least discount that other playwright. In Shakespeare in Love, Tom Stoppard imagines the world’s greatest writer as an opportunist who…
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Tour Music Review: IN MY MIND: MONK AT TOWN HALL 1959 (Jason Moran and The Big Bandwagon)
A CONCERT THAT WILL STAY IN MY MIND There are certain experiences involving the arts that stay with you forever. A seamless meld of spiritual and artistic experience, Jason Moran’s tribute piece to Theolonius Monk’s legendary 1959 concert at Town Hall achieved something I rarely witness in the arts: As with a séance, Moran’s octet—rivaling…
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Los Angeles Theater Review: WOMEN ON THE VERGE OF A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN (Musical Theatre Guild)
A CONCERT ON THE VERGE OF A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN Given the Madrid setting, Hispano characters, and Latin-inspired score, it’s possible that the musicalized version of Pedro Almodóvar’s film will one day make the rounds in regional theaters and high schools. But for now, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown—a 2010 Broadway flop that…
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CD Review: DREAMS AND DAGGERS (Cécile McLorin Salvant on Mack Avenue)
NO DAGGERS FROM ME FOR THIS DREAM Hooray and hallelujah! With her newest CD, a live double-album, jazz vocalist and song interpreter extraordinaire Cécile McLorin Salvant has cemented herself as this generation’s most mesmerizing, fascinating, and supreme songstress. Yes, she has that remarkably distinctive voice, but it’s supported by a personality which is an amalgam…
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CD Review: RICHARD RODGERS REIMAGINED (Kyle Riabko on Ghostlight Records)
RIABKO ROMANTICALLY RETHINKS RODGERS I had a chance to catch Kyle Riabko on stage at The Wallis in Beverly Hills last weekend, where he returned to offer the Los Angeles debut of his Richard Rodgers Reimagined concert (his successful cabaret of Burt Bacharach songs played last year). Aided by three back-up musicians/vocalists, it was surprising…
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Los Angeles Theater Review: TALES FROM THE CRYPT THEATER OF MYSTERY (Captured Aural Phantasy Theater at the Bob Baker Marionette Theater)
ORIGINAL GHOST HOST A COUP FOR CAPT Captured Aural Phantasy Theater (CAPT), the only group authorized to perform EC Comics’ material live, offered a blood-bucket of charm at their recent annual Halloween show, Tales from the Crypt Theater of Mystery. For those who don’t know, Entertaining Comics was an American publisher of comic books specializing…
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Los Angeles Theater Review: MR. BURNS, A POST-ELECTRIC PLAY (Sacred Fools Theatre Company)
LET THERE BE DARK A group of campers sits around the warm glow of campfire embers and tries to retell a favorite episode of The Simpsons. One man excitedly recalls and performs “Cape Feare” with entertaining accuracy. Others chime in with a few lines and impersonations, goading on his storytelling when he falters. No doubt some…
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CD Review: UNDER THE STREETLIGHT (Boyz II Men on Sony Masterworks)
DOO-WOP NOT REINVENTED In the mid-80s, Boyz II Men original members Nathan Morris, Wanya Morris, Shawn Stockman, and Michael McCary began like the classic doo-wop singers of the 1950s: practicing on street corners and areas with great acoustics (McCary left the popular R&B quartet in 2003). So it’s fitting that the trio’s latest CD is a…
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Los Angeles Dance Review: L.A. DANCE PROJECT FALL PROGRAM (in residence at The Wallis in Beverly Hills)
IS THAT ALL THERE IS? For his intriguing but overlong new work Second Quartet, which received its U.S. premiere at The Wallis last weekend, young French choreographer Noé Soulier writes in the program about his 28-minute piece: “Without the spectator having to recognize the motivations behind these complete movements, they are intended to stimulate his…
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Music Preview: BRUCKNER’S EIGHTH WITH CARL ST. CLAIR (Pacific Symphony at Segerstrom Concert Hall)
AN EXPERIENCE NOT TO BE MISSED On a website which attempts to list every Anton Bruckner orchestral recording offered to the public (abruckner.com), the discography collector and annotator John F. Berky states that the Austrian composer “expanded the concept of the symphonic form in ways that have never been witnessed before or since. When listening to a…
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Los Angeles Theater and Music Review: A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM (Mendelssohn music and Shakespeare scenes with the LA Phil)
COME FOR MENDELSSOHN, STAY FOR Mí„LKKI There are three things to consider regarding LA Phil’s huge production of Felix Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which has music interlaced with scenes from one of Shakespeare’s most produced plays: the orchestra; the production; and the venue. Since this is, after all, the LA Phil, I’m happy to report…
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CD Review: NEW WORLDS (Bill Murray, Jan Vogler and Friends on Decca Gold)
WORLDS APART This is easily one of the most jaw-dropping CDs to come my way in a while. Not just in some of its amazing selections, but in the disparity between tracks: most cuts are revelational (Bill Murray’s interpretation of Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is one of the greatest readings I have ever…
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Los Angeles Theater Review: THE RIDICULOUS DARKNESS (Son of Semele Ensemble)
THE RIDICULOUSNESS OF IT ALL I had a college film-course assignment: Read Joseph Conrad’s 1899 novella The Heart of Darkness and then watch Francis Ford Coppola’s 1979 film adaptation, Apocalypse Now. In the novella, a British ivory transporter named Marlow develops a concentrated curiosity about an ivory-procurement agent named Kurtz while journeying up the Congo…
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Los Angeles Opera Photo Preview: THE MEDIUM & THE MONKEY’S PAW (Pacific Opera Project)
TAKE A PAWS Pacific Opera Project (POP) is serving up six spooky performances of the world premiere of LA-based composer Brooke deRosa’s The Monkey’s Paw. This is the company’s first presentation of a world premiere opera, and it is paired with Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Medium, one of his best works. Performances begin tonight, October…
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Book Review: ADDICTED TO AMERICANA (Charles Phoenix / Prospect Park Books)
HOOKED ON HAPPY With trademark enthusiasm, quick wit, and keen eye for oddball detail, Charles Phoenix has become one of the American Treasures he often discusses. I often wonder that centuries from now, people will speak of him—perhaps from a picture they found of him in a fez and red-and-white striped suit—with the fascination that…
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CD Review: SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS THE NEW MUSICAL (Original Cast Recording)
A SPLISH SPLASH MISHMASH After a successful out-of-town tryout in Chicago, SpongeBob SquarePants The New Musical is opening on Broadway this November. To whet the public’s appetite í la the “Abominable Showman” David Merrick, a recording was completed and is now available on Masterworks Broadway—hence the descriptor “Original Cast” not “Broadway Cast,” even though the…
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Music Preview: ISRAEL PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA (North American tour with Zubin Mehta)
ISRAEL PHILHARMONIC; ZUBIN MEHTA; YEFIM BRONFMAN; AND A U.S. PREMIERE AT DISNEY HALL Beginning tonight in New York, the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra is beginning its six-city North American tour. This highly anticipated but very short tour—they’re only on the road for two weeks through November 9—includes Toronto, San Francisco, West Palm Beach, Miami, and, happily,…
Theater Review: ST. NICHOLAS (Black Button Eyes / City Lit / Chicago)
by Croydon Fernandes | July 3, 2026
in Chicago, TheaterFAST PAYOUT CASINOS USA 2026 — 5 BEST INSTANT WITHDRAWAL CASINOS RANKED
by Michael Carr | July 3, 2026
in ExtrasTheater Review: MEN OF SOUL (Black Ensemble Theater / Chicago)
by Mitchell Oldham | July 1, 2026
in Chicago, Theater
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