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Los Angeles
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Music Review: ELGAR AND TCHAIKOVSKY (LA Phil; Paolo Bortolameolli, conductor; Camille Thomas, cello)
WAR AND PEACE LA Phil’s Associate Conductor Paolo Bortolameolli made sure that two of the best-known chestnuts in the repertoire were presented by the LA Phil players last weekend in such a way that they sounded completely different than any interpretation one has heard. And given Russia’s hateful invasion of Ukraine last week, Elgar’s Cello…
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Music Preview: ACADEMY OF ST MARTIN IN THE FIELDS WITH JOSHUA BELL, VIOLIN (The Soraya)
Thor Steingraber, the Executive and Artistic Director of The Soraya concert space in Northridge, has transformed this amazingly gorgeous hall from a college adjunct into a world-class location for the arts — one of the best in Southern California. On March 10, Joshua Bell and Academy of St Martin in the Fields return to the…
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Theater Review: ON THE OTHER HAND, WE’RE HAPPY (Rogue Machine at The Matrix Theatre)
THERE IS NO OTHER HAND: ROGUE MACHINE HAS A WINNER Another one of Los Angeles’s best theater groups got back on the boards last week, as Rogue Machine Theatre kicked off its first post-pandemic season in a new home at the Matrix on Melrose Avenue. Always a reliable importer of significant new plays to Los…
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Theater Review: NEXT TO NORMAL (Chance Theater)
FINALLY: NEXT TO PERFECT The first three times I saw Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey’s Next to Normal, it never truly floored me. There are many ingredients that validate the 2009 musical’s popularity: it is to be commended for a bold and daring new way of communicating the kind of subject matter that you would…
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Dance: THE VOICE WITHIN — FEATURING SEIBI LEE (Leela Dance Collective in SF, LA & Edmonton)
Leela Dance Collective presents The Voice Within, featuring veteran kathak artist Seibi Lee in an intimate performance exploring the themes of duality and paradox. Lee renders two ancient stories – Houyi and Chang’e, a heart-rending Chinese story about the love between a mortal hero and an immortal beauty, and Yuki no Onna, a Japanese tale evoking the mystery of the…
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Dance & Music: MARTHA GRAHAM DANCE COMPANY (World Premiere: “The New Canticle for Innocent Comedians” composed and performed by Jason Moran at The Soraya)
A lost 1952 dance creation by Martha Graham herself — a primal artistic force of the 20th century — is reborn with the Martha Graham Dance Company’s World Premiere of The New Canticle for Innocent Comedians at The Soraya on Saturday, March 19 at 8pm. The program also includes two classic Graham works Lamentation (1930)…
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Dance: BALLET BC (New Program at The Soraya, CSUN)
This Saturday, February 26 at 8, The Soraya’s resident ballet company, Ballet BC, offers a program of unusual depth with two works: GARDEN (by the new Artistic Director Medhi Walerski) and The Statement from Crystal Pite, both originally created for Nederlands Dans Theatre (NDT). The program also includes a Pas de Deux from Walerski’s Romeo…
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Theater Review: POWER OF SAIL (Geffen Playhouse)
THE KIDS AREN’T ALL RIGHT Ever heard of Godwin’s Law? If you’ve spent a sizable amount of time on social media you’ve surely experienced it. An adage from the ‘90s, Godwin’s Law states that the longer an online discussion continues the chance that someone gets compared to Hitler (or Nazis) is inescapable. The Law serves…
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Opera: WE HOLD THESE TRUTHS (LA Opera Digital Short)
LA Opera’s next Digital Short, We Hold These Truths, premieres on March 4, 2022 LA Opera has commissioned some of today’s most in-demand artists to create a series of short musical films. Superstar composers team up with talented visual artists including animators, experimental filmmakers and choreographers to bring you a number of new pieces throughout the fall and…
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Los Angeles Theater: HOLLYWOOD FRINGE FESTIVAL, 2022 (Registration Open)
Registration is officially open for the 2022 Hollywood Fringe Festival, LA’s largest celebration of the performing arts. Organizers are seeking artists and producers in the performing arts to join the 12th annual festival which will take place this June. Registration for the festival consists of three steps: 1) creating a project on the festival website,…
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Jazz: CONNIE HAN TRIO (The Wallis in Beverly Hills)
Pianist and composer Connie Han takes on the pantheon of jazz piano ranging from Harlem stride to modal post-bop with her own fiery, contemporary style. Her performances are both powerful and elegant, putting a fresh spin on tradition. The New York Times calls her “the rare musician with fearsome technical chops and a breadth of…
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Theater Review: LIFE SUCKS (Cygnet in San Diego)
LIFE MAY SUCK, BUT THE PLAY SURE DOESN’T For those familiar with Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya, it might seem an odd choice to modernize. But Aaron Posner’s tight script, combined with Cygnet’s strong cast, is a breath of fresh air, as it takes Chekhov’s story solidly into the stress of our post-2020 world — and…
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Opera Tour: FIDELIO (Heartbeat Opera in NYC, AZ & CA)
NYC’S HEARTBEAT OPERA PRESENTS ITS FIRST-EVER TOUR WITH FIDELIO Music by Ludwig van BeethovenOriginal libretto by Joseph Sonnleithner and Georg Friedrich SonnleithnerAdapted & Directed by Ethan HeardArranged & Music Directed by Daniel SchlosbergNew English Dialogue Co-Written by Marcus Scott and Ethan HeardFIDELIO TOUR STOPS:The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NYThursday, February 10 at 7pmSaturday, February 12 at 7pmSunday, February…
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Streaming Theater: THIS BITTER EARTH (The Road Theatre)
THE ROAD THEATRE COMPANY celebrates Black History Month with an encore stream presentation of THIS BITTER EARTH, written by Harrison David Rivers and directed by Gregg T. Daniel. Recorded live on February 27, 2021 in North Hollywood, California, THIS BITTER EARTH follows Jesse (Matthew Hancock), an introspective black playwright, who finds his choices called into…
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Upcoming Music: FOG (premiere); BREATHING FORESTS (premiere); ALSO SPRACH ZARATHUSTRA (Esa-Pekka Salonen)
When architect Frank Gehry designed Walt Disney Concert Hall, he took into account how musicians would experience the building. He believed if the sound is good, the musicians would feel more confident and, in turn, would play better. With this in mind, Gehry worked closely with expert acoustician Yasuhisa Toyota and then-Los Angeles Philharmonic Music…
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San Diego Theater Review: DESPERATE MEASURES (North Coast Rep in Solano Beach/San Diego)
A SHAKESPEAREAN WESTERN MUSICAL? DON’T WORRY, IT MEASURES UP Love Shakespeare? Great. Hate Shakespeare? No problem. North Coast Rep’s Desperate Measures may be based on the Bard’s Measure for Measure, but the language is fully contemporary (unless you count a hint of 1950s Western thrown in). The whole program only contains one line from actual…
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Theater Review: EVERYBODY’S TALKING ABOUT JAIME (Ahmanson Theatre)
WHAT WILL YOU TALK ABOUT? Red high-heeled shoes? Professional drag queens? Repetitive pop music? Overcoming homophobia? Yeah, the new-ish musical Everybody’s Talking About Jaime sounds a lot like Kinky Boots, because it is. (There are so many ways to glitter and be gay in modern Musical Theater.) Jaime is a musical about a 16-year-old boy…
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Theater Review: HEISENBERG (Scripps Ranch Theatre in Scripps Ranch/San Diego)
THE PHYSICS OF ATTRACTION If this totally non-physicist reviewer understands what he is reading — the Uncertainty Principle launched by renowned physicist Werner Heisenberg, roughly states that the more precise the position of a particle is given, the less precisely can one say what its momentum is. If that has your head already spinning, no worries;…
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Music Review: MENDELSSOHN & BEETHOVEN (Igor Levit, piano; Elim Chan, conductor; LA Philharmonic)
COME FOR IGOR LEVIT: STAY FOR MENDELSSOHN’S FOURTH SYMPHONY Along with Daniil Trifonov, pianist Igor Levit’s concerts and CDs must recall what it first felt like to encounter Gilels and Richter, two other super-talented Russian pianists who brought excitement to classical music. When I saw Mr. Levit live, one of the most striking aspects for…
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Recommended Music Concert: AMERICAN YOUTH SYMPHONY (Sounds About Town at Disney Concert Hall, March 6, 2022)
The American Youth Symphony (AYS), led by Music Director Carlos Izcaray, returns to Walt Disney Concert Hall on the LA Phil’s “Sounds About Town” series on Sunday, March 6, 2022 at 7:30 p.m. Works by Brian Raphael Nabors, Jennifer Higdon, Unsuk Chin, Jimmy Lopez, Tchaikovsky and Izcaray complete a program that celebrates cultural diversity through…
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