Los Angeles

GREAT GOOD GRIEF It’s clear that jazz pianist David Benoit has more than an affection for all things Charlie Brown. The pensive character from Charles Schultz’ strip, Peanuts, has certainly inspired many–from  filmmakers and musicians  to the “Average Joe” who contemplates the enormity of just existing–but Benoit presented his charming Christmas concert with a  childlike persona that was…

CROSSFIRE Between religious zealots, especially those who use the word of God to control the populace rather than to create peace, and the liberation of a new world’”gay marriage, Roe v. Wade’”more and more people are leaving organized religion. Especially in America. A recent study indicated that millennials are leaving the church in droves. Some…

ME SO FELIZ A friend mentioned  that three comediennes–a Cuban American from Miami,  a Mexican American from Texas, and the daughter of an “over-dedicated Mexican mother and a compliant Lithuanian father” from Sun Valley, CA–are putting on a show in which they indulge in reminiscences about  their childhood  Navidades (Christmases). He invited me, but I declined, telling my friend…

GET YOUR RACHS OFF I can think of nothing better to do this holiday season then something that has nothing to do with the holidays. It’s not easy to find, but in the midst of the Messiah morass, the Los Angeles Philharmonic is offering an All-Rachmaninoff program this weekend that is sure to bring you…

THE BEST IS YET TO COME ON SINATRA’S BIRTHDAY Frank Sinatra was not only one of the most popular entertainers of the 20th century, but he was arguably the greatest singer as well, recording more than 1,500 songs. His extraordinary interpretative genius and the way he could rescue some songs from obscurity and extend the…

ALL DOLLED UP AND READY TO GO, GUYS It’s a new tradition that I could get used to. The season of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival is practically year-round. Performances begin in Ashland in February and last until late October or early November. That leaves two months for a “breather” before the company heads back into…

APOLLO EARTHBOUND; SHOSTAKOVICH SOARS Rollicking, mysterious, and adventurous may be  attributes of Britten’s Young Apollo,but these adjectives  also describe the outcome, respectively, of the three pieces that comprised the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s program last night. Britten’s 1939 10-minute work for piano, string quartet, and string orchestra, included a rip-roaring performance by Joanne Pearce Martin; Stravinsky’s 1928 ballet…

TMI AOK I’m a librarian during the day, and one thing I remember from back in Library School (because you have to go to Library School to become a librarian, you know) is that there are many discussions about the nature of information. Oh, librarians are fascinated about information. To a specialist in such things,…

DO I FEAR A WALTZ? Musicals are generally “lost” for any one of a number of reasons: the libretto may be filled with once topical socio-political humor now meaningless to contemporary audiences; it’s too expensive to produce; the score may have gone out of fashion; or the show itself is like a machine whose  parts don’t…

NERO MY HEART TO THEE I always have a peculiar mix of excitement and trepidation when seeing a favorite entertainer live for the first time, especially when they are well past retirement years. In the case of Peter Nero, I wondered if my memories of listening to  this astounding pianist would be pushed aside by a…

IF STORYTELLING’S YOUR THING, SKIP SCOTCH French poet and essayist Charles Pierre Péguy wrote, “It is the essence of genius to make use of the simplest ideas.” Yuval Sharon, director and creator of Hopscotch, “the world’s first-ever opera to take place in cars,” is the essence of genius. Only a genius of this kind could…

FALLING IN LOVE WITH LAUGHS AND LEAPS Sadly a review of record, but this experimental, eclectic mash-up from Chicago looks to have a life beyond its short runs in the cities of wind and angels; in fact, The Art of Falling returns next year to the Harris Theater in Chicago where it had its world…

VIVA LA POP’S MAMMA Bringing opera to a wider audience is the noble goal of many a musical entrepreneur, but few succeed as well as Josh Shaw (stage direction and production design) and Stephen Karr (music director and conductor), founders of Pacific Opera Project (POP). Major opera companies should take note of the upstart company’s…

I DID, TEN MINUTES IN Ike Holter’s play Hit the Wall, a historical “remix” about June 27 and 28, 1969 in New York City, went up first at the Steppenwolf in Chicago in 2012. The next year it went to New York, where it received mixed notices. A new production by LA’s LGBT Center has…

HOW BROWN WAS MY VALLEY? The San Fernando Valley has always creeped me out. My family moved from Anaheim to Canoga Park (now West Hills) in 1971 (two weeks before the earthquake, thank you). For the next 11 years I never felt like I fit in. It was like it was haunted or something. White…