Front Page
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Dominican Heroines at Repertorio Espagnol
Caridad Svich Tells the Story of Mariposas
By: - May 21st, 2019There had been a surge of interest in the Mariposa sisters since Junio Diaz told their story in his Pulitzer Prize winning, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. In a middle-class family, three out of four sisters formed an underground resistance to the Trujillo dictatorship in the Dominican Republic, each in her own way. Minerva studied law and led her group. She could not sit by and leave her children living in a world created by a tyrant.
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Sister Act – the Musical
Produced by Theatre Rhinoceros
By: - May 22nd, 2019As “the longest running LGBT theatre anywhere,” Theatre Rhinoceros’s mission is to “enlighten, enrich, and explore . . . aspects of our queer community.” So what connection would prompt Rhino to produce this musical? By convincing the license holder to allow a first – gender switching the key roles – Rhino made it fit.
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Barbara Hannigan at the Ojai Festival
From The Rake's Progress to a Crazy Girl Suite
By: - May 21st, 2019What makes the Ojai Festival in California unique among festivals? Its Artistic Director continues year after year. Each year a different Music Director is chosen. That person curates the festival as through-performance. You are led by the music on a journey full of surprises and delights.
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A Cultural Trip Through Canada
Encountering First Nations Artworks
By: - May 23rd, 2019On the spot, fully packed and ready to travel, we decided on a car trip to Canadian locations: Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto and Niagara Falls, after we were denied boarding an airplane to Chicago. Our final destination was (not) to be Edinburgh, Scotland and London, England. Here's a cultural overview of our ersatz-trip, which turned out to be just great!
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Spring Awakening at Hancock Shaker Village
Borrowed Light Watercolors by Barbara Ernst Prey
By: - May 24th, 2019Working "24/7" over several months the renowned, Williamstown-based artist, Barbara Ernst Prey, created Borrowed Light. The suite of watercolor renderings of interiors is on view in a converted chicken coop of Hancock Shaker Village. It is a part of expanded contemporary programming under the director Jennifer Trainer Thompson. She was a founding member of the MASS MoCA team. They have been neighbors and friends for many years. It was intuitive for them to undertake this remarkable project.
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Young People's Chorus Premieres Ellen Reid
Joined by Shallaway Choir and Mantra Percussion
By: - May 23rd, 2019The Young People’s Chorus gave their third annual Vocal Resolutions Concert on May 19th at the Gerald Lynch Theater in New York. This group, founded by Francisco Nunez three decades ago, has reached the pinnacle of professional success. They invited an equally celebrated group, the Shalloway Choir from Newfoundland, to join them this year. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 2019, Ellen Reid's world premiere composition for YPC was a highlight of the program.
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Theatre Festival, Berlin
May 5 - May 20, Berliner Festspiele
By: - May 25th, 2019Two weeks of theatre mania, the Theatre Festival, came to an end on May 20. Selected productions from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland could be experienced on several Berlin stages. Serious and timeless human struggles and subjects took center stage.
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MASS MoCA Launches Summer Season
Annie Lennox Life of the Party
By: - May 26th, 2019For the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend general admission to MASS MoCA was free. For the launch of it's 20th summer season the museum was mobbed. There were food and drink stands as well as many family oriented activities. For tickets ranging from $100 to $1000 there was a performance by British rock star Annie Lennox. There was also an installation of her memorabelia and legacy which will be on view for the coming months. The museum launched many new temporary exhibitions. There are also long term displays of contemporary masters.
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Kings written by Sarah Burgess
Produced by Shotgun Players
By: - May 27th, 2019The central character of Kings is Sydney Millsap, the newly elected U.S. Representative from the 24th district of Texas, modeled after the new wave of congresswomen like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
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Falstaff by Giuseppe Verdi
By West Bay Opera
By: - May 28th, 2019Verdi was no doubt drawn to the bigger-than-life character of Falstaff. Lecherous and self-indulgent, he is one of the great comic characters from literature. The success of the production rides first on the able shoulders of Richard Zeller, a classic Falstaff. With the aid of costumery, makeup, and wig, he looks the part of the corpulent rogue.
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Ink by James Graham
Broadway at the Samuel J. Friedman Theater
By: - May 28th, 2019Ink is not just about Rupert Murdoch; it is actually more about Larry Lamb, the man he brought in from a northern England city where he had been editing a paper, to edit The Sun and overtake its rival.
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Hamilton by Ishmael Reed
Full Production to Tag National Tour of Miranda's Version
By: - May 29th, 2019Nuyorican Poets Cafe and writer Ishmael Reed present The Haunting Of Lin Manuel Miranda through June 17th. Amid the flurry of enthusiasm for the Broadway show, Hamilton, Reed lays waste to the show's premises and assumptions, without deriding the talent or intentions of the remarkably gifted Miranda or his cast.
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A Man for All Seasons Howie Levitz
Photographer, Piano Man and Raconteur
By: - May 30th, 2019In 1969 Howie and Dale Levitz moved to the Berkshires when he became head of the photography department at Williams College. After seven years they opened a photo store which had a smaller iteration on Holden Street in North Adams. He was the piano man with a vast command of songs. Howie loved to entertain with tales, anecdotes and jokes. He passed away over the Memorial Day weekend.
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The Goat, or Who is Sylvia? by Edward Albee
Bestiality Explored by Berkshire Theatre Group
By: - Jun 01st, 2019On his 50th birthday the architect Martin (David Adkins) is on the cusp of loss and gain. He is forgetting things like why he has entered a room. A lifelong friend Ross (Josh Aaron McCabe) is taping a TV interview. He is young to win the Pritzker Prize. But Martin is too distracted. Probing the problem Ross pushes Martin to admit to an affair. No biggie. But, it ensues, his beloved Sylvia is a goat. The late play by Edard Albee The Goat or Who is Silvia? won a Tony for best new play in 2002. Since then it has been regarded as controversial and problematic. We discover why in a tsunami production directed by Eric Hill for Berkshire Theatre Group.
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First Nations at Art Gallery of Ontario
A Third of the Museum’s Gallery Space
By: - Jun 03rd, 2019During a recent road trip we visited museums in Montreal, Ottowa and Toronto. We noted different strategies to intergate First Nations artists into special exhibitions and permanent collection galleries. A third of the exhibition space of the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto features First Nations artists. With an unfavorable comparison only a handful of American museums have a commitment to feature Native American art and culture.
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MFA Addresses Recent Incident of Racism
An Open Letter from Director Matthew Teitelbaum
By: - Jun 03rd, 2019A group of 26 middle-school students with chaperones from the Helen Y. Davis Leadership Academy visited the MFA on May 16, 2019. They were on a self-guided visit. Before leaving the Museum, the group filed a complaint with Member and Visitor Services that they were met with racism and verbal abuse from visitors and staff during the visit. In an open letter to the MFA Community its director Matthew Teitelbaum details the museum's response and plan of action.
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Ensemble Studio Theatre's 37th Marathon
One Acts Present Dilemmas in Series B
By: - Jun 04th, 2019Dilemmas in all their perplexity, humanity or otherwise, and bewilderment are presented in all five one act plays in Series B of the Ensemble Studio Theatre’s annual one act marathon.
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Dr. John at "77"
Voodoo Hoodoo at MASS MoCA in 2002
By: - Jun 06th, 2019New Orleans master Dr. John has died. Perhaps he was 77 but like most aspects of the musician it is yet another factoid swathed in swamp gas. On June 1, 2002, with singer Jimmy Scott, he jammed the inner court yard of MASS MoCA. Over the years I covered him numerous times including his witch doctor Gris Gris phase in the late 1960s. He long ago earned a spot in the pantheon of America's greatest musical tradition.
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50th Anniversary of Stonewall
About Face: Stonewall, Revolt and New Queer Art
By: - Jun 09th, 2019About Face: Stonewall, Revolt and New Queer Art commemorates the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots, a spontaneous rebellion by gay activists after a police raid on a gay bar in Greenwich Village. Curated by Jonathan David Katz, Ph.D., activist, art historian, writer and university professor, the exhibit features almost 500 works of art in every conceivable media.
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Kit Steinkellner’s Ladies
Boston Court Theatre, in Pasadena
By: - Jun 12th, 2019The story is based on The Blue Stocking Society of 1750 London. It was a society of creative, sophisticated, and educated women; women who came together to discuss literature, philosophy, and art in their London homes. They sought to bring the conversations and opinions of the day that were happening in the men’s private clubs and coffee houses into the parlor room where women could participate as well.
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A Walk in the Woods
North Coast Repertory Theatre
By: - Jun 13th, 2019Playwright Lee Blessing, back in 1988, debuted his fact-based drama “A Walk in the Woods,” about two arms negotiators; one American John Honeyman (J.Todd Adams) and one Russian Andrey Botvinnik (David Ellenstein), is now wowing audiences at North Coast Repertory Theatre in Solana Beach, CA.
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A Bronx Tale
Touring Production of Broadway Musical
By: - Jun 12th, 2019A Bronx Tale's heart and humor makes this crowd pleasing musical a worthy afternoon or night at the theater. An equity national touring production is playing in Ft. Lauderdale through later this month. Loyalty, family and trust are some of the themes examined in A Bronx Tale.
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Experiencing Barbara Hannigan
Ojai Music Director 2019
By: - Jun 13th, 2019As a conductor, Barbara Hannigan is full of physical energy and a dynamic beat. Listening to her sing and conduct feels intimate, intuitive, and collaborative. Bowled over by Hannigan’s deep musicality, her sense of the proper degree of vibrato is often overlooked. She has just the right amount of delicate breath in each note, giving the slightest hint of texture to a smooth and pure line. One’s sense of this may be a matter of taste, but the style suits the music she chooses to sing.
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Sweet Texas Reckoning
Award Winning Play by Traci Godfrey at Artemisia
By: - Jun 14th, 2019The play won Artemisia’s 2016 Fall Festival of new play readings. Julie Proudfoot has been working with Traci Godfrey since then to refine the play for Artemisia, which is dedicated to new feminist plays that center on women who own their own narratives.
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Reading by Berkshire Author Steve Nelson
Get Lit Wine Bar @ The Bookstore, Lenox, MA
By: - Jun 16th, 2019In 1967-68 Steve Nelson was the manager of the legendary rock and blues club The Boston Tea Party, and later ran The Woodrose Ballroom in western Mass. In his memoir Gettin’ Home: An Odyssey Through the ‘60s, he recalls the long and winding journey which took him from high in the Andes to become the foremost producer/promoter of concerts by The Velvet Underground. He will read from his book and chat about those times on Thursday, June 20 at 5:30.
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