Jacob's Pillow

The Latin jazz pianist Nicki Denner will perform at the Hunter Center of Mass MoCA on Friday, May 1. With the easing of travel restrictions for Americans with family in Cuba this is a call for celebration with a night of music and dance.

Despite a drastic 20% budget cut Kate Maguire, the artistic director and CEO of Berkshire Theatre Festival is excitied about the coming season and the return of Randy Harrison in Ibsen's "Ghosts." During an upbeat interview she stated that "I'm not a director. I love directors. I'm married to one (Eric Hill). I love directing directors and I wanted to build a director's theatre."

For the coming season the ever popular annual appearance by Berkshire native, James Taylor, has been shifted from the Fourth of July weekend to close the season, August 27-30, and anticipate the annual Jazz Festival on Labor Day weekend which falls late this year. The BSO announces that other than lawn tickets the Taylor concerts have sold out.

The $50 million for the arts in the $787 billion stimulus bill has been added to the existing budget of $145 million for the National Endowment for the Arts. But that is small change compared to recent appropriations for the arts of $2 billion by Germany and $4 billion in France. There is a prevailing attitude that goverment support for the arts in the U.S. is an agenda of a "cultural elite" and "liberals." But after the disaster of the eight Bush years "liberal" is no longer a dirty word.

Given the poor economy, artistic director, Nicholas Martin, has reduced the number of Nikos Stage productions from five to three plays and shortened the seaon (July 1 through August 23) by two weeks. By making these cuts he has avoided any compromise of the quality of productions for one of the nation's most renowned theatre companies.

Spending money it can ill afford during a time of financial crisis, Jehudah Reinharz, President of Brandeis University hired Rasky Baerlein Stategic Communications, a PR firm than specializes in crisis management, to draft a carefully worded apology for a rash and irresponsible decision to close the Rose Art Museum and sell its renowned collection.

The world renowned Jacob's Pillow Dance announced a full schedule of performances by 50 companies on three stages. The 77th season in the Berkshires features world/ U.S. premieres and special events including the 90th birthday celebration of choreographer Merce Cunningham.

Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet will offer a world premiere of Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui's "Obro Nova" at Jacob's Pillow from July 8 through 12. It will be a highlight of the dance season in the Berkshires.

With $4 a gallon gas and a sinking economy 2008 was a challenge for arts and tourism in the Berkshires. But our contibutors covered not only the Berkshires but arts and culture in New York, Boston, London, New Orleans and Shanghai. We reflect on some of the highlights.

Seattle-based Pacific Northwest Ballet (PNB), one of the most prominent ballet companies in the United States, will perform an exclusive Ulysses Dove program August 19 – 23, in the Ted Shawn Theatre. Dove was lauded as one of the most innovative contemporary choreographers of the past 50 years.

This is the third, self published book by artist/ entrepreneur, Eric Rudd. The superb images in this picture book were photographed by Kelly Lee who worked for ABC News and The News Hour with Jim Lehrer in D.C. before he settled in the Berkshires.

Squeezing hairy chests into tight costumes and donning feathery headpieces, these Clown Princes of Ballet in full makeup danced sur les pointes across the stage of the Hunter Center at Mass MoCA. As both merry makers and serious dancers all they want is their turn in the spotlight, and endless applause.

The Berkshire Hills are very much alive this fall. Choose from the ridiculous or the sublime, from the Ballet Trockaderos with men in tutus and on pointe to the arrival of Irina Brook at Shakespeare & Company to wrest a play from Oscar Wilde's book, The Canterville Ghost. For a complete change of pace, the Cirque du Soleil is coming to Amherst and Boston.

Berkshire residents are reveling in an amazing array of area arts offerings. Our monthly Preview serves to help guide your choices with helpful facts, insider details and handy links. The only mistake would be to procrastinate. Nothing gold can stay.

At Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, a 7.5 million fund goal was met and the Elayne Bernstein Theatre opened, Willliamstown began its Greylock Project and series of play readings, Barrington Stage is workshopping a new musical in Pittsfield, and the Berkshire Theatre Festival in Stockbridge received grants for their renewal plan, and to allow extended rehearsals for their much anticipated Waiting for Godot.

Jacob's Pillow merges contemporary dance with timeless natural beauty. Here you can celebrate life and the joy of dance movement. Forget the chores. Pack a picnic lunch and make a day of it.

The awesome array of Berkshire arts events in July is astounding. Our theater, music and dance companies create their schedules one by one, but taken together it's going to be one sensational Summer Festival right here in our own backyard. Enjoy.

Part Two of our report on saving money while enjoying the Berkshire's many performing arts attractions. Theater, music and dance are available at a discount, sometimes even Free!

Bob Dylan and Joan Baez put the funky Dreamaway-Lodge, hidden in the woods of Becket, Mass, on the map when they filmed it during the Rolling Thunder tour. Now it is a popular Berkshire destination for atmospheric family style dining and entertainment.

Berkshire residents and visitors are about to enjoy the earliest and most promising arts season in years. We pick the best of the early music, theater, dance and gallery offerings, from Memorial Day to the end of June 2008.

Theater, music and dance performances are sprouting up everywhere. Here's a head's up on the most promising. After a hard winter, it's nice to see the Berkshires bloom with life again.

The recently established tradition returns to Lenox, Mass with the annual Labor Day Weekend Tanglewood Jazz Festival. Tickets to all Tanglewood events are now on sale.

While not a "best" and "worst" list in the usual sense we offer an overview of events and what proved to be moving and insightful while covering the arts in 2007.

Jacob's Pillow Dance Company has announced that it will present a special two week residence and performances by the Bill T. Jones/ Arnie Zane Dance Company of the work Chapel/Chapter starting on June 23 before the usual opening of the summer season.

After many years of working in Europe with opera and ballet Karole Armitage has retunred to New York and is touring with a company which visited Mass MoCA in a performance co presented with Jacobs Pillow.