For centuries, blues has been one of the few musical genres to succeed through purposeful simplicity, grit, and an innate sense of Southern musical feel. Ironically, one of the artists on the leading edge of new blues, singing South Florida guitarist JP Soars (www.jpsoars.com), resides among the shopping centers and pink office buildings of the decidedly non-bluesy Boca … [Read more...]
Archives for January 2013
Firm of Schwarz & Son lifts Boca Symphonia
Surely one of the best pieces of local musical news to be heard this past weekend is that Gerard Schwarz will be returning at some future date to lead a concert by the Boca Raton Symphonia. Schwarz, who led the Seattle Symphony from regional to stellar status in his 26 years as its music director, demonstrated in the Symphonia’s concert Sunday afternoon at the Roberts Theater … [Read more...]
‘Stand Up Guys’: We’re getting too old for this, too
Remember the good old days when it seemed like every comedy and action movie pandered to teenage boys with disposable incomes? Back in the first decade of the Aughts, when Stallone and van Damme were languishing in direct-to-video purgatory and Arnold Schwarzenegger was governing, we saw the rise of millennial cash cows like Jason Statham, Robert Pattinson and Channing Tatum. … [Read more...]
New curator to bring fresh eyes to Norton’s American collection
“I like to put things in a historical context. I think like my father,” said Ellen Roberts, the new Harold and Anne Berkley Smith Curator of American Art at the Norton Museum of Art, about why she loves being a curator. “He’s a 20th-century European intellectual historian.” This kind of thinking will help in her new post, where she’ll document and educate the public and … [Read more...]
A strong debut from a promising writer
Ayana Mathis was stunned when Oprah Winfrey called recently to say that she had selected Mathis’s debut work of fiction, The Twelve Tribes of Hattie, as her next book club selection. Mathis’s well-crafted first novel tells the story of Hattie Shepherd, a teenager who leaves Georgia in 1923 and heads north to Philadelphia in search of a better life. Hattie and her lazy, … [Read more...]
Martin Casuso: Enticed by textiles
By Colleen Dougher Martin Casuso, a Miami Beach artist who spent around 15 years working in the antique business, says his appreciation of objects and their untold tales began as a child when he and his brother would go to the seawall in their Coconut Grove neighborhood and build forts from treasures they found there. Their finds included rusty copper, sun-bleached … [Read more...]
Emilie Autumn at Revolution: A night with the crumpets
By Kylie Phillips Simultaneous sun showers and sullen skies set a befitting air of dreary surprise Monday evening as Emilie Autumn, a classically trained violinist with a past as unstable as the weather, brought the dark allies of the Victorian era to the stage at Revolution Live in Fort Lauderdale. Autumn’s Fight Like a Girl Tour is named after her newest album, released … [Read more...]
Sundays: I think, therefore I augment
By Myles Ludwig What does one do when reality isn’t enough? To paraphrase Socrates, is the unaugmented life worth living? These are troubling times in the kingdom, sayeth both Shakespeare and the Progressive Insurance lady, a fast-moving time of delusions and illusions for even the smarmiest among us, not to mention trivia fans and popular culture pundits. The snowy pixels … [Read more...]
Scarlett’s ‘Euphotic’ showcases big talent of MCB corps
The Miami City Ballet showcased its Program II, Tradition and Innovation, this weekend at the Kravis Center presenting something old and something new, but also something timeless and something different. George Balanchine’s choreography, the mainstay of Miami City Ballet’s repertory, is known for its unsurpassed musicality, and it is interesting to note that the first two … [Read more...]
Rarities and masterworks, freshly played by Utrecht quartet
The city of Utrecht in Holland has a music conservatory that draws unto it teachers of high caliber. Students from all over the world cross its portals. Only two of the members of this version of the Utrecht String Quartet studied there, but they honor the school by taking its name. Renowned for searching for forgotten repertoire, the Utrecht opened the program at the Flagler … [Read more...]