By Tara Mitton Catao On Saturday night at the Kravis, American Ballet Theatre, one of the most outstanding ballet companies in the world, made a long overdue visit to South Florida in a program that featured a mixed repertory including Agnes de Mille’s Rodeo, Mark Morris’ Drink to Me Only With Thine Eyes and the White Swan pas de deux from Act II of Swan Lake. It was a … [Read more...]
Archives for March 2013
Aggressive Vivaldi, joyful Bach at Firebird Chamber
Over the course of its 11 years, the Seraphic Fire organization has returned several times to the music of J.S. Bach: The Mass in B minor, the St. John Passion, the six Motets, the Brandenburg Concertos. Although the subject of its spinoff chamber group’s most recent concert is nominally Vivaldi, one of the Bach cantatas, Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen (BWV 51), plays just as … [Read more...]
Frank Wildhorn: This time, the ‘Jekyll’ he’s always wanted
Theater and pop music composer Frank Wildhorn, who grew up in Hollywood, Fla., has eight Broadway shows to his credit — from long-running cult favorites like Jekyll & Hyde and The Scarlet Pimpernel to such one-month flops as Wonderland and Bonnie and Clyde. On Tuesday, a newly redesigned and reconceived production of Jekyll & Hyde arrives at the Kravis Center for a weeklong … [Read more...]
Sundays: Past lives, luminous memories
By Myles Ludwig There are times in every writer’s life when he can only write about himself. Philosophy becomes personal. The strictures of fiction, the narrative structure, the plot all seem improbable, and one can no longer feel comfortable creating a landscape into which armies of characters are moved around like tin soldiers on the counterpane of youth. Disguise fails. … [Read more...]
Story of literacy campaign at its best when children speak
At age 35, John Wood left the world of business, a decision he chronicled in Leaving Microsoft to Change the World. Now he has written a sequel titled Creating Room to Read. One cannot help but admire Wood’s obvious determination to combat illiteracy in underdeveloped nations in Asia and Africa. While vacationing in Nepal in 1998, Wood visited a primary school that had a … [Read more...]
Parsons Dance brings exciting athleticism to Duncan
By Tara Mitton Catao Parsons Dance has been bringing its own brand of churning dynamics and punchy athleticism to audiences around the world for decades, including one last night at the Duncan Theatre. David Parsons started his career at age 17 dancing for master choreographer Paul Taylor and his choreography still reflects that grounded, strong, exuberant physicality and … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: March 23-26
(Editor’s note: The posting of this entry was delayed by technical difficulties.) Art: Boynton Beach settings have been transformed into vibrant paintings by the Palm Beach County Plein-Air meet-up group. The group’s work can be viewed in the Breeze into Boynton Beach: Plein-Air Exhibit on display on the second floor of the Boynton Beach City Library, 208 S. Seacrest Blvd. … [Read more...]
Radiant ‘Neruda Songs,’ zesty Beethoven Ninth close Cleveland residency
The five songs for mezzo-soprano and orchestra that Peter Lieberson composed in 2004 to the poems of Pablo Neruda have taken on something of a sacred aura since the death of Lieberson’s wife, Lorraine, in 2005. With Lieberson’s own death in 2011, also from cancer, the Neruda Songs wear a cloak of tragedy once you know their back story, much as Wagner’s Wesendonck Lieder … [Read more...]
Armory Art Center set to celebrate 25th anniversary
It’s not generally known that the Armory Art Center is what it is today — and celebrating its silver anniversary Saturday — thanks to the foresight and vision of the Flamingo Park neighborhood preservation committee, community organizers, and students and teachers from the former Norton Museum Gallery and School of Art. Back before the Kravis Center and the convention center … [Read more...]
‘Koch’ profiles the unpredictable, unforgettable mayor of New York
In a scene in the new documentary Koch, the titular former mayor sits with some companions in a half-circle restaurant booth, sharing a story that took place in a limousine with Ronald Reagan. The caravan passed countless adoring fans -- along with one loner who decided to assess the president’s performance with a middle-finger salute. Koch says Reagan saw past all the … [Read more...]