By Sandra Schulman A group exhibition called Monarchs: Brown and Native Contemporary Artists in the Path of the Butterfly, now at The Museum of Contemporary Art North Miami (MOCA), uses the borderless migration pattern of the majestic monarch butterfly to alight on artists from Canada to Mexico. The works of 37 artists who are native to the Americas are separated into … [Read more...]
Archives for July 2018
Mainly Mozart finale featured fine playing, muddled concept
By Dennis D. Rooney The conclusion of the Mainly Mozart Festival’s 25th season, held July 8 at the University of Miami’s Gusman Auditorium, was a gallimaufry masquerading as a concept program. It would have been better dubbed “a bit of Mozart, but mostly Shostakovich.” The subtitle was “The Soul of Celebration” and included video accompanying the music, credited to Ali … [Read more...]
FAU summer rep’s ‘Cabaret’ proves masterful
By Dale King The musical Cabaret is dark and forbidding, much like its setting, Berlin in the 1930s, when Adolf Hitler and his minions began their horrific mission of turning Germany into a gutter of hate. Grad students from Florida Atlantic University’s Department of Theatre and Dance wrap up their two-play Festival Rep series this summer with a masterful retelling and … [Read more...]
Miami Music Festival’s ‘Walküre’ sees directorial debut by composer’s descendant
Sitting alone deep in the ancient cedar forests on the Japanese island of Yukushima, Antoine Wagner came in direct contact with his quest for silence. “You spend three days living in a dense forest in tents, and then suddenly the guide says, ‘You have to stay here for an hour, someone will come get you,’” he said. “There’s not a single sound in the forest, and you feel like … [Read more...]
PBCMF, Program I: Bubbly Bellini and strong Mendelssohn
By Dennis D. Rooney “Not a millennial in sight,” observed an elderly man whom I encountered on my way into the Helen K. Persson Concert Hall on the campus of Palm Beach Atlantic University last Friday. I had to agree. “Yes,” I replied, “the median age definitely skews older.” And it was an old audience who attended the inaugural program of the Palm Beach Chamber Music … [Read more...]
‘En El Séptimo Día’: A slice of migrant life on the margins
On the seventh day, as one best-seller has put it, God rested from all His work which He had done. José (Fernando Cardona), the vacillating hero of En El Séptimo Día, does not have that luxury. His seventh day, which indeed falls on a Sunday, is fraught with an existential crisis. José, an undocumented immigrant from Puebla, Mexico, now living in Brooklyn, is a soccer … [Read more...]
Dramaworks to celebrate timely troubadour
By Sandra Schulman Woody Guthrie was many things – a poet, songwriter, occasional hobo. The new summer musical at Dramaworks, Woody Guthrie’s American Song, follows Guthrie’s coast to coast life using his songs and quotes straight from his journals. The main character of Guthrie is never named; instead, the three stages of his life “are called The Searcher, the Folk … [Read more...]
Lake Worth’s Bamboo Room renews itself as Phoenix Charity Bar
Risen from the ashes, the Bamboo Room opened for the fourth time in Lake Worth on June 8 as The Phoenix Charity Bar (www.facebook.com/PhoenixCharityBar) at the Bamboo Room. The reason for the new name is based more in benevolence than in the mythical bird’s revival, though. More on that later. The iconic venue, located in the 1920s-era Paradise Building, has featured … [Read more...]