Art: In time for Earth Day, the Ann Norton Sculpture Gardens is opening an exhibit of works compiled from “recycled, reused and found objects.” Executive Director Cynthia Palmieri selected artists who would be willing to consider the site’s unique location and its natural materials as well as the limitation that a historic home would have in installing larger works. The … [Read more...]
The View From Home 4: New releases on DVD
The Italian Straw Hat (Flicker Alley) Release date: April 6 Standard list price: $23.99 In the movies and the theater, the institution of marriage is not often a melodious tradition, with infidelity and domestic strife serving as effective dramatic devices for more than a century. But day-to-day wedlock is downright harmonious compared to the ceremony leading up to it. … [Read more...]
Nostalgic ‘Dr. Radio’ slight but entertaining
Composer-lyricist-musical director Christopher McGovern has been involved with most of the musicals at Florida Stage in the last few years, including writing songs in period style to complement the hits associated with Ginger Rogers (Backwards in High Heels) and Jimmy Cagney (Cagney!). But with the exception of a site-specific mini-musical penned to be performed in a bowling … [Read more...]
The View From Home 3: New releases on DVD
Mystery Science Theater 3000: Vol. XVII (Shout! Factory) Release date: March 16 Standard list price: $32.99 Aside from, perhaps, the wheel, the cotton gin and the printing press, Mystery Science Theater 3000 is one of man’s greatest creations. OK, well, at least it should be the top 100. Such hyperbole is not uncommon among Mystery Science Theater 3000 fanatics, or … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: March 19-21
Art: You don’t have to go to art school to be an artist, or even be working at it all the time. Such is the case with Anthony Calicchio, who finds his inspiration in his culinary education and background as a second-generation restaurateur. In Café Frankie, he fashions masterful dishes with his basting brush, and the bistro’s walls are adorned with paintings he has created with … [Read more...]
Jazz singer Milman favors craft over image
The recording industry has always been more image- than music-driven, a fact that's been made worse by TV since the 1950s and MTV since the 1980s. The latest example is American Idol, on which youthful toothpaste models-turned-singers recruit text-messaged votes from teenaged fans to springboard toward celebrity. Vocalist Sophie Milman wants nothing to do with the … [Read more...]
Amelia Piano Trio excellent in program of teen trios
Frederic Chopin did not write much chamber music, but it's fair to say that the two major works that qualify -- the early Piano Trio and the late Cello Sonata -- have been too often overlooked. In this bicentenary year of Chopin's birth, the Connecticut-based Amelia Piano Trio is redressing that balance with performances of this fine work, and it was part of the bold, … [Read more...]
Art fair to expand; FAU sets second Jewish fest
Art fair does booming business, will be 10 days long in 2011 The recession may be dragging on, but the 2010 American International Art Fair enjoyed 15 percent higher participation over 2009 and a significant improvement in sales, according to founders David and Lee Ann Lester. Based on the strength of this year’s fair, organizers plan to return to a 10-day length in 2011, … [Read more...]
Piano fest wraps at PBAU with three names to watch
Like better-known programs of its ilk, the young International Certificate of Piano Artists program is a good way for rising stars of the classical piano to get expert advice, and for aficionados of the art to catch some rising stars. Thursday night at the DeSantis Family Chapel on the campus of Palm Beach Atlantic University, the Palm Beach Symphony accompanied three ICPA … [Read more...]
Violinist Numata shows power, wide range in Duncan recital
If eclecticism is the name of the game for today's younger virtuosi, then to be successful these days requires that you play all those different kinds of pieces equally well. It won't do, in other words, to have a middling Mozart but an incandescent Shostakovich. Too much is expected, but that doesn't mean you can't shine a little brighter in some things more than in others. … [Read more...]