There has been no shortage during the past century of American composers who have been willing to write violin concertos. But there has been a dearth of conductors and orchestras who have been willing to turn those concertos into repertory pieces (or at least try). A tip of the hat, then, to Alexander Platt and the Boca Raton Symphonia, who did their bit Sunday afternoon for … [Read more...]
Palm Beach Poetry Festival bigger than ever
Miles Coon did not build the Palm Beach Poetry Festival into one of Florida’s top literary events in five short years by being cautious. After last year’s economically troubled festival, when one workshop had to be canceled for lack of enrollment, he knew prudence dictated a smaller, less ambitious plan for 2010. Instead, Coon chose a bolder path, increasing the … [Read more...]
PB Opera’s Beethoven sometimes messy, but packs a wallop
Seeing the gigantic forces arrayed on the stage of the Kravis Center, one couldn't help wondering whether the audience was about to hear a performance of the Mahler Eighth Symphony. But all those people were there Friday night for Beethoven's Ninth, which was the season opener this year for the Palm Beach Opera, in lieu of a fourth staged production. With no less than four … [Read more...]
Jewish film fest offers 11-day nosh of 35 movies
To paraphrase a line from Fiddler on the Roof: “So if the economy had a bad year, why should the Jewish Film Festival suffer?” Beginning tonight and continuing through Sunday, Dec. 13, here comes the 20th anniversary Palm Beach Jewish Film Festival, slightly smaller due to belt-tightening by the sponsoring Jewish Community Centers of the Palm Beaches, but still artistically … [Read more...]
Florida Stage moving to Kravis, MCB gets its orchestra back
Florida Stage moving to Kravis Center next summer Florida Stage is making a long-anticipated move to West Palm Beach. Beginning in July 2010, Florida’s largest professional theater company dedicated exclusively to new and emerging plays will take up residence in the Marshall E. Rinker Sr. Playhouse at the Kravis Center, the company said Monday night. Officials with both … [Read more...]
Morikami’s kettles, prints evoke classic Japan
Readers of Yasunari Kawabata's novel Thousand Cranes will have some idea of the significance of the tea ceremony in Japanese life, of how each element of the ritual, from kettle to the tea itself, is fraught with meaning. An exhibit at the Morikami Museum west of Delray Beach offers a glimpse into the rituals of tea over the past few centuries through a display of more than … [Read more...]
Butcher exhibit at Boca offers insight into our wild places
Many of us may never wade into the alligator- and snake-infested swamps of South Florida or hike into the mountain wildernesses of the West. But through Clyde Butcher’s photographs, we can get a feeling of what we would see and of the great beauty that awaits in our natural environment. Through November 8, visitors to the Boca Raton Museum of Art can vicariously travel from … [Read more...]
Seraphic Fire luminous in Palestrina mass
FORT LAUDERDALE -- In its previous seven seasons of music-making, the members of Seraphic Fire have presented hugely varied concerts that included everything from Purcell's Dido and Aeneas to American gospel, from all six Bach motets to world premieres of challenging contemporary music written just for them. But in its opening series of concerts for its eighth season, the … [Read more...]
Dutch group gets Delray Baroque off to vigorous start
It's useful to remember that no matter how far we've come from the Baroque era, good music of whatever age will engage interested young performers and be reborn anew. The time to really notice that Saturday night was in the ensemble selections of a concert by the Netherlands-based Haagsche Hofmuzieck, a young trio (joined by a guest violinist to make a foursome) that opened … [Read more...]
Shakespeare fest finds itself living a ‘Dream’
Eighteen years ago, the fledgling Palm Beach Shakespeare Festival first performed A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the crowd-pleasing comedy that the company returns to this year to inaugurate the new Seabreeze Amphitheatre in Jupiter’s Carlin Park. “It’s unheard of for a Shakespeare company to go that long without reviving this play,” says Kevin Crawford, a founding troupe member … [Read more...]