Tickets

By far one of the greatest opening sequences of any film ever made is Woody Allen’s Manhattan. Yes, it’s the photography, the voice-over narration, the shots of New York City at its finest, but more than anything, it’s George Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue.” The undertow of buzzing clarinet and twinkling piano, combined with the slow, celebratory build of the entire orchestra induces a simultaneous feeling of hopeful anticipation and relaxed confidence. In Gershwin’s own words: “I heard it as a sort of musical kaleidoscope of America, of our vast melting pot, of our unduplicated national pep, of our blues, our metropolitan madness.”

No, no. Too expected. Too pretentious. Calls too much attention to the movie. Try it again.

By far one of the best pieces of music to completely and flawlessly capture the essence of an entire season is “Summertime,” by George Gershwin. Originally conceived for the ‘folk-opera,’ Porgy and Bess, the aria—which has been covered more times than “Blackbird”—manages to somehow smell like summer. You need an iced tea when you hear it. And what better time, what better place than the Hollywood Bowl…

No. Just get to the point, Josh. You’re supposed to be giving away tickets. That’s all people care about. Just do your job.

This Wednesday, August 25^th at 8:00 PM at the Hollywood Bowl, the LA Philharmonic presents Gershwin Across America, an all-star, all-genre tribute to the legendary composer and upcoming CD of the same name. Artists include Jason Mraz, Monica Mancini (daughter of film composer Henry Mancini), gospel singer Bebe Winans, Grammy Award-winning Nancy Wilson), St. Vincent (for the hipster fetishists among us), and an accompanying big band and strings section feautring the Shelly Berg Trio, Gordon Goodwin, Tom Scott, Arturo Sandoval and more.

To win two tickets to this summertime rhapsody of sorts, all you have to do is enter your first name, last name, and e-mail address into the form below,and you will automatically be entered into the running for this concert, as well as our next three ticket giveaways.

I guess that’s good enough. Why make a blog longer than it needs to be? Why even write these things? God, it’s hot out… I wish I could play the piano…

- By Joshua Morrison

I have mixed feelings about Rent.

On one hand, the wildly popular, Tony Award-winning musical turned major motion picture seems to have climaxed to the level of bubbly pop non-sense—Joey Fatone playing no small role in this symbolic transformation. (Trey Parker and Matt Stone’s Team America: World Police decidedly contains the best satirical take on Rent to date: a group of overjoyed actors on a Broadway stage, clapping their hands to the lyrics, “We’ve all got AIDS!”—the bourgeois audience happily joining in).

On the other hand, Rent is a great show. It reinvented the musical genre and operatic concept for a younger audience, told a worthwhile and relevent story, had some excellent numbers that I still find myself singing in the shower, and originated from the genuine heart and soul of a true artist: Jonathan Larson.

In a weird way, the on-going legacy of Rent has begun to reflect its central theme, which, to me, is the struggle between the intentions of romantic integrity and the compromises of life’s daily realities. Where Larson once insisted on casting actors with little or no experience, the role of Mimi in the film adaptation was handed over to Rosario Dawson. Where the production was once a simple staged reading at the New York Theatre Workshop, the latest tours have ventured as far as Slovakia and Guam. And where the first two rows of every Broadway show were once reserved for the homeless (or at least whoever stood in line the whole day), tickets now sell upwards of $200 a pop.

Jazz remains one of the few indigenous, American art forms, in that nothing quite like it ever existed before Buddy Bolden and Jelly Roll Morton started mixing up ragtime with the blues in an early 1900’s city called New Orleans. And to understand the history of jazz, as well as its incredible influence on our culture, is to understand the history of America and American music from slavery on up. Simply put, no artist you listen to today could exist without jazz. Which is why the genre makes its sudden flares of resurgence from time to time, and why you can still walk into most hip coffee shops around the city—notably, the Downbeat Café on Alvarado—and find a slick laptop-er or two subconsciously tapping their heels to the likes of Duke Ellington or Count Basie.

This Wednesday, July 28^th at 8:00 PM at the Hollywood Bowl, jazz proves its not dead with the internationally renowned Count Basie Orchestra—still going after eighty years. Known for popularizing the Kansas City-style of big band jazz, as well as initiating some of the greatest artists in history (including Billy Holiday, Jo Jones, and Charlie Parker), Basie, himself, passed away in 1984, but his band plays on under different direction and with a regenerating cast of musicians. The current Orchestra doesn’t strictly adhere to its Kansas City roots (i.e. rhythmic riffs under improvised solos), but instead incoporates more of the East coast, neo-classisist style of big band jazz, with complex arrangements by director Bill Hughes.

That’s not to say, however, that such Count classics as “One O’Clock Jump” or “April in Paris” won’t be bouncing through the Bowl on Wednesday—along with the Dave Holland Big Band, the Dave Douglas Big Band, and yes, maybe you. Due to the overwhelming response of our last giveaways, FineArtsLA.com is once again raffling off two tickets to the Hollywood Bowl to see the Count Basie Orchestra live at 8:00 PM. Just enter your first and last name into the form below, as well as your e-mail address, and you are automatically entered into the running to win not just Wednesday night’s tickets, but also the next three FineArtsLA.com giveaways. So brush up on your two-step, and dust off those dancing shoes; even if you don’t win our contest, you can still buy tickets here.

http://www.spike.com/video/2828991Bactrian camels, Arctic wolves, Pakistani snow leopards, oceanic whitetip sharks, and one coat-tailed conductor; that’s a lot to pack in anywhere, even the Hollywood Bowl. But this Friday and Saturday at the legendary amphitheatre, the LA Philharmonic will perform live musical accompaniment to selected footage from the spectacular BBC television series Planet Earth. Conducted by none other than the shows’ composer himself, George Fenton, the orchestra promises to match the stunning high-defition footage, as projected onto the Bowl’s big screen.

Planet Earth, which first premiered on the BBC in 2006, and was re-broadcast in the U.S. in 2007, compiles extraordinary, cinematic scenes of nature from all over the world, in eleven different habitats. It’s probably the best reality show you’ll ever see, if only because it’s completely devoid of humans. Yet, the series is without a doubt a distinctly human feat, and would be half as exciting were it not for the power of a fully human, orchestral score.

And yes, Fine Arts LA has two tickets to give away to hear this score performed live by the LA Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl this Friday, July 23^rd at 8:30 PM, alongside footage from BBC’s Planet Earth. George Fenton conducts, you and your date cuddle up, while the entire audience is transported to the places far beyond even Hollywood’s imagination. Just write in your first name, last name, and e-mail address into the form below, and you can be eligible to receive these Planet Earth passes, as well as the next three ticket giveaways we do. Safe travels.

Fireworks have the ability to conjure up about as many disparate meanings and memories as the number of spokes in their shooting spiral light displays. In China, they’re thought to scare away evil spirits. In America, they’re billed as patriotic—provoking heckles of “ooh’s” and “aah’s” and “hell yeah’s” from admiring crowds. In zombie movies, they’re often used as weapons of distraction. In the Middle East, they’re not much different than the sights and sounds of air bombs. And in romantic relationships, they’re either explosive celebrations of symbolic ecstasy, or nostalgic reminders of dying light.

Whatever meaning you may attach to them, fireworks do possess a universal power. And on this July 4^th, FineArtsLA.com is giving you and a lucky date the chance to witness the magic close-up at the best Independence Day pyrotechnics show this city has to offer. Live at the Hollywood Bowl, with special guest Vince Gill (does is get more patriotic?), and the U.S. Air Force Band of the Golden West (apparently it does), the Los Angeles Philharmonic presents the famous July 4^th Fireworks Spectacular. Simply write in your first name, last name, and e-mail address into the form below, and you will automatically be put in the running to win two free tickets to this year’s show (and as always, your name will be added to the lottery of the next three FineArtsLA.com ticket giveaways).

Sure, you could catch the lights from a distance off the side of the 101. But why not immerse yourself in the Bowl this year, and join the true fireworks show, which of course has nothing to do with gunpowder, but rather the thousands of individual sparks that fly up from our own collective subconscious.

Why Shakespeare? Why read him in high school, and teach him in college, and perform him in the park? Why not Marlowe? Or Chekhov? Ibsen? Why not go back further, and read Euripides or Sophocles? Why Shakespeare?

Some would say it’s due to his undeniable talent as a playwright and illuminator of the  human soul. Others might simply attribute his omnipresence to the best marketing team in the history of the world. Me—in case you were wondering—I think it’s the elasticity inherent in his work. Pretty much anyone could read his best plays, and get anything they want out of them. Othello, for example, could easily be read as a neo-Nazi call to arms. And I won’t even get into The Merchant of Venice.

But seriously, Shakespeare is, if nothing else, adaptable—and on every level, from script to cast. This is why we see mix-gendered versions of Romeo and Juliet, and high school-set films of The Taming of the Shrew. And this seems to be the impetus behind actress, director, and producer Lisa Wolpe’s newest venture, The Wicked Wilde Shakespeare Festival. It’s a five-week long summer theatre extravaganza of adapted Shakespeare works (with one Oscar Wilde piece thrown into the mix), playing at the Miles Memorial Playhouse in Santa Monica from May 29^th through June 7^th.

Wolpe is the founder and artistic director of the Los Angeles Women’s Shakespeare Company, an outfit dedicated to reversing the tradition of the old Globe Theatre, and casting all women. For this festival, however, Wolpe has included the male persuasion in her own adapted and directed material, while still maintaining her playful sense of gender confusion that already runs deep in much of Shakespeare.

The fest opens with A Tyrant’s Tale, Wolpe’s abbreviated take on A Winter’s Tale, with only seven actors (the original Shakespeare version has seventeen characters and spans sixteen years). Much like Othello (but funnier), the play concerns a jealous leader—King Leontes—and the borderline paranoia he suffers over his wife’s possible infidelity. The part I’m looking forward to, though, is how Wolpe interprets one of the most famous stage directions in all of theatre: “Exit, pursued by a bear.”

Macbeth3, the next in the wicked, wilde lineup, is Wolpe’s highly acclaimed post-apocalyptic adaptation of Macbeth. This reworking incorporates a whiff of Hamlet into the mix as well, with the character of Satan visiting Macbeth, and leading him into his tragic torment. Why the number 3 added to the title? You’ll just have to find out.

The festival also includes a gender-bending variation of Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest, as well as the anthologized Lovers and Madmen, an all-female grab-bag of Shakespeare scenes. But for now, FineArtsLA is giving away a pair of tickets to just the first two shows: A Tyrant’s Tale and Macbeth3 for this Sunday, May 30^th. The double-bill begins at 2 PM at Miles Memorial Playhouse.

If you’re a regular viewer of the site, you know the rules: simply enter your first name, last name, and e-mail address into the form below, and you will eligible to receive tickets to the first half of The Wicked Wilde Shakespeare Festival, and as an added bonus, you will be automatically entered into the running for our next three ticket giveaways (hint: The Importance of Being Earnest is on the list). Why Shakespeare? Why not? Especially if it’s free.

For more information about The Wicked Wilde Shakespeare Festival, or to find out how to buy the tickets on your own, please visit their site at www.lawsc.net.

On hearing a name like Buster Keaton or Charlie Chaplin, there are a number of typical silent film songs that pop into your head – mostly of the slapstick, bumbling, parodying varietal.  Films from the twenties, that roaring decade before the era of the “talkies” with flickering motion pictures of flappers and hapless hopeless romantic gentlemen who can’t quite seem to get anything right, were accompanied by live orchestras in the cinema.  The musicians would play upbeat, complex melodies that would stick in your head as exactly what Charlie Chaplin sounded like when he’d accidentally let another gentleman caller intercept a bouquet of flowers just before presenting them to a lady-friend.   Or they’d play downtrodden songs to suit a dejected Buster Keaton as he walks away from a car that’s inexplicably fallen apart beneath him.

The Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra has long been a fan of remembering those silent film orchestras of the past.  They host an annual Silent Film concert allowing audiences to reminisce the golden days of silent film by screening one or two and providing pitch-perfect accompaniment.   This year, LACO presents two silent, short films: Disney’s Alice’s Wild West Show and Buster Keaton’s iconic film, The Cameraman.  Both represent the joy of filmmaking in that era – a time when newcomers to the cinema actually believed a train was making its way into the theatre and evacuated with great speed in self-defense.

With conductor Timothy Brock at the helm, the LA Chamber Orchestra will play a new work, by Mr. Brock himself, to accompany The Cameraman and the original music that accompanied Alice’s Wild West Show all those years ago by Alexander Rannie. Because who would Buster Keaton be without that wily, horn-heavy soundtrack we all came to know and love?

Performing Sunday, May 23 at Royce Hall at 6:30pm, the concert just wouldn’t be complete without, well, you!  That’s right, welcome to our latest Extra! Extra! ticket giveaway.

A few things of note: by entering into this contest, you’re automatically entered to win our next three giveaways.  (We know, you’re welcome.) All we need is your first name, last name, and email address and voila – is that a newsboy cap you’re wearing?

(Click here if you think contests are for wussies and you’d rather buy your own tickets.)

Generally, creative innovation in any field is thought to have a kind of narrative. When young, the pull toward radical exploration and experiment is bright, vigorous, and hardly noticed by the establishment; that is until a little bit later when these once controversial methods start to become accepted by the mainstream, tauted as revolutionary, and before you know it, the avant-garde becomes the old guard—wisdom and tradition taking precedence over innovation.

But what if this narrative is in itself a kind of trap? What if the possibility for newness, for regeneration never peters out, even in death?

For the late master, avant-garde choreographer and dancer Merce Cunningham, this was essential. From his early 1950’s collaborations with such ground-breaking artists as Robert Rauschenberg and John Cage, up until his death at age 90, Cunningham was constantly striving for the future. As late as last year, he could be found hosting a weekly webcast series called “Mondays with Merce,” where he invited the world to see the inner-workings of his 57-year-old, world-renowned company, the Merce Cunningham Dance Company (MCDC).

And after his death in July of 2009, his innovation lives on. He, himself, arranged for a post-humous outline for his company called the “Legacy Plan”—a way for his work to continue to grow for future generations. As a part of it, the MCDC has embarked on its final, two-year-long international tour, where they will premiere brand new pieces by Cunningham for the very last time.

This is where FineArtsLA comes in. We have managed to score two tickets to see the Saturday, June 5^th performance of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, where they will be premiering to the world the reconstructed Roaratorio, featuring music by John Cage. And yes, we’re giving them away to you, our loyal followers. This is literally beyond a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity: all you have to do is enter your first name, last name, and e-mail address into the form below, and you will be eligible to receive two free tickets to see the 7:30 PM world-premiere performance of Merce Cunningham’s Roaratorio, as performed at the Walt Disney Concert Hall by the Merce Cunningham Dance Company on Saturday, June 5^th. Not only that, but you will be automatically entered into the running for our next three ticket giveaways.

Cunningham liked to leave his work up to chance, but if you just want guaranteed tickets, you can buy them here.

In Latin, the word “escape” means “out of cape,” due to the custom of the ancient Romans who would often avoid capture by literally throwing off their capes when fleeing. I personally like to recall this origin whenever I am thinking of escaping something—or someone—in my life, because it implies that part of me will always be left behind. Consider my favorite passage from the much-celebrated Cormac McCarthy novel No Country for Old Men, involving the newly acquainted Llewelyn Moss and a young gal on her way to California, both on them on the run from their respective pasts (quotation marks inserted by myself):

“There’s a road goin to California and there’s one comin back. But the best way would be just to show up there.”

“Show up there.”

“Yeah.”

“You mean and not know how you got there?”

“Yeah. And not know how you got there.”

“I don’t know how you’d do that.”

“I don’t either. That’s the point.”

The reason I like this particular conversation so much is because it calls into question the high-school-grad aphorisms of ‘there’s always tomorrow,’ or ‘today is the first day of the rest of your life,’ or ‘carpe diem,’ and instead offers a deeper, truer lesson—that each moment is always a continuation of the one before it.

Multi-award-winning, New York City-based playwright Sheila Callaghan knows this lesson all too well, and employs it to the max in the upcoming, debut production of her play Lascivious Something at the [Inside] the Ford Theatre. Opening this weekend on March 27th, and running until May 1st, the Paul Willis-directed Lascivous Something deals with the attempted escape of an American ex-pat and his new bride from the perils of 1980’s Reaganism to the lush vineyard of a secluded Greek Island. All is good and well with the fresh, grape-gurgling couple until the past comes back to haunt them in the form of an ex-lover with a metaphorical cape in hand.

If you would like to be among the first of those privvy to this new drama from one of America’s foremost, emerging talents in the theatre world —and maybe catch a few dialogues like the McCarthy passage above—then do we have a deal for you! FineArtsLA is giving away two free tickets to see the Friday, April 2nd production of Lascivious Something, beginning at 8 PM at the [Inside] the Ford Theatre on Cahuenga Blvd. Simply enter your first name, last name, and e-mail address into the form below. Not only will you be eligible to receive tickets to see Lascivious Something on April 2nd, but the next three shows in which we give away tickets as well. Just remember to not leave your cape at home.

Don’t want to risk the competition? Buy tickets here.

The kind people at UCLA Live have offered, exclusively to Fine Arts LA readers thank you very much, a discount on tickets to see that tortured, irresistible Englishman we wrote about last night at Royce Hall!  The man: Ian Bostridge.  The performance: Schubert’s Winterreise. The time: tomorrow evening, 8pm.

Click here to go to the event page and make sure once you’ve chosen your tickets that you enter in the following secret password: WINTERREISE.  That will get you 25% off — just cause you’re so in-the-know. Enjoy the show!  (The offer only lasts for a limited time and can’t be combined with any other offers.)