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Kansas City's Online Journal of the Performing Arts

The first half of April affords opera fans several opportunities to enjoy their favorites. The Lyric Opera closes 41 years in the Lyric Theatre with a production of Mozart’s "The Marriage of Figaro." Also, this month gives you not one, but two opportunities to hear Handel operas (or excerpts from) by the Boston Early Music Festival courtesy of The Friends of Chamber Music and by the William Jewell College music department. Another operatic highlight is Kansas City Metro Opera’s production of a rarely done Gilbert & Sullivan piece, "The Gondoliers."

Fans of dance have several juicy opportunities this month, including the famed Joffrey Ballet at JCCC, City in Motion Dance Theater at the H&R Block City Stage in Union Station, the 940 Dance Company in Lawrence, and the UMKC Conservatory’s spring dance concert. Piano connoisseurs have an opportunity to hear pianist Alpin Hong at the Lied Center. We also have a spring performance by the outstanding Summerfest chamber ensemble, Mozart's Requiem with Timothy McDonald’s Musica Sacra, guitarist Douglas Niedt in recital, and the renowned ensemble I Musici de Montréal with the Harriman–Jewell Series. In addition, a number of community ensembles have spring concerts, including several with patriotic themes.


Friends of Chamber Music
Boston Early Music Festival: Acis and Galatea
Friday, April 1 at 8:00 p.m.
Folly Theater
12th St and Central Ave, Kansas City, MO
For tickets call 816-561-9999 or visit online at www.chambermusic.org.

Those who know the composer George Frideric Handel only through his oratorios, mostly famously The Messiah, and perhaps his instrumental suites such as Music for the Royal Fireworks and Water Music, are missing one of the most important ingredients of this Baroque master’s success: his operas. For much of his career, Handel considered himself primarily an opera composer, and, after learning his trade in Italy, practiced it by being both the feature composer for, but also the manager and impresario of, the Italian opera house in London.

In this region we occasionally have the privilege of hearing some of Handel’s opera arias in recital programs such as the magnificent program given last year as part of the Harriman-Jewell Series by our own Joyce DiDonato.  However, the chance to hear a full-length Handel opera is rare. The Lyric Opera performed Julius Caesar a few years ago, much to the delight of Handel fans, and occasionally, one of our local conservatories will host a Handel opera, but that’s about it.

Therefore, it is with special pleasure that we should welcome one of today’s leading Baroque music ensembles, the Boston Early Music Festival, to Kansas City for a costumed and staged production of Handel’s opera Acis and Galatea at the Folly Theater. Known for its exquisite performances of Baroque classics, this ensemble's Acis and Galatea has already met with much acclaim elsewhere.  A review in the Boston Globe in late 2009 noted Handel’s “musical generosity” with the score, and stated that, “BEMF’s production was musically impeccable.”

Not to be missed.

 
City in Motion Dance Theater
Transported
Friday, April 1 and Saturday, April 2 at 8:00 p.m.
Sunday, April 3 at 2:00 p.m.
H&R Block City Stage Theatre, Union Station
300 W Pershing Rd, Kansas City, MO
For tickets call 816-460-2020 or visit online at www.unionstation.org.

 City in Motion Dance Theater, one of Kansas City’s small inventive dance ensembles, presents its spring concert, Transported, at an appropriate transportation-themed venue, Kansas City’s Union Station.

Stephanie Whittler choreographs Something Unknown, set to the ethereal choral music of Björk. Penelope Hearne’s choreography of The Glorious Death of a Mechanical Answering Machine, is characterized as a “joyful piece” accompanied by music from The Books. The group will also perform another of her choreographies, The Ballad of Broken Strings, in partnership with a Kansas City aerial dance company called Paragon Aerial Silks.

Dale Fellin portrays the mating habits of the black widow spider in his piece, Widow.  The group also performs his Siamo, in selections interspersed throughout the concert. A dance called Mordia from 1992, by several choreographers, is being recreated by Andrea Skowronek.

The final numbers on the program are Formula by guest choreographer David Ollington,  set to a “driving percussion score” by Gabriel Roth, and A Play With Angels and Demons, danced to a gamelan score by Pat Conway, from choreographer Tuesday Faust.

William Jewell College
Opera Workshop: Handel’s Radamisto
Friday, April 1 and Saturday, April 2 at 7:30 p.m.
Gano Chapel, William Jewell College Campus
500 College Hill, Liberty, MO
For more information, visit online at www.jewell.edu/music.

Could it be possible that we have not one, but two opportunities to hear operatic Handel on the same night?  It's true—not only is the Friends of Chamber Music presenting Acis and Galatea on Friday evening, but the William Jewell College Opera Workshop is presenting excerpts from Handel’s opera Radamisto.  Considered one of the premiere operas by the English composer, Radamisto is rarely done these days and performances in this country, in particular, are almost unknown.  The William Jewell opera workshop continues with a second performance on Saturday.

 

Performing Arts Series at JCCC
The Joffrey Ballet
Saturday, April 2 at 8:00 p.m.
Yardley Hall at Carlsen Center
Yardley Hall at Carlsen Center, Johnson County Community College
12345 College Blvd, Overland Park, KS
For tickets call 913-469-4445 or visit online at www.jccc.edu/performing-arts-series.

The Performing Arts Series at Johnson County Community College offers one of the dance highlights of the season this weekend with the famed Joffrey Ballet performing at Yardley Hall. Founded in 1956, the company has become one of the most celebrated dance companies in the country. All features of the company’s talents, whose repertoire ranges from classic ballet to modern dance, will be on display in this program.

The performance will include Reflections with choreography by Gerald Arpino, the company’s artistic director, to music by Tchaikovsky; … smile with my heart to the music of Richard Rodgers and choreography by Lar Lubovitch; Sea Shadow, choreographed by Arpino to the music of Maurice Ravel; and Age of Innocence, which Edwaard Liang choreographed to the music of Philip Glass and Thomas Newman.

This should be one of the outstanding visiting dance programs of the season.

Kansas City Wind Symphony
And Thou, America!
Sunday, April 3 at 3:00 p.m.
Village Presbyterian Church
6641 Mission Rd, Prairie Village, KS
For tickets call 913-507-2575 or visit online at http://www.kcwindsymphony.org/

Philip Posey brings the Kansas City Wind Symphony’s 2010–11 season to a close Sunday afternoon with a concert of patriotic numbers. The evening will feature The Testament of Freedom for male chorus and wind orchestra by American composer Randall Thompson, set to the words of Thomas Jefferson. Also included on the program is William Schuman’s New England Triptych based on songs by the New England composer William Billings and Flag of Stars by English composer Gordon Jacob. John Wasson’s American Fanfare and Carmen Dragon’s setting of America the Beautiful round out the concert.

 
Bach Aria Soloists
Herman Hauskonzert
Sunday, April 3, 7:00 p.m.
Herman House (Private Residence)
Overland Park, KS
For tickets call 816-820-1473 or visit online at www.bachariasoloists.org.

The Bach Aria Soloists’ harpsichordist Elisa Bickers plays a Couperin unmeasured Prelude at this exclusive concert at a private home. Bach Aria Soloists founder and violinist Elizabeth Suh Lane joins with classical guitarist Beau Bledsoe to perform classics by the group’s eponymous composer Johann Sebastian Bach as well as master violinist Fritz Kreisler and others. In addition, Kansas City’s own Nathan Granner, one of the Three American Tenors, appears as a guest vocalist.

The Bach Aria Soloists’ Hauskonzerts are given in private homes and thus ticketing is very limited; call first, as this concert may well be sold out by the time this column appears.

 
UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance
Conservatory Choirs: Past, Present and Future
Thursday, April 7 at 7:30 p.m.
Visitation Catholic Church
5141 Main St, Kansas City, MO
For more information call 816-235-2799 or visit online at http://conservatory.umkc.edu

The Conservatory Choir directed by Charles Robertson is joined by choirs from area high schools and middle schools to perform Franz Beibl’s Ave Maria and other works.

 
UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance
Conservatory Graduate Fellowship Brass Quintet
Thursday, April 7 at 7:30 p.m.
Central United Methodist Church
5114 Oak St, Kansas City, MO
For more information call 816-235-2799 or visit online at http://conservatory.umkc.edu

Details of this concert have not been announced, but the UMKC Conservatory’s Graduate Fellowship Brass Quintet often gives fine performances.

Harriman-Jewell Series
I Musici de Montréal
Friday, April 8 at 8:00 p.m.
Folly Theater
12th St and Central Ave, Kansas City, MO
For tickets call 816-415-5025 or visit online at www.hjseries.org.

The Canadian ensemble I Musici de Montréal will make its third Harriman-Jewell appearance this Friday, presenting the music of two Russian masters, Tchaikovsky and Mussorgsky. Two Tchaikovsky pieces open the concert, but the centerpiece of the performance will be Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition.

As most music lovers know, this series of tone poems was inspired by an exhibition of paintings by Victor Hartmann, some of which have since been lost.  The Canadian ensemble’s director, Yuli Turovsky, decided to have his daughter, the artist/violinist Natasha Turovsky, “re-create” some of the lost pieces, taking as her inspiration the music which the original paintings inspired.  This performance will therefore feature both musical and visual elements.

 
Summerfest
Spring Into Summertime
Friday, April 8 at 7:30 p.m.
Atonement Lutheran Church
9848 Metcalf Ave, Overland Park, KS
For more information visit http://www.summerfestconcertsinc.com/

Well, it may not quite be summertime yet, but you wouldn’t know it from Summerfest, the fine Kansas City chamber music ensemble which ordinarily performs concerts in July. This year the group is getting a head start on its summer season by presenting a free concert featuring the Mozart Clarinet Quintet as well as music by Georg Philipp Telemann, Alberto Ginastera and Robert Musczynski.

The music should be excellent, the performers are talented, the price is right, and, in case you were wondering, no other ensemble this weekend is performing the work of Robert Musczynski.  Sounds like a winning combination.

 

Lied Center Series
Alpin Hong, pianist
Friday, April 8 at 7:30 p.m.
Lied Center, University of Kansas
1600 Stewart Dr, Lawrence, KS
For tickets call 913-864-3464 or visit online at www.lied.ku.edu.

Pianist Alpin Hong, a Michigan native who was raised in California and educated at Juilliard, will appear this weekend at the Lied Center in Lawrence.  At a young age, he won the 1989 Stravinsky Piano Competition, the 1993 SYMF Competition and the 1994 Los Angeles Spotlight Awards Competition. He was the winner of the Concert Artists Guild Competition in 2001. 

His many performances include solo recitals, including one in the Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, and collaborations with numerous symphony orchestras. Praised by many for his vivacity and his dedication to educating audiences in classical music, he was labeled “a pianistic firebrand” by The New York Times.

Hong’s Lied Center solo piano concert will include Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, Scriabin's Nocturne for the Left Hand Alone and works by Chopin, Mendelssohn, Liszt, and Rachmaninoff.

 

Lyric Opera of Kansas City
The Marriage of Figaro
Saturday, April 9 at 8:00 p.m.
Wednesday, April 13 at 7:30 p.m.
Friday, April 15 at 8:00 p.m.
Sunday, April 17 at 2:00 p.m.
Lyric Theatre
11th St and Central Ave, Kansas City, MO
For tickets call 816-471-7344 or visit online at www.kcopera.org.

When the Lyric Opera began performing in the Lyric Theatre building in 1970, it was a revelation for the company and its audiences to hear the company in spacious quarters far more befitting the city’s premiere opera company than the cramped confines of its previous venues. To celebrate the occasion, the company performed one of the most popular pieces in the repertoire, Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro, in that first Lyric Theatre season.

Fast forward a mere 41 years and we now find the company ready to change venues once again, this time to the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts which opens in September. To draw a fitting conclusion to its years in the Lyric Theatre, the Lyric Opera is producing The Marriage of Figaro once again. This time, however, it is being mounted as a “farewell to the theater” production which will contain some interesting staging concepts such as… Well, we should just let you come and see for yourself. Suffice it to say that the ending, among other things, will be unique and unlike any Figaro you may have seen before.

Starring in the Figaro production will be baritone Andrew Gangestad in the title role, with Sari Gruber portraying his true love, Susannah. Lyric Opera newcomer Katie Van Kooten will sing the Countess, with veteran baritone Troy Cook as the Count. Debuting artist Brenda Patterson portrays the impetuous young boy Cherubino. Director Mark Streshinsky, who debuted with the Lyric Opera in Handel’s Julius Caesar in 2008, will mount the unusual staging, with Lyric Opera artistic director Ward Holmquist conducting the orchestra.

Mozart was peerless as a composer who could portray characterizations in music, and Figaro represents perhaps the finest example of this talent. Covering the range of almost all emotions, and containing some of the most hilarious and also some of the most poignant scenes in all of opera, the work remains as timeless and relevant today as it was when it was composed, on the eve of the French Revolution. This will be your chance to not only enjoy one of opera’s greatest classics with an outstanding cast and unusual staging, but also to bid farewell to a Kansas City music landmark which has served all three of our major performing arts organizations well. And in just a few months, our opera, symphonic and ballet worlds will be changing dramatically as the Kauffman Center opens. It’s an exciting time for Kansas City!

 

Northland Symphony Orchestra
Latin American Music
Sunday, April 10 at 3:00 p.m.
Park Hill South High School
4500 NW River Park Dr Riverside, MO
For more information visit www.northlandsymphony.org

The Northland Symphony Orchestra, one of several fine community orchestral ensembles in Kansas City, presents its fourth concert of the 2010–11 season on Sunday afternoon. The performance of Latin-themed music will include the Cuban Overture of George Gershwin, Manuel da Falla’s Suite No. 2 from his wonderful ballet The Three Cornered Hat, España by French composer Emmanuel Charbrier, an Intermezzo from Enrique Granados, and the Andalucian Suite by the mid-20th-century Cuban composer Ernesto Lecouna.

Also included in the concert will be a performance by the winner of the Northland Symphony Orchestra’s Young Artist Competition, yet to be announced.

 

UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance
Spring Dance Concert
Thursday through Saturday, April 14–16, at 7:30 p.m.
White Recital Hall, James C. Olson Performing Arts Center
4949 Cherry, Kansas City, MO
For tickets call 816-235-6222 or visit online at www.umkc.edu/cto.

The spring dance concert by the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance is your opportunity to see some of the fine young dancers being trained by the Conservatory, often in choreography by members of the Conservatory dance faculty. The central piece will be Anthony Tudor’s ballet Dark Elegies, staged by Kansas City Ballet assistant ballet master James Jordan to the music of Mahler.  Conductor Robert Olson will lead the Conservatory Chamber Orchestra in the music from Mahler’s Kindertotenlieder.  Aidan Soder of the UMKC Conservatory voice faculty will sing.

 
940 Dance Company
Red
Thursday, April 14 and Saturday, April 16 at 7:30 p.m.
Lawrence Arts Center
940 New Hampshire St, Lawrence, KS
For tickets call 785-843-2787 or visit online at www.940dancecompany.org.

Artistic director Susan Rieger presents her 940 Dance Company in a program called Red, and is encouraging audience members to dress in that color. The program will feature the director’s new double duet, entitled Warranty Not Included, to the David Lang piece Cheating, Lying, Stealing. The dance explores “the minefield of long–term love.”

Also on the program are two new works, the humorous Sword of Damocles and Ark-eology, an “abstract, driving sextet” to the music of John Cage. In addition, Rieger’s Resilience inspired by the sculpture of Maria Abakanowicz, will also be on the program.

Another premiere is Justin Hundley’s Six, to music composed by Ryan Woodhouse and performed live by a sextet from the University of Kansas. Bobbi Foudree will present a humorous take on media addiction, TV: It Might Rot Your Brain. Jennifer Flynn has choreographed a fast-paced quartet to the music of guitarist Trace Bundy. Eric Tedder will present two new works, a trio and a quintet.

Each evening the dance company will feature a different guest artist.  On Thursday it is  Alash, “the tuvan throat–singing ensemble,” and on Saturday it is members of the Black House Improvisers’ Collective.

Kansas City Metro Opera
The Gondoliers
Friday, April 15 at 7:30 p.m.
Central United Methodist Church
5144 Oak St, Kansas City, MO
Saturday, April 16 at 7:30 p.m.
Sunday, April 17 at 4:00 p.m.
Congregation Kol Ami
7501 Belinder Ave, Prairie Village, KS
For more information visit http://www.kcmetroopera.com/

Tired of the same three Gilbert and Sullivan operettas?  Patrick Buckley’s Kansas City Metro Opera performs offers you an opportunity this weekend to hear another one of the delightful pair’s hits, The Gondoliers. The predictably silly story is set in Venice, but the tunes are strictly English. Sit back and enjoy.

Kansas City Guitar Society
Douglas Niedt, guitar
Saturday, April 16 at 7:30 p.m.
St. Paul’s Episcopal Church
40th St and Main St, Kansas City, MO
Tickets available at the door.  For more information visit http://www.kansascityguitarsociety.org/

This fund raising concert for the Kansas City Guitar Society will feature one of the area’s finest classical guitarist, Douglas Niedt, the head of the guitar program at the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance.

Musica Sacra
Mozart’s Requiem Mass
Saturday, April 16 at 7 p.m.
St. Francis Xavier Catholic Church
52nd St and Troost Ave, Kansas City, MO
For tickets call 816-235-6222 or visit online at www.rockhurst.edu/musicasacra.

Rockhurst University music department chair Timothy McDonald turns the attention of his fine Musica Sacra ensemble to one of the great masterworks of the choral repertoire, Mozart’s Requiem Mass, in this concert.  It will be preceded by another Mozart work, the Missa Brevis in F. 

Singing solo parts in the Requiem will be an impressive quartet of singers: soprano Rebecca Lloyd, mezzo–soprano Un–Chong Christopher, tenor Jacob Sentgeorge, and bass Chad Floyd.  

The Requiem Mass was one of the final pieces Mozart ever wrote, and he famously dictated the final movements of it from his deathbed not Antonio Salieri, as playwright Peter Schaffer would have us believe, but to his pupil and loyal aide Franz Xaver Sussmayr.  Regardless of the method of composition, it is one of the most melodious and stirring choral works ever composed.  This listener, for one, always cherishes an opportunity to hear it one more time.  It makes a fitting end to Musica Sacra’s 2010–11 concert season.

William Baker Festival Singers
Modern Masters Concert
Saturday, April 16 at 8:00 p.m.
Grace and Holy Trinity Cathedral
415 W 13th St, Kansas City, MO
Tickets available online at www.festivalsingers.org.

The William Baker Festival Singers presents one of its Kansas City area concerts this weekend.  At press time no information was available about the program for this concert.

Kansas City Civic Orchestra
Magnificence, Mendelssohn and Magic!
Saturday, April 16 at 7:30 p.m.
Folly Theater
12th St and Central Ave, Kansas City, MO
For more information visit http://www.kccivic.org

The Civic Orchestra presents its final concert of the 2010–11 season at the Folly Theater, consisting of two Mendelssohn favorites, two orchestral excerpts from Wagner’s Die Walküre, and a world premiere of a work commissioned by the Civic Orchestra.

The two Mendelssohn works are his popular Hebrides Overture, “Fingal’s Cave” and the Violin Concerto in E minor.  The featured soloist in the violin concerto is Yu-Fang Chen, a native of Taipei who has studied with several teachers in Asia and who is now is working on a doctorate degree at the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance and studying with Benny Kim. She has performed on several continents and as a member of numerous orchestras and chamber ensembles, including the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra.

For its Wagner selection, the Orchestra has chosen the “Wotan’s Farewell” and “Magic Fire Music” from the third act of his Ring cycle opera, Die Walküre. 

The world premiere work on the program is William Funk’s Trettanrune for String Orchestra.  Funk is a professor at Baker University and a freelance trumpeter in the Kansas City area. His previous compositions include Additions, Anne’s Villanelle and Concert Piece for Strings, among others. His works have been performed by the Lawrence Chamber Orchestra, Kansas City Wind Symphony, Southeast Missouri State University Wind Symphony, as well as other ensembles throughout the country.

Kansas City Electronic Music and Arts Alliance
Spring Concert: Unity
Saturday, April 16 at 7:30 p.m.
Unity Temple on the Plaza
707 West 47^th Street, Kansas City, MO
Tickets available at the door; for information see www.kcema.net.

The four-year-old Kansas City Electronic Music and Arts Alliance (KcEMA) presents its spring concert featuring Queen of Heaven for piano and electronics by Scott Blasco, The End of Histories for piano and multimedia by Chris Biggs, Velvet Sink for piano and electronics by Jeff Harriot, Liquid Bars for percussion and electronics by João Pedro Oliveria, and Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is for percussion and electronics by Peter Swendensen.

The concert features pianist Kari Johnson and percussionist Robert Burke. Both are DMA students at the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance.

Jacomo Chorale
American Favorites
Saturday, April 16 at 7:30 p.m.
Nativity of Mary Church
10017 East 36th Ter S, Independence, MO
Tickets available at the door. For more information visit http://www.jacomochorale.org/.

The Jacomo Chorale, an Eastern Jackson County community choral group, performs its spring choral concert this Saturday, featuring the music of American favorites George M. Cohan, Cole Porter, George and Ira Gershwin, and Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein.

Northland Community Choir
37th Annual Spring Concert
Saturday, April 16 at 7:00 p.m.
Graham Tyler Memorial Chapel, Park University
8700 NW River Park Dr, Parkville, MO
For tickets call 816-245-6769 or visit online at www.northlandcommunitiychoir.org.

The Northland Community Choir is a community vocal ensemble which has been around for most of four decades. The group performs its spring concert on the campus of Park University this Saturday evening. The featured number is Et Lux Perpetua Requiem by composer Maurice Duruflé. The piece will feature soprano Julia Scozzafava, baritone Joshua Lawlor, and organist Terry Foster.

Youth Symphony of Kansas City
Spring Concert
Sunday, April 17 at 8:00 p.m.
Folly Theater
12th St and Central Ave, Kansas City, MO
For more information visit http://www.youthsymphonykc.org/

The Youth Symphony of Kansas City’s full orchestra has its spring concert this weekend at the Folly Theater. The concert will be preceded earlier in the day by the String Orchestra and Academy Orchestra (2:00 p.m.) and the Symphonette and Philharmonic Orchestra (5:00 p.m.).  No programming for this concert is available at press time for this issue.

By Don Dagenais

City Classics Music and Dance Columnist; Classical Contributor

A lifelong classical music fan, Don Dagenais is a frequent preview speaker for the Lyric Opera of Kansas City and has taught classical music and opera courses at several Kansas City venues. He has served on the boards of directors of a number of performing arts organizations including the Lyric Opera of Kansas City, the Lyric Opera Guild, UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance, Opera Volunteers International, the Civic Opera Theater of Kansas City, Inspiration Point Fine Arts Colony, Octarium, and the Friends of the Symphony.  He has been the past president of most of these organizations and is current the president of the Friends of the Symphony. 

Dagenais co-authored a history of the Lyric Opera of Kansas City, published on the occasion of its 50th anniversary (2007) and has written books on the histories of both the Lyric Opera Guild and Opera Volunteers International, as well as an introductory book for opera novices (Your Passport to the Opera).  He has received several local and national awards for outstanding volunteer work for the arts, including a lifetime achievement award from The Coterie Theatre in 2000, the Kansas City Musical Club's annual award in 2001, a Partners in Excellence Award from Opera Volunteers International in 2002, a Bravo Award from Opera Volunteers International in 2004 and a community service award from the Daughter of the American Revolution in 2008 honoring him for his community service to the arts.

In addition to his music interests, Don is president of the board of directors for the Metropolitan Ensemble Theater and has served on the boards of The Coterie Theatre and the Heart of America Shakespeare Festival, serving as president of each organization.  He publishes newsletters for seven arts organizations.  When not involved in the performing arts, Don is a senior real estate attorney with Lathrop & Gage LLP in Kansas City, Missouri, where he has practiced law since 1976 after graduating from the Cornell Law School.