KCMETROPOLIS.org
Kansas City's Online Journal of the Performing Arts

Harriman-Jewell Series
Sir James Galway and Lady Jeanne Galway, flutists
Thursday, November 3 at 7:30 p.m.
Folly Theater
300 W. 12^th St., Kansas City, MO
For tickets call (816) 415-5025, or visit online at www.hjseries.org.

For decades James Galway has been known as one of the outstanding flute performers in the world, and for this concert he is joined by his wife, also an accomplished flutist. The two of them will perform flute concertos or arrangements of music by Fauré, Debussy, Doppler, Morlacchi and others, in addition to a number of traditional folk tunes arranged for double flutes.

Both of the Galways have been praised internationally for the excellence of their performances. James Galway in particular has greatly popularized classical music in general and the flute in particular with dozens of classical and crossover albums which have sold over thirty million copies worldwide. This concert marks his seventh appearance on the Harriman-Jewell Series, and it is Lady Jeanne Galway’s second.

 

UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance
Fall Dance Concert
Thursday, November 3 at 7:30 p.m.
Friday, November 4 at 7:30 p.m.
Saturday, November 5 at 2:30 p.m. (free) and 7:30 p.m.
White Recital Hall, James C. Olson Performing Arts Center, UMKC Campus
4949 Cherry St., Kansas City, MO
For tickets call (816) 235-6222, or online at http://conservatory.umkc.edu

The UMKC Conservatory’s excellent dance division presents a variety of dance offerings in its fall concert this weekend. The featured choreography is by Antony Tudor, Jamal Story, and Augustus Bournonville, with additional choreography by UMKC Dance Division faculty DeeAnna Hiett, Sabrina Madison-Cannon, Ronald Tice, and Paula Weber.

To be performed are Tangent, choreographed by Ronald Tice; Rite Remixed (Notes on Rite of Spring), choreographed by Jamal Story; “Pas de trios” from La Ventana, with choreography by Augustus Bournonville; To Each Her Own, a number by dance department chair Paula Weber; Suite Etta, with dances by DeeAnna Hiett; Continuo, with choreography by DeeAnna Hiett; and Revisit, by Sabrina Madison-Cannon. The talented student dancers at UMKC generally give polished, nuanced performances.

 

Kacico Contemporary Dance Company
6 Impressions
Friday, November 4 at 8:00 p.m.Yardley Hall, Carlsen Center, JCCC Campus
12345 College Blvd, Overland Park, KS
For tickets call (913) 469-4445 or online at www.jccc.edu/performing-arts-series or www.kacicodance.org

The Kacico Contemporary Dance Company is one of Kansas City’s finest young contemporary dance companies and schools. In this performance, the company will present its annual repertory concert. Among the modern dance numbers will be works by co-artistic director Maggie Osgood Nicholls, Holly Noel Harmison and Allison McKinzie, as well as a reprise of a 2007 work by founder Michelle Diane Brown.

 

Lyric Opera of Kansas City
Così fan tutte
Saturday, November 5 at 7:30 p.m.
Wednesday, November 9 at 7:30 p.m.
Friday, November 11 at 7:30 p.m.
Sunday, November 13 at 2:00 p.m.
Muriel Kauffman Theatre, Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts
1601 Broadway, Kansas City, MO
For tickets, call (816) 471-7344, or online at www.kcopera.org.

In stark contrast to the spectacular grand opera production of Turandot which marked the Lyric Opera’s debut performances in the Muriel Kauffman Theatre at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts, the Lyric Opera is turning to a more intimate opera by Mozart for its second production of the season. Now that we know how the Kauffman Theatre handles lots of noise and action on stage (pretty well), this will be a more nuanced test of the theater’s acoustics and sight lines for smaller scale works.

The third of Mozart’s collaborations with the brilliant librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte, Così fan tutte was for years disparaged by critics and opera house managers alike for its scandalous libretto. Time seems to tame all things, however, and finally, more than a hundred years after it was born, Così fan tutte began to make its way through the great opera houses of the world and now stands as one of the composer’s most popular works.

Supposedly recounting true life events which took place during the lifetime of the composer, Così fan tutte tells of two sets of young lovers whose attachment is tested by a world-weary and cynical friend of the two young men. He challenges them to a test of their respective fiancés’ fidelity by inducing them to don disguises and woo each other’s lover. Bizarre though the plot sounds, it offers plenty of opportunity for great arias, duets, and two of the most classic vocal trios in the operatic repertory.

The Lyric Opera is bringing a talented and new-ish cash to the production. All four principal artists are making their Lyric Opera debuts: soprano Amanda Hall and French mezzo Marie Lenormand as the ladies, and tenor Matthew Plenk and Korean baritone David Won as the men. The saucy maid Despina is played by famous mezzo-soprano Suzanne Mentzer, making her Lyric Opera debut, and longtime Lyric Opera favorite John Stephens sings the bass role of Don Alfonso, the cynical gambler.

The production is being updated to the 1930s era with suitable costumes and sets. Così fan tutte is one of those operas that can easy be relocated in time and space without damage to the basic plot, so it should offer an interesting contemporary look to this classic comedy.

 

Friends of Chamber Music
Chanticleer
Saturday, November 5 at 8:00 p.m.
Helzberg Hall, Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts
1601 Broadway, Kansas City, MO
For tickets, call (816) 561-9999 or online at www.chambermusic.org.

The stellar male vocal group Chanticleer gives luminescent performances of choral works from ancient music to modern, and it is always a treat when they are in town. The Friends of Chamber Music is bringing them back this weekend to perform a program called “Love Story.” According to the publicity material, the program spans six centuries and includes music by de Victoria, Vivanco, R. Strauss, Whitacre, Paulus, Tavener, Ellington and more.

The concert appears to be the same as that which was recorded for compact disc release in the group’s home base of San Francisco last year. Copies of the CD will undoubtedly be available in the lobby for purchase and possible autographing…maybe it would make a good holiday present for the love interest in your life!

 

newEar Contemporary Music Ensemble
Concert 2: Strange Nonsense
Saturday, November 5 at 8:00 p.m.
All Soul’s Universalist Unitarian Church
4501 Walnut Street, Kansas City, MO
For tickets call (816) 235-6222, or online at http://www.newear.org

The second concert of newEar’s season “invites you to experience our take on ‘nonsense’—which is most decidedly more sense than non,” according to the group. A piano trio by Jeremy Podgursky is entitled Nonsense or Sorcery?#%!  The group will also perform Turkish-American composer Kamran Ince’s Strange Stone.

Other works on the program are Olge Neuwirth’s 5 Daily Miniatures, scored for countertenor, bass clarinet, piano, violin and cello, along with works by Jay Batzner and Henri Lazarof.

 

Heritage Philharmonic
Music to Lift Your Soul
Saturday, November 5 at 7:30 p.m.
Tri-City Ministries
4500 Little Blue Parkway, Independence, MO
Free admission. For more information visit http://www.heritagephilharmonic.org/ 

The Heritage Philharmonic, one of our fine community orchestras, under the direction of James Murray III, is presentation Beethoven’s Symphony No. 1 in this concert, along with vocal selections by sopranos Sarah Tannehill Anderson and Nicole Murray.

 

Performing Arts Series at Johnson County Community College
Munich Symphony with Gloriae Dei Cantores
Sunday, November 6 at 7:00 p.m.
Yardley Hall, Carlsen Center, JCCC Campus
12345 College Blvd, Overland Park, KS
For tickets call (913) 469-4445 or online at www.jccc.edu/performing-arts-series

The Munich Symphony Orchestra appears at Yardley Hall in the Johnson County Community College Performing Arts Series, conducted by Philippe Entremont.  The Symphony will be joined by Gloriae Dei Cantores chorus in performing Mozart’s Requiem. The concert will also include Verklarte Nacht (Transfigured Night) by Arnold Schoenberg.

The Munich Symphony Orchestra is one of the world’s great ensembles, and this writer does not remember its appearing in the Kansas City area before.  A review in the Washington Post of a different performance recently said that “Entremont and his orchestra conjured up a joyous whirlwind of sound that ultimately launched the music blazing into the ether.”

Gloria Dei Cantores is an American group, whose home base is in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, but which frequently tours the country and makes recordings.

 

William Baker Festival Singers
A Festival of Hymns Benefit
Sunday, November 6 at 2:00 p.m.
Faith Lutheran Church
67^th Street and Roe Avenue, Prairie Village, KS
Free admission, but good will donations will be collected.  For more information visit http://festivalsingers.org/

The William Baker Festival Singers, along with Steve McDonald on the 33-rank Nordlie Pipe Organ, perform a benefit concert for the Feast of All Saints, for the victims of the 2011 tornado in Reading, Kansas.  The concert will include selections by Gibbons, Bruckner, Brahms, Parker, Thomas, and a number of favorite hymns including For All the Saints, Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence, Now Thank We All Our God, Tell Out My Soul, and others.

 

Heritage Choir, MidAmerica Nazarene University
Great Choral Masterworks
Sunday, November 6 at 3:30 p.m.
Bell Performing Arts Center, MidAmerica Nazarene University
2030 East College Way, Olathe, KS
For tickets call (913) 971-3636 or online at www.mnu.edu/events

The Heritage Choir of Mid America Nazarene University in Olathe joins with the Symphonic Choir and Orchestra in a concert of choral masterworks. Detailed programming is not available at press time for KCMetropolis.org.

 

UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance
UMKC Fellowship Brass Quintet
Monday, November 7 at 2:30 p.m.
Central United Methodist Church
5114 Oak Street, Kansas City, MO
Free admission. For more information, visit http://conservatory.umkc.edu

For its fall concert, the UMKC Fellowship Brass Quintet, consisting mostly of graduate students at the Conservatory, will play selections by Gabrieli, Maurer, Weelkes, Kamen and Previn, and also an arrangement of The Plow That Broke the Plains by Kansas City native composer Virgil Thomson, who grew up just blocks from the current location of the Conservatory.

 

University of Kansas School of Music
University of Kansas Wind Ensemble
Monday, November 7 at 7:30 p.m.
Lied Center, University of Kansas
1600 Stewart Drive, Lawrence, KS
For tickets call (785) 864-3436 or online at www.music.ku.edu

The University of Kansas Wind Ensemble performs at the Lied Center in the group’s premiere of Michael Torke’s Mojave featuring Professor Ji Hye Jung, marimba.  The concert also includes Aaron Copland’s Quiet City with trumpet professor Steve Leisring and professor Margaret Marco playing the English horn.

 

Harriman-Jewell Series
Vienna Symphony Orchestra with Eroica Trio
Wednesday, November 9 at 7:00 p.m.
Helzberg Hall, Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts
1601 Broadway, Kansas City, MO
For tickets call (816) 415-5025, or visit online at www.hjseries.org.

The Orchestra of the City of Vienna has an outstanding reputation throughout the world as one of the leading touring orchestras, and under the direction of Fabio Luisi it has already given three prior performances with the Harriman-Jewell Series; this presentation is its fourth.

For this concert, the Orchestra is joined by the Eroica Trio who are carving out a deserved reputation as one of the fine piano trios (violin, cello, piano) of today. The trio will join the orchestra for Beethoven’s Triple Concerto, to be followed by the Brahms Symphony No. 2. 

Please note the earlier than usual start time for this concert! Also please note that Fabio Luisi has recently been appointed the principal conductor of the Metropolitan Opera and is almost fully booked with Met performances this fall following the sudden cancellation of Met artistic director James Levine. There has been no announced change of conductors for this concert, but don’t be surprised if it happens.

 

Kansas City Metro Opera
The Merry Widow
Friday, November 11 and Saturday, November 12, 7:30 p.m.
Sunday, November 13 at 4:00 p.m.
Congregation Kol Ami
7501 Belinder, Prairie Village, KS
Free admission. For more information visit http://www.kcmetroopera.com/

The Merry Widow, Franz Lehar’s evergreen Viennese operetta, is one of the most tuneful and attractive works in the canon, featuring comic situations, romantic interludes and a hummable score that contains some of operetta’s greatest hits. Patrick Buckley’s Metro Opera gives you an opportunity to enjoy it free of charge, as performed in a semi-staged version with local talent.

 

Lawrence Chamber Orchestra
The Strange Eyeless Heavens
Friday, November 11 at 7:30 p.m.
Lawrence Free Methodist Church
3001 Lawrence Avenue, Lawrence, KS
Tickets available at the door. For more information visit http://www.lawrencechamberorchestra.org/

The Lawrence Chamber Orchestra launches its 2011–12 season in a concert featuring English music for string orchestra from the first two decades of the 20^th century, including works by Sir Edward Elgar, John Ireland, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Frank Bridge.

 

Kansas City Wind Symphony
All That Jazz
Sunday, November 13 at 2:00 p.m.
Lakeview Village
9100 Park Street, Lenexa, KS
Sunday, November 20 at 2:00 p.m.
Village Presbyterian Church
6641 Mission Road, Prairie Village, KS
Free admission. For more information visit http://www.kcwindsymphony.org/

Director Philip Posey takes his Kansas City Wind Symphony to Lenexa and then back home to Prairie Village for two Sunday concerts which apparently will feature jazz favorites orchestrated for wind symphony.

 

Northland Community Choir
On With the Show
Sunday, November 13 at 3:00 p.m.
Graham Tyler Memorial Chapel
Park University, Parkville, MO 
Free admission. For more information visit http://www.northlandcommunitychoir.org/

The Northland Community Choir opens its season Sunday afternoon with a performance of what looks to be Broadway and show tune favorites.

 

Musica Vocale
Uplifting Music Born of Grief
Tuesday, November 15 at 7:00 p.m.
St. Therese North
7207 North State Route 9, Kansas City, MO
Sunday, November 20 at 3:00 p.m.
St. Elizabeth Church
2 East 75th Street, Kansas City, MO
Tickets available online at www.musicavocale.org.

Vocal conductor Arnold Epley, one of this area’s most sensitive and accomplished choir directors, brings his Musica Vocale group to two locals for this interestingly themed concert which will feature the works of Bach, Brahms, Hawley, Mäntyjärvi, and Moore. Performances by Epley’s groups always present a shimmering sound and a depth of detail.

 

UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance
Le nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro)
Thursday, November 17 at 7:30 p.m.
Friday, November 18 at 7:30 p.m.
Saturday, November 19 at 7:30 p.m.
Sunday, November 20 at 2:30 p.m.
White Recital Hall, James C. Olson Performing Arts Center, UMKC Campus
4949 Cherry Street, Kansas City, MO
For tickets call (816) 235-6222, or online at http://conservatory.umkc.edu.

For fans of Mozart operas, November is a glorious time.  If you enjoyed Mozart and Da Ponte’s Così fan tutte at the Lyric Opera near the beginning of the month, just two weeks later you can catch the first of the pair’s collaborations, Le nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro) at the UMKC Conservatory as performed by fine student undergraduate and graduate students.  Figaro is an ideal opera for student voices, requiring fine technique and nuanced acting, yet making no particularly strenuous vocal demands. Marciem Bazell, the Conservatory’s director of opera, will stage the production.

 

University of Kansas School of Music
The Beggar’s Opera
Thursday, November 17 at 7:30 p.m.
Sunday, November 20 at 2:30 p.m.
Murphy Hall
University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS
For tickets call (785) 864-3436 or online at www.music.ku.edu

John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera of 1728 is one of the early masterworks of opera, and one of the few prominent English operas between the times of Henry Purcell and Benjamin Britten. These performances will offer you an opportunity to enjoy this tuneful classic performed by the spirited and talented students of the University of Kansas School of Music.

 

Kansas City Symphony
Miraculous Mandarin, Plus Rachmaninoff
Friday and Saturday, November 18 and 19 at 8:00 p.m.
Sunday, November 20 at 2:00 p.m.
Helzberg Hall, Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts
1601 Broadway, Kansas City, MO
For tickets call (816) 471-0400 or online at www.kcsymphony.org.

Behzod Abduraimov, a student of Van Cliburn medalist Stanislav Ioudenitch at the Park University International Center for Music, is one of today’s leading young pianists, and the Symphony will feature him for the first time, playing the Paganini Variations of Rachmaninoff.

Abduraimov has already posted an impressive win at the London International Piano Competition and has performed with the London and Royal Philharmonic Orchestras. His solo dates this season include performances with the symphonies of Tokyo, Atlanta, Ottawa, Monte Carlo, and the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra in Zurich.

Also on the program are the Miraculous Mandarin Suite of Bartók, a suite from A Love for Three Oranges by Prokofiev, and Hindemith’s Symphonic Metamorphosis.

 

Friends of Chamber Music
REBEL with Rufus Muller
Friday, November 18 at 8:00 p.m.
Grace and Holy Trinity Cathedral
415 West 13^th Street, Kansas City, MO
For tickets call (816) 561-9999 or online at www.chambermusic.org. 

It sounds like a rock music group, but actually REBEL is a New York-based vocal ensemble which specializes in Baroque and classical repertoire, which it performs with a “distinctive, active” approach utilizing a “flamboyant, interventionist style” (The Los Angeles Times) and is known for “performances that lack nothing in inwardness, charm, or brilliance” (The Boston Globe).  The St. Paul Pioneer Press has reported that in the playing of the group “there was none of the bloodless artificial elegance of many early-music performers. They played beautifully, with a force and intensity that was invigorating.”

In this concert REBEL is joined by English-German tenor Rufus Müller known for his performances in both oratorio and Baroque opera, with appearances in the Netherlands, France, Portugal, Canada and the United States, among other countries.

The program is entitled “Out of the Eclipse: Music of Transformation & Revelation,” and includes cantatas, arias and instrumental music by Handel, Vivaldi, J.S. Bach, Blow, Telemann and Purcell. The concert is part of the Friends of Chamber Music’s Early Music Series.

 

Harriman-Jewell Series
Alek Shrader, tenor
Friday, November 19 at 7:00 p.m.
Folly Theater
300 W. 12^th St., Kansas City, MO
Free Discovery concert, but tickets are still required. For tickets call (816) 415-5025, or visit online at www.hjseries.org.

Several years ago the Metropolitan Opera released a film called The Audition, which told in documentary format the stories of several young singers who were engaged in the Metropolitan Opera National Council auditions, a nationwide process which results in just a few winners who sing in a concert onstage at the Metropolitan Opera in New York and go on to sign contracts with the company. Many of the world’s finest opera singers are winners of the Metropolitan Opera auditions.

One of the stars of the documentary was young tenor Alek Shrader, who is now following up his audition success with engagements in some of the world’s leading opera houses. This Harriman-Jewell concert offers you an opportunity to hear him for free.

The program has yet to be announced, but with critical acclaim on his side and an outstanding career just beginning, this recital should be a treat, regardless of what he sings.

 

Kansas City Civic Orchestra
2011: A Classical Odyssey
Friday, November 18 at 7:30 p.m.
Atonement Lutheran Church
9948 Metcalf Avenue, Overland Park, KS
Free admission. For more information visit http://kccivic.org

Christopher Kelts leads the Kansas City Civic Orchestra in its fall concert, featuring the music of Richard Strauss, Gustav Holst, Johann Strauss, Claude Debussy and John Williams, and especially featuring the Also Sprach Zarathustra theme made famous from the opening of the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey.   The John Williams compositions are themes from popular movies. Sounds like an enjoyable light-hearted evening of popular numbers.

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.