For the second consecutive year, the collaboration of Ballet Vero Beach and the Museum of Art produced a poem of a performance last week and this time, if you missed it, you don’t have to wallow in regret. You can jump online and buy a ticket to another joint effort Feb. 10, when the dancers leave the traditional stage of the museum’s Leonhardt auditorium and enter the galleries themselves to perform pop-up style.
Wednesday’s short program, “Moving Images: 3 X 3”, was composed of pieces of original choreography performed before screened images of the art that inspired them. Danced by ballet master Camilo Rodriguez and two excellent dancers, one male and one female, from Ballet Nebraska, the works had the dancers engaging the image at the back of the stage as a one-dimensional set; at other points, the projected images bled onto the dancers themselves, effectively creating a layer of costuming and a sense that the art was subsuming the dancers.
The net effect was beautiful and moving, and the caliber of both this year’s performance and last speaks to just how seriously Vero needs to take this new company.
As compared with last year’s dances that used no set, the images provided a more candid connection of choreography and the museum’s exhibits. And February’s performance will be even more connected: The dancers will perform in the museum’s galleries and other spaces, paying tribute to the museum’s 30th anniversary.
“From driven artists to lunching society ladies, we are really trying to highlight the museum as a cultural gathering point,” says Ballet Vero Beach artistic director Adam Schnell. “From what I know so far, the company is really throwing themselves into it.”
He says rehearsals will intensify in January, when dancers from Ballet Nebraska arrive to perform the first of two programs this season. The Jan. 22 and 23 performances will include Schell’s “Pastoral Symphony” and a repeat performance of last year’s sold-out museum collaboration, “Museum Pieces.”
If you missed out on tickets to the sold-out Riverside Goes to Hollywood cabaret benefit, there are two encore stagings Thursday night and Saturday night. Created by producing artistic director Alan Cornell and music director Ken Clifton, the show includes favorite songs from film scores, from “Mary Poppins” to “Dirty Dancing.” Four actors perform to the accompaniment of two grand pianos played by Clifton and Anne Shuttlesworth, who’ll also execute some instrumental numbers.
Last year, the pair teamed up to produce a concert of Lerner and Loewe’s music, and called the audience response “overwhelming.” The show takes place on the Stark Stage at 8 p.m. both nights. Tickets are $45.
Riverside Theatre is betting on the funny-nun phenomenon later this season when it presents “Sister Act” in April. If you need your fix before then, there’s “Late Nite Catechism” at Kravis Center’s Rinker Playhouse this weekend. The one-person show premiered in 1993 and has been running ever since. Written by Vicki Quade and Maripat Donovan, the comedy counts on participation from the audience to fill out the seats in the nuns’ school room as St. Bruno’s Adult Catechism Class. The smaller Rinker Playhouse should suit the show perfectly. Performances are Friday and Saturday night at 7:30; with matinees Saturday and Sunday at 1:30. Tickets are $35.
The Vero Beach Choral Society along with Rosewood Magnet School’s chorus are performing Fauré Requiem tonight at 7 p.m. at Community Church, with the children’s music teacher, JoAnn Palmer, performing as soloist. Justin Maxey, Community’s new associate conductor currently wrapping up a Master’s at Eastman School of Music, will be playing organ. And Choral Society accompanist Joanne Knott will be playing for the beautiful “Cantique de Jean Racine.”
The choir recently moved back to its original home at Community Church, where choral society musical director Jason Hobratschk has been helping out since his departure from Trinity Episcopal.
Last week, it was announced that Hobratschk has accepted a new position as organist and choirmaster of St. Augustine of Canterbury Church, continuing “the tradition of great music” established by Dr. Iris Tapley who is retiring at the end of the year.
Hobratschk studied in Germany as a Fulbright scholar before receiving his Ph.D. in musicology from Florida State University.
Tickets to the concert are $10 on the Choral Society’s website and $15 at the door.
Jazz percussionist Sammy Figueroa and the band he created, Sally’s Tomatoes, are playing in the intimate Black Box theater of Sunrise Theatre in Fort Pierce Friday night. Figueroa, side man to a long list of all-stars including Miles Davis, Chaka Khan, Mariah Carey and David Bowie, who frequently played with the bands of David Letterman and Saturday Night Live, is world-class in his delivery of Latin jazz. Twice nominated for a Grammy, he’s just released his fourth album, “Imaginary Worlds.”
The Miami-based drummer cites the influence of the late Cal Tjader, who got his start playing in a trio with Dave Brubeck and Paul Desmond post World War II, and moved into Latin Jazz in the 1950s and became noted for being the best-known non-Latin Latin artist. It was in honor of Tjader that Figueroa put together Sally’s Tomatoes to play his music. The concert starts at 8 p.m. Tickets are $25, or $40 for two. Students are $10.
