Aisle Be Seeing You

Golden Dragon Acrobats return to Boston this Sunday!

Boston favorites the Golden Dragon Acrobats return to Symphony Hall this Sunday. Good seats are still available!

Boston Globe review of Balé Folclórico da Bahia

Balé Folclórico da Bahia lit up the Opera House on Saturday night. Karen Campbell reviewed the performance for today's Boston Globe: Brazilian troupe kicks up the heat.

Christine Brewer and Helen Traubel, a musical lineage

Helen Traubel

Following Christine Brewer's recital last Saturday, Richard Dyer, the former classical music critic for the Boston Globe, made an apt comparison between Brewer and an earlier operatic denizen of St. Louis, Helen Traubel. Brewer herself mentioned Traubel, but it was Mr. Dyer who made the comparison and got this writer thinking...

I took a look in the Celebrity Series archives and sure enough Aaron Richmond had presented Ms. Traubel at Symphony Hall in 1942 with BSO cellist Jean Bedetti and two piano accompanists: Conrad V. Bos and Leonard Bernstein (you heard me). There were numerous overlaps between Ms. Traubel's 1942 program and Ms. Brewer's (at least as originally planned). Traubel also programmed Gluck's "Divinités du Styx" from Alceste, some of the same Wagner and Richard Strauss. Both singers closed their programs with Frank LaForge's "Hills." I wonder if Ms. Brewer conceived of her program as a kind of tribute.

I wasn't around in 1942, but I'm betting Ms. Traubel's recital was as musically wondrous as Ms. Brewer's. It's nice to know that our muse here at the Series has not drifted too far and that we are in some way representing quality performing in a continuum.

Here is the Boston Globe's review of Ms. Brewer's recital.

UPDATE: Please see Ms. Brewer's comment below (a first!) and note that Amazon.com is taking pre-orders for her CD, Echoes of Nightingales, and Hyperion, the label releasing the CD, is offering streaming excerpts.

The Sisters Callaway sing Rodgers and Hammerstein (video)

Ann Hampton and Liz Callaway bring their sister act to Sanders Theatre in Cambridge this Friday night. They'll be singing songs of the 60s and 70s in Cambridge, but this is Rodgers and Hammerstein's You'll Never Walk Alone.

We still have good seats for Friday night's performance.

Martha H. Jones receives Patrick Hayes Award

Martha H. Jones

Congratulations to Celebrity Series of Boston President and Executive Director, Martha H. Jones, on receiving the 2011 Patrick Hayes Award at the International Society for the Performing Arts (ISPA) annual conference in New York. ISPA is a not-for-profit network of performing arts professionals who convene with the goal of strengthening the arts internationally by building leadership ability, recognizing and discussing field-wide trends and deepening global exchange through the arts.  ISPA is wide-ranging network of over 350 individuals, organizations and institutions from more than 40 countries around the world. 

The Patrick Hayes Award recognizes an ISPA member whose achievements in arts management are deserving of special praise and recognition, and is named after ISPA’s founding president, Patrick Hayes. With her 25 years of leadership at the Celebrity Series of Boston, previous role as Chair of ISPA, role as founding member of the Huntington Theatre Company, and numerous achievements in the field of arts administration, Marty has continually proven her indispensability as a leader in the field of arts management.

Marty joins a select group of only 24 arts leaders who have received this prestigious award. 

For more information on the award, visit:
http://www.ispa.org/who/awards/424-2011patrickhayesaward