REVIEW: Restarting Songs for a New World (Artistry) Arts Music Theatre by Basil Considine - September 11, 2021September 12, 2021 Joey Miller (front, center) crouches in the spotlight in Artistry's production of Songs for a New World, playing at the Bloomington Center for the Arts through September 26, 2021. The production is dramatically lit by lighting designer Karin Olson. Photo by Lucas Wells. In the disruptive world of theatre rescheduling and
PREVIEW: Love Makes Fools and Philosophers: Fortune’s Fool’s New Show (Crane Theatre) Arts Theatre by Basil Considine - August 31, 2021August 31, 2021 Four of the storytellers for Fortune's Fool Theatre's upcoming storytelling show, You Who I Always/Never/Once Loved. Clockwise from UL: Les Kurkendaal-Barrett, Sam Landman, Denzel Belin, and Ariel Leaf. A fling kindled at the Rocky Horror Picture Show. First dates and hyper-commitment during the pandemic. Pining after someone's gone. These are a few
REVIEW: Karina Canellakis Leads MN Orchestra to Exciting Close (Orchestra Hall) Arts Music by Basil Considine - August 30, 2021August 31, 2021 The Minnesota Orchestra closed its summer programming this weekend with a thrilling program led by guest conductor Karina Canellakis. The evening included a movement from a symphony by William Grant Still, two excerpts from a Mozart piano concerto, and a Tchaikovsky symphony. For some season planners, the archetypical summer classical music
REVIEW: Should you Van Gogh? Are You on a Date? (Lighthouse) Arts Visual Arts by Basil Considine - August 24, 2021August 28, 2021 Patrons take in the Immersive Van Gogh Experience, now playing at Lighthouse Minneapolis in Northeast Minneapolis, Minnesota. Photo by Lucas Wells. It's been a week since the opening of the Immersive Van Gogh Exhibit in Northeast Minneapolis. This traveling multimedia experience runs through October 31, 2021, immersing visitors in a 360-degree,
REVIEW: Harmony Plunges Into the Ives of Summer (Seagle Festival/Schroon Lake, NY) Arts Music Opera by Basil Considine - August 15, 2021August 15, 2021 Victoria Erickson (as Harmony Twitchell), Joel Clemens (as Charles Ives), and Jake Goz (as Dr. David Twitchell) in the Seagle Festival's premiere of Harmony by Robert Carl & Russell Banks. How does the oldest summer singer training program in the country respond to a pandemic? When you're the Seagle Festival – a
REVIEW: Stirring American Musical Heroes (Minnesota Orchestra) Arts Music by Basil Considine - July 31, 2021July 31, 2021 Orchestra Hall in Minneapolis. Photo by George Heinrich Photography. The Minnesota Orchestra is getting its flirt on. No, not some sort of brass-woodwinds or string-percussion imbroglio – flirting with the audience. The ensemble's American Musical Heroes program, playing this weekend, is a grand tease, leaving the audience wanting more of just about every
REVIEW: Musically Impressive Islander (Theatre Elision) Arts Music Theatre by Basil Considine - July 29, 2021July 29, 2021 Deidre Cochran and Christine Wade in Theatre Elision's production of Islander by Amy Draper, Finn Anderson, and Stewart Melton, playing through July 31 at the Elision Playhouse in Crystal, MN. Photo by Jessica Holleque. If you're hesitant about returning to live theatre attendance, Theatre Elision is rolling out the red carpet treatment
BREAKING NEWS: Uprising Theatre Company to Close Arts Theatre by Basil Considine - July 26, 2021July 27, 2021 The Twin Cities-based Uprising Theatre Company announced today that it will cease operation in 2021. The organization joins the ranks of more than 200 Minnesota nonprofits to announce their plans to close since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Uprising Theatre's close leaves behind a legacy of rich and vigorous
REVIEW: Leslie Vincent Rocks the Belvedere in Sold-Out Show (Crooners) Arts Music by Basil Considine - June 6, 2021June 6, 2021 Singer-songwriter Leslie Vincent at her sold-out show at Crooners in Fridley, MN on Saturday, June 6. It was 95 degrees Fahrenheit in the open air in Fridley on Saturday evening. At Crooners, however, things were cooler, with a cooling breeze blowing off the lake and running under the tented canopy of
INTERVIEW: Leslie Vincent on Jazzing Up the Return to Live Performance (Crooners/The Belvedere) Arts Music by Basil Considine - June 3, 2021June 3, 2021 White Bear Lake-based singer-songwriter Leslie Vincent (front left) with her band at Crooners on August 10, 2020. Photo by Darin Kamnetz. For some musicians, 2020-2021 has been a giant artistic blank spot – less a tabula rasa, more a vacant room. Not so for singer-songwriter Leslie Vincent, who is taking the