Brava

June 2011

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play in the spotlight Serious Fun Celebrating 20 years of classic entertainment By Michael and Jean Muckian agreed with her, their unorthodox view led to the creation of Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society in 1992, an annual col- laboration of some of the area’s best clas- sical musicians who reunite each June for F lutist Stephanie Jutt never believed classical chamber music needed to be stuffy. When pianist Jeffrey Sykes what the group describes as “serious fun.” The ensemble celebrates its 20th season this month. “There’s nothing about classical music that says the players have to be serious or stodgy,” says Jutt, who is principal flut- ist with the Madison Symphony Orchestra and faculty member in the UW School of Music. “We play all kinds of music, from the most lighthearted fluffy stuff to the most serious and profound, but our habit of keeping a light touch on it all has served us well.” In addition to Jutt and Sykes, music di- rector for Madison’s Opera for the Young and music faculty member at California State University-East Bay, BDDS attracts involvement from a revolving group of classical pros that have numbered more than 100 in the organization’s 20 years. The 2011 roster includes Parry Karp, UW- Madison’s professor of cello and chamber music and a member of Pro Arte Quartet, violinist Suzanne Beia, a fellow Pro Arte member and co-concertmaster for both MSO and the Wisconsin Chamber Or- chestra, and seven other accomplished musicians. The rotating ensembles offer two per- formances each of six different concerts For more on local arts and entertainment, visit Culturosity at bravamagazine.com. performed throughout southern Wiscon- sin. All performances are ganged under a single, usually whimsical, theme. This year’s series embraces the music of BDDS’s namesake composer under the sobriquet, “Bach to the Future.” “We thought we’d indulge ourselves in a bounty of baroque playing,” says Jutt, who began her career in the 1970s as a San Fran- cisco street musician. “Our audiences love Bach and are always asking for more, so we will feature an important piece by Bach in every concert this year.” For many audience members the music performed Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays throughout June is only part of the draw. The concerts are accompanied by prize drawings, dramatic readings and other fri- volity, and rotate between The Playhouse at Madison’s Overture Center, the beauti- fully restored Stoughton Opera House, and Hillside School on Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin campus near Spring Green. “Chamber music, or any classical music, is truly on the endangered list,” Jutt says. “But once we get listeners in the door, they tend to love it and come back again and again.” Visit bachdancinganddynamite.org. The Play’s Still the Thing American Player’s Theatre kicks off its eight-play summer season June 11 with “The Taming of the Shrew,” a Shakespear- ean favorite designed to raise the hackles of feminists everywhere. Also opening in June are Noel Coward’s “Blythe Spirit,” Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s “The Critic,” Tennessee Williams’ “The Glass Menag- erie,” and a stage adaptation of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s “Crime and Punishment.” In August, watch for an adaptation of John Steinbeck’s “Of Mice and Men,” William Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” and Seamus Haney’s “The Cure at Troy,” an adaptation of Sophocles’ “Philoctetes.” Visit americanplayers.org. 64 BRAVA Magazine June 2011 Provocative Prints Printmakers produce artistic images in quantity, and the message those images communicate— whether high-minded, humorous or horrific—can have a powerful and far-reaching influence. The Chazen Museum of Art on the UW-Madison campus will offer “The Loaded Image: Printmaking as Persuasion,” an exhibition of prints from its permanent collection dating from the 19th century to modern day. The exhibition runs June 18 through Sept. 25. Visit chazen.wisc.edu.

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