The 2015–16 UW–Platteville Performing Arts Series is under way.
All but the final performance will be held in the Richard and Helen Brodbeck Concert Hall in the Center for the Arts. The final performance, the Pro Arte Quartet, will be held in the Harry and Laura Nohr Gallery in Ullsvik Hall. All performances begin at 7 p.m.
“The Performing Arts Series once again brings a wide variety of musical genres to our area,” said Michael Breitner, interim director of event services at UW–Platteville. “The Center for the Arts ensures access to the arts for everyone and advances the arts for the community’s civic, economic and educational success. The arts are fundamental to the lives of the people of Platteville and Grant County.”
This year’s schedule of performances includes:
Igudesman and Joo: And Now Mozart, Oct. 22: Violinist Aleksey Igudesman and pianist Hyung-Ki Joo are an inventive comic duo whose mix of music, pop culture and zaniness has won them fans of all ages and cultures worldwide. As evidence, their YouTube sketches have attracted close to 40 million viewers.
Highly trained musicians, their inspired silliness can start with Rachmaninoff or Liszt and find its way through martial arts, movie classics, rock, hip hop, folk, heavy metal and disco, step dancing and Monty Python’s Ministry of Silly Walks.
Women of Will: The Overview, Nov. 20: A combination of riveting scenes and trenchant analysis, “Women of Will: The Overview” explores themes of love, loss, freedom, control, violence and power through the heroines of Shakespeare’s text.
Using performance and discussion, Tina Packer traces the chronological evolution of Shakespeare’s female characters and examines Shakespeare’s own journey and growth as a writer.
Director Eric Tucker returns to join forces with Packer and her acting mate, Nigel Gore, giving the trio another opportunity to tackle Shakespeare’s canon. Packer and Gore have starred opposite each other in several productions, including “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” (which netted Gore an Elliot Norton Award for Best Actor in 2010), “Antony and Cleopatra,” and “Hamlet.”
The Overview is a comprehensive presentation of Shakespearean scenes, insights, and discussion taken from the full five-part series. It covers the full breadth of Shakespeare’s works.
Everything Everly: The Guthrie Brothers, Jan. 22: Like their idols Don and Phil Everly, Jeb and Jock Guthrie have Kentucky roots, grew up in the Midwest and discovered at an early age their perfect singing harmonies. Jeb and Jock perform the “Everything Everly” tribute with authenticity and engage audiences with humor and history, performing all of The Everly Brothers greatest hits.
Gordon Goodwin: 2016 Jazz Festival, Feb. 5: A steady, persistent audio diet of the giants of jazz, pop, rock and funk has nourished Gordon Goodwin’s being since childhood. Count Basic; Duke Ellington; Buddy Rich; Thad Jones and Mel Lewis; Earth, Wind and Fire; and Tower of Power, among many others, influenced the music he makes today.
Goodwin’s ability to combine jazz excellence with any musical style makes his writing appealing to fans across the spectrum.
Danú. Feb. 29: Hailing from historic County Waterford, Danú is one of the leading traditional Irish ensembles of today.
The ensemble’s standing room only concerts throughout Ireland are events featuring performances and a mix of ancient Irish music and new repertoire. For two decades, Danú’s virtuosi players on flute, tin whistle, fiddle, button accordion, bouzouki and vocals have performed around the globe and recorded seven critically acclaimed albums. Winners of numerous awards from the BBC and Irish Music Magazine, Danú takes its audiences on a musical journey to the ensemble’s native Ireland.
Third Coast Percussion, March 14: Hailed by The New Yorker as “vibrant” and “superb,” Third Coast Percussion explores and expands the sonic possibilities of the percussion repertoire, delivering performances for audiences of all kinds.
Formed in 2005, Third Coast Percussion has developed an international reputation with concerts and recordings of energy and nuance. It is the Ensemble-in-Residence at the University of Notre Dame’s DeBarrolo Perfoming Arts Center, a position it assumed in 2013. The ensemble has the honor of being the first ensemble at the University of Notre Dame to create a permanent and progressive ensemble residency program at the center.
Pro Arte Quartet, April 5: The Pro Arte Quartet, founded in 1911–12 in Brussels, played its American debut in 1926, performing at the inauguration of the Hall of Music in the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. It returned for 30 tours to the United States, as well as a tour of Canada, often under the auspices of the noted patron of chamber music, Mrs. Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge.
Its first visit to Madison was in 1938, where, two years later, the musicians were stranded by Hitler’s invasion of Belgium and the outbreak of World War II. Following the concert on campus, the UW–Madison chancellor offered a permanent home to the quartet. It was the first such residency ever in a major American university and became the model on which many other similar arrangements were developed at other institutes. The Pro Arte became the faculty string quartet at UW–Madison in the late 1950s, an appointment that continues to the present day.
Additional information about the Performing Arts Series is available at http://www.uwplatt.edu/cfa/pas.
Tickets can be purchased at the University Box Office, located in the lower level of Ullsvik Hall, or by calling 342-1298 or 1-877-727-1CFA. Tickets can also be ordered online at tickets.uwplatt.edu.
Individual tickets for spring shows go on sale Dec. 15.
