Now Playing Onstage in Wichita - Week of 2/10/2013

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Count Basie Orchestra w/the New York Voices in Broadway" border="0" height="100" width="100" align="right"> Count Basie ORCHESTRA W/THE New York Voices
Orpheum Theatre
2/16-2/16/2013
The Count Basie Orchestra is one of the most thriving big bands in history With 17 Grammy awards, the musicians have grown up with the Kansas City Swing style of Count Basie and add their own voice to the band. With 19 performers, 17 sidemen, 1 vocalist, and 1 bandleader, they've become the premier jazz band. Check out the Kansas City style swing for yourself. The Count Basie Orchestra celebrates the big band experience through the completely original and identifiable Count Basie repertoire. Come and experience our musical heritage. They will be releasing our latest recording in the next few months, be on the look out for new album wherever the Count Basie Orchestra performs. You can then say, " I came back to Basie. The real Basie! Not a counterfeit�. Celebrating their 20th Anniversary in 2009, New York Voices is the Grammy Award winning vocal ensemble renowned for their excellence in jazz and the art of group singing. Like the great groups that have come before, such as Lambert, Hendricks and Ross, Singers Unlimited, and Manhattan Transfer, they have learned from the best and taken the art form to new levels. Their interests are rooted in jazz, but often Brazilian, R and B, classical, and pop influences are infused with equal creativity and authenticity.
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VERDI'S RIGOLETTO
Murdock Theatre
2/16-2/16/2013
or this production, the action has been updated to 1960 Las Vegas. Act I At his casino, the Duke boasts of his way with women. He dances with the Countess Ceprano, while Rigoletto, the Duke's hunchbacked sidekick and sometime comedian, mocks the countess's enraged but helpless husband, Count Ceprano. Marullo, one of the Duke's entourage, bursts in with the latest gossip: Rigoletto is suspected of keeping a young mistress at his place. Rigoletto, unaware of the news, continues to taunt Ceprano, who plots with the others to punish hiM. Monterone, an Arab tycoon, forces his way into the crowd to denounce the Duke for seducing his daughter and is viciously ridiculed by Rigoletto. Monterone is arrested and curses Rigoletto. Rigoletto is disturbed by Monterone's curse. He encounters Sparafucile, a hitman, who offers his services. Rigoletto reflects that his own tongue is as sharp as the murderer's knife. Arriving at home he warmly greets his daughter, Gilda. Afraid for the girl's safety, he warns the housekeeper, Giovanna, not to let anyone into the apartment. When Rigoletto leaves, the Duke appears and bribes Giovanna, who lets him in. He declares his love for Gilda, who has secretly admired him at church, and tells her he is a poor student. After he has left, Gilda tenderly thinks of her newfound love before going to bed. The Duke's entourage gathers, intending to abduct Rigoletto's "mistress." Rigoletto appears and they quickly change their story, telling him they are abducting the Countess Ceprano, and enlist his aid in their scheme. But they have deceived him and it is Gilda they carry off, with Rigoletto's unwitting assistance. He rushes in to discover that his daughter is gone and collapses as he remembers Monterone's curse. Act II At the casino, the Duke is distraught about the abduction of Gilda. When his entourage returns and tells him the story of how they took the girl from Rigoletto's apartment and left her in the Duke's rooms, her hurries off to her. Rigoletto enters, looking for Gilda. The entourage is astonished to find out that she is his daughter rather than his mistress, but they prevent him from storming into the Duke's apartment. Rigoletto violently denounces them for their cruelty, then asks for compassion. Gilda appears and runs in shame to her father, who orders the others to leave. Alone with Rigoletto, Gilda tells him of the Duke's courtship, of her abduction, and her seduction by the Duke. Monterone is brought in as he is being taken away by the Duke's men, and Rigoletto swears that both he and the old man will be avenged. Gilda begs her father to forgive the Duke. Act III Rigoletto and Gilda arrive at a seedy club on the outskirts of town where Sparafucile and his sister Maddalena live. Inside, the Duke laughs at the fickleness of women. Gilda and Rigoletto watch through the window as the Duke amuses himself with Maddalena. Rigoletto tells Gilda to leave town disguised as a man and pays Sparafucile to murder the Duke. Gilda returns to overhear Maddalena urge her brother to spare the handsome stranger and kill the hunchback instead. Sparafucile refuses to murder Rigoletto but agrees to kill the next person who arrives at the club, so that he will be able to produce a dead body. Gilda decides to sacrifice herself for the Duke. She knocks, enters the club, and is stabbed. Rigoletto returns and Sparafucile presents him with the body, which is wrapped in a trenchcoat with its face covered. Assuming it is the Duke's, Rigoletto gloats over the body, when he hears his supposed victim singing in the distance. Frantically pulling the covering aside, he finds his daughter, who dies asking his forgiveness. Horrified, Rigoletto remembers Monterone's curse.
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RADIATING LIKE A STONE
The Wichita Center for the Arts
2/13-2/17/2013
As Adele and her teenage daughter Zoey pack for their move, items they pull from trunks and boxes-a bikini, a bumper sticker, an infant's never-worn shirt-propel Adele into memories of the 1970s women's movement in her home town of Wichita, Kansas. She is stunned to learn that her 16-year-old daughter is not only unaware of how much happened in that tumultuous decade, but oblivious to how recently won many women's achievements have been. This plays has been adapted from the book Radiating Like a Stone: Wichita Women and the 1970s Feminist Movement, by Myrne Roe, which was published in late fall 2011. Its contributors include noted Wichita leaders, among them Nola Foulston, Jo Ann Pottorff, poet Anita Skeen (from whose poem the title is derived), and dozens more leaders in Wichita's artistic, social, political, and academic communities, as well as "ordinary" women who did extraordinary things.
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John Denver: A Rocky Mountain High Concert in Broadway" border="0" height="100" width="100" align="right"> John Denver: A ROCKY MOUNTAIN HIGH CONCERT
Orpheum Theatre
2/19-2/19/2013
ohn Denver: A Rocky Mountain High Concert is a live touring experience honoring Denver's memory and music. The concert features projected video of Denver performing, backed LIVE by members of his original touring band and an accompanying string section. For the first time in fifteen years, audiences will experience John Denver in concert, performing hit songs from throughout his career. Denver's estate has recently announced that ATO Records will celebrate his life and music with The Music Is You: A Tribute to John Denver, slated for early 2013 release. The album features covers of Denver's most popular songs by a diverse group of artists including Dave Matthews, My Morning Jacket, Train, Amos Lee, Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes, Brandi Carlile, Lucinda Williams, Josh Ritter, Old Crow Medicine Show, Kathleen Edwards, Brett Dennen, Milow, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Blind Pilot, J Mascis, Sharon Von Etten and more to be announced. Today, Denver's status as a cultural icon stands undiminished. His popularity and continuing influence on popular culture fifteen years after his untimely death in 1997 is remarkable. The fusion of classic Denver tunes combined with performances by musicians from his original band and archival video footage makes the Rocky Mountain High tour an uncommon musical treat, dishing up night after night of unforgettable music, all in tribute to the musical legacy of a National Treasure: John Denver.
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DON PASQUALE
Wichita Grand Opera
2/8-5/17/2013
Based on a concept by William Powers ACT I. Don Pasquale is the proprietor of Pasquale's Garden Restaurant, one of Wichita's most popular night spots! Pasquale can always count on his nephew Ernesto to turn up for Karaoke Night at the restaurant. Annoyed that Ernesto has resisted all of his attempts to fix Ernesto up with a "nice girl," Pasquale decides to marry and have children so he can cut Ernesto out of his will. Fortunately for Ernesto, Dr. Malatesta - Pasquale's psychiatrist - has a foolproof plan to help out. Dr. Malatesta offers to set Pasquale up with his sister Sophronia, a sweet Catholic girl who just graduated from Newman University. What Pasquale doesn't know is that "Sophronia" is Ernesto's girlfriend Norina in disguise! Norina grasps Malatesta's plan quickly: enchant old man Pasquale, pretend to marry him, and then make his life completely miserable. Norina takes to her new role with gusto, bossing the befuddled old man around and transforming his happy little restaurant into a gaudy nightclub. The plan works so well that Pasquale begs the Doctor to help him get rid of "Sophronia". ACT II. Malatesta tells Pasquale that "Sophronia" and Ernesto will be having a secret rendezvous late that night. Since it's Karaoke Night, it should be easy to follow Ernesto there. When they confront "Sophronia," Malatesta - on Pasquale's orders - tells "Sophronia" that Pasquale's nephew Ernesto will be marrying a girl named Norina soon, and the new couple will be moving in with Pasquale. Outraged, "Sophronia" refuses to live in the same house with another woman, and threatens to move out. But first, she demands proof that the wedding isn't just a trick to get rid of her. Pasquale happily consents to a wedding on the spot and asks Malatesta to go fetch Norina, only to learn that Norina has been there the whole time!
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