The Tulsa Symphony Orchestra might be partnering with the Tulsa Area United Way for the orchestra’s upcoming concert, “Charming,” which might be presented 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 4, on the Tulsa PAC, 101 E. Third St.
Tickets for the concert are $20-$75, and available at tulsasymphony.org. Purchasers are encouraged to make use of the promo code UNITEDWAY, as a portion of ticket sales might be donated to the Tulsa Area United Way.
“The Tulsa Symphony and the Tulsa Area United Way share a typical mission and vision to serve our wonderful community through human connection,” said Keith Elder, executive director of the Tulsa Symphony. “This partnership distinctly highlights the importance of the humanities in our city, and we’re excited to pair two powerhouse organizations to share the facility of music. Working together to unite people through music and repair gives us great pride and admiration for the Tulsa Area United Way.”
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The Tulsa Area United Way helps to support nearly 60 nonprofit organizations that work to enhance the lives of Tulsans by providing health and basic needs, education and financial mobility.
Alison Anthony, president and CEO of the Tulsa Area United Way, said in recent times musicians of the Tulsa Symphony have been “increasingly visible in our community, playing and lifting the spirits of nonprofit clients on the Day Center for the Homeless, for instance.
“We’re looking forward to bringing together Tulsa Symphony and Tulsa Area United Way fans to learn our 59 nonprofits since music connects us and reminds us of the humanity we have now in common,” Anthony said.
The concert itself will feature two very familiar pieces of music, together with a piece that may likely be recent to many listeners.
That may be the Sinfonica India, by the Mexican composer and conductor Carlos Chavez. Chavez drew his inspiration for this 1936 composition from melodies from indigenous people of his place of origin.
While the piece is played without pause, it’s made up of three sections, with each section having as its essential theme a melody related to a selected tribe or nation, reminiscent of the Huicholes from the Mexican state of Nayarit, the Yaqui of Sonora, and the Seris of Tiburón Island in Baja California.
Also on this system is the “Peer Gynt” Suite No. 1 by Edvard Grieg. The suite is drawn from some 90 minutes of incidental music Grieg wrote for a production of Henrik Ibsen’s verse play, based on a personality from Norwegian folklore.
The Suite No. 1 incorporates two sections which have turn out to be perhaps Grieg’s best-known works: the ethereal “Morning Mood,” and the dramatic “Within the Hall of the Mountain King,” each of which have been co-opted for every little thing from commercials to TV themes to heavy metal songs.
Closing out this system might be the Symphony No. 1 in C Minor, Op. 68, by Johannes Brahms. Brahms on this piece makes no secret of his veneration for Beethoven, because it incorporates tributes each obvious and subtle to the older composer. But Brahms used those familiar quotes to create, within the words of musicologist D. Kern Holoman, “a daring, personal statement of recent ideals, a symphony of epic lyricism, and what amounts to an altogether recent orchestral sonority.”
Yaniv Dinur, resident conductor of the Milwaukee Symphony and music director of the Latest Bedford Symphony, will lead the orchestra.
‘Pete ’N’ Keely’
Tulsa Repertory Musicals first paired Mike Pryor and Heather Richetto-Rumley because the once-married entertainment duo Pete Bartel and Keely Stevens nearly 20 years ago, when it first presented the musical “Pete ’N’ Keely.”
A behind-the-camera comedy a few couple of performers once often called “America’s Swingin’ Sweethearts” who’ve reunited in a TV studio for a live variety show special that they hope will re-ignite the careers that stalled with their divorce.
But out-sized egos, skilled and romantic jealousies, and live broadcasts make for all forms of musical comedy mayhem.
The corporate has revived the show several times and is readying a recent production to be presented 8 p.m. Friday-Saturday, Feb. 3-4, on the Lynn Riggs Theater of the Dennis R. Neill Equality Center, 621 E. Fourth St.
Pryor and Richetto-Rumley reprise their roles as Bartel and Stevens, characters modeled after such Sixties-era performers as Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gormé.
Tickets are $20-$25. To buy: tulsamusicals.com.
‘Further Up & Further In’
Writer and actor Max McLean returns to present the most recent in his series of one-man shows on the life and theology of C.S. Lewis, “Further Up & Further In,” presented by McLean’s Fellowship for Performing Arts.
The play may have five performance Feb. 2-5 on the Tulsa PAC, 110 E. Second St. Tickets are $57-$67, and available by calling 918-596-7111 or online at tulsapac.com.
McLean’s previous show, “The Most Reluctant Convert,” told the story of Lewis’ life as much as his conversion to Christianity in 1931. “Further Up & Further In” continues the story of Lewis’ spiritual journey, as he became some of the beloved and admired Christian writers of the twentieth century.
McLean said the brand new play will explore why the BBC gave Lewis a national audience to deliver the series of radio talks that might turn out to be his well-known book “Mere Christianity,” and the way Adolf Hitler’s devious charm influenced the writing of “The Screwtape Letters.”
He added that the play will address what made Lewis such an efficient apologist to skeptics. “Was it prayer?” McLean asked, rhetorically. “His expectation of the second coming? Or was it his deep eager for heaven that also inspired much of his writing including ‘Narnia’ and ‘The Great Divorce’?”
“Further Up & Further In” will feature state-of-the-art projections by Harry Feiner that augment Lewis’ reflections on the past, the current and the longer term.
The show runs 90 minutes with no intermission, and might be followed by a question-and-answer session with McLean. Performances are 7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 2; 8 p.m. Friday, Feb. 3; 4 and eight p.m. Saturday, Feb. 4; and three p.m. Sunday, Feb. 5.
‘Terminus’
In a small, ramshackle house in rural Georgia, a lady named Eller is slowly losing her mind to dementia. Her mixed-race grandson, Jaybo, lives along with her and cares for her, but that love might be put to the test, as Eller retreats right into a past stained with racial violence that seems to have permeated her family home.
Gabriel Jason Dean’s play “Terminus” has been described by the Latest York Times as “a tale of Southern Gothic horror where fantasy and reality, past and present, freely intermingle,” and as “theatrical magic” by the Latest Yorker.
World Stage Theatre Company will present this drama, directed by Dionne Lambert, with performance at 8 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 2 and Friday, Feb. 3 and 10; 2 and eight p.m. Saturday, Feb. 4 and 11; 2 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 5 and 12, on the Tulsa PAC, 110 E. Second St.
The forged includes Kathryn Hartney, Ibrahim Buyckes, Cosette Davi Allen-Lawrence, Messina Eve, Domino Diamond, David A. Allen-Lawrence and Courtney Meadows.
Tickets are $15-$25. 918-596-7111, tulsapac.com.
‘Jesus…,’ ‘1776’ final showsThe national touring production of “Jesus Christ Superstar” may have its final shows at 1 and 6:30 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 29, on the Tulsa PAC, 101 E. Third St. This recent production of the Andrew Lloyd Webber-Tim Rice retelling of the ultimate week of Jesus’ life was created to mark the show’s fiftieth anniversary. For tickets: tulsapac.com.
Theatre Tulsa will close out its acclaimed production of “1776” with a matinee performance 2 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 29 on the Tulsa PAC, 110 E. Second St. An all-female and nonbinary forged gives a recent perspective to this story that re-imagines the conflict among the many “Founding Fathers” to come to a decision to interrupt from Great Britain and create a recent nation. For tickets: tulsapac.com.