Arts & Events

New: Movie review: “City of Gold” at Shattuck Cinemas

Christopher Adams
Tuesday March 29, 2016 - 11:51:00 AM

While I was born and raised in Los Angeles, I haven’t really called it home for over 50 years. Family visits tended to be exactly that, visits with family, leavened with occasional forays to the nearby beach or one of the art museums, which LA has in spades, though unfortunately separated by miles of freeway. My post childhood memories of LA have been of endless driving and endless strip malls. -more-


Around & About--Music: Kent Nagano Conducts; Kalil Wilson Sings; The Israeli Chamber Project Plays ...

Ken Bullock
Friday March 25, 2016 - 05:21:00 PM

—Kent Nagano, who stepped down after 30 years at the podium of the Berkeley Symphony in 2009, will conduct the Montreal Symphony with pianist Danil Trifonov in a program featuring Debussy's Jeux (1913), Prokofiev's Piano Concerto in C major, Opus 26 (1921) and Stravinsky's Rite of Spring (also 1913--and, like Jeux, composed for Diaghilev's Ballets Russes with Nijinsky)--this Saturday night, March at 8, for Cal Performances at Zellerbach Auditorium on the UC campus, Bancroft near Telegraph Avenues. Tickets: $21-$150. calperformances.org (including program notes); 642-9988. -more-


Theater Explorations & Music Appreciation Adult Classes

Ken Bullock
Friday March 25, 2016 - 05:18:00 PM

Marion Fay's popular, longrunning classes for adults, Theater Explorations and Music Appreciation, both held at the Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda near the Solano Avenue Tunnel in Berkeley, are starting up again.
Theater Explorations, four two-hour classes with two separate groups, one meeting Mondays from April 4, 1-3 p. m., the other on Thursdays from March 31, also 1-3, both for nine weeks, features post-performance discussions, guest speakers (including presentations by the artistic directors of SF Playhouse, Ubuntu Theatre Project and Theatre First, as well as pre-play talks by Berkeley Rep docents) and trips to see Mary Zimmerman's adaptation of 'Treasure Island' (from Robert Louis Stevenson) at Berkeley Rep, 'Grapes of Wrath' (adapted from Steinbeck) by Ubuntu and a visit to the new Strand Theater in San Francisco.
Music Appreciation meets Thursdays, 10-noon, starting April 7, and features composers, conductors and musicians from the Berkeley Oakland and San Francisco Symphony orchestras and other professional musicians performing and discussing their work in class, as well as field trips to concerts and performances..
Special events include a piano quintet by SF Symphony musicians; a presentation by a music therapist; and a program of pieces for oboe, English horn and piano, featuring solos from orchestral masterpieces.
No background in music is required for Music Appreciation classes.
Both courses, Theater Explorations and Music Appreciation, are nine weeks for $90, excluding discounted tickets for performances. Register at the first class. For further information: marionf5@earthlink.net
-more-


Ted Rall Comes to Town with the Book of Bernie

Gar Smith
Friday March 25, 2016 - 04:56:00 PM

Earlier this week, political blogger, columnist and cartoonist Ted Rall dropped by Berkeley's University Press Bookstore to flog his new book, Bernie, a 200-page "bio-graphic novel" about the insurgent presidential candidate from Vermont.

Like Bernie Sanders, Rall is an independent, anti-establishment crusader and critic. He's also a two-time winner of the Robert F. Kennedy journalism award and a Pulitzer Prize finalist. His syndicated cartoons—and trenchant political commentaries—appear across the board, from the New York Times to the Village Voice and he's recently turned to producing full-length cartoon treatises on subjects ranging from election theft to controversial public figures. Before Bernie, his previous book profiled Edward Snowden.

Rall told the bookstore crowd that he sees his role as "filling a gap in coverage" and allowed that the "ideal audience" for his politico-graphic comic books is "a smart 12-year-old."
-more-