By Paul Horsley Local organizations in music, theater and dance are bringing you the best that the world, and Kansas City, can offer. Here are some events to make a note of. JANUARY 29-February 21: Kansas City Repertory Theatre, The Diary of Anne Frank; This Pulitzer Prize-winning adaptation incorporates some new information about the young […]

By Paul Horsley Alex Saxon may be a star of TV and films these days, but he gives a lot of credit to the firm theatrical foundation he received growing up in the Kansas City area. From the age of eight the Liberty native, currently starring in MTV’s hit show “Finding Carter,” acted, sang and […]

By Paul Horsley When manmade laws seem to contradict fundamental human law, how is a civil society to decide between right and wrong? The Coterie Theatre’s upcoming production of And Justice for Some: The Freedom Trial of Anthony Burns asks big questions: Though not exactly ripped from today’s headlines, it has lessons for all of […]

By Paul Horsley Each production of The Nutcracker is to some extent a balancing act between spectacle and dance. At best it seamlessly integrates the colors and stagecraft that keep holiday audiences coming back with the ballet traditions on which the 1892 Russian classic is based. When the Kansas City Ballet under Artistic Director Devon […]

By Paul Horsley When you create a new Nutcracker, you’re inventing from your own personal ballet experience but you’re also drawing on several centuries of dance history. “Nutcracker has always been a part of my life, from the time I was a child to this very minute,” said Devon Carney during a recent break from […]

By Paul Horsley Keeping a favorite holiday show fresh, year in and year out, requires care and vigilance. Each November J. Kent Barnhart begins the meticulous planning of Quality Hill Playhouse’s “Christmas in Song” by going through hundreds of songs (from his database of thousands) and narrowing the more than 500 Christmas-themed songs to about […]

By Paul Horsley The Lyric Opera of Kansas City deserves applause for taking on an opera in Czech for the first time in its history, but the opening performance of its Rusalka on November 7th at the Kauffman Center offered mixed results. Dvořák’s shimmering score—with its delicious colors, sophisticated use of motif, and seamless integration […]

By Paul Horsley What will we do in the evenings when the lights go out? How will we entertain ourselves when the nuclear cataclysm brings down the grid and there’s no electricity: no television, no internet, no cinema? These are questions playwright Anne Washburn asks in her brilliantly provocative Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play, which […]

By Paul Horsley Fairy tales may be populated largely by imaginary characters, but they exist to tell us things about ourselves. Jaroslav Kvapil’s libretto for Dvořák’s Rusalka concerns a water-nymph who yearns to be human; at the same time the 1901 opera, which opens at the Lyric Opera on November 7th, teaches us to be […]

By Paul Horsley “O hushed October morning mild,” Robert Frost wrote, “beguile us in the way you know.” If you want a good sampling of what the Harriman-Jewell Series has presented over the last 51 years, look no further than this month’s offerings. The Series offers half a dozen performances drawing on an amazing range […]

By Paul Horsley The Lyric Opera’s newish production of Don Giovanni, which opened September 26th at the Kauffman Center, embraces the opera’s light-dark contrasts in ways both external and internal. By setting the 1787 opera as a film noir the production opens up design possibilities that exploit the chiaroscuro nature of such movies as The […]

By Paul Horsley The Kansas City Repertory Theatre’s production of Sunday in the Park with George, which opened September 18th at the Nelson-Atkins Museum’s Atkins Auditorium, is visually so complex that it keeps the eye occupied even at points where Stephen Sondheim’s drama lags. Perhaps that’s appropriate for a piece of musical theater that is […]

By Paul Horsley Opera choruses: You know you love ’em. The big splashy numbers in the drama where the lights go brilliant and dozens of boisterous singers fill the stage will color and sound. Sometimes the music is so good that you wish you could hear it without all the distractions of costumes and stage […]

By Paul Horsley Don Giovanni: despicable misogynist, or dashing ladies’ man with anger-management issues? When the Lyric Opera’s creative team, led by director Kristine McIntyre and scenic designer R. Keith Brumley, set about to craft a fresh concept for Mozart’s and Da Ponte’s most troublesome opera, they sought a world with all the ambiguity and […]

By Paul Horsley One of the most satisfying concerts I attended this summer was that of tenor Joseph DeSota and pianist Natalia Rivera, who gave a sophisticated performance of Schubert’s Die schöne Müllerin on August 9th at Grace & Holy Trinity Cathedral. It was part of the “Summer Music at the Cathedrals” series sponsored by […]

By Paul Horsley So let’s say you’re a major theater company and you need a big splash for your new season, but your building is under construction until late fall. What to do? In a word: innovate. Stephen Sondheim’s Sunday in the Park with George, a multidimensional reflection on the nature of art and creativity, […]

By Paul Horsley We may be a tad hidebound in our cultural tastes at times, but here in KC we do a lot of things right and we don’t put on airs about it. Here are some Fall highlights to watch for. AUGUST 20-September 5 Spinning Tree Theatre; West Side Story; This plucky young company […]

By Paul Horsley Theater is like any form of communication in that it boils down to one thing: two people talking. With this in mind, Kansas City Actors Theatre has determined to devote its 11th season to “two-handers,” plays consisting of two characters who command the stage for an entire evening. True, economics might have […]

By Paul Horsley One of the fruits of Kansas City’s performing-arts community is an abundance of opportunities for young people. From orchestras to dance groups, children’s theater to music lessons of all kinds, our region is host to dozens of places where young folks can gain skills and learn the joy of playing, dancing, acting […]

By Paul Horsley What if we made a Cinderella in which, instead of a noble prince rescuing a desperate girl, we tell a tale of two people sort of rescuing each other? That’s just what playwright Douglas Carter Beane set out to do in his new version of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella, which was a […]

By Paul Horsley When it comes to chamber music, three’s already a crowd, and 13 is a veritable multitude. So when Summerfest Chamber Music Series began planning a “blowout” Gala to celebrate its 25th season, it didn’t have to go far in order to push the limits of this intimate genre. On July 25th this […]