Tattoos, not tutus

Posted on February 22, 2012 by Rebecca Sundet-Schoenwald

The last time MSUM hosted the James Sewell Ballet Company, mesmerized audience members saw dancers crash-land on wrestling mats, do magic with Chinese linking rings and thrash to the punk beats of the Dead Kennedys. All with extraordinary style and grace, of course.

It wasn’t what most people expected. Nor will it be the next time around, when the dance company performs again on the Hansen Theatre stage, Saturday, March 3, in the Roland Dille Center for the Arts. As the New York Times wrote: “different and unpredictable, this is the company to see…”

The James Sewell Ballet Company was founded by James Sewell and Sally Rouse in New York City and brought to Minnesota in 1992. The two dancers envisioned a close-knit company of dance artists willing to both challenge their physical limits and expand their notions about ballet.

So forget toe shoes and tutus. Look instead for bare feet and tattoos. This company’s dancers are gorgeous, but also gritty and unconventional. Sewell’s choreography, set to the music of Patsy Cline, The Gorillaz, Q-Burns, Debussy, Maurice Ravel, Erik Satie, Jerry Lee Lewis and Felix Mendelssohn, is always surprising. There’s even a number set to Eric Weissberg’s arrangement of Dueling Banjos.

Another unusual twist: This dance event includes Sewell’s choreography to the Mendelssohn Piano Trio, performed in entirety by violinist Ben Sung, pianist Jihye Chang and cellist Hrant Parsamian.

Don’t miss this masterful collaboration, and the last event of this season’s Cheryl Nelson Lossett Performing Arts Series. To get tickets, call the MSUM Box Office at (218) 477-2271 M-F from noon to 4 p.m., or buy online at www.mnstate.edu/perform. Tickets will also be available at the door.

Military veterans get in free to All Is Calm: The Christmas Truce of 1914

Posted on December 6, 2011 by Rebecca Sundet-Schoenwald

Limited number of tickets available to those with military ID

It’s a long way to Tipperary, but it’s not far to Hansen Theatre for a Dec. 8 holiday event that tells the true story of the truce between Allied Forces and German Soldiers in the trenches at Christmas during World War I. All Is Calm: the Christmas Truce of 1914, is a heartwarming, joyous and sentimental production featuring renowned Minneapolis men’s chorus Cantus and three members of a Twin Cities theatre company. Performance time is 7:30 p.m.

Text for the production comes from official war documents, accounts from soldiers’ actual letters and journal entries, grave stone inscriptions and radio broadcasts. Musical numbers are stunning arrangements of traditional war songs and Christmas carols. A solo rendition of Stille Nacht (Silent Night) will bring tears to the most stoic listeners’ eyes.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune wrote of the production, which sells out every year there, “All Is Calm — a theatrical concert — feeds our need for heroes, gives space to our needs for human nobility, allows us to approach the enigma of Christmas and puzzle over the miracle that stopped enemies from killing each other for one day.”

In honor of the service of military veterans, a number of free tickets are available to those who served in the wars that followed World War I (the last American World War I veteran, Frank Woodruff Buckles, died last February). Veterans can call the MSUM Box Office at (218) 477-2271 to reserve a ticket. Veterans will be asked to provide a VA card, military ID or a membership card from the American Legion or VFW when they pick up their tickets at the Box Office. Hours of the Box Office are Monday through Friday from noon to 4 p.m., and 90 minutes before the performance begins.

If you’re not a veteran, you may purchase tickets online at www.mnstate.edu/perform, or through the MSUM Box Office at (218) 477-2271 or at the door. Tickets are $28 for adults, $24 for seniors and $12 for students with student ID.

This event is the third in the Cheryl Nelson Lossett Performing Arts Series at MSUM. For more information about the PAS, go to www.mnstate.edu/perform. Hansen Theatre is located in the Roland Dille Center for the Arts on the MSUM campus.

“All Is Calm” brings Matthew Tintes home for the holidays

Posted on December 5, 2011 by Rebecca Sundet-Schoenwald

West Fargo High and NDSU grad tours with professional chorus Cantus

Landing a permanent position with nationally recognized professional male chorus Cantus was quite an accomplishment for West Fargo High grad Matthew Tintes. The young tenor will be in Fargo-Moorhead for All Is Calm: the Christmas Truce of 1914.

The Cheryl Nelson Lossett Performing Arts Series event features the entire Cantus chorus and three actors from Theatre Latté Da, a Twin Cities theatre company. The production tells the true story of the remarkable World War I truce between Allied Forces and German soldiers in the trenches at Christmastime in 1914, using official war documents, accounts from soldiers’ actual letters and journal entries, grave stone inscriptions, radio broadcasts and stunning vocal arrangements of traditional Christmas music and war songs. A solo rendition of Stille Nacht (Silent Night) will bring tears to the most stoic listeners’ eyes.

Tintes received a bachelor’s degree in vocal music education from NDSU, and a master’s degree in vocal performance with an opera emphasis from the University of Wisconsin at Madison. While at UW, he sang the roles of Leporello in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Arkel in Debussy’s Pelleas et Melisande and the title role in Donizetti’s Don Pasquale.

After completing his studies at UW, Tintes taught voice at a number of institutions and academies, including Beloit College in Beloit, Wisc. In 2009, Tintes sang with the opera company, “Opera for the Young” where he toured Wisconsin and Minnesota educating kids about opera and music while performing an adaptation of Donizetti’s The Elixir of Love. He was recently a soloist in J.S. Bach’s Mass in B Minor and the St. Matthew Passion with the baroque chamber ensemble, Madison Bach Musicians; soloist in Mozart’s Requiem, and PDQ Bach’s Missa Hilarious. This is his third season with Cantus.

West Fargo High and NDSU grad sings Thursday with Cantus

To purchase tickets online, go to www.mnstate.edu/perform. Tickets are also available at the door before the performance, or by calling the MSUM Box Office at (218) 477-2271 Monday through Friday from noon to 4 p.m. Tickets are $28 for adults, $24 for seniors and $12 for students with student ID.

When The Best Blows Into Town

Posted on October 26, 2011 by Rebecca Sundet-Schoenwald

Oh, to be the best at something. What must that feel like? I’ll never know, but I console myself with this – the best string quartet in the world performs here Nov. 17, and I will hear them. Will the musicians meet my expectations? Your expectations? Is it possible, at every performance, to live up to a reputation of being “the best in the world?”

Ben Sung, Fargo-Moorhead’s beloved concertmaster of the FM Symphony and my former partner in running the MSUM Performing Arts Series, wanted the Takács String Quartet (pronounced Talk-osh) to come here, but didn’t expect to find a fee or a date that would work for us.

He did. The Takács is coming. And when you have a chance to hear and see the best in the world (according to the London Guardian, the Boston Globe, and the Cleveland Plain Dealer, to name just a few), you should take it, even if your taste runs more to rap than string quartets. Hey, if I had a chance to hear and see the best rapper in the world (who is it, by the way?) I’d take it!

Go to www.mnstate.edu/perform if you’re inclined to learn more, and, if you know what’s good for you, to buy tickets. Check this blog again soon. I hope to get Ben’s comments on why he thinks the Takács is the best in the world.

Note: Rebecca Sundet-Schoenwald is the Managing Director of the Cheryl Nelson Lossett Performing Arts Series and Assistant to the Dean for Marketing and Publicity for the College of Arts and Humanities at MSUM.