Arts & Society

Mary Bird • June 29, 2012

Under the patronage of Permanent Representatives to the Organization of American States Joel Hernández of Mexico and Walter Albán of Peru, Opera Camerata presented a concert version of Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville” at the OAS June 23. Guests enjoyed wine and a silent auction before the performance, which featured many young Latin American artists already known to D.C. audiences, including Peruvian baritone José Sacín and coloratura soprano Elizabeth Treat. The evening continued with a delectable Latin American repast. [gallery ids="100884,127589,127564,127582,127571,127578" nav="thumbs"]

Georgetowner •

In a glorious collaboration, Imagination Stage and The Washington Ballet have made magic with their own “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.” The spell was cast at the June 22 opening, replete with reception, and will continue to delight audiences through August 12. Jean-Marie Fernandez, Anne Marie Parisi-Trone and Evonne Courtney Connolly were the ?Lion Ladies,? ensuring funding for the voyage through the wardrobe. Morgann Rose is a daunting wicked White Witch and designer Eric Van Wyk?s inspired lion puppet Aslan had the audience aroar. Please bring your nearest and dearest of every age to this inspirational marvel.

Jade Floyd • June 27, 2012

Each year, nearly 10 million flights circle the globe, carrying passengers to new locales and old stomping grounds alike. Travel comes with the territory in the District ? dignitaries commute to and from home countries, businessmen and women cross continents to close deals and families spend much-deserved vacations to relax beyond the Beltway. I?ve seen passports filled with enough stamps to rival secretaries of state. Most recently, after a return from a world tour, a friend complained that, with too many stamps, he needed a new passport.

While many of us dream of winters in Whistler, British Columbia, and summer cruises off the Solomon Islands, there is a segment of inner-city youth that will never leave D.C. ? or the Eastern Seaboard. In fact, the idea of needing a passport is even more foreign to them than travelling to a national park. But a number of organizations across the city are now working to address this lack of cultural and geographical awareness by exposing inner-city youth to outdoor and cultural opportunities.

D.C.?s City Kids, for one, offers annual backpacking excursions to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, where youth learn mountaineering and life skills on a 62-acre ranch. On June, 20 young girls journeyed to Jackson Hole for a summer filled with outdoor adventure and leadership development courses.
?Having the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to live in Wyoming for the summer has exposed me to a life I did not know existed,? said a past City Kids participant. ?Those experiences have given me a new outlook on life. Through the skills developed at City Kids, I know that my actions matter and what I choose to do or choose not to do has repercussions.?

Like City Kids, Wilderness Leadership & Learning (WILL) is also based in D.C. and provides youths with life skill development tools. Primarily working with high school students from under-served neighborhoods in Wards 1, 6, 7 and 8, WILL expose a group of students to the Appalachian Trail for a week-long trip with Steve Abraham, president and founder of WILL. A former attorney, Abraham created the 12 month long, interactive WILL program providing safe after-school time for kids.

?WILL not only enables teens to become aware of the world around them, but also encourages them to become better stewards of the environment,? Abraham said. ?Our programs include environmental learning and service projects on the Anacostia and Potomac Rivers, scavenger hunts on the National Mall, canoeing on the Anacostia River, a seven-day backpacking Expedition on the Appalachian Trail and three days at the Chesapeake Bay.?

Travel opportunities exist locally, too. Live It Learn It partners exclusively with high-poverty Title I D.C. public elementary schools and their teachers. It offers classroom instruction and trips to a range of recognized museums and memorials; more than 1,500 students from 21 schools across the District benefit.

?We partner with schools in every quadrant of the city, with the majority located east of the Anacostia River,? said Matthew Wheelock, founder of Live It Learn It. ?Despite having world-renowned monuments, museums, memorials and national parks right in their own backyard, the overwhelming majority of our students have never experienced these places. . . It seemed like such a waste.?

For many of the youth enrolled in these D.C. programs, their first entr?e to travel both near and far stems from the commitment of non-profits focusing on education through travel. You can help them on their journey by donating to these organizations to support flights, bus transportation and needed gear for each kid?s adventure. ?

**HOW YOU CAN HELP**

**City Kids** welcomes donations of gear, including hiking books, fleece tops, twin bedding, saddles and horse tacks. Visit its wish list at www.CityKidsDC.org/donors/our-wish-list

**Wilderness Leadership & Learning** (WILL) is always looking for volunteers to help drive students to events and welcomes online donations at www.WILL-lead.org/friends.html

**Live It Learn It** seeks in-school volunteers and welcomes donations at
www.LiveItLearnIt.org/pages/get-involved.php

*Jade Floyd is a managing associate at a D.C.-based international public relations firm and has served on the board of directors for several non-profits. She is a frequent volunteer and host of fundraising events across the District supporting arts, animal welfare and education programs. Follow her on Twitter @DCThisWeek.*

Gary Tischler • June 18, 2012

There’s a certain air of expectation that hangs over artistic director Molly Smith’s production of “The Music Man” at Arena Stage, now running for a better part of the summer there.

It’s the rarefied air of success achieved by Smith with “Oklahoma,” the classic Rodgers and Hammerstein musical with which she chose to open the newly renovated Mead Center for the American Theater, a grand old musical that has quite a few things in common with “The Music Man.”

Broadly speaking, it’s a show, like “Oklahoma,” which resurrects the spirit of a mostly vanished turn-of-the-20th-century America. “Oklahoma” bristled with western confidence, its characters are swept up by and embrace change. “The Music Man” is carried and buoyed by what happens when a burst of con-man energy lifts a classic Midwestern small town out of its narrow-minded, time-locked lethargy. Smith’s way with classic American musicals is to bless them with a breath of fresh air that is both energizing and engaging. It’s as if she waves a magic wand over things and makes the proceedings both rejuvenating and meaningful for today’s audiences.

Meredith Wilson — book author, composer and lyricist of “The Music Man”— may not have a Rodgers and Hammerstein resume but he has the Broadway musical pedigree. “The Music Man” is at turns energized by spirited dancing, it has bowl-you-over songs that make a perfect sales pitch like “76 Trombones” and “Trouble” and soaring ballads, none more pertinent and moving than “Til There was You.” It has romance, it has conflict, it has a believable and recognizable setting, and it resolves itself, not with schmaltz, but with a believable inevitability.

And so far as entertainment machines go, “The Music Man” delivers. It’s a robust vehicle that never flags and runs right past potential pitfalls, thanks to Smith. It has a deftly selected cast that couldn’t be more gifted, especially in the leads. Kate Baldwin, as Marian the town librarian and music teacher, is slight and dynamic, all blazing red hair with a shining, patient sort of charisma. Burke Moses strikes up the band and revs up the room temperature as Harold Hill, the con man as magician. He’s every bit as high-stepping and high-spirited as the iconic Robert Preston, sweeping almost all before him as he works his con of talking the town folks into the dream of a marching band, complete with lessons, uniforms and instruments.

The number of persons who might have seen the original Broadway production “The Music Man” is probably pretty small, although we have the happy coincidence of Barbara Cook, the original Marian, singing for two nights at the Kennedy Center next month. Our memories, if we have any, are tied to the film, where Preston shares the screen with Shirley Jones.

It seems to me that “The Music Man” and “Oklahoma” are about change. They’re transformative to audience and characters, and Smith makes change the beating hearts of both shows, especially this one. You could do a “Music Man” that hits all the highlights of song and story and not disappoint a soul, but this production does a little more for an audience that’s plugged into the whole wide world. The first thing you hear is a slow, almost mournful instrumental riff off the usually jaunty “76 Trombones,” accompanied by the sound of a train on its tracks, the rhythmic, familiar syncopated sound of movement and progress. Out of the Arena stages rises a table and seats filled with traveling salesmen, railing musically against change—you can’t give credit, you gotta know the territory, and so on. They gossip about one of their own, the elusive Harold Hill whose specialty is boondoggling small towns with promises of a marching band.

Hill arrives in River City and knows just what to do—he warns against the evils of sin in pool halls, he sings about marching bands—those trombones again—and he lays siege to the often disappointed, but still dreamy, heart of Marian. The townspeople—a generally unfriendly, gossipy and intolerant lot—are quickly undone by Hill’s abundant charms and soon enough he has the kids dancing, the matrons smiling and the town’s long-time enemies pulling together as a barbershop quartet.

“He sure seems to be having a good time,” one audience member said of Moses as Hill, and that’s a judgement that’s self-evident. Once he collides with Marian in a kind of tug-and-pull of romance and energy, the show practically takes wing. Baldwin, as Marian, has the task of singing songs that usually provide a lull in most musicals—the love-proclaiming ballad, the high, high soprano sweet songs that can kill energy like a fly swatter. She, however, knocks them right of the park, and the show never skips a beat. They get help from the high-flying wrong-side of the track kid Tommy played with energetic charm by Will Burton, and the Nehal Joshi’s goofy sidekick Marcellus, and area veteran actors like Donna Migliacco, John Lescault and Lawrence Redmond.

The costumes may indeed be suggestive of no particular period, although the outrageous costumes worn by the local ladies’ culture club are eye-boggling. If that’s confusing, you’re not paying attention. Wilson — born in Mason City, Iowa, in 1902 — meant to resurrect his hometown with all of its shortcomings and glories, which are located in Marian’s heart, in the tuning fork hum of barbershop quartet, in the leaps of the dancers, in the whispers of gossip, in the small, but greedy ambitions of the mayor, in a time when kisses, instead of investor money, could still be stolen on the back porch.

“The Music Man” isn’t “Oklahoma,” but it is something just as good. In this show, there really is love all around, and you can hear it singing

(“The Music Man” runs in Arena’s Fichandler Stage through July 22)

Georgetowner •

Conrad Cafritz, Chairman of Modus Hotels, welcomed fortunate guests to a preview of Avenue Suites and the West End’s newest outdoor cocktail destination A Bar. Guests enjoyed lychee martinis accompanied by tempting nibbles. DJ Neekola was joined by New York-based electric violinist Sarah Charness. Highlights were the sun dappled patio and a second floor suite draped in chocolates and desserts where guests could win a weekend stay at Avenue Suites, chef’s tasting at Marcel’s and a gift card to A Bar. [gallery ids="100761,123198,123161,123193,123168,123188,123174,123182" nav="thumbs"]

Bethany Trigilio •

The L’Enfant Society hosted its annual “Ball on the Mall” on May 5. The event, co-chaired by Christian Gullott and Marissa Mitrovich of the L’Enfant Society, and sponsored by Time Warner, Inc., and HBO Verizon, raises money for the Trust for the National Mall, a nonprofit partner of the National Park Service, which cannot fund necessary repairs due to budget cuts. Dressed to impress, guests dined and danced, and as they exited the event, were greeted by a full moon peeking out from behind the Washington Monument, as if to serve as a reminder of why they were there. [gallery ids="100803,124508,124478,124502,124495,124487" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

GALA, the National Center for Latino Performing Arts, celebrated the Inter-American Year of Culture in collaboration with the Organization of American States at the Art Museum of the Americas on April 16. The picture perfect evening honored singer/songwriter Ricardo Montaner, arts and business leader Janet Farrell, and American Airlines for its corporate philanthropy. GALA provides opportunities for the Latino artist, educates youth and engages the entire community. Costa Rican Ambassador Muni Figueres heralded GALA Co-founder/Executive Director Rebecca Medrano as “a motor and a muse.” [gallery ids="100764,123252,123246,123240,123211,123234,123220,123227" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

First Lady Michelle Obama served as Honorary Chair of the 2012 Smithsonian Craft Show. The April 18 Preview Night Benefit drew an enthusiastic crowd to the National Building Museum. Craft Show Co-chairs Anne-Lise Auclair-Jones and Ann Peel joined with Wendy Somerville Wall, President Smithsonian Women’s Committee, for what is widely regarded as the country’s most prestigious juried show and sale of fine American craft featuring 121 distinguished craft artists for the 30th Anniversary Celebrating the Creative Spirit of America. [gallery ids="100765,123282,123241,123275,123249,123270,123257,123265" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

Basking in the stellar reviews of Alice (in Wonderland), The Washington Ballet is partnering with Imagination Stage in Bethesda for The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe, which will run June 20-August 12, promising a dazzling fusion of dance, acting and puppetry. On April 19, Evonne Connolly, Jean-Marie Fernandez and Anna Marie Parisi-Trone hosted a spring trend fashion presentation at Saks Chevy Chase. WB Artistic Director Septime Webre and his companion stuffed lion encouraged everyone to “step through the wardrobe into the magical world of Narnia. [gallery ids="100766,123299,123272,123292,123280,123288" nav="thumbs"]