English Baroque composer Henry Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, his only true opera, is an indisputable masterpiece and one of the most beloved operas in the repertoire.
Society for the Performing Arts is now Performing Arts Houston, but Meg Booth, chief executive officer, makes it clear that their mission to bring the world of music, dance, theater as well as cultural speakers to the city is still fundamental to who they are after 50 years.
During an immersive dance production the line between audience and dancer can blur, but in an Annie Arnoult Open Dance Project performance that blurring expands from the space between dancer and audience to the line between theater and dance, history and story, viewing and autonomous experiencing.
San Antonio-based artist Jennifer Ling Datchuk reminded me of Brecht’s riddle-like assurance while discussing her current exhibition Later, Longer, Fewer: The Work of Jennifer Ling Datchuk, on view at the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft until Jan. 8, 2022.
Brett Ishida, a California transplant to Austin, is bringing her new Austin-based contemporary dance company ISHIDA to the stage for the company’s first evening-length production since the pandemic began.
“These pitiful souls being tossed to and fro in the waves among you, their stories are mine as well,” decrees the magician Prospera in the Open Dance Project’s All the Devils are Here: A Tempest in the Galapagos.
I caught up with musicians from nine distinctive ensembles in Houston to reflect on the past year and look to the future. In Part Three, I visited with the Axiom Quartet, Houston Brass Quintet and Texas New Music Ensemble.
Houston is home to numerous chamber music ensembles that have thrived alongside each other, carving out their own niches with unique visions of how to present music and connect with audiences.