Matt Smith News

The Chattanooga Symphony & Opera will be holding open auditions for vocalists interested in joining the CSO Chorus for the 2016/17 season. Auditions will be held on Thursday, June 23 and Tuesday, June 28 from 5:30 PM to 9:30 PM in the Chapel at First Baptist Church, located at 401 Gateway Ave. in Chattanooga. The Chorus will be performing next season on Beethoven's Choral Fantasy, the world premiere of Kendra D'Ercole's Wie die Blatter des Herbstes herabfallen, Home for the Holidays, and more. Complete concert dates and details will be available at auditions. Visit the CSO website at www.chattanoogasymphony.org for complete 2016/17 season details.

Houston, June 14, 2016— Houston Grand Opera (HGO) has appointed Carleen Graham, an award-winning opera educator, administrator, researcher, and stage director, as director of the company's community collaboration and education initiative, HGOco. She will assume the position August 22. The executive search process was guided by Arts Consulting Group.

Taking their successful and groundbreaking dance-music-theater work to new levels, award-winning choreographers Janice Garrett and Charles Moulton will present the world premiere of Speak, Angels, a new evening-length work for 36 dancers, singers and instrumentalists, July 28-31 at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Theater. Following the sold-out success of their 2014-15 production of The Luminous Edge, Garrett and Moulton continue their work with large-scale, multi-genre performances, once again collaborating with Composer/Bass Clarinetist Jonathan Russell and contralto Karen Clark. Twenty-four dancers—including a “movement choir”—are joined by five singers and an ensemble of instrumental musicians in a work celebrating the providential voices that guide us through our lives.

PITTSBURGH – Rock 'n roll icons Pat Benatar and Neil Giraldo join the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra on stage for a night of symphonic rock at Heinz Hall on June 30 at 7:30 p.m.

New York, NY (June 14, 2016) – Spring Studios has announced the launch of The Gallery@Spring, an open-to-the-public exhibition featuring more than 50 exceptional fashion photographs from the LIFE Photo Archives from the 1940's to 1970's, providing a unique and rare perspective into the history of fashion in the city. The exhibition takes place June 16th through August 30th at Spring Studios in TriBeCa, New York City.

BUFFALO, NY - After two nights of semi-finals, the judges of the 2016 JoAnn Falletta International Guitar Concerto Competition have selected three finalists. The three finalists will perform with the Buffalo Philharmonic under the baton of JoAnn Falletta at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, June 11 at Kleinhans Music Hall, 3 Symphony Circle. The evening of music will culminate with the announcement of the first, second, and third place winners. Tickets are available at bpo.org or by calling (716) 885-5000. The competition is presented by the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and WNED | WBFO.  The three finalists are: Anton Baranov of Russia, Andras Csaki of Hungary, and Alec Holcomb of the United States.

Stars including Michael Xavier, Beverley Knight, Matt Cardle, Samantha Barks and Pixie Lott will perform as part of 2016's incredible line-up for London's free musical theatre extravaganza, West End LIVE with MasterCard.

CHICAGO —The Chicago Dancing Festival proudly celebrates its 10th anniversary of free programming featuring performances by leading ballet, modern and contemporary dancers from across the country, August 23-27, 2016. Just as the Festival draws from top dance companies, this year's program will once again be presented in Chicago's top downtown venues including the Harris Theater for Music and Dance, the Museum of Contemporary Art and the Jay Pritzker Pavilion at Millennium Park plus the highly anticipated return to Chicago's Landmark Stage, the Auditorium Theatre. 

Brill, the international scholarly publisher, is pleased to announce that the Journal of Greek Linguistics, which is indexed by Scopus and Web of Science, has become a full Open Access publication. To help the journal transition to a full gold Open Access journal, Brill will sponsor the journal by setting the Article Publication Charge (APC) at a lower rate for the first three years and by waiving the charges for authors unable to raise the funds for publication. APCs will be charged for all new submissions to the journal. In addition to the current volume, all back volumes will now be freely available.

The Art Gallery of South Australia presents its first exhibition of the work of South Australia's most celebrated portraitist, Robert Hannaford from 2 July 2016.

(San Francisco, June 9, 2016) The Merola Opera Program presents Conrad Susa's Transformations, led by conductor Neal Goren and director Roy Rallo, in two performances Thursday, July 21 at 7:30 pm and Saturday, July 23 at 2 pm at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music in San Francisco.

(UPDATED June 8, 2016) — On July 29-30, members of the Britt Orchestra and Music Director Teddy Abrams will celebrate the unique majesty of Oregon's Crater Lake with six performances at the national park of a world premiere by New York-based composer Michael Gordon, commissioned by Britt Music & Arts Festival and inspired by Crater Lake. Abrams will lead approximately 40 Britt Orchestra musicians in the performances, with the dramatic panorama of the lake as the setting. Joining the Britt Orchestra musicians are 15 members of Steiger Butte Drum, a drum troupe composed of members of the local Klamath Tribes; 30 brass and percussion musicians from Southern Oregon University; and a 50-member chorus. The performances are free, and are being presented as part of the centennial celebration of the U.S. National Park Service. 

 Orange County, Calif.—June 8, 2016—It's sure to be a “thriller”—when Pacific Symphony's blockbuster Summer Festival 2016 kicks off its final season at Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre with a “July 4 Spectacular,” featuring a symphonic tribute to Michael Jackson's music. The first of five exceptional musical experiences under the stars, the Symphony's holiday extravaganza begins with picnic baskets packed with goodies and the company of family and friends—all just a prelude to a celebratory, rockin' good time with the orchestra and guest band, Windborne, whose lead singer James Delisco brings to life the genius of Michael Jackson. Showcasing the best-known hits of the legendary “King of Pop”—from The Jackson 5 to the singer's final film, “This Is It”—the concert includes music from the albums “Off the Wall,” “Thriller,” “Bad,” “Blood on the Dance Floor” and much more. Traditionally the best-attended concert of the year, this holiday celebration also honors American heroes and includes a moving fireworks finale orchestrated to patriotic classics.

P.S. Art 2016: Celebrating the Creative Spirit of NYC Kids, the annual juried exhibition of works of art in a variety of media created by public school students in New York City's five boroughs, will return to The Met Fifth Avenue this summer, from June 14 through October 23, 2016. The Museum will celebrate the artists with an opening ceremony for students, parents, and teachers at 5 p.m. on Tuesday, June 14, the evening of the City's annual Museum Mile Festival, after which the exhibition will open for a special public viewing. In addition to being displayed at The Met, a select group of works of art from the exhibition will also be featured for five days on outdoor digital screens in Times Square, June 22–26, courtesy of the Times Square Advertising Coalition (TSAC).

CANTON, OH  (June 7, 2016) - The Canton Youth Symphonies will be holding auditions on Monday June 27 and Tuesday June 28 from 4:00pm – 6:00pm in preparation for the 2016-17 season.  Auditions will be held at the Zimmermann Symphony Center at 2331 17th St NW, Canton, OH 44708. To schedule an audition, call Lisa Boyer, Director of Education and Community Engagement at (330) 452-3434 ext. 604.

In Advance of the Broken Justy is a grievance against everything inimical to nuance and subtlety and delicacy and charm. It's a Phone: fervent attempt to reclaim a quality of attention that has been threatened to near extinction by rampant techno-narcissism. Attention, as defined by William James, “implies withdrawal from some things in order to deal effectively with others, and is a condition which has a real opposite in the confused, dazed, scatterbrained state which in French is called distraction, and Zerstreutheit in German.” Zerstreuitheit, according to Olson, is a supervisor's sour gaze. It's mandatory overtime. It's having to work for a living. It's the buzz of an alarm clock dissipating a pleasant dream. It's a playground bully. It's a motorcycle gang at a rock concert. It's a cop spraying capsaicin in an elderly woman's face. It's a loud party next door when you're in bed and have to get up early to go to a job you hate. It's endless war. It's the nagging ever-present worry about climate change and corporate predation and the death of value. It's cancer. It's chemotherapy. It's Syria and Gaza and Israel and wrecked Iraq. It's smartphones, the erosion of the commons, and the obliviousness of one's fellow citizens. It's rudeness and insanity and fascism and a boot in the face. It's a neighbor's power saw ripping a quiet afternoon in half.

Helping kids identify, understand and talk about their emotions was Janan Cain's goal back in the 1990s when she began work on  her first book. Today that picture book, The Way I Feel, is 16 years old and the most popular book Parenting Press has ever published. 

WASHINGTON, DC – The OAS AMA | Art Museum of the Americas presents (Art)xiomas - CUBAAHORA: the Next Generation, a contemporary Cuban art exhibition organized with SPAIN Arts and Culture. This exhibition is curated by art historian Gabriela García Azcuy. (Art)xiomas is part of AMA's celebration of the birth centennial of its founding director, Cuban-born José Gómez Sicre. 

National Museum of Scotland Chambers Street, Edinburgh, EH1 1JF  Fossil Hunters: Unearthing the Mystery of Life on Land 19 Feb – 14 Aug 2016 Free Exhibition Gallery 2, Level 3 Discover how life on earth moved from water onto land 360-345 million years ago through ground-breaking discoveries made in Scotland. See fossils unearthed as recently as summer 2015, meet the people who uncovered these remarkable finds, discover the scientific techniques used to extract and identify them, and glimpse what life was like before the dinosaurs.