New York State Council on the Arts News

The New York Musical Festival (NYMF), previously known as The New York Musical Theater Festival, has announced the recipients of their 2016 Awards, given out at this year's Gala.

Music Director Alan Gilbert will lead the New York Philharmonic in Brahms's Symphony No. 3 and Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5, Emperor, with Stephen Hough as soloist, Wednesday, January 11, 2017, at 7:30 p.m.; Thursday, January 12 at 7:30 p.m.; Friday, January 13 at 8:00 p.m.; and Saturday, January 14 at 8:00 p.m. The January 14 performance will be broadcast on Facebook Live, the Philharmonic's second live concert broadcast on Facebook, following the 2016-17 season Opening Gala Concert. Hosted by WQXR's Terrance McKnight and directed by Habib Azar, the live, online broadcast - available at facebook.com/nyphilharmonic - will also feature live interviews with the evening's artists. The concert will be available for on-demand viewing on the Philharmonic's website, YouTube, and Facebook through August 31, 2017.

Under the baton of music director conductor George Rothman, Riverside Symphony will present the second installment of its 2016-17 season at Alice Tully Hall on Saturday evening, January 28. From Jacques Ibert's effervescent Parisian Music Hall time (Divertissement) to Juan Trigos' endearingly brash bass concerto, a confident assimilation of high and low culture, to a wittily buoyant, little-known Haydn symphony, the program shows composers in a largely (though by no means exclusively) carefree musical state of mind.  

Richard Move/MoveOpolis! returns to New York Live Arts as the opening performance of Live Ideas 2017 with the world premiere of XXYY, a multilayered work conceived and directed by Move, with costumes by acclaimed theater artist Alba Clemente and an original score by Italian electronic music pioneer Martux_m. The program will also feature Martha@... 20, a special performance marking the 20th anniversary of Move's highly acclaimed performances as Martha Graham in the Martha@... series. Performances are Wednesday, March 8, to Saturday, March 11, at 7:30pm, at New York Live Arts, 219 West 19th Street (between 7th and 8th Avenues), in Manhattan.

Chen Dance Center presents newsteps, its semi-annual emerging choreographer's series.  Since 1994, its theater has supported and presented artists developing innovative and risk-taking works through space and production grants.  The series has received acclaim in The New York Times, Dance Magazine, The Village Voice, Downtown Express and The Villager.

Waterwell (Arian Moayed & Tom Ridgely, Artistic Directors) announced today the complete cast, comprised of Broadway regulars, Military veterans, and civilian artists, for the Blueprint Specials, presented in association with the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum and the Public Theater's Under the Radar Festival.

The New York Gilbert & Sullivan Players, America's preeminent professional Gilbert & Sullivan repertory company, continues its 42nd season with the time-honored classic The Mikado! The brand new production will play December 28-31, 2016 and January 5-8, 2017 at The Kaye Playhouse at Hunter College (East 68th Street between Park & Lexington Avenues).

New York Live Arts presents Sonya Tayeh, Obie and Lucille Lortel award winner and Drama Desk and two-time Emmy award nominated choreographer, in her New York City debut of an evening-length original work, you'll still call me by name, an emotionally charged dance-symphony that explores a mystifying, complex and jagged relationship between a mother and daughter. Commissioned by New York Live Arts and presented through its Live Feed creative residency program, the performances will take place December 9-11 and 14-17, 2016, at 7:30PM at New York Live Arts, 219 West 19thStreet, NYC. Press night is December 10, 7:30PM.  For tickets and information, call 212 924 0077 or visit livearts.

Performance Space 122's annual performance festival, Coil, returns for its twelfth edition with 13 individual events. The festival explores the constant vitality of live performance in New York City through contemporary artists from diverse genres, cultures and perspectives. Featuring work created locally, across the U.S., and around the world, Coil is known for its groundbreaking contemporary performance across interdisciplinary art, working with new technologies and forms. Through installations, live and virtual practices, PS122 is committed to redefining how, where, and when performance is experienced.

The Bushwick Starr is thrilled to present the world premiere of [PORTO] by Kate Benson and directed by Lee Sunday Evans, their follow-up to the Obie Award-winning A Beautiful Day in November on the Banks of the Greatest of the Great Lakes.

Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts at Brooklyn College continues its 2016-17 season with its annual holiday performance of Dance Theatre in Westchester's The Colonial Nutcracker on Sunday, December 11, 2016 at 2pm. Tickets are $15 and can be purchased at BrooklynCenter.org or by calling the box office at 718-951-4500 (Tue-Sat, 1pm-6pm).

In this monumental week in Cuban and Cuban-American history, singer/performer Jadele McPherson creates a musical and theatrical bridge connecting the Cuban-American experience of today with black liberation figures, conjurers and spiritual leaders from two hundred years ago. Scenes of a young Cuban-American woman discovering her own rebellious ancestry are swallowed by music, dance and ritual featuring some of the great dance and music artists this city has to offer, many coming out of Cuban and Haitian traditions, including Osvaldo "Bembesito" Lora, Val Jeanty, Maxine Montilus, Yomaira Gonzalez, Caridad Paisan Garbey, Daniel Gil, Hansel Vaillant, Miguelo Valdes, Charles Hart and Diosvany Valladares. Themes of black resistance - both historical and contemporary - swell in this colorful and immersive spectacle. 

Entering its eighth season in 2016-17, CONTACT!, the Philharmonic's new-music series, will return to National Sawdust in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, for two chamber programs featuring New York-area composers. This season of CONTACT!complements the Philharmonic's 175th anniversary season celebrations, which highlight the Orchestra's rich history of commissioning and premiering important works and salute its hometown of New York City. Esa-Pekka Salonen, who is in the second year of his three-year tenure as the Philharmonic's Marie-Josee Kravis Composer-in-Residence, continues his advisory role on CONTACT!.

 On Friday, December 9, Road Less Traveled Productions (RLTP), in collaboration with Mason Winfield (Haunted History Ghost Walks) and The Kila Group, will present Paranormal Theater, A Special Event/Paranormal Investigation for the Holiday Season.

Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts at Brooklyn College continues its 2016-17 family series on Saturday, February 11, 2017 at 2pm with Treehouse Shakers' production of the original dance-play, Coyote's Dance. This interactive spectacle leads young audiences into the remarkable world of Coyote, the infamous mischief-maker from Native American cultures.

The Bronx Opera will celebrate its 50th season in 2017 with two different takes on the story of William Shakespeare's lovable rogue knight, Sir John Falstaff: the rarely-performed Sir John in Love, by English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams (January 14, 15, 21, 22); and Verdi's Falstaff, the final, miraculous opera by the Italian master (April 29, 20, May 6, 7). Each production will be performed both in the Bronx, at Lehman College's Lovinger Theatre, and in Manhattan, at Hunter College's Kaye Playhouse. This will be BxO's third presentation of Sir John in Love (they gave the U.S. Premiere in 1978) and their first of Falstaff, and both operas will be performed in English.

The 2016-2017 Hoff-Barthelson Music School Master Class Series opens with cellist Pamela Devenport on Saturday, December 17, 2016, at 1:00 p.m., at Hoff-Barthelson Music School, 25 School Lane, Scarsdale. 

Roundabout Theatre Company (Todd Haimes, Artistic Director) and Education at Roundabout (Jennifer DiBella, Director of Education) are pleased to announce that Skyline High School in Oakland, CA will present the regional premiere of PROSPECT HIGH: BROOKLYN.

As part of its 25th Anniversary Celebration, Target Margin Theater presents the Unseen O'Neill Lab. Lead artists Ann Marie Dorr, Kathleen Kennedy Tobin and Eva von Schweinitz revive some of O'Neill's known but rarely-seen works including Beyond the Horizon, Dynamo, and The Great God Brown.

Come back in time to Southern Italy with I GIULLARI DI PIAZZA, the renowned Italian music/theater/dance company, when they present their traditional Southern Italian 'La Cantata dei Pastori,' (The Shepherd's Cantata) a musical family holiday delight, at Theater for the New City, 155 First Avenue (between 9th & 10th Streets).  Five performances, December 16 & 17 at 8 PM; December 18 at 5 PM; December 21 & 22 at  8 PM.