Kimmel Center Kicks Off 10th Anniversary Season

Kimmel Center's 10th Anniversary Season officially kicks off with two vocalists taking the stage to showcase new works:

Grammy award winning singer-songwriter k.d. lang with The Siss Boom Bang and special guest Teddy Thompson perform a fusion of country rock and sweeping visceral melodies in Verizon Hall on September 29 including new works from their April 2011 release, Sing it Loud, and songs from throughout lang's career.

And, reminiscent of the Kimmel Center's inaugural season, opening weekend festivities at the Kimmel Center also include a performance by four-time Tony® Award winner Audra McDonald in Verizon Hall, an encore to her performance a decade ago. McDonald kicks off her 20-city North American Tour at the Kimmel Center on October 1, performing her trademark mix of show tunes, classic movie songs and pieces written expressly for her by leading contemporary composers.

Tickets for k.d. lang and the Siss Boom Bang and special guest Teddy Thompson, Sept. 29, and Audra McDonald, Oct. 1, concerts, are available for purchase by calling 215-893-1999, online at kimmelcenter.org, or at the Kimmel Center box office, which is open daily from 10am to 6pm and later on performance evenings. (Additional fees may apply.)

k.d. lang and the Siss Boom Bang
special guest Teddy Thompson
Thurs., Sept. 29, 2011 at 8pm
Verizon Hall
Ticket Price: $38.50 - $81

"Few singers command such perfection of pitch. Her voice, at once beautiful and unadorned and softened with a veil of smoke, invariably hits the middle of a note and remains there." -New York Times about k.d. lang

k.d. lang and the Siss Boom Bang perform in Verizon Hall on September 29, as part of the North American tour in support of 2011 country rock release, Sing it Loud, co-produced by Joe Pisapia, music director of Siss Boom Bang and multi-instrumentalist who will join lang onstage with band members Daniel Clarke (keyboardist), Fred Eltringham (drums/percussion), Joshua Grange (baritone, guitar, dobro), and Lex Price (bass). Teddy Thompson, who is touring in support of his most recent release, Bella, will perform a solo acoustic set to open the show.

"It was like being given wings," comments k.d. lang about the studio recording of Sing it Loud, her first record made entirely with a band of her own since the pair of albums with the Reclines that launched her career more than 20 years ago. "I could go from an extraordinary soft, vulnerable sounding vocal technique to really loud, almost shouting. To have a vocal situation that can handle that sort of dynamic is rare." Continues lang on the title track, "Sing it Loud," written by Pisapia several years ago for her, "I think we all feel like outsiders. Part of us feels like we really don't fit in anywhere, and I think that's great. That part of us should be celebrated."

Sing it Loud is lang's first studio album since 2008's Watershed, which debuted in the Top 10 of the Billboard 200. In 2010, k.d. lang marked the 25th anniversary of her recording debut with Recollection, a career retrospective. She has won four GRAMMY® awards, eight Juno Awards, a BRIT, an AMA, a VMA, and four awards from GLAAD. "Hallelujah Vancouver Winter 2010"-an interpretation of the Leonard Cohen classic that lang recorded live at the opening ceremonies of the 2010 Winter Olympics-was recently nominated for a Juno Award for Single of the Year. In 1996, she received Canada's highest civilian honor, the Order of Canada. She has appeared alongside such musical luminaries as Roy Orbison, Bonnie Raitt, Elton John, Loretta Lynn, and Tony Bennett.
"She's the best singer of her generation," observed Tony Bennett, who has frequently toured with lang since their 2002 Wonderful World duets album. lang has also contributed to numerous soundtracks, including Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, and Happy Feet, and has appeared in such films as Salmonberries, The Black Dahlia, and Eye of the Beholder.

Audra McDonald
Verizon Hall
Sat., Oct. 1, 2011 at 8pm
Ticket Price: $35 to $75

Tony® and Grammy® Award-winning singer and actress Audra McDonald returns to the stage to embark on 20-city coast-to-coast concert tour of North America, which officially kicks off with at the Kimmel Center on October 1. Tour dates are also scheduled at the Celebrity Series in Boston, Washington D.C.'s Kennedy Center and New York's Carnegie Hall. Her Kimmel Center program includes new music from her first complete recording of Rodgers and Hammerstein's "Allegro" (2009, with artist Patrick Wilson), as well as her signature mix of show tunes, classic songs from movies, and contemporary theater pieces written expressly for her by leading contemporary composers, such as Stephen Sondheim. Joining McDonald on stage is Andy Einhorn (piano), Mark Vanderpoel (bass) and Gene Lewin (drums).

Blessed with a luminous soprano and an incomparable gift for dramatic truth-telling, singer/ actress Audra McDonald is equally at home on Broadway and opera stages as in roles on film and television. After four seasons of playing Dr. Naomi Bennett on ABC's hit television series Private Practice, McDonald returns her attention back to live performances. Between her North American Concert Tour Dates, McDonald is also making her role debut as the title character in a new musical adaptation of the Gershwins' folk opera, Porgy and Bess. The production-co-starring Norm Lewis as Porgy and David Alan Grier as Sportin' Life, and directed by the Tony®-nominated Diane Paulus-runs from August to the end of September at the American Repertory Theater's home base of the Loeb Drama Center in Cambridge, Massechusetts. In December the production is slated to begin previews at the Richard Rodgers Theatre in New York City, marking McDonald's first foray into Broadway since 2007, when she received a Drama Desk Award and a Tony® nomination for her performance in 110 in the Shade.

McDonald has won four Tony® Awards, two Grammy® Awards, and a long list of other accolades to her name. Born into a musical family, McDonald grew up in Fresno, Caolifornia and received her classical vocal training at the Julliard School. One year after graduating, she won her first Tony® Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Musical for Carousel at Lincoln Center Theater. She received two additional Tony® Awards in the Featured Actress category over the next four years for her performances in the Broadway premieres of Terrence McNally's play Master Class (1996) and his musical Ragtime (1998), earning her an unprecedented three Tony Wards before turning 30. In 2004, she won her fourth Tony, starring alongside Sean "Diddy" Combs in a Raisin in the Sun. Other recent theater credits include 110 in the Shade (2007) and Public Theater "Shakespeare in the Park" debut in Twelfth Night alongside Anne Hathaway and Raúl Esparza (2009).

A prominent advocate for marriage equality, McDonald joined Twitter to promote the cause, naming her Twitter handle @AudraEqualityMc. She sits on the advisory board for the marriage equality advocacy organization Broadway Impact. In June 2011, she sang at the Democratic National Committee's LGBT Leadership Dinner, hosted by Neal Patrick Harris, in New York City. Guests included President Barack Obama, Cynthia Nixon, and Cheyenne Jackson.

Kimmel Center, Inc., a charitable, not-for-profit organization, owns, manages, supports and maintains The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, which includes Verizon Hall, Perelman Theater, Innovation Studio and the Merck Arts Education Center. Kimmel Center, Inc. also manages the Academy of Music, owned by the Philadelphia Orchestra Association, and the University of the Arts Merriam Theater. Kimmel Center, Inc.'s mission is to operate a world class performing arts center that engages and serves a broad audience which includes providing arts in education, community outreach and a rich diversity of programming. The 2011/2012 season is sponsored by Citi. For additional information, visit kimmelcenter.org.