Interlude - September 17
September 17, 2020
Virtual field trips, ‘Music Man’ joins Hall of Fame and more
Welcome back to Interlude, your weekly reminder that there’s a lot of great stuff happening at the Center and other places you can visit with your computer or mobile device.
New ‘virtual field trips’ explore the arts
Now is not a great time to travel to the nation’s leading arts institutions, but you can visit virtually through the magic of Zoom teleconferencing with the Center’s new series of virtual field trips, Performing Arts Connect.
The digital destinations include the Manhattan School of Music for a discussion of great stage musicals, the Country Music Hall of Fame for a crash course in songwriting, and the Center for Puppetry Arts in Atlanta, where you can test your Muppet trivia skills and your kids can learn to make their own puppets.
Dig the Beatles? George Gershwin? There’s something for everyone, so read more about these monthly events on our website.
‘Music Man’ Hall of Fame induction starts today
The Great American Songbook Foundation continues its Songbook Hall of Fame 2020 inductions this week with tributes to Meredith Willson, the playwright and composer behind The Music Man and author of such standards as “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas.” His personal papers are housed in the Songbook Archives and are being digitized for online research access.
The celebration kicks off at 12 noon ET today with a video tour of that Meredith Willson Collection, viewable on YouTube and the Songbook Foundation’s Facebook page. Foundation Founder Michael Feinstein and Archivist Lisa Lobdell will dig deep for materials that include early drafts and international translations of The Music Man, newly digitized recordings from Willson’s radio career, and letters from friends such as Doris Day, Angela Lansbury, Robert Preston and multiple U.S. presidents. (By the way, this is the launch of a new video series, In the Archives with Michael Feinstein.)
Other highlights include the Friday premiere of a discussion between Lobdell and Dr. Dominic McHugh, a musicology professor at the U.K.’s University of Sheffield who frequents the Songbook Archives for research on Willson; and on Saturday, a performance by local Songbook Academy alumnus Jack Ducat as well as Willson’s official induction ceremony, also viewable on YouTube and Facebook.
Find further details on the Meredith Willson Week event page.
Listen back to the songs of September
Listen up, children, and we’ll tell you about a magical place, where artists as diverse as Willie Nelson, Sheryl Crow, Buddy Guy, Blondie, DEVO, Wynton Marsalis, Jason Isbell and Martina McBride come to share their talents. That place is called the Center for the Performing Arts, and during its first decade of existence, the month of September has brought performances by those cool people and many others.
Now, there’s another place where you can relive those moments: It’s called Spotify, and there you will find the Center’s new Shepherd Insurance Rewind Playlist for September! The collection also includes selections from Josh Turner, Ann Hampton Callaway, Scotty McCreery, the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band …
This week in performing arts history
September 16: In 1963, pop-rocker Richard Marx is born in Chicago. The “Don’t Mean Nothing” singer – the only male artist to send his first seven singles into the Billboard Top 5 – played to a packed Palladium in January 2018.
September 19: In 2013, acclaimed Chinese pianist Lang Lang, known for bringing rock-star charisma to the classical stage, makes his first appearance at the Palladium. He returned to captivate another capacity crowd in September 2016.
