Arts

“A rock musical that really rocks, the audacious and affecting “Hedwig and the Angry Inch” tells the tale of a young East German “slip of a girly boy” who has a sex-change operation in order to marry a U.S. soldier and pursue a rock ‘ n’ roll dream in America. Things don’t go smoothly. The…

Leonard Bernstein at 100 celebrates the life and work of Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990), the great Jewish American composer and conductor who dedicated his life to making classical music a vibrant part of American culture. The exhibition features photographs, personal items, papers, scores, correspondence, costumes, furniture and audio and video recordings. A vocal booth gives visitors…

“Nat Meade uses glowing sunset-toned oil paint to render blocky humanoid forms engaged in absurdist compositions that poke fun at stereotypes of masculinity. His roughly textured brushwork gives his figures an almost monolithic feel, and adds to the delightful weirdness of this local artist’s style.” – Oregon Arts Watch

“Controlling social cliques, oppressive beauty standards and cut-throat competition. Yep, sounds like high school! In Jocelyn Bioh’s comedy, though, these familiar dynamics play out at an exclusive Ghanaian boarding school, where issues of skin color and colonialism are added to the brew — then the pot is stirred by a light-skinned transfer student from America…

“You always hurt the one you love,” goes the familiar refrain. In this dark comedy by Savannah Reich, that applies not just to humans, but also to ghosts — even a nice ghost living in the woods and minding her own business. Suddenly infatuated with a pretty girl, our friendly ghost follows her home —…

Froelick Gallery is pleased to present “Echo,” its latest exhibition with Joe Feddersen, a member of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation (Okanagan, Lakes), featuring recent monoprints, works on paper, and blown glass vessels. Feddersen’s imagery draws on traditional petroglyph forms to call attention to both ancient and contemporary sights and symbols of the…

“One day life is good, the next you’re treading water. That’s not supposed to happen to folks like us.” The “us” in Lynn Nottage’s Pulitzer-winning drama are the good, blue-collar folk in the Rust Belt town of Reading, Pennsylvania, whose stable finances and social bonds start corroding and collapsing amid 21st century union busting and…

Fans of last season’s Dial M for Murder will want to come back for Wait Until Dark, a sensory thriller that will chill you to your very core. Susan Hendrix, a blind Greenwich Village housewife, has been left alone in her apartment when she becomes the target of ruthless con men hatching an elaborate charade…

See Portland’s newest theater and dance works every January at Portland’s Fertile Ground Festival.

Join Live On Stage for Portland’s own festival of all new musicals and check out shows by local writers and composers. Brett Campbell from Oregon Arts Watch writes that Portland’s Mini Musical Festival is “one of the most enjoyable theatrical experiences of the year.”

“Geghis Barbie, the premiere “post-post-feminist all-female horn experience,” is a quartet of orchestral horn players known for sporting stage names such as “Attilla the Horn” and “Alpine Barbie,” along with for playing vivid, creatively faithful reimaginings of popular songs by the likes of David Bowie and the Eurythmics. Local music organization Third Angle brings the…

From its stately opening to its majestic finale, Mussorgsky’s depiction of a stroll through an art exhibit is a perennial symphonic favorite, thanks to Ravel’s splendid orchestration. Augustin Hadelich, Musical America’s 2018 Instrumentalist of the Year, brings his astonishing technical wizardry to Paganini’s dazzlingly virtuosic First Violin Concerto. “Russian composer Modest Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an…

“Eye-popping athleticism, rhythmic sophistication and visual vibrancy help make this Brazilian dance powerhouse on eof the most popular repeat visitors to the White Bird Dance Series. Returning for its fifth Portland appearance, the troupe’s synthesis of contemporary dance, ballet and Afro-Brazilian folkloric movement is well represented in a program featuring two works by choreographer Rodrigo…

“Portland’s Corrib Theatre continues its fruitful focus on contemporary Irish plays with writer and Dublin City Councilor Gerard Mannix Flynn’s one-man show about the abuse and neglect of Irish children at the hands of both church and state. Performed here by the reliably remarkable Darius Pierce, with Corrib founder (and former Dubliner) Gemma Whelan directing.”…

For centuries, opera has manipulated gender: men playing women, women singing “trouser roles” as men. In this production, contralto Vicki St. Pierre sings roles written for several of the Baroque era’s famed castrati. Monica Huggett leads the orchestra in a new twist of gender in Handel opera, including the captivating “mad scene” from Orlando. “Portland…

“In 2010, Oregon Ballet Theatre added to its repertoire of great Tchaikovsky story ballets, with then-artistic director Christopher Stowell choreographing a version of the classic fairytale “The Sleeping Beauty,” modeled after Marius Petipa’s 1890 original. Now, under current artistic director Kevin Irving, the company returns to the land of 19th century classical splendor.” – Oregon…

“Two women in love — kissing, even! That was controversial stuff a century ago when the Sholem Asch play “God of Vengeance” made its English-language premiere on Broadway. Paula Vogel’s 2017 Tony nominated play “Indecent” tells the tale of Asch’s iconoclastic approach to the stage, his play’s worldwide success (in the original Yiddish) and the…

“In this 2017 drama by Dominique Morisseau, a MacArthur “genius grant” winner best-known for her play “Skeleton Crew,” the title refers not a conduit for oil but the so-called “school-to-prison pipeline” — educational policies that criminalize minor infractions and disproportionately punish students of color. Addressing the topic through the story of an inner-city teacher who…

Concertmaster Sarah Kwak takes center stage in opera composer Gian Carlo Menotti’s sensuous and expressive Violin Concerto. Dmitri Shostakovich’s cinematic Eleventh Symphony depicts the struggle and drama of the Russian Revolution of 1905 in vivid detail. “These concerts feature a pair of mid-century compositions: an American violin concerto and a Russian symphony. Oregon Symphony concertmaster…

Bury the Hatchet is artist John Hitchcock’s mixed-media, cross-disciplinary, multisensory installation. Hitchcock combines his interests in printmaking, rock ’n’ roll, and Kiowa and Comanche history into one visual expression that offers a retelling of the narrative of the American frontier. Bury the Hatchet explores issues of assimilation, acculturation, and indoctrination through oral history and music….

Relive the 1920s in all its decadence. The Oregon Symphony will take you through the dark cabarets and speakeasies of New York, Paris, Berlin, London and Atlantic City, featuring the top hits of the decade, from Rudy Vallée to Josephine Baker and from Kurt Weill to King Oliver. This concert will feature vintage imagery and…