UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance’s Crescendo Patrons’ Party was held on October 26th at the beautiful home of Barbara and Dr. Doug Cusick. More than 100 guests enjoyed a special inside look at Barbara and Doug’s collection of antique, automatic musical instruments. The beautiful collection even includes a self-playing grand piano that once belonged […]

November 4th was the date for the 11th annual Stand Up for Synergy at the Argosy Casino Hotel & Spa. Kathleen Madigan was the featured performer. More than 325 guests enjoyed cocktails, a delicious dinner and a live auction. Michelle and Ryan Brown and Daryl Lynch and Ruben Chacon were the co-chairmen, and Nicole DiAntonio […]

November 2nd was the date for a luncheon celebrating the 25th anniversary of Health Partnership Clinic (HPC), which provides healthcare to low-income and underserved individuals in the community. Nearly 150 guests attended the event, which was held at The Ritz-Charles and raised more than $50,000. HPC currently has four clinic sites in three counties and […]

Great Plains SPCA’s Brunch & Bubbly for Paws was held at Pennway Place at Studio Dan Meiners. The October 15th event raised more than $20,000 for homeless pets. Jami Pryor and Pam Scott, board members   Dan and Kelly Kultala   Chuck Laue, board member; and Fred Pryor   Emilio and Diana Larson Also featured […]

Was it Romeo and Juliet’s Verona? No, it was the Muriel Kauffman Theatre stage at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts, with decor by Larry Wheeler and Craig Sole. Patrons of the 50th Annual Ballet Gala enjoyed a delicious, four-course meal in this delightful setting during The Diamond Ball’s Private Dinner on October 17th. Gigi […]

Happily Ever After KC, a wedding to benefit KC Pet Project, took place on October 14th at The Loretto. The bride was Grace Lane Curran, and her groom was Charles Atlas Ward. Guests enjoyed music by Diamond Empire Band, delectables from Cupini’s and floral arrangements from The Little Flower Shop. On September 11th, a bridal […]

Mr. and Mrs. John Christopher McCarthy of Leawood are pleased to announce the engagement of their daughter, Lauren Ann McCarthy, to Ross Vincent Scimeca, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Phillip Louis Scimeca of Our Town. The bride-to-be is a graduate of St. Thomas Aquinas High School. She earned a bachelor of arts degree in […]

October 14th was the date for The Library Lets Loose, a benefit for the Johnson County Library Foundation, at The Central Resource Library in Overland Park. Ann and Bob Regnier served as the honorary hosts. More than 400 guests enjoyed cocktails and delicious fare from local restaurants, caricatures by Deborah Moreno, trivia games, and much […]

Kansas City musicians scored extraordinarily well in the 2018 Grammy Award nominations announced on November 28th: seven nominations in all. Congratulations go to the Kansas City Symphony, KC’s mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato, UMKC Conservatory Assistant Professor Zachary Shemon, and rap producer/songwriter (and KCK native) J. White. Topping the list is the Symphony’s disc of works by Adam […]

Change is almost always frightening, but when it comes to timeworn holiday traditions it can be as terrifying as realizing you left the Christmas turkey in the oven on “high” all night. For arts organizations whose popular yultetide fare provides a substantial chunk of annual revenue, tinkering with it can fill administrators and board members […]

As holidays approach, let’s all agree to relax and just have blessed fun this year. We’ve earned it! We offer suggestions for some of the more intriguing, inspiring events of this year’s performing-arts lineup. NOVEMBER Through the 19th: Lyric Opera of Kansas City; Everest; What better opera to get you in the mood for subzero […]

Everest possesses something found in surprisingly few contemporary operas: soaring, tastefully singable tunes that stick in your head but avoid the tacky pizzazz of Broadway that plagues so many new operas. Some will admire the piece (by composer Joby Talbot and librettist Gene Scheer) simply for its dazzling physical production and its starkly naturalistic score, […]

Hearing one musical giant at a concert is a great thing. Two, even better. But three, on the same program? Few events on this season’s calendar stand out quite as much as the appearance of Maestro Valery Gergiev on the Harriman-Jewell Series, with an ensemble from the Mariinsky Orchestra that he has built into a […]

Lee Ritenour might not know exactly what he and his ensemble will be playing when they perform here on October 28th, at the glittering Opening Night of the Folly Jazz Series’ 35th Anniversary Season. But that doesn’t mean they’ll be arriving unprepared. In fact, the legendary 65-year-old guitarist, who has played with everyone from Sinatra […]

The Chicago Symphony plays like a well-oiled, meticulously hand-crafted engine, and an opportunity to hear it in a fine acoustic space is always a treat. In 2015, when the Harriman-Jewell Series brought the CSO for its first appearance here in nearly a half-century, Music Director Riccardo Muti was so delighted with the experience of performing […]

Devon Carney has already demonstrated his skill as choreographer in the four full-length ballets he’s created since becoming the Kansas City Ballet’s Artistic Director in 2013. What stood out in his Romeo and Juliet, which received its world premiere October 13th at the Kauffman Center, was the former Boston Ballet Principal Dancer’s unwavering skill as […]

Theater comes in all shapes and sizes, but the plays that stick with us tend to be those that hold up a mirror to our own joys and tragedies, our loves and weaknesses and ruined relationships. When August Wilson’s plays began to appear on prominent stages during the 1980s, many noticed immediately the birth of […]

The Lyric Opera’s handsome production of Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin hit home partly because of its simplicity. The spare approach both to design and to direction, and the unfussy singing that managed to avoid excess (even as non-Russian-speakers labored to sing in Russian), allowed us to focus so intently on the drama that we found ourselves […]

Kansas City’s performing-arts season opened with a vengeance in mid-September, with more than a dozen professional-level productions of music, dance and theater vying for attention. Among the half-dozen or so I managed to take in, one that stood out (after Cliburn medalist Kenny Broberg’s recital, reviewed here) was the Harriman-Jewell Series’ presentation of Parsons Dance […]

It’s true that many operas of the standard repertoire are drawn from stories that are implausible, overwrought or even downright ridiculous. Almost as often, though, composers find themselves setting literary masterpieces to music, and they are challenged to create a work that can at least function on its own terms, stand up to the mastery […]

When I was growing up, it always bothered me that Thanksgiving seemed like the forgotten holiday. Each year, all the stores would put out tons of decorations for Halloween. The minute that Halloween ended, Christmas decorations would fill the shelves and The Jackson 5 could be heard singing “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” everywhere. […]