Art and performance 4/15 to 4/21

Visual Art

Gallery Night and Day, metro Milwaukee area, Friday evening on April 17 and Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. April 18 (most locations)

*See our special section for a preview of this quarterly must-see event.

Multimedia

Tile, Quilt, Pixel: Paul Berger, UW-Milwaukee, Wed. April 15 at the Arts Center Lecture Hall. Starts at 7 p.m.
Paul Berger talks about the trajectory of his composite and collage works over the course of the last thirty-five years. Currently a professor of art at the University of Washington’s School of Art where he founded the school’s photography program, Berger moved from traditional forms to digital manipulation and gained fame throughout Europe plus grants from the National Endowment of the Arts. A retrospective of his work showed at the Museum of Contemporary Photography in 2003. He will be speaking about his work as part of UWM’s 2008-09 Artist Now series.

Merengue: Visual Rhythms, Latino Arts museum, now through June 5. Open M-F 9 a.m. to 8 p.m.
In this Milwaukee stop on a national tour organized by International Arts and Artists showcases 27 classic and cuurent artists from the Dominican Republic. The focus of the show looks at that country’s national music form through mediums including photographs, sculpture, paintings, and videos by “analyzing the rhythm’s artistic components and environmental contexts”. Admission is free.

Theater

Last of the Red Hot Lovers! , Broadway Baby Dinner Theatre, now until April 26.
Milwaukee’s longest-running dinner theater is putting on Neil Simon’s successful 1969 comedy. The story revolves around a middle-aged and shy man who hopes to join the sexual revolution before it’s over. Lacking experience and chutzpah, he arranges three separate seductions with women of various neuroses — one of whom is his best friend’s wife.

The Cherry Orchard, Milwaukee Rep at the Quadracci Powerhouse Theatre, April 14 to May 10.
Anton Chekhov’s last play is the newest production by members of the Resident Acting Company and other guest actors. While Chekhov intended this to be a comedy, its first director set it as a tragedy. Directors have been wrestling with what it is ever since.

Brooklyn Boy, Milwaukee Chamber Theatre at the Cabot Stage. Opens April 16 running through May 3.
The MCT will finish its 34th season with Pulitzer Prize-winning Playwright Donald Margulies’s drama about a best-selling author of a loosely autobiographical novel describing growing up Jewish in Brooklyn. But the author also experiences a midlife crisis as he struggles to come to terms with an aging father, a failing marriage and lost roots.

Zombies From the Beyond, Cardinal Stritch at the Nancy Kendall Theater. April 17-19 and April 24-26.
The school’s Music and Theater Department is premiering this hit Off-Broadway play, adapted for local reference. The original musical comedy by James Valcq skewered American ideals during the Eisenhower era using a sci-fi B-movie structure. The local production sets the play at “the Milwaukee Space Station, where a flying saucer lands, piloted by Zombina, an alien aviatrix”.

How I Became a Pirate, Milwaukee First Stage at the Todd Wehr stage. Opens April 17 running weekends until May 17.
based on the well-known children’s book by Melinda Long and given new lyrics and notes by musical composers Janet Yates Vogt and Mark Friedman, the story follows young Jeremy Jacobs. His exceptional digging skills attracts a sea captain for treasure burying purposes. At first Jeremy thinks the pirate life is cool but eventually longs for the comfort of home and family. An interactive workshops is available for extra (unless you are subscriber family) where kids can work with the production company to better understand the play’s heart.

The Magic Flute, Florentine Opera at Marcus Center for the Performing Arts. April 17 – 19.
The venerable  opera company present an all-new production of Mozart’s great swan song as its anniversary season draws to a close. The music will be performed by the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Maestro Joseph Rescigno and has been designed locally. Performers will be sing in English with lyric translations projected above the stage, making this perhaps a nice introduction to the art form for younger audience-goers.

Social Security, Sunset Playhouse in Elm Grove. Opens April 17 running Thursdays – Sundays through May 9.
This long-standing non-profit community theatre group presents its fifth offering of the year with a comedy about an art dealing couple who take in the wife’s screwy sister, husband, and Jewish mother. The author, Andrew Bergman, was behind many famous cult scripts and stories such as Blazing Saddles, Honeymoon in Vegas, and Striptease.

The Boys Next Door, Racine Theater Guild. April 17 – 19 and April 24 – 26.
This bonus show sponsored by SC Johnson is a moving comedy about four mentally disabled men living in a group home being held together by a harried social worker. It is being directed by the famed and storied local director Norm McPhee.

Old-Time Radio: Sherlock Holmes, Alchemist Theater. April 19 at 3 p.m.
The Wisconsin Hybrid Theater and Alchemist Productions are presenting the second in a series of live productions revealing both an imagined behind the scenes and original classic stories that once captivated audiences who huddled around the radio before the advent of television. The cast regularly portrays staff and actors from the imagined WHT radio station set in the 1920s.

Hair! Peck School of the Arts at Mainstage Theater. Opens April 21 -25 at 7:30 p.m. and April 26 at 2 p.m.
The PSOA Department of Theatre Mainstage Series concludes with HAIR, the American tribal love-rock musical…originally produced by the New York Shakespeare Festival Theatre in 1967. It is directed by Bill Watson; William Lavonis is the conductor and music director; Elizabeth Johnson provides the choreography. Scenery is by R.H. Graham, costumes are by Pamela Rehberg, and Christopher Guse is technical director and sound engineer.

The performance on Wednesday, April 22, will be preceded by an informal talk beginning at 6:45 pm. Sign interpretation will be available for the performance on Thursday, April 23. This production contains adult themes, language and nudity.  HAIR fits right into the Theatre Department’s season-long examination of politics in many forms: the politics of love, the politics of war and the politics of power. In directing HAIR, Bill Watson has focused on the musical’s anti-war themes. “This is an important moment to re-examine the social and political activism of the sixties. Here we are, four decades later, engaged in two foreign wars.”

Music

Conservatory Nights Concert Series, Wisconsin Conservatory of Music. April 16 at 7:30 p.m.
This “series has proved exceptionally popular with sold out audiences for nearly every concert. This season’s concerts will include an eclectic mixture of five jazz styles: straight-ahead, modern, Latin, fusion and funk; as well as concerts that focus on Afro-Cuban, French, Spanish, breakbeat and hip-hop music…Helen Bader Hall will be transformed into an intimate candle-lit club with cabaret table seating and bar service.”

Unruly Music, the Electro-Acoustic Music Center at UWM Recital Hall. April 16 at 7:30 p.m.
At UWM, under the direction of Musical Composition and Theory Chair Jon Welstead, this program promises to be a strange and wonderful show making music with electronic equipment, sonic noises, and tape recordings “in surround sound”.

Unofficial Gallery Night After-Event, the Wherehouse in Milwaukee’s Fifth Ward. April 17 @ 9 p.m.
Offered by Present Music as a way to unwind from the pressures of Gallery Night, it should be a bombastic affair. From the web page announcement:  “You’d think we were in SoHo…with musical sets by Present Music and Nobot, video by Beeple, and dance with WMSE’s BTS.WRKNG. $10, Doors open at 9pm, enjoy a free drink before 10pm, stay late.”

Whirled Music, Unitarian Universalist Church West. April 18, 2009 at 7:30 p.m.
A choral recital featuring the likes of Joel Kopischke, J. Ruben Piirainen and the Wisconsin Cream City Chorus. Showcasing a “blend of well-known tunes with an original script and visual elements”.

Legend in Black, Wisconsin Lutheran College in the Schwan Concert Hall. April 17 at 8 p.m.
From WLC: “Bill Cayley shares more than just a birthday with Johnny Cash – he also has the same look and stage presence as the music legend. Cayley and a June Carter-Cash character, as well as a three piece back-up band, realistically re-enact the moving country songs that Johnny and June played so many times. The Legend in Black truly replicates the sound and emotions that made the world fall in love with these legendary performers.”

Rachid Taha, part of Alverno Presents: April 18
“Never mind the war on terrorism. What about the war on fear, complacency, ignorance, racism, poverty and lies? That’s a struggle that Rachid Taha has been fighting for the past two decades and more, ever since he was a a tear-away punk immigrant from Algeria. His weapons – a whole canon of innovative, powerful and enduring songs which jostle rock, electronic and North African influences in the service of honesty and risk. The talent, passion and ferocity are legendary.”

One Night in Paris (with Robin Pluer) , Cedarburg Cultural Center. April 18
This event can be purchased alone for the concert at $18, or with a French dinner (the Alliance Francaise de Milwaukee is a sponsor) catered by Larry’s Brown Deer Market set in a French atmosphere. Dinner tickets include: Friday night movie at the historic Rivoli theater, French dinner and Robin Pluer’s performance at $65.

An Evening with the Frankly Music Chamber Orchestra, Wisconsin Lutheran College in the Schwan Concert Hall. April 20 at 7 p.m.
Violinist and conductor Frank Almond with featured members of the Milwaukee Symphony will be performing four pieces from composers Vivaldi, Mendelssohn, and Haydn in this perfect little venue — putting the classy in classical music.

Prometheus Trio, Wisconsin Conservatory of Music. April 20, 21 at 7:30 p.m.
Three impressive musicians conclude this year’s set with a few older but eclectic pieces by Beethoven and Gabriel Pierné — plus two newer pieces by former Milwaukeean Jason Seed. Frequent collaborator and bassist Dan Armstrong is scheduled to play on these compositions. So wouldn’t that make it a quartet?

For venue, tickets, showtimes and more, visit Footlights Milwaukee online.