Exquisite Corps is doing a fundraiser.  A bunch of different directors present staged readings of portions of plays they want to direct.

I’ll be playing Victoria/Singer in the first portion of August Strindberg’s A Dream Play on Thursday and Saturday nights. Directed by Adrienne Boris.

ONE WEEKEND ONLY!
September 9-12, 2010
Thursday @ 8:00pm
Friday @ 8:00pm
Saturday @ 8:00pm*
Sunday @ 2:00pm*

* reception following Saturday and Sunday performances

At the Factory Theatre
491 Tremont St., Boston, MA [map]
$10 suggested donation. No advance reservations.

Quelle chance!

I’m going to be spending six weeks this summer with the Franco-America Vocal Academy in southern France working on French vocal music.  I will play Orphée in the mezzo version of Offenbach’s Orphée aux Enfers, perform solos in concerts of sacred music by Gounod and Saint-Saëns, and prepare songs of contemporary composer Isabelle Aboulker under her tutelage.  I will also get to take lessons in singing, movement, and French.  And did I mention spend six weeks in the south of France in the summer?

Specific performance dates TBA.

My violinist sister Julia and I are teaming up to present a lunchtime recital at St. Paul Cathedral in downtown Boston on June 16th.  We’ll be playing Vaughan Williams’s “Along the Field” - settings of A.E. Housman poems - and folk song settings by Rebecca Clarke.

Wednesday, June 16th
12:00-12:30 sharp *time change* (no longer at 12:15)
St. Paul Cathedral
138 Tremont St, across from Park Street Station
Boston, MA

$5 suggested donation goes to benefit the church’s organ fund.
This event is open to the public and you are free to bring your lunch!

A World Premiere Staged Reading of College/Bound, a new musical by Marlena Merrin.

College/Bound is a dramatic comedy about family expectations and college aspirations. There are complications, revelations and transformations. This is a full-length show (2+ hours) and is appropriate for adults and mature teenagers. (Unfortunately we can’t accommodate children under 13, including infants, on June 12th)

When: June 12th 2pm
Running time: 2.5 hours including a 15 minute intermission

Where: Margaret Jewett Hall within the First Congregational Church. The church is on the corner of Garden Street and Mason Street. The entrance to the Hall is actually on Mason Street.
Directions

Cost: $5

by Jennifer Dubois
Presented by 11:11 Theatre Company

April 30 @ 8pm
May 1, 6, 7, & 8 @ 8pm
May 2 @ 3pm
At the Factory Theatre,   MAP

Laura and Jonah, a childless couple, deal with the arrival and care of a foreign-exchange student.  After the student’s death, the two form separate and competing narratives about who the student was and what their interactions with her meant.  These divergent stories challenge the couple’s marriage and, ultimately, their sense of reality.   I play Alice, one of Laura and Jonah’s neighbors (read: foil).

$15 Online Presale, $17 at the Door
Thursday, May 6 is pay-what-you-can at the door
Tickets

Who could love a Dwarf?  OperaHub presents Zemlinsky’s heartbreaking tale of love and disillusionment.  This semi-autobiographical one-act makes a long-overdue Boston appearance.

I’m one of the Princess’s small Entourage.

DER ZWERG (The Dwarf)
By Alexander Zemlinsky
Libretto by George Klaren, based on Oscar Wilde’s
The Birthday of the Infanta

FREE ADMISSION!

Thursday, March 11, 2010 @ 8pm
Friday, March 12, 2010 @ 8pm
Saturday, March 13, 2010 @ 3pm + 8pm

Plaza Black Box Theatre, The Boston Center for the Arts
539 Tremont Street, Boston [map]

TICKETS
In the spirit of accessible opera for all, tickets to the Boston performances of Der Zwerg are absolutely free and may be reserved in advance by emailing tickets@operahub.org with your name, phone number, requested performance date, and number of seats.

This full-length play is part of the New England Russian Theatre Festival at the Boston Playwright’s Theatre. The show follows Chekhov and the actress Olga Knipper who created leading roles in his plays and whom he eventually married. I play Masha, Anton Chekhov’s sister and caretaker whose life is bound up in her brother and his work.

Boston Playwrights’ Theatre
949 Commonwealth Avenue
Boston, MA 02215
February 18, 19, 20, 21, 2010

February 18 and 19: $15 adults, $12 seniors and students
February 20 Gorky’s Park Children’s Program - $8 adults, $6 seniors and students, $5 children, Under age 5 free!
February 20 and 21 Half day - $15 adults, $12 seniors and students; All day $25.00
Rush tickets available $5 cash only (all four days) Available only 10 minutes before curtain, based on availability

For six marvel-filled nights in January and February, playwrights, filmmakers, musicians, dancers, and roustabouts, along with diverse practitioners of the carny crafts, will create an unforgettable evening of ballyhoo, burlesque, and incomparable entertainment.

Carny Knowledge draws its inspiration from the sideshows that spread across the nation from the mid-1800s to the mid-1900s. In most any town of any size, curious onlookers would gather near the midway of the fair or the circus to hear sideshow barkers tout the wonders available to those willing to pay just a few cents to see what they couldn’t view anywhere else in those days before international air travel and television . . . before the exploration of every corner of the planet seemed to rid the world of mystery.  Carny Knowledge will join short theatrical works, carnival sideshow acts, the Carny Band, and artistic installations to create an environment enveloping audiences and performers alike.

I will be directing John Weagly’s Scuffle and Jump and acting in Peter Cavell’s Tales of the Midnight Carnival.

Carny Knowledge
Silvia Graziano & Marc S. Miller, Impresarios
January 29-February 6, 2010
18+
Cambridge YMCA Theatre
820 Mass. Ave.
Central Square, Cambridge MAP

Tickets

The Harvard Yiddish Players proudly present a landmark bilingual production of Abraham Goldfaden’s operetta Shulamis, the most popular Yiddish play of all time. While wandering thirsty through the desert, the beautiful young Shulamis is rescued by the handsome Avisholem, who swears to marry her upon his return from Jerusalem.  When Avisholem fails to come for her and marries Avigail instead, Shulamis pretends to go mad in order to keep her vow to him, yearning both for his return and for revenge. Her choice is at the center of this timeless Biblical operetta of love and deception, of the price of revenge and the power of forgiveness. I will be playing Avigail.

Show Times:
Wednesday, December 2nd @ 8:00 PM
Thursday, December 3rd @ 8:00 PM
Saturday, December 5th @ 8:00 PM
Sunday, December 6th @ 2:00 PM
Sunday, December 6th @ 8:00 PM

Produced in cooperation with the National Yiddish Theater-Folksbiene
Directed by Debra Caplan and Cecelia Raker
Music Directed by Lidiya Yankovskaya and Choreographed by Gabrielle Orcha
In a new translation by Nahma Sandrow
and featuring a new musical score arranged by Zalmen Mlotek

More Info

Harvard’s Agassiz Theatre in Radcliffe Yard
Garden Street/5 James Street, Cambridge, MA 02138.

Tickets: $15 general, $10 students/seniors. Tickets can be purchased from the Harvard Box Office by phone at 617-496-2222 or online. For group sales, please contact Debra.

An evening of inter-genre performance works featuring made-up music.

EP!7
Sautrday, November 14, 7pm
Channel Center, Fort Point, Boston, across from Midway Studios
FREE

Fort Point Theatre Channel Presents Music on the Fly, the 7th installment of the Exclamation Point! series.  This one is curated by Robin Smith and yours truly.With new works and works in progress by Robin Smith, Christie Lee Gibson & Arvid Tomayko-Peters, Nick Thorkelson, and guests, Fort Point Theatre Channel’s seventh Exclamation Point! will feature music combined with video, acting improv, or other visual or stage components.

Reservations accepted but not required.

HOLLAND PRODUCTIONS presents
SLAMBoston: Diverse Voices in Theatre
(a trademark of Another Country Productions)

In an evening of new short plays, I’ll be playing Jillian in Philana Gnatowski’s play Her Dying Wish.

Monday, November 2nd @ 8:00 p.m.
Tuesday, November 3rd @ 8:00 p.m.

The Factory Theatre
791 Tremont Street
Boston, MA
www.thefactorytheatre.org

Tickets: $17
http://www.theatermania.com/ticketing/index.cfm/show/160625

An Algonquin Cinderella.  A neat piece and very family-friendly.  I will be singing in the chorus.  Presented by Mass Theatrica.

Sat, October 17, 2009
8:00pm
First Parish in Malden, Univeralist
2 Elm Street, Malden, MA

Sun, October 18, 2009
4:00pm
LynnArts
The Neal Rantoul Vault Theater
25 Exchange Street, Lynn, MA

Tickets may be purchased in advance or at the door for $15 Adults, $13 Students and Seniors.

Directions to LynnArts
Tickets (also available at the door, but cash and check only at that point)

Arvid and I have been asked back to Pixilerations, part of the FirstWorksProv festival. This time we will be playing a set of songs we are working on called “Awakenings: A potpourri of pithy poems and prose about sleep and awakening set to electro-acoustic music”. Poems by Alan Dugan and Jaime Sabines, prose by John Cage.

PIXILERATED: CONCERT PERFORMANCES II
Saturday, Sept. 26, 8pm, Free
URI Shepard Auditorium, 80 Washington St. [map]
Groundbreaking Electronic And Interactive Performances

What a great title for a musical! This show revolves around an Italian family in Boston’s North End in 1914, when the only jobs were building the Ginormous Molasses Tank or in the Panty Factory. Little did they know that 6 years later, the tank would ’splode!

This is a staged-reading of a new work, so all “performances” are a work in progress. I’ll be playing multiple roles, including Auntie Maria. Come see us put it on its feet.

Molasses Panty Town
Book and Lyrics by Francine Pellegrino, Music by Michael Hartigan
Directed by Elena Araoz
at the Boston Center for the Arts

Sept 17 (Thursday) at 7:30PM – until 10pm
Sept 18 (Friday) at 8PM – until 10:30pm
Sept 19 (Saturday) at 8pm – until 10:30pm
Sept 20 (Sunday) at 2pm – until 4:30pm
Sept 24 (Thurs) 8pm – until 10pm
Sept 25 (Fri) 8pm – until 10:30pm
Sept 26 - 8pm show  Note: There is a show this evening, but I will not be in it!  (see below)

Entrance is free and we are running at about 1.5 hrs.

I will be in the chorus and covering the role of Cancer Woman for the premiere of this new opera.  Music by Larry Bell and libretto by Andrea Olmstead and Romulus Linney (it is based on his play of the same name).

Holy Ghosts
September 15, 2009
Berklee Performance Center
136 Massachusetts Ave
Boston, MA 02115 MAP

I am doing a scenes workshop this summer with Sondra Kelly and Dr. Michelle Alexander at Boston University.  It’s a program of all American repertoire and I’m doing scenes from Little Women (Meg), Sacco and Vanzetti (Julia), and Susannah (Mrs. Ott).

Saturday, July 25th at 7pm at BU (more specific location TBA)

…No longer at Strange Maine!  New venue:

58 Wilmot St
Portland, ME 04101
MAP
Saturday, July 11th, time TBA.

with the Chris Welcome Trio and Jeff Platz Trio.  Organized by Kit Demos.  Arvid and I are working on some new songs based on poems by Alan Dugan and Jaime Sabines.  We’re also trying to figure out ways to notate our music.

by Claudio Monteverdi, with OperaHub.  I will be singing Soldier #1 and one of Seneca’s Friends.  Tickets are free and usually sell out, so you should reserve them sooner rather than later.

Directed and Arranged for Electronic Sound by Jordan Rodu

Cambridge Family YMCA Theatre
820 Massachusetts Ave
Cambridge, MA  MAP

Thursday, June 18, 2009 @ 7:30 PM
Friday, June 19, 2009 @ 7:30 PM
Saturday, June 20, 2009 @ 7:30 PM
Sunday, June 21, 2009 @ 2:00 PM

Friday, May 8th 7-9pm Free.

From those of us who brought you The Science of Love back in February, another evening of eclecticism brings you fresh poems brought to life by actors and multi-media. I will be working on grapefruit and grandfathers and possibly red hair dye. My roommate Leora has a poem featured!

At Bob’s Your Uncle/Front, 25 Channel Center Street, Fort Point neighborhood, Boston, MA (next door to Midway Studios).

I am directing…
“Ways to Eat a Grapefruit” by Leora Fox
“Red in Our Hair” by Ellen Lewis
“Hell’s Angels in a Bar” by Frederick Farryl Goodwin

Shelly’s family is in danger of losing their farm in the sweep of competition with agribusiness.  In a last-ditch attempt to keep it in the family, she convinces them to grow industrial help - a once-popular crop with oodles of manufacturing potential.  There’s just one hitch, and that is that non-narcotic hemp was lumped in with marijuana when that plant was made illegal.  And now, even as some states legalize medicinal marijuana, William Randolph Hearst’s paper-lobby legacy lives on in the form of this law.  Can Shelly’s family turn a profit on their hemp and save their farm, or will they get caught and go to jail?

I will be performing as Helen and the Farmer’s Wife in a workshop production of the new musical Caitlin County Hemp Wars at the ART’s Zero Arrow Theatre.  I get to sing a solo in a tango number!

Caitlin County Hemp Wars
Tuesday, May 5th, 2009
ART’s Zero Arrow Theatre
Arrow St., Cambridge, MA MAP

$20 per ticket
For advanced tickets
contact Terry Crystal
mail@risingearth.org
or (617) 497-4942
Reservations highly recommended
for this one time special event!

Ravel’s L’Enfant et les sortilèges!

Double bill with Mozart’s Impresario.
Saturday, March 21 at 7:30pm
Sunday, March 22 at 2pm
Friday, March 27 at 7:30pm
Sunday, March 29 at 2pm
First Parish Unitarian Church, 349 Boston Post Road, Weston, MA  MAP

I will be singing the Dragonfly on Sunday, March 22nd and Friday, March 27th;  I will be in the chorus for the other two performances.

Ravel’s music for this is awesome and hilarious and touching.  A young boy throws a tantrum instead of doing his homework and his mother sentences him to stay in his room with no snack.  He proceeds to tear the room apart.  Then the furniture, the Wedgewood teapot, the China cup, and the storybook princess grow larger than life and terrorize him with their grandeur and brokenness.  His arithmetic lessons come to life and 4 + 4 = 18.  The child ends up in the garden where he is mutinied against by the animals he habitually plagues.  I will be playing the distraught dragonfly whose mate the boy has crushed with his fingernail.  Eventually the boy comes to understand what a holy terror he has been and begs for his maman.  The animals decide to spare him.