Author: Mark Arnest
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LIVE REVIEW: Philharmonic candidate wows crowd
Colorado Springs got its first look at Shizuo Kuwahara on Saturday night, when the second of five finalists for the position of Colorado Springs Philharmonic music director took the orchestra’s helm at the Pikes Peak Center.But the look was blurry: A Kuwahara concert is a kinetic experience that made the extravagant Leif Bjaland, the first…
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MURDER DINNERS refuse to die
A GUNSHOT. A SCREAM IN THE NIGHT. MURDER. Dessert. And maybe a drink or two. It’s murder-mystery dinner theater, in which the characters die, but the genre lives on. “Comedy is just tragedy gone awry,” says Karen Kennedy, producer of Madcap Mysteries. This fall, Red Herring Productions — the region’s oldest and largest murder-mystery theater…
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Murder mysteries refuse to die
A GUNSHOT. A SCREAM IN THE NIGHT. MURDER. Dessert. And maybe a drink or two. It’s murder-mystery dinner theater, in which the characters die, but the genre lives on. “Comedy is just tragedy gone awry,” says Karen Kennedy, producer of Madcap Mysteries. This fall, Red Herring Productions — the region’s oldest and largest murder-mystery theater…
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LIVE REVIEW: First conductor candidate makes strong impression
The Colorado Springs Philharmonic’s search for a successor to Lawrence Leighton Smith took a big step on Saturday when Leif Bjaland, the first of five candidates for the music director position, took the stage in a program of Brahms, Schumann and Chabrier. Bjaland’s thrilling interpretation of Brahms’ difficult Symphony No. 2 showed him to be a very…
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Arts maven Kathleen Collins will finally get her due
Local arts maven Kathleen Collins will have a long overdue curtain call tonight when the Pikes Peak Arts Council hands her a lifetime achievement award. “It’s kind of an in-the-trenches award,” said Eve Tilley, the former Arts Council president who suggested honoring Collins. “She doesn’t do it for the recognition. She does it for the…
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Young actor shrugs off disability, reaches for the stars
When director Jacki Mangan saw Brenden Van Bruwaene’s audition for “High School Musical,” she turned to her partners and said, “You know he’s going to be in the show, right?” It was partly the 14-year-old’s enthusiasm and winning smile. But Mangan was also impressed that a child with Down Syndrome — a genetic condition shared…
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CC Music Festival will go on!
A few months ago, it wasn’t a sure thing that the Colorado College Music Festival would take place at all. With funding from the college down, Susan Grace — the pianist who has directed the festival for all its 26 years — went to the festival’s donors with an extraordinary appeal. “We just had an…
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CC Music Festival isn’t ready to let the fat lady sing
A few months ago, it wasn’t a sure thing that the Colorado College Music Festival would take place at all. With funding from the college down, Susan Grace — the pianist who has directed the festival for all its 26 years — went to the festival’s donors with an extraordinary appeal. “We just had an…
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Concerts and luncheon honor the man who made the Pikes Peak Center sing
Once a household name in Colorado Springs, Charles Ansbacher dropped from the local limelight when he left in 1988 to conduct symphonies elsewhere. But the former symphony director’s legacies here have remained a constant, and tens of thousands of music lovers who never heard his name have reaped the benefits of his work. “Every time…
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Experimental theater gets inside your head
EDITOR’S NOTE: “Autoteatro,” a new experimental theater experience by the British troupe Rotozaza, turns the medium upside down. In this series of plays, presented by the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs’ Gallery of Contemporary Art and TheatreWorks, the audience members are the actors. To capture this very subjective experience, we asked writers Lauren…