Out West Arts: Performance at the end of the world

Georg Friedrich Haas
Photo: Philippe Gontier 2009

There were some promising program announcements recently here in Los Angeles that deserve some mention. First and foremost is the return of the Monday Evening Concert series at Zipper Hall beginning in December for five concerts focusing, as usual, nearly exclusively on contemporary and late 20th-century music. The programs range from an evening of Californian composers on January 11 to nights devoted to Salvatore Sciarrino, Mauricio Kagel and later Frank Denyer. The event I’m most looking forward to, however, will come at the end of their season on April 19 when the JACK Quartet will perform Georg Friedrich Haas’ Third String Quartet, “In iij. Noct.”, a work that the composer dictates should be performed in total darkness. Haas is not well known in this country and I'm eager to hear a little more live music from him following my encounter with his opera Melancholia in Paris a couple of years back. It should be another interesting season. MEC’s role in the forefront of contemporary music in Los Angeles grows ever more important especially now that the new music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic has yet to demonstrate much of his own interests in this area.

Meanwhile the Blank Theater in Hollywood announced a series that includes a number of worthwhile productions. David Sedaris’ work will return to Los Angeles in a staged version of his “Santaland Diaries” in November. To follow this, the company plans for the West Coast premiere of the recent Christopher Durang hit from the Public Theater in New York, Why Torture is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them. All this and another musical offering from Michael John LaChiusa provides sufficient reasons to get over to Hollywood. So you’ve been warned. Act appropriately.

Labels: plan ahead