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The Pirates of Penzance will play at 8 p.m. March 26-29,
with a 2:30 p.m. matinee on March 29, at Penn State Erie.
Lord of the Dance will be at The Bryce Jordan Center on
the University Park campus
Wednesday, March 25. For tickets, call (814) 865-5555 or (800) 863-3336.
Music at Noon: The Logan Wintergarden Series continues Friday, March 20, with a lunchtime performance by The Crosstown Trio, an eclectic ensemble that includes electric guitar, classical guitar and flute. The performance in the Wintergarden at Penn State Erie is free to the public, and guests may bring a brown-bag lunch.
The Crosstown Trio includes three young virtuoso performers: classical guitarist Andrew Leonard, jazz guitarist Tom Dempsey and flutist Christine Fish. For more information, call (814) 898-6159.
On "Queen Nzinga & Portuguese," the next episode of Odyssey Through Literature, host Leonard Rubinstein and Gerald Moser, professor emeritus of Spanish and Portuguese, discuss Portuguese influence on African Literature. Moser is the author of several books, including Essays in Portuguese African Literature.
Odyssey Through Literature is a continuing education service of the Department of Comparative Literature. It airs Sundays at 6:30 p.m. on WPSU, 91.5 FM from University Park and 106.7 FM in Altoona, and on WPSB, 90.1 in northern Pennsylvania.
Penn State Hazleton will host a one-man performance by Michael Fowlin called "This is Our Story" which explores the issues of race, gender, discrimination and unity, at 8 p.m. Tuesday, March 24, in room 1 of the Kostos Classroom Building. The event is free to the public.
Fowlin's presentation involves 10 different characters who reflect on their own identity issues as they relate to bias and discrimination.
For more information, call (717) 450-3179.
Penn State Berks and Penn State Lehigh Valley will present their first co-production, featuring two absurdist one-act plays.
Lehigh Valley will present Arthur Kopit's "Chamber Music,"
directed by Janice Pope; and Berks will present Harold Pinter's "The
Room," directed by D. Roger Dixon. Pope and Dixon are assistant
professors of
theatre arts. Together, the plays will be performed at both locations for
a two-week run.
The performance schedule is: Penn State Lehigh Valley, 8 p.m. March 25, 26, 27 and 28; and Berks, 8 p.m. April 2, 3 and 4, and 2 p.m. April 5.
The plays should be considered PG 13. Some material in both plays is unsuitable for children. Tickets are $6 for adults and $4 for students. Call Lehigh Valley at (610) 285-5062 or Berks at (610) 396-6371 to order tickets.
The Penn State Mallet Ensemble will perform for the Bach's Lunch concert at 12:10 p.m. Thursday, March 26, in the Helen Eakin Eisenhower Chapel on the University Park campus. In the event of bad weather, the concert will be held in 128 Music Building II.
The free, 20-minute concert is part of the Bach's Lunch series sponsored by the College of Arts and Architecture School of Music and the University Lutheran Parish.
After the concert, audience members may take their bag lunches to the Roy and Agnes Wilkinson Lounge in the Eisenhower Chapel. Coffee and tea will be provided.
This spring the theatre students at Penn State Erie will step out of the intimate Studio Theatre and into the Reed Union Building Commons for The Pirates of Penzance, a musical comedy. The production is set for 8 p.m. March 26, 27, 28 and 29, with an additional performance at 2:30 p.m. March 29.
The production is directed by Tony Elliot, lecturer in theatre.
Penn State Berks and Penn State Lehigh Valley will present a jazz performance of the Eric Mintel Quartet at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 1, in Berks campus' Perkins Student Center Theatre and at noon the same day in the Lehigh Valley campus Atrium.
Jazz may be making its comeback after nearly seven decades, but for pianist and composer Eric Mintel, jazz has never really faded from the music scene. His goal is to bring jazz to the mainstream audience. Other members of the group include George Hrab on drums, Nick Roberti on bass and Harvey Orkin on alto sax.
Admission is free to the public. For more information, call Doreen Fisher at Berks at (610) 396-6067 or Suzanne Preston at Lehigh Valley at (610) 285-5021.
David Dontigny will display his terra cotta plates in the Hetzel Union Building's Formal Gallery on the University Park campus through April 25.
Dontigny, who founded Penn State's ceramic department and headed this division in the School of Visual Arts for 20 years before his retirement, considers these ceramic plates to be a combination of early American pottery's strength of character and Japanese ceramics' sensitivity.
The public may attend a reception to meet the artist from 4 to 6 p.m. Thursday, April 16, in the HUB Formal Gallery.
Veteran rock band Grand Funk Railroad, who ruled as the American "power trio" band throughout the 1970s, will play at the Community Arts Center in Williamsport, part of Penn College, on Sunday, April 26.
Grand Funk Railroad built an audience one live performance at a time. Starting in the summer of 1969, they played festival after festival until the recording labels could no longer ignore them.
The trio of Mark Farner on guitar, Mel Schacher on bass and Don Brewer on drums pounded its way through the early 1970s with hits like "We're An American Band" and "The Loco-Motion." Breaking up and reforming several times in the 1980s, the band reunited in 1997.
Tickets are $30, $24.50 and $19.50.
For more information, call the Community Arts Center box office at (717) 326-2424 or its NAC Omni line at (800) 432-9382.
Gettysburg resident Andrea Theisson closes the 1997-98 season of Penn State Mont Alto's "How to Hoot and Toot, Howl and Scowl, Plink and Plunk and Call It Art!" series with an exhibit through May 1 at the Penn State Mont Alto Library.
After recently receiving a fellowship/grant awarded by the Vermont Studio Center, Theisson was inspired to paint the works to be displayed in this exhibit, titled, "Reverse to Ip: Refuge and Renewal, New Work from Vermont Mountains." She describes this series of pieces as "...a triumph over personal losses, natural disaster and depletion."
The Berks County Intermediate Unit will sponsor its annual high school art exhibit at Penn State Berks' Freyberger Gallery from April 29 -May 7.
This exhibition features works from the art departments of secondary schools throughout Berks County and includes a variety of media. Awards will be presented in the different categories.
Admission is free to the public. Refreshments will be served at a public reception in the Freyberger Gallery from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 29.
For more information, call
Beverly Leviner at (610)396-6099.
Mary J. Blige, the reigning queen of hip hop soul, and Usher, R&B's newest sensation, with special guest Next, will appear at The Bryce Jordan Center at 7 p.m. Sunday, April 5. Tickets are $35.75 for reserved seating.
Blige won a 1994 Grammy Award for her duet with Method Man (of Wu-Tang Clan), "I'll Be There For You/You're All That I Need."
Joining Blige is 18-year-old Usher, whose 1997 release "My Way" has remained at the top of the charts. His single "Nice And Slow" is currently No.1 on Billboard's R&B singles chart.
Tickets can be purchased at the Jordan Ticket Center, Eisenhower Auditorium South Box Office, selected Uni-Mart outlets, Commonwealth campus and college ticket outlets or by calling (814) 865-5555 or (800) 863-3336.