'Sweeney Star' to Sharpen Student Skills; Dresden Dolls Share Views on 'Onion Cellar'
Michael Cerveris, who recently retired his bloodied razor from his Tony-nominated title role in John Doyle’s hit revival of Stephen Sondheim’s musical Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street, will present an audition workshop and Q&A on Monday, December 11 at 3 pm and 7 pm at the Agassiz Theatre, located in the Rieman Center for the Performing Arts in Agassiz House.
Cerveris’s multifaceted career as actor, musician, singer and songwriter spans drama, indie/alternative rock, and Broadway musicals, as well as work in television and film. He received a Tony Award and an Outer Critics Circle Award for his portrayal of John Wilkes Booth in Sondheim’s Assassins, and his other Broadway appearances include originating the title role in The Who’s Tommy (Tony nomination, Theater World Award) and Maury Yeston’s Titanic, the Musical. On London’s West End he starred in Hedwig and the Angry Inch—a role he also performed Off-Broadway and in Los Angeles. As a musician, Cerveris toured the U.S. and United Kingdom as guitarist with punk icon Bob Mould (of the bands Hüsker Dü and Sugar). He also toured with The Who’s Pete Townshend, sang with The Breeders and Stone Temple Pilots, and opened for Frank Black of the Pixies and Lloyd Cole.
Afro-Cuban Rhythms the Focus of Jazz Program
The intricate rhythms and melodies of the music of the Americas—with an emphasis on Afro-Cuban influences—are the focus of the Office for the Arts’ Jazz Program this year. Learning From Performers has teamed with the Harvard Jazz Bands (Tom Everett, Director) to bring percussionist Bobby Sanabria to campus. Following a visit in November, during which Sanabria rehearsed with the Monday Jazz Band and presented a lecture-demonstration, Sanabria returns on Saturday, December 9 to present a workshop at 1 pm and a concert with the band at 8 pm, both in Lowell Hall.
Of Puerto Rican descent, Sanabria has long been part of New York’s vibrant Latin-jazz club scene. He attended the Berklee College of Music in Boston, and after graduating in 1979 formed his group Ascension. He has performed with most of the major figures in modern Latin-jazz, including Henry Threadgill, Tito Puente, Chico Freeman, Luis “Perico” Ortiz, Daniel Ponce, Michael Gibbs, Phil Wilson, Mario Bauza, Marco Rizo, and Dizzy Gillespie, and has been honored with a National Endowment for the Arts grant. Sanabria is also a teacher, writer, arranger, bandleader, studio musician and producer, and is dedicated to educating the public about Latin jazz; over the past 15 years, he’s performed and lectured for thousands of New York City public-school students, teachers, and families as part of the city-run Arts Exposure Program.
Classical, Salsa, Art-Rock to Spice Up Spring
The spring 2007 Learning From Performers roster will feature other notable music artists, including Larry Rachleff, Music Director of the Rhode Island Philharmonic as well as Chicago’s Symphony II, which comprises members of the Chicago Lyric Opera Orchestra. Rachleff will visit campus on Monday, March 5, to conduct an open rehearsal with Harvard’s Mozart Society Orchestra (Akiko Fujimoto, Director) in Paine Hall. And the Jazz Program’s emphasis on Afro-Cuban jazz will continue with an April visit by legendary pianist, arranger, and composer Eddie Palmieri, whose musical career spans 50 years as a bandleader of salsa and Latin-jazz orchestras (an eight-time Grammy Award winner, Palmieri’s discography includes more than 32 titles).
Also in the spring term, Learning From Performers continues its collaboration with Harvard’s American Repertory Theatre (A.R.T.) by focusing on The Onion Cellar, a new musical performance piece created by Boston’s own cabaret/punk/art-rock duo Amanda Palmer and Brian Viglione, aka the Dresden Dolls. Students joined Palmer and Viglione on November 15 to discuss the work-in-progress, and will now have a chance to see the finished piece—and continue the discussion—at a performance followed by a Q&A at the A.R.T.’s Zero Arrow Theatre on January 6. Learning From Performers will also present workshops featuring South-African political humorist Pieter-Dirk Uys, who returns to the A.R.T. with a new show, Elections and Erections, a Memoir of Fear and Fun, April 4-
May 6 at Zero Arrow.
