CARIBBEAN SOUNDS KICK OFF CHICAGO SINFONIETTA'S 30th SEASON

Chi, IL LIVE Shows On Our Radar:

CHICAGO SINFONIETTA OPENS 30TH SEASON WITH A BANG OF CARIBBEAN SOUNDS, CONTEMPORARY DANCE AND 

TWO WORLD PREMIERES IN

TRADEMARK

Featuring Northern Illinois University Steelband and 

Chicago’s Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre

Wentz Concert Hall, Naperville, September 16

Symphony Center, Chicago, September 18

Chicago Sinfonietta, the nation’s most diverse orchestra, kicks off its 30th anniversary with Trademark showcasing unusual instruments, collaborations, and classical reinterpretations - a trademark of the orchestra’s programming for three decades. This unexpected and adventurous concert experience will include guest performances from the 16-piece Northern Illinois University Steelband led by Liam Teague and Chicago’s own Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre plus two World Premieres as part of the orchestra’s year-long initiative Project W: Commissions by Women Composers. 

The Sinfonietta performs Trademark twice: first in the western suburbs at Wentz Concert Hall at North Central College, Naperville, Saturday, September 16 at 8 pm, and then again in its downtown Chicago home venue of Symphony Center, Monday, September 18 at 7:30 pm.

The concert begins with the World Premiere of emerging composer and violinist Jessie Montgomery’s Coincident Dances and continues with one of Mozart’s best-known works Rondo alla Turca reinvented by the Northern Illinois University Steelband who then joins Sinfonietta’s principal harpist Faye Seeman on her original solo composition Fayed to Blue before switching to the Caribbean sounds of Lord Kitchener’s upbeat Pan in A-minor. The second half opens with the World Premiere of Grammy Award-nominated composer Clarice Assad’s Sin Fronteras, meaning “without borders”, featuring Chicago’s Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre performing a new piece of choreography also commissioned by the orchestra, and concludes with Bedřich Smetana’s symphonic poem Má vlast.

“As Chicago Sinfonietta approaches an important milestone in its history, our programming continues to reflect a pioneering and innovative spirit more than ever, especially through the dedication to showcasing unusual instruments, and our unprecedented commitment to featuring brand new commissions by diverse, prominent women composers," stated Music Director Mei-Ann Chen. "Making the commissions known through the 2019 release of our 16th commercial recording produced with our wonderful partner, Cedille Records, will help this unique organization advance its mission of diversity, equity, and inclusion while showcasing the incredible talent of women composers in America."

Before the concert and during intermission, audience members will have the opportunity to learn to play the steel drum and harp with students from Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra’s Steel Orchestras and The People’s Music School. Archival photos, artifacts, and more from Chicago Sinfonietta’s 30-year history will be on display for patrons to view as well.

Prior to the concert, Chicago Sinfonietta's Associate Board will host its annual fundraising event, Prelude: Start with a Bang!, to celebrate the start of the 30th Anniversary season. A selection from Chicago’s Crafthouse® cocktails and hors d'oeuvres will be served while attendees take part in a silent auction and raffle, as well as other interactive activities inspired by the Northern Illinois University Steelband. The event begins at 5:30 p.m. at Orchestra Hall of Symphony Center. Tickets are priced at $50 for the reception only and $95 for the reception and a concert ticket to Trademark. Early bird tickets are also available through August 30 at $40 for the reception and $85 for reception and concert. Tickets are available for purchase by calling 312-284-1554 or online at chicagosinfonietta.org/prelude. 

Trademark is sponsored in part by ITW.

Tickets: Tickets range from $20-$99 for concerts at Symphony Center and $49-$62 for concerts at North Central College with special $10 pricing available for students at both concerts. Tickets can be purchased by calling Chicago Sinfonietta at 312-284-1554 or online at www.chicagosinfonietta.org.

Program:     
MONTGOMERY
Coincident Dances
MOZART
Rondo alla Turca
SEEMAN
Fayed to Blue
KITCHENER
Pan in A-minor
ASSAD
Sin Fronteras
SMETANA
Má vlast (My Homeland)
I. Vyšehrad (The High Castle)
II. Vltava (The Moldau)

Mei-Ann Chen, music director and conductor
Faye Seeman, harp
Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre 
Northern Illinois University Steelband, steel drum ensemble directed by Liam Teague



About the Sinfonietta
Now in its 30th season, Chicago Sinfonietta and music director Mei-Ann Chen have pushed artistic boundaries to provide an alternative way of hearing, seeing and thinking about a symphony orchestra and are dedicated to promoting diversity, inclusion, racial and cultural equity in the arts. Each concert experience blends inventive new works with classical masterworks, each from a diverse array of voices, to entertain, transform and inspire. In 2016, Chicago Sinfonietta was the proud recipient of the 2016 Spirit of Innovation Award presented by the Chicago Innovation Awards as well as the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation’s prestigious MacArthur Award for Creative and Effective Institutions (MACEI). The MacArthur award recognizes exceptional organizations that are key contributors in their fields. Learn more at www.chicagosinfonietta.org

Chicago Sinfonietta is grateful to its season sponsors including Aon, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois, Southwest Airlines, Fairmont Hotel, Hotel Indigo and NBC5. Chicago Sinfonietta also thanks its BRIDGE Audience Engagement sponsor Macy's, as well as its season media sponsors including Chicago Tribune, Chicago magazine, Naperville magazine, and WBEZ.

OPENING: Million Dollar Quartet To Rock Paramount Theatre 9/13-10/29

Chi, IL LIVE Shows On Our Radar:

GREAT BALLS OF FIRE! 

MILLION DOLLAR QUARTET 

OPENS PARAMOUNT THEATRE’S 2017-18 SEASON, 

SEPT. 13–OCT. 29, 2017

Here at ChiIL Live Shows, we're elated to hear that the Million Dollar Quartet will be rockin' the Paramount this fall! We reviewed this show in Chicago during their epic run of 2,500 performances, and loved it. This is a true multigenerational crowd pleaser full of instantly recognizable classics and larger than life personas. Don't miss this! 

Paramount Theatre is excited to tune up for its rollicking 2017-18 Broadway Series opener Million Dollar Quartet, the wildly popular rock and roll musical.
Travel back in time to Memphis’s Sun Records recording studio on December 4, 1956, when Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins played together their first and only time and created an explosive album that has yet to be matched. Million Dollar Quartet tells that story with all the raw energy and monumental talent everyone has come to expect from these music giants.

Paramount Artistic Director Jim Corti, the man responsible for the past two Jeff Award-winning Best Musicals (Large), Les Misérables and West Side Story, will stage Paramount’s rockin’ opener.

Playing the Quartet are Adam Wesley Brown as Carl Perkins, Kavan Hashemian as Elvis Presley, Gavin Rohrer as Jerry Lee Lewis and Bill Scott Sheets as Johnny Cash, with Nicholas Harazin as Sam Phillips, Zach Lentino as Brother Jay, Courtney Mack as Dyanne and Scott Simon as Fluke.

The production team is Kory Danielson, music director; Trent Stork, associate director; Ethan Deppe, associate music director; Kevin Depinet, scenic design; Sally Dolembo, costume design; Jesse Klug, lighting design; Adam Rosenthal, sound designer; Katie Cordts, wig, hair and makeup design; Amanda Relaford, properties design; Susan Gosdick, dialect coach; Maggie O’Donnell, stage manager; and Matthew McMullen, assistant stage manager. 

Don’t miss Paramount’s high-spirited, nostalgic new take on the three-time Tony Award nominated musical, featuring some of the biggest and best songs of all time like “Peace in the Valley,” “Blue Suede Shoes,” “Folsom Prison Blues,” “I Walk the Line,” “Hound Dog” and “Great Balls of Fire.”

Previews start September 13. Press opening is Saturday, September 16 at 8 p.m. Performances continue through October 29: Wednesday at 1:30 p.m. and 7 p.m.; Thursday at 7 p.m.; Friday at 8 p.m.; Saturday at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m.; and Sunday at 1 p.m. and 5:30 p.m. Single tickets are $36 to $64. Million Dollar Quartet is rated PG.

But hold on, there’s still time to include Million Dollar Quartet in Paramount’s “Buy Two Shows, Get Two Shows Free” 2017-18 Broadway subscription offer. For less than the cost of a ticket to one show downtown, patrons can see three more Broadway-quality musicals: Elf The Musical (November 22-January 7), Cabaret (February 7–March 18) and Once (April 25-June 3). Four-play packages start as low as $72. The rewards are ample – four amazing, Broadway-quality musicals, at one of the most majestic theaters in the Midwest. 

The Paramount Theatre, 23 E. Galena Blvd. in downtown Aurora, is surrounded by affordable parking and a variety of restaurants for pre- or post-show dining. For subscriptions and single tickets, visit ParamountAurora.com, call (630) 896-6666, or stop by the Paramount box office Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and two hours prior to evening performances. 


Behind the scenes: 
Paramount’s Million Dollar Quartet
There was no plan for Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins to record together on December 4, 1956. But as fate would have it, their impromptu jam session left behind a historic and mind-blowing album. The evening begins in the Sun Records recording studio in Memphis. Up and comer Jerry Lee Lewis is recording songs with rockabilly king Carl Perkins when the iconic Elvis Presley stops by with his girlfriend. The not-quite-yet-guitar-god Johnny Cash is there to pay a visit to music manager Sam Phillips. Throw them all together, and you have one of the most unexpected, unprecedented and unforgettable musical moments in history. It was the first and only time they played together and, through their musical genius, created an explosive album that has yet to be matched.   

Colin Escott and Floyd Mutrux wrote the book for Million Dollar Quartet based on Mutrux’s original concept and direction. The Chicago production ran from 2008 to 2016 and became the third longest-running show in Chicago theater history. Critics called it “the most exuberant theatrical event,” “dazzling from first beat to last” and “the best live rock ‘n’ roll show I have ever seen.” 

Fast forward to the kick off of Chicago’s 2017-18 theater season, featuring Paramount’s talented lead cast for Million Dollar Quartet. Adam Wesley Brown (Jerry Lee Lewis) played Eamon in Once on Broadway, has numerous regional credits and has been seen on local stages including Lookingglass and Chicago Shakespeare Theater. Kavan Hashemian (Elvis Presley) began performing his Elvis tribute at age three. Today he performs all over the world, including in London where he won the title of "The World's #1 Rock N Roll Elvis” on BBC-TV. Gavin Rohrer (Jerry Lee Lewis) is fresh from playing the role at Lyric Theatre in Oklahoma City, where Broadwayworld.com raved “his piano skills are unrivaled, and his brash certainty provides some of the funniest moments of the night.” Bill Scott Sheets (Johnny Cash) just played the “Man in Black” at Berkshire Theatre Group in Massachusetts. Berkshire Fine Arts wrote “particularly strong was Bill Sheets, whose voice and delivery were sublime.” 

"Icons Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins and Johnny Cash were southern, rockabilly country boys before they were discovered by Sam Phillips, the young, upstart record producer and owner of Sun Studio in Memphis, Tennessee. Their purely by chance meeting for the first and only time on Dec. 4, 1956, is a seminal moment in the birth of Rock ‘N’ Roll,” said Paramount Artistic Director Jim Corti. 

“The show, exploring the connections of these four to their music and each other, is full of intriguing surprises and is not only a fascinating, short history but a full scale, no holds barred, in-your-face jam session of the kind of music that grabbed hold of our youth culture back then and hasn’t let go ever since,” Corti added. “From our Chicago and national talent pool, we’ve assembled a dynamite cast; you won’t believe your eyes and ears! There’ll be a whole lot of shakin’ goin’ on, all live, all on the Paramount stage, all made in Aurora!”

Jim Corti (director) was hired in 2011 to be the first-ever artistic director in the Paramount’s 80+ year history. He was instrumental in launching Paramount’s inaugural Broadway Series and directed and choreographed Paramount’s first self-produced Broadway Series show My Fair Lady, which played to rave reviews. Corti’s 2013 Paramount production of Fiddler on the Roof was a smash hit, and his Miss Saigon was the only musical to make the Chicago Tribune’s Top Ten Shows of 2013. Rent in 2014 was a critical and box office success, followed by consecutive productions of The Who’s Tommy and Les Misérables, which collectively garnered five Jeff Awards for Paramount in its first year of eligibility, including Best Production – Musical - Large for Les Misérables and Best Director - Musical for Corti. He also staged Paramount’s 2015-16 opener Oklahoma! and closer West Side Story, Paramount’s second-consecutive Jeff Award winning Best Musical. Last season, Corti directed memorable productions of Mamma Mia! and Sweeney Todd. Before Paramount, Corti was a seasoned Broadway veteran, appearing in the New York casts of Ragtime, A Chorus Line and Candide and national tours of Urinetown, Cabaret and Bob Fosse’s Dancin’. Career highlights over three decades include being the only director in Chicago to have two productions at the same time in the Chicago Tribune’s list of 10 Best Shows in 2009 – Drury Lane’s Cabaret and Writers Theatre’s Oh, Coward!. He remains the sole honoree to have garnered a Jeff Award as an actor (in Marriott’s Grand Hotel), a choreographer (Drury Lane’s Singin’ in the Rain) and director (Paramount’s Les Misérables, Drury Lane’s Sweet Charity and Northlight’s Blues in the Night).

Kory Danielson (music director) is coming back for his 11th consecutive musical at the Paramount, after serving as co-music director and associate conductor with Tom Vendafreddo on Jesus Christ Superstar, and assistant music director and associate conductor for Sweeney Todd-The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Disney’s The Little Mermaid, Mamma Mia!, West Side Story, Hairspray – The Broadway Musical, A Christmas Story - The Musical, Oklahoma!, Les Misérables and The Who's Tommy. Other Chicago credits include Assassins, The Full Monty, Loving Repeating, Heathers, Tomorrow Morning (Kokandy Productions); Passion (2014 Jeff Award for Outstanding Music Direction), Smokey Joe's Cafe (Theo Ubique); How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying (Porchlight Music Theatre); Hedwig, Wedding Singer (Haven Theatre); and Zanna, Don't!, Lucky Stiff, Triumph of Love (The Music Theatre Company). Danielson has also worked with Drury Lane, Broadway in Chicago, Chicago Children's Theatre, Bailiwick and Hell in a Handbag.

Paramount’s 2017-18 Broadway Series is sponsored by BMO Harris Bank and The Dunham Fund. Broadway Series Orchestra Sponsor is Rush-Copley Medical Center. Broadway Series Lighting Sponsor is ComEd. Broadway Series Costume Sponsor is Gerald Kia. Million Dollar Quartet is also sponsored by Asbury Gardens.


More about Paramount Theatre’s 2017-18 Season
In addition to Paramount’s Broadway Series, Paramount’s 2017-18 season also includes Tim Allen (August 18), 60s music favorite The Happy Together Tour (August 25), Unforgettable: Falling in Love with Nat King Cole (November 5) featuring Evan Tyrone Martin (Jesus in Paramount’s 2017 smash hit Jesus Christ Superstar), comedian and impersonator Frank Caliendo (November 10), The Second City’s Non-Denominational Christmas Show (December 1-23 in the Copley Theatre), Las Vegas’s #1 ventriloquist Terry Fator (January 20), the incredible magic of Penn & Teller (March 23), Chicago’s own Jersey boys Under the Streetlamp (March 24), country star and American Idol winner Scotty McCreery (March 25), late night comedy legend Jay Leno (April 13), Judy Garland: Come Rain or Come Shine featuring Angela Ingersoll (June 10) and the world’s #1 Bee Gees tribute band Stayin’ Alive (June 15).

For subscriptions, single tickets or more information, go to ParamountAurora.com, call
(630) 896-6666, or stop by the Paramount Theatre, 23 E. Galena Blvd. in Aurora.



About the Paramount Theatre
The Paramount Theatre (ParamountAurora.com) is the center for performing arts, entertainment and arts education in Aurora, the second largest city in Illinois. Named "One of Chicago's Top 10 Attended Theatres" by the League of Chicago Theatres, the 1,888-seat Paramount, located in downtown Aurora at 23 E. Galena Blvd., is nationally renowned for the quality and caliber of its presentations, superb acoustics and historic beauty.

The Paramount opened on September 3, 1931. Designed by renowned theater architects C.W. and George L. Rapp, the theater captures a unique Venetian setting with a 1930s art deco influence. The first air-conditioned building outside of Chicago, the Paramount offered a variety of entertainment, including "talking pictures," vaudeville, concerts and circus performances for over 40 years. In 1976, the Aurora Civic Center Authority (ACCA) purchased the Paramount, closed the theater for restoration and returned the Paramount to its original grandeur. The Paramount Arts Centre reopened in 1978, offering a variety of theatrical, musical, comedy, dance and family programming. In 2006, a 12,000-square-foot, two-story Grand Gallery lobby was added, with a new, state-of-the-art box office, café and art gallery.

Today, the Paramount self-produces its own Broadway Series, presents an eclectic array of comedy, music, dance and family shows, and on most Mondays, screens a classic movie. 

The Paramount Theatre is one of three live performance venues programmed and managed by the ACCA, which also oversees the Paramount’s “sister” stage, the intimate, 173-seat Copley Theatre located directly across the street from the Paramount at 8 E. Galena Blvd., as well as RiverEdge Park, downtown Aurora’s summer outdoor concert venue. 
                                                                             
The Paramount Theatre continues to expand its artistic and institutional boundaries under the guidance of Tim Rater, President and CEO, Aurora Civic Center Authority; Jim Corti, Artistic Director, Paramount Theatre; a dedicated Board of Trustees and a devoted staff of live theatre and music professionals. For tickets and information, go to ParamountAurora.com or call (630) 896-6666.