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Articles by Lawrence B. Johnson

It’s Mamet, so nothing’s plain as black/white when Goodman taps the bitter humor of ‘Race’

Jan 24, 2012 – 8:00 pm | 7,355 views
Race, Goodman Theatre

Cynically, unbearably funny. 4 stars!

Honeck and the Chicago Symphony recall Dvorak on native soil with a dancing Eighth

Jan 20, 2012 – 1:03 pm | 2,981 views
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Review: If Dvorak’s Ninth Symphony is a yearning postcard “From the New World,” his Symphony No. 8 in G major is redolent of a composer happily settled on native ground. The Eighth is decidedly of the Old World, as conductor Manfred Honeck and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra so generously demonstrated Jan. 19 at Orchestra Hall. ****

‘Mr. Rickey’ imagines a prelude to history, before Jackie Robinson joined the Dodgers

Jan 19, 2012 – 8:11 pm | 8,717 views
Mr Rickey Calls Meeting featured image

Full count at the Lookingglass. 3 stars.

Role Playing: Diane D’Aquila’s twice regal portrait as lover-monarch in ‘Elizabeth Rex’

Jan 9, 2012 – 3:36 am | 7,484 views
Diane D'Aquila featured image

Interview: Diane D’Aquila, who brings Queen Elizabeth I to regal and vulnerable life in Timothy Findley’s “Elizabeth Rex” at Chicago Shakespeare Theater, says acting in this gripping, keenly honed production “is a like a dance out there, and it’s scary as hell.”

Chailly lifts his quick baton, and Beethoven’s symphonies emerge from the veil of tradition

Jan 6, 2012 – 4:31 pm | 12,284 views
Riccardo Chailly Decca Beethoven featured image

CD review: Conductor Riccardo Chailly’s new recording of Beethoven’s nine symphonies, with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, may finally be the document that changes the way we think of these seminal works – and the way the next generation of conductors approaches them. *****

Marriage of true minds: Chicago Shakespeare brings the Bard to Chicago Symphony’s party

Jan 4, 2012 – 4:57 pm | 5,300 views
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Preview: Barbara Gaines directs actors from Chicago Shakespeare Theater in concerts Jan. 5-14 with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir Mark Elder, featuring music inspired by the Bard.

‘Penelope’ at Steppenwolf: Four guys in an empty pool, down to life’s last threads

Dec 22, 2011 – 3:38 pm | 7,473 views
Penelope featured image Steppenwolf Theatre Yasen Peyankov Scott Jaeck Tracy Letts credit Michael Brosilow

And Odysseus is bearing down. 3 stars.

Role Playing: Dean Evans, in clown costume, enters the darkness of ‘Burning Bluebeard’

Dec 20, 2011 – 7:26 pm | 7,459 views
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Interview: His clown suit, a bit tattered and soiled with soot, looks like it once might have been pure white. But the character Dean Evans plays in the Neo-Futurists’ production of “Burning Bluebeard” is decidedly dark, one might even say spectral.

‘It’s a Wonderful Life,’ and a wonderful night when ATC revisits ‘radio’ parable of faith

Dec 19, 2011 – 4:02 pm | 5,212 views
Wonderful Life featured image American Theater Company 2011

Capra’s film as oldie broadcast. 4 stars!

Like composer on the podium, Salonen leads Chicago Symphony in brilliant Mahler Sixth

Dec 17, 2011 – 10:30 pm | 4,999 views
Salonen_Esa-Pekka_featured image credit_Snezana Vucetic Bohm

The Finnish conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen shares a peculiarity of temperament and genius with Gustav Mahler. Like Mahler in his time, Salonen today stands among the most important conductors in the world. And again like his great forebear, Salonen would really rather be composing than be saddled with the responsibilities of music director for any orchestra you could name. Even one that might be looking for someone to succeed James Levine in Boston.

Queen’s agony over love and duty gets royal treatment in CST’s searing ‘Elizabeth Rex’

Dec 11, 2011 – 3:52 pm | 11,732 views
Diane D'Aquila Elizabeth Rex featured image Chicago Shakespeare Theater credit Liz Lauren

Shakespeare’s in the barn. 5 stars!

Tallis Scholars magnify spirit of Christmas in a Renaissance concert at Rockefeller Chapel

Dec 10, 2011 – 3:41 pm | 3,514 views
Tallis Scholars featured image c Eric Richmond

Review: For many music lovers, the single word Magnificat probably summons the name Bach, whose setting of this ancient “song of Mary” is doubtless the most famous to modern listeners. But in fact the Magnificat enjoys a long and glorious tradition in music history, notably in the 16th century, and several such Renaissance gems were on display Friday night in an exquisite concert by the Tallis Scholars at the University of Chicago’s Rockefeller Chapel. *****

CD Review: Paul Lewis rambles Schubertian paths strewn with sonatas, fantasies, fragments

Dec 7, 2011 – 1:21 pm | 9,745 views
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British pianist Paul Lewis brings a potent blend of ingredients to a diverse collection that shows Schubert as both Beethoven’s heir and an original, indeed daring creative spirit. ****

Role Playing: Dan Waller wields a personal brush as uneasy genius of ‘Pitmen Painters’

Nov 26, 2011 – 5:20 pm | 7,983 views
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Interview: Actor Dan Waller describes himself as a simple guy who values friendship and the respect of his peers. That makes him a close kin to the North England coal miner, revealed as gifted artist, he portrays in Lee Hall’s play “The Pitmen Painters” at TimeLine Theatre.

In the pre-dawn of rock ‘n’ roll, ‘Memphis’ bundles daring hearts in a jumping love story

Nov 25, 2011 – 9:47 am | 4,949 views
Bryan Fenkart as Huey in Memphis National Tour Featured Image credit Paul Kolnik

Burning hot at the Cadillac. 5 stars!

Lyric Opera’s zany ‘Ariadne auf Naxos’ is model Strauss with dash of Marx Brothers

Nov 24, 2011 – 1:17 pm | 7,591 views
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Lovable but seriously bizarre. 4 stars!

Bereft clowns of ‘Burning Bluebeard’ recycle pain and guilt of 1903 Iroquois Theatre fire

Nov 21, 2011 – 5:55 pm | 17,875 views
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Neo-Futurists riff on a tragedy. 4 stars!

Holland Taylor’s one-woman show ‘Ann’ gets down with the grit and humor of a Texas star

Nov 18, 2011 – 5:48 pm | 8,195 views
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At Bank of America Theatre. 4 stars!

Ho-ho-ho! Best bet for giving is the 60-CD Leonard Bernstein treasury

Nov 16, 2011 – 1:59 pm | 2,618 views
Discs for giving

In a quandary about what to give the person you dare not buy for? If that knotty assignment is a music or theater lover, we at Chicago On the Aisle have a garland of happy solutions: concert music, operas, plays and musicals on CDs, DVDs and downloadable recordings. We’ll be stringing our bright recommendations over the weeks ahead, so check back often.

Role Playing: City boy Michael Stegall ropes wild cowboy in Raven Theatre’s ‘Bus Stop’

Nov 15, 2011 – 1:12 pm | 15,908 views
Actor Michael Stegall portrait

Interview: Michael Stegall, who looks and sounds every inch a ropin’ cowboy in the Raven Theatre production of William Inge’s “Bus Stop,” grew up in the West. No surprise there. But wait a minute. Not that West. The 6-foot-3, 23-year-old actor hails from Palm Springs, CA, where the buffalo do not roam.

French conductor Stéphane Denève scores a triumph in Chicago Symphony debut

Nov 11, 2011 – 1:40 pm | 4,021 views
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Review: The French conductor Stéphane Denève made a thrilling debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on Thursday night. Denève, who turns 40 this month, is going to be an international force, and his concert with the CSO amply demonstrated why. *****

Da capo al fine, sharply accented ‘Bernstein’ sketches life of a great American conductor

Nov 10, 2011 – 7:12 pm | 9,022 views
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Maestro at the Royal George. 3 stars

CD Review: Invention, finesse of Mozart’s ‘Prussian’ Quartets revealed in Emerson’s hands

Nov 8, 2011 – 4:05 pm | 6,418 views
Emerson String Quartet records Mozart's "Prussian" Quartets for Sony Classical

The last three string quartets Mozart composed, in 1789 just two years before his death, utterly belie the desperate financial straits into which he had fallen. These sunny, and technically brilliant, performances by the Emerson String Quartet reveal Mozart at the zenith of his creative powers.

Motley travelers looking to get their tickets punched at Raven’s snowbound ‘Bus Stop’

Nov 7, 2011 – 4:09 pm | 8,500 views
Michael Stegall and Jen Short in Raven's Bus Stop credit Dean LaPrairie

Engagingly off-kilter charms. 3 stars
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Role Playing: Brent Barrett’s glad he joined ‘Follies’ as that womanizing, empty cad Ben

Nov 4, 2011 – 5:28 pm | 13,323 views
Brent Barrett in Follies at Chicago Shakespeare featured image

Interview: At the center of Stephen Sondheim’s acerbic musical “Follies”stands Benjamin Stone, worldly, rich, the envy of his old acquaintances gathered at this reunion of theater folks. Ben is all of that, and one more thing — miserable. Veteran actor Brent Barrett offers a candid analysis of the self-centered cad and womanizer.

In Handel’s ‘Water Music,’ Labadie and Chicago Symphony provide a splash of Baroque authenticity

Nov 4, 2011 – 12:43 pm | 2,337 views
Portrait of Handel by Edouard Jean Conrad Hamman (1819–88)

What a pleasure it was Thursday night to hear Handel’s vivacious “Water Music” in the hands of a conductor who knows it so intimately that he doesn’t require a score – and who understands what charms it possesses that induced a delighted monarch to command repeated performances at its first hearing.

Review: Pacifica Quartet pairs Shostakovich and Beethoven, showing them as peers

Oct 31, 2011 – 5:37 pm | 1,469 views
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Review: The Pacifica Quartet offered a stunning reminder in its concert Sunday at the University of Chicago that the quartets of Shostakovich stand shoulder to shoulder with Beethoven’s as exemplars of the form, great and deeply personal expressions. *****

Amid Beethoven and Shostakovich quartet cycles, Pacifica to glimpse both at University of Chicago

Oct 27, 2011 – 10:17 am | 2,530 views
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The Pacifica Quartet has been playing complete cycles of Beethoven’s 16 string quartets and Shostakovich’s 15 in international venues over the last couple of years. Violist Masumi Per Rostad talks about the enduring importance of both composers.

CD review: Guitarist David Russell’s Albeniz displays mastery of instrument, style

Oct 26, 2011 – 4:11 pm | 2,857 views
DavidRussellCD

The American guitarist David Russell got my attention a few years back with a CD of Renaissance music that included some very fine readings of works by John Dowland. That same technical finesse and artful musicianship grace this wide-ranging collection of pieces by Isaac Albeniz.

Profiles’ ‘Behanding in Spokane’ bundles laughter and terror in the same dark bag

Oct 25, 2011 – 10:16 pm | 5,713 views
ProfilesBehanding2

Sardonic, but clear-sighted. 3 stars