MUSIC
Guitar-violin duo
Grammy-winning classical guitarist Jason Vieaux and violinist Eunice Kim will perform at 7:30 p.m. Thursday at Little Rock’s Christ Episcopal Church, 509 Scott St., under the auspices of the Chamber Music Society of Little Rock. The program includes the Sonata e minor, op.9 No. 2, by Jean Leclair; “Cantabile” for violin and guitar by Niccolò Paganini; “Gran Duetto Concertante,” op.52, by Mauro Giuliani; “Loure” and “Gavotte en rondeau” from the Violin Partita No. 3 in E major, BWV 1006, and the “Allegro” from Prelude, Fugue and Allegro, BWV 998, by J.S. Bach; “Romanian Folk Dances” by Béla Bartók (in an arrangement by Arthur Levering); and “Histoire du Tango” by Astor Piazzolla. Tickets are $25, free for students of all ages. Visit chambermusicLR.com.
Silkroad and artistic director Rhiannon Giddens performs Tuesday at the Rogers Convention Center in Rogers. (Special to the Democrat-Gazette)
Silkroad on tour
Silkroad and its artistic director Rhiannon Giddens, on the second tour of their multiyear “American Railroad” initiative to 10 cities with railroad-related cultural history, makes a stop in Northwest Arkansas, 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at the Rogers Convention Center, 3303 S Pinnacle Hills Parkway, Rogers.
The program includes world premiere works by Silkroad members Layale Chaker and Sandeep Das and by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Michael Abels, as well as new arrangements by Silkroad members Balla Kouyaté with Mike Block, Pura Fé and Shane Shanahan and by guest performer Yazhi Guo. The program also features works originally performed on the group’s debut tour in 2023. Tickets are $35-$75. Visit thevictorytheater.com/tickets-events.
For its “American Railroad” project, Silkroad, conceived by cellist Yo-Yo Ma in 1998, illuminates the impact of Black, Chinese, Irish and other immigrant communities on the creation of the U.S. Transcontinental Railroad and connecting railways in North America, as well as the Indigenous communities it displaced.
Many hands
The University of Arkansas at Little Rock Piano Ensemble and UALR Extended Education Piano Ensemble join for a debut concert at 7:30 p.m. Monday in the Stella Boyle Smith Concert Hall in the Fine Arts building at UALR, 2801 S. University Ave., Little Rock. Naoki Hakutani, associate professor of music, leads the ensemble. The program consists of four-hands, six-hands and eight-hands works by Reynaldo Hahn, Mike Cornick, Robert Schumann, Cecile Chaminade, Sergei Rachmaninoff and Georges Bizet. Admission is free. Call (501) 916-3291.
Maddy Konkle (from left), Liam Puls and Miki Clendenin head up the Hendrix College cast of “John Proctor is the Villain.” (Special to the Democrat-Gazette)
THEATER
‘Crucible’ construct
A group of female high school juniors in a small town in Northeast Georgia is starting a feminism club just as they are beginning to study Arthur Miller’s classic play “The Crucible” in “John Proctor Is the Villain” by Kimberly Belflower, which the Hendrix Players are staging, 7:30 p.m. Wednesday-Friday, 2 p.m. Saturday Nov. 13-16, in Cabe Theatre at Hendrix College, 1600 Washington Ave., Conway. The play contains adult language, “sexist micro aggressions,” depictions of grooming and abusive relationship dynamics, discussion of sexual assault, exploitation and infidelity, and the theater is recommending it as “suited for ages 16 and up.” Admission is free; reserve seats at ticketstripe.com/events/2910106089463011. For more information, call (501) 450-1343.
‘White Christmas’
Murry’s Dinner Playhouse, 6323 Colonel Glenn Road, Little Rock, opens its production of the musical “White Christmas” (music and lyrics by Irving Berlin, book by David Ives and Paul Blake based on the 1954 film) with a 12:30 p.m. preview Wednesday. There’s a second preview at 7:30 p.m. Thursday; “real” shows are at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday (12:30 p.m. Wednesday matinees only, Nov. 20 and 27) and 12:45 and 6:45 p.m. Sunday through Dec. 31. The buffet opens 90 minutes before curtain time. Call (501) 562-3131 or visit murrysdp.com.
Meanwhile, the Southwest Little Rock dinner theater has announced its 2025 season:
◼️ Jan. 8-Feb. 1: “Ripcord” by David Lindsay-Abaire. Two unlikely roommates in a senior living facility agree to a bet that starts as a series of pranks but escalates into a dangerous game of one-upsmanship.
◼️ Feb. 5-March 8: “Social Security” by Andrew Bergman. An 83-year-old “Cinderella” teaches her unusual family that it’s never too late to find Prince Charming.
◼️ March 19-April 10: “Church Basement Ladies” by Jim Stowell and Jessica Zuehlke with music and lyrics by Little Rock native Drew Jansen, based on the works of Janet Letnes Martin and Suzann Johnson Nelson, including “Growing Up Lutheran.” A group of church ladies and their pastor cook up an evening of music and laughter.
◼️ April 23-May 24: “Leading Ladies” by Ken Ludwig. A pair of down-at-heel actors latch onto a scam involving an elderly woman’s will that leaves her fortune to two long-lost British nephews.
◼️ May 28-June 21: “Driving Miss Daisy” by Alfred Uhry
◼️ June 25-Aug. 9: “The Wizard of Oz,” music and lyrics by Harold Arlen and E.Y. “Yip” Harburg, based upon the classic movie, derived from the classic by L. Frank Baum, adapted by John Kane for the Royal Shakespeare Company
◼️ Aug. 13-Sept. 6: “The Bunco Squad” by Jim Hesselman. Eight long-time friends drink, eat, reminisce, gossip, complain about their husbands and occasionally remember to play another round of Bunco.
◼️ Sept. 10-Oct. 4: “Catch Me If You Can,” adapted by Willie Gilbert and Jack Weinstock from a French play by Robert Thomas titled “Trap for a Lonely Man.” Not the Leonardo di Caprio movie, but a comedy murder mystery involving a couple honeymooning in rural New York; after the wife disappears, a woman shows up at the door, insisting she’s the missing bride, with a sinister priest in tow.
◼️ Oct. 8-Nov. 8: “Young Frankenstein,” music and lyrics by Mel Brooks, book by Brooks and Thomas Meehan, based on Brooks’ 1974 film comedy classic about the Frankenstein family scion who re-creates his ancestor’s grisly accomplishment of reanimating a corpse.
◼️ Nov. 12-Dec. 31: “Frozen: The Musical,” music and lyrics by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez, book by Jennifer Lee, based on the Disney animated film.
As a special attraction, Travis Ledoyt, “the world’s best young Elvis,” performs March 12-15.
Contemporary jewelry artist Dongyi Wu is in residence this fall at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. An exhibit of her work goes on display Monday Nov. 11 in the university’s Windgate Center of Art + Design. (Special to the Democrat-Gazette)
ART
Jewelry artist in residence
“Dongyi Wu, Artist-in-Residence: Whisper of Nights,” contemporary jewelry by Wu, a Chinese-born artist who is the Windgate Artist-in-Residence for the fall 2024 semester at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, goes on display Monday in the North and Focus Galleries of UALR’s Windgate Center of Art + Design, 2801 S. University Ave., Little Rock. The center will host a reception at 5 p.m. Thursday. The exhibition will be up until Dec. 6. Admission to the exhibition and reception is free. Gallery hours are 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday, 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday-Sunday. Call (501) 916-5101 or email [email protected].
AT THE PODIUM
Language and physics
Hendrix-Murphy Foundation Murphy Visiting Writer Alberto Rojo, a professor of physics at Oakland University in Rochester, Mich., will read from and discuss his work regarding the intersection of language and physics, at 7:30 p.m. Thursday in Reves Recital Hall at Hendrix College, 1600 Washington Ave., Conway. A reception in the nearby Trieschmann Gallery will follow. Admission is free. Visit hendrixmurphy.org/rojo.
Central High crisis
Johanna Miller Lewis, former associate dean of the College of Humanities, Arts, Social Sciences and Education at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, will give a talk titled “The Federal Government Must Prevail: Eisenhower, the 101st Airborne and the 1957 Central High Crisis,” 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in the Ottenheimer Auditorium at the Historic Arkansas Museum, 200 E. Third St., Little Rock. It’s part of the university history department’s Evenings with History lecture series. Lewis, who retired in June, has been doing research on the Central High Crisis over several decades. Light refreshments will be served at 7 p.m. Admission is free. Visit ualr.edu/history/history-institute or email [email protected].
ETC.
O’Neill evening
“An Evening with the Man Known as Craig O’Neill” is the next presentation in the Festival of the Senses performing arts series, 7 p.m. Tuesday at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, 4106 John F. Kennedy Blvd., North Little Rock. Admission is free. A reception will follow in the Parish Hall. Call (501) 753-3578 or email [email protected]. The event will be livestreamed and available later for viewing at facebook.com/frcarey.
Craig O’Neill is the stage name of media personality Randy Hankins, who retired at the end of 2023 after 54 years in broadcasting. He will be reading a chapter from “Whatever Happened to Craig O’Neill?,” his recently completed autobiography.
TICKETS
‘Merrier Motown’
Following the success of 2023’s “Motown Christmas,” the Arkansas Repertory Theatre, 601 Main St., Little Rock, plans “A Merrier Motown Christmas,” featuring “favorite holiday songs in fresh arrangements inspired by your favorite Motown artists,” according to a news release, 7 p.m. Dec 18-20 and 22, 2 and 7 p.m. Dec. 21 and 23. Music director Nygel D. Robinson rejoins local singers Bijoux, Tawanna Campbell and Antonio Woodard, with musicians Corey Harris, Ricardo Richardson and Josh Starks. Ken-Matt Martin directs. Tickets are $45, $25 for students. Call (501) 378-0405 or visit therep.org/merrier-motown-christmas.
