Titans and titillation

Wharton’s performing arts series blends flash and substance

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Pull the modest levers within your reach and big things rollyour way — with a little luck.

That’s how Michigan State University’s Wharton Center piecedtogether a big-city performing arts series in a middle-sized market for2011-2012, drawing big names like Tony Bennett, Wynton Marsalis and the ViennaSymphony to the capital area.

Wharton doesn’t have the cultural heft of Ann Arbor’sUniversity Music Society, but it has its own Spartan assets, including MSU’sstrong college of music, a supportive community and a savvy impresario inexecutive director Michael Brand.

It doesn’t hurt to be near big markets like Chicago andCleveland, either, according to Brand.

Walking the line between showbiz and substance, the seriesbalances titans like Bennett and Marsalis with titillations like the sexyballet “Moulin Rouge” and 22-year-old classical hotties, the Naughton twins.

Among the secondary themes running through the new seasonare Wharton’s strengthened commitment to dance and theater, the resumption ofthe Worldview Lecture series and a stepped-up effort to put visiting stars towork at MSU in residencies and workshops.

Wharton snagged the dean of American vocalists, Bennett(Oct. 28), by piggy-backing on a nearby date, according to Brand.

“We paired with Cleveland,” Brand said. “Sheer luck.”

But Bennett has a history with the Wharton Center. Heperformed there in 1985 and returned in 2001 to deliver his trademark heartfeltstroll through the American songbook.

At 84, Bennett keeps on redefining the idea of a singer’sprime. He was already a legend (and Frank Sinatra’s favorite singer) by the1960s, but he’s won 13 of his 15 Grammy Awards since his generation-spanningcomeback performance on “MTV Unplugged” in 1995. Bennett ended his jazzy 2001Wharton show by pulling the plug from his mike and flattening the rearmost rowswith near-operatic force.

The other major jazz star on Wharton’s slate istrumpeter-composer-bandleader-educator Marsalis, who brings his Jazz at LincolnCenter Orchestra Sept. 22. Marsalis has plenty of connections with MSU throughhis old Lincoln Center bandmate, MSU jazz studies chief Rodney Whitaker.

While in town, Marsalis will conduct a master class — atheme the Wharton Center and MSU want to develop further in coming years,according to Brand.

The third pillar in Wharton’s jazz series is the charismaticand powerful singer Simone, daughter of legendary jazz vocalist Nina Simone,coming Feb. 16. An unabashed keeper of her mother’s flame, Simone also has agreat sense of humor: she has compared her bond with her famous mother to thatof Captain Kirk with himself, before and after he’s used the transporter. Witha 19-piece big band, she’ll perform her mother’s original charts.

Wharton’s jazz series officially concludes when FrankSinatra clone Steve Lippia brings a big band for a tribute show, “SimplySinatra” on April 19, 2012, but that may not be all for Wharton where jazz isconcerned. Sometime during the season, Brand expects to host young jazz pianostar Taylor Eigsti, who is slated to headline the East Lansing Jazz Festival insummer 2012.

“He’s not part of the season, but we’re going to toss him inthere,” Brand said.

On the classical side, the Wharton scored a high-leveltwofer with the Orchestra of the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields April 21,2012, directed by superstar violinist Joshua Bell.

The Academy/Bell tour, highlighting Bell on the Beethovenviolin concerto, was three years in the planning. Wharton snagged a spot on thetour two years ago, Brand said.

As a trumpet player and orchestral musician from way back,Brand speaks the lingo. “They’ll have a Noah’s Ark gig in the winds — twohorns, two flutes, two trumpets — to play the Beethoven,” he said. “And thatstring section is just exemplary.”

The Academy is a world-renowned chamber orchestra, but aneven bigger army, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, comes to Wharton Nov. 6,thanks to the Austrian government and some creative scheduling.

“They are rehearsing in Chicago, coming to East LansingSunday, then returning to Chicago to play Symphony Hall,” Brand said. TheEroica Trio will join the Viennese to play Beethoven’s Triple Concerto.

Brand freely admitted that a Prussian invasion that massiveis beyond Wharton’s financial powers. The symphony’s two-and-a-half-week NorthAmerican tour is backed by the Austrian government.

The multi-dimensional charms of the Naughton sisters,Christina & Michelle, waft through the Great Hall on March 16, 2012.

In the cultural twilight of old white guys, gorgeous,22-year-old identical twins are the kind of classical act that makesimpresarios light up.

“They’re going to be huge,” Brand said. “They just got a bigSony contract. They just did the Milwaukee Symphony, they always to Philly andthey’re going to do a premiere with the New York Philharmonic soon. All thebiggies are using them.”

They’re the latest in a series of glossy male fantasiestucked into squarebound classics (remember Lara St. John wearing only aviolin?) but wait — they dig into meaty repertoire like “Contrapunctus #9” fromBach’s “Art of the Fugue” and Maurice Ravel’s cataclysmic “La Valse,” andcritics have described a telepathic rapport you would expect out of acollaboration that started in the womb.

Two less flashy but strong dates round out Wharton’sclassical series next season. The Empire Brass, a spit-polish-and-blat dreamquintet culled from top American orchestras, will do a Christmas program Dec. 1with Elisabeth von Trapp, granddaughter of Maria and Baron von Trapp of “TheSound of Music” fame. Acclaimed guitarist Sharon Isbin, who scored big atWharton a decade ago, will perform March 18, 2012 and conduct a master classduring her stay.

Bringing more theater to Wharton has long been a priorityfor Brand. “We’re trying to develop the spoken word more,” he said. But ithasn’t been easy for Brand to find the right mix of quality, accessibility andaffordability.

Brand hopes the nimble and exuberant Aquila Theatre, atroupe of American Brits who work out of New York, will fill the bill. They’ll performShakespeare’s “Macbeth” Feb. 24 and Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of BeingEarnest” Feb. 25.

Lavishly praised in the New Yorker and The New York Times,Aquila is known for creative staging, innovative technology and a sensitivitytoward modern audiences. (They worked The Clash’s “Rock the Casbah” intoShakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing” and dropped Homer’s “Iliad” into WorldWar II.)

They’re big on education, too. They’ll do anything and goanywhere, from the ancient stadium at Delphi — the real one, not the township —to a middle school to the White House to win new audiences for the classics.Brand said they’ll do a residency at MSU while they’re here.

Brand wants to go further in theater. This summer, he said,Wharton will talk to Ontario’s Stratford Theatre about a possiblecollaboration.

“They’re interested in transferring something [to Wharton],but we just don’t know what yet,” Brand said.

For a different style of spoken word, Wharton has renewedthe Worldview Lecture series after a one-year hiatus. Deans from three MSUcolleges picked the speakers to dovetail with their curricula. RobertSternberg, an expert on intelligence and creativity, will speak Nov. 16. SteveCurwood, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and host of NPR’s environmentalprogram “Life on Earth,” will talk about the economic, social and nationalsecurity benefits of facing up to global warming Feb. 27. Travel and adventurewriter Doug Stanton, author of bestsellers on the war in Afghanistan, visitsMarch 19.

A different kind of language — body language — willliberally punctuate Wharton’s schedule next season. The dance card runs from Spanishspice to Russian ice to New York rye and beyond. Compaia Flamenca Jos Porcelignites “Gypsy Fire” Nov. 15; Moscow Festival Ballet dredges “Swan Lake” Jan.20; and, to sprinkle ants in your tights, the playful Les Ballets Trockadero deMonte Carlo comes Feb. 18, 2012. Brand is such a big fan of “The Trocks,” a NewYork-based mashup of high culture and low parody, he asked the management toreroute the tour to get them.

Even in such colorful company, the Royal Winnipeg Ballet maymake the biggest dance splash at Wharton next season, with an extravaganzainspired by film visionary Baz Luhrman’s world, “Moulin Rouge – The Ballet,” onMarch 14.

Brand said the “super-sexy” ballet sold out the 4800-seatNorthrop theatre at the University of Minnesota last year, drawing youngaudiences.

“It’s a period piece, like the Baz movie,” Brand said. Likethe Naughton twins, “Moulin Rouge” is likely to stimulate more than one area ofthe brain.

“Romantic, colorful — it’s just hot,” Brand said. “We’vebeen waiting for that.”

Finally, a combined World Music & Dance series consistsof a streamlined, revamped “Riverdance” March 23-24, 2012 and two majorperforming troupes from the Far East.

The big one here is the National Acrobats of the People’sRepublic of China, a huge troupe that rarely tours, coming Oct. 27.

Brand said he hopes nobody falls off the stage.

“This is the big national company of China,” he declared.“Other groups like the Shanghai Acrobats come from the school they run.” Expectthe Great Hall to smell enticing that night, because the troupe will prepareits own food backstage.

A no less athletic, but more percussive, troupe is Yamato,the Drummers of Japan, set to rock the house Nov. 4. What’s the differencebetween Kodo, the Japanese drum troupe familiar to local audiences, and Yamato?Ask an impresario and you get an impresario’s answer.

“These guys are a little easier to deal with, loading inwise and stuff,” Brand said. “The other one is more of a religious focus, theyhave to do their thing, meditate. These guys know how to tour. They meditatewhen the gig’s over.”

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