Tucson Weekly: City Week (October 16

Thursday | Friday | Saturday | Sunday | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday

Thursday 16

WILLIES OF THE VALLEY. Experience the creepy-crawlies full force, when the Valley of the Moon presents its annual Haunted Ruins. The Valley, legacy of late visionary eccentric George Phar Leglar, is wonderfully strange in its own right; adding a Halloween twist only heightens the weirdness.
City Week All-age tours run every 30 minutes, from 7 to 9:30 p.m. today through Sunday at the Valley of the Moon, 2544 E. Allen Road, located north of Prince Road and east of Tucson Boulevard. Tours continue Thursday, October 23, through Thursday, October 30. Admission is $5, $3 for kids ages seven through 12, free for kids 6 and under, and for Valley members. Call 323-1331 for details.
ART FOR THE HEART. Give both head and heart a workout when the Tucson Arts District Partnership hosts another Thursday Night Art Walk. The weekly tours take in the funky art galleries, clever art studios, and general creative ambiance of downtown's art scene.
Free guided tour runs from 5:30 to 7 p.m., starting from the lobby of the Clarion Santa Rita Hotel, 88 E. Broadway. Walking shoes are recommended. For information, call 624-9977.

Friday 17

OPERATIC AMORE. The world's most famous lovers return to Tucson in fine musical form, in the Arizona Opera presentation Roméo et Juliette, adapted by Charles Gounod. Directed by James Lucas, this season opener features Susanna Uher and Robin Lee Parkin alternating as Juliette, James Miller as Romeo, and Dennis Jesse as Mercutio. See this week's art feature for more information.
Show times are 7:30 tonight and tomorrow, and 2 p.m. Sunday, in the TCC Music Hall, 260 S. Church Ave. Tickets range from $14 to $56, and are available by calling 293-4336.
MOUNTAIN MUSIC. Their name means "Sun Mountain" in their native language. Tonight, the members of Inti-Illimani bring the stunning sound of Chile's highlands to the Old Pueblo, in a concert sponsored by UA Presents.
This folkloric ensemble founded the Chilean Nueva Canción (New Song) protest movement, before their voices were squelched by the Pinochet regime. Today, their songs continue celebrating that country's vibrant soul with more than 30 instruments, from the guitar-like guitarrón, cuatro and charango, to haunting pipes like the rondador, quena and zampona. Their skills have garnered widespread acclaim and world tours with such stars as Bruce Springsteen, Tracy Chapman and Pete Seeger.
Performance is 8 p.m. in UA Centennial Hall, located inside the University Boulevard main gate east of Park Avenue. Tickets range from $15 to $24, and are available at the Centennial Hall box office, or by calling 621-3341.

HIGH STEPPIN'. The UA Dance Division presents Family Ties, an annual concert held in conjunction with the UA's Family Weekend.
Ballet, jazz and modern dance are all on the ticket, including Dan Owen's Sabor a Mi!, billed as "the spirit and spice of traditional Argentine tango on the same plate with ultra-contemporary jazz."
Performance is 5:30 p.m. in the UA Ina Gittings Dance Theater, located on the northeast side of the UA mall, near Campbell Avenues. Tickets are $8, $6 for students and seniors, and available at the door. For details, call 626-8030.

Saturday 18

HAPPENING HOMES. Today, 20 owners of cutting-edge dwellings and buildings provide glimpses of passive and active solar designs, cutting-edge construction and desert-friendly landscaping as part of the Tucson Innovative Home Tour and Seminar.
Sponsored by Towards a Sustainable Tucson, this outing visits structures made of everything from rammed earth and adobe to straw bale. Many of the sites also incorporate permaculture and xeriscape landscaping, along with advanced water conservation techniques. On the flashy side, the tour will include that remodeled home recently featured in the PBS series This Old House.
Self-guided tour runs from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tickets are $10 per person, or $15 for families, and include a guide and resource book. Tickets are available at The Book Mark, Photocomm, Antigone Books, Book Stop Used Books, Rammed Earth Solar Homes, Progressive Solar, Silverbell Trading, or by calling 696-7224.
KINETIC CELTS. As Scotland's best-known traditional band, the Tannahill Weavers tote more than two decades of performing and recording experience under their talented kilts. Incorporating plenty of time-honored instruments, from the fiddle and bagpipes to flutes, whistles and guitar, they also add rousing harmonies to an extensive selection of jigs, reels and hornpipes.
Today, the five-member highland powerhouse visits Tucson for an 8 p.m. performance in the Berger Performing Arts Center, 1200 W. Speedway. Tickets are $13 and $15, $12 and $14 for seniors, and available at Hear's Music, Scot Photo, Piney Hollow, or by calling 327-4809.

Sunday 19

BLUE SKIES. The 13th-annual Blues Festival gets underway today.
This year's headliners include L.A. guitar vet Smokey Wilson, harmonica hardliners the Paul de Lay Band, Oakland's soulful Sista Monica, old-timer Henry Gray on barrelhouse piano, Louisiana country bluesman Guy Davis, and Tucson's own Lisa Otey.
Free concert runs from 11:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. in the Reid Park DeMeester Outdoor Performance Center. Shuttles will run continuously from the northeast parking lot of El Con Mall. Glass containers and alcoholic beverages are not permitted, and dogs should be left at home. For information, call 570-7955.
NON-STOP CARNIVAL. Guitarist Richard Boukas and the Sounds of Brazil tap Carnival's spirit in the latest installment of the Tucson Jazz Society's Plaza Suite Series.
Boukas packs the punch of his recent jazz ensembles, Brazilian Jazz, AMAZONA and Trio Brasileiro, along with stints with musicians ranging from David Grusin and John Lucien to Ben Vereen, Carole King and Helen Reddy. The Sounds of Brazil are local favorites, known for their fiery Latin rhythms.
Performances run from 5 to 8 p.m. in St. Philip's Plaza, 4380 N. Campbell Ave. Tickets are $8, $4 for TJS members, available at the door. Call 743-3399 for details.

Monday 20

VISUAL MIX. New meets old in Blue Ring, Washington, D.C., artist Andrea Hull's exhibit now on display in the Tucson Museum of Art. New, as in the latest visual technologies, the video disk; old, as in that most ancient of sounds, the vibrating string.
In Blue Ring, six eye-level video monitors mounted on an hexagonal framework display the images of dancers performing choreographed moves in an ever-expanding ring.
The dancers appear to pass from one monitor to the next while the audience stands in the center or moves between the monitors, in essence interrupting the dance while passing between the screens.
At the same time, a canopy of strings induce sympathetic vibrations in resonant aluminum panels suspended between the monitors.
If it all sounds like a visual kick, it is. Miriam Seidel, writing about the Blue Ring in Art in America, says, "While work using multiple perspectives can tend toward fragmentation or agglomeration of elements, this tightly conceived and executed work led viewers to a remarkably organized yet complex experience."
Blue Ring runs through November 30 in the TMA, 140 N. Main Ave. Hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Saturday, noon to 4 p.m. Sunday. Admission is $2, $1 for seniors and students. Call 624-2333 for details.

Tuesday 21

BREAKING GLASS. Part dance program, part opera and part multi-media event, Les Enfants Terribles, as interpreted by composer Philip Glass and choreographer Susan Marshall, is "groundbreaking and original in concept and execution," says The New York Times.
Now the adventurous production makes its Arizona premier with a performance tonight in UA Centennial Hall.
Les Enfants is Glass' third work based on the surreal dream world of late French novelist and filmmaker Jean Cocteau. And this piece uses Cocteau's tragic 1930 novel and subsequent film to create a multi-media "dance-opera spectacle." The drama unfolds as a company of musicians, singers, actors, dancers and electronic wizards recreate the haunting tale of a young brother and sister trapped in an isolated nightmare world of their own imagination.
Show time is 7:30 p.m. in Centennial Hall, located inside the main gate east of Park Avenue. Tickets range from $18 to $29, and are available at the Centennial Hall box office, or by calling 621-3341.

Wednesday 22

SOUND CHAMBER. The dedicated Arizona Friends of Chamber Music open their fall season with a performance by Boston's Metamorphosen Chamber Orchestra.
Taking Richard Strauss' powerful Metamorphosen for 23 solo strings as its namesake, the group represents much of the best young talent around, resulting in a sound that's both innovative and inspired.
"Not merely another slick ensemble of top-caliber professionals, Metamorphosen also boasts plenty of those ineffable qualities of musicianship, such as vitality, conviction and excitement," says The Boston Globe. "It has the poise and the sound of a virtuoso string ensemble, one that is refreshingly unashamed of its Romantic leanings."
Performance is 8 p.m. in the TCC Leo Rich Theater, 260 S. Church Ave. Tickets are $14, $4 for students, and available at the door. For details, call 298-5806.
NUPTIAL VITAE. Biting French satirist Moliére left few targets unchewed, particularly the henpecked husband. Now the Arizona Repertory Theatre presents a double billing of his sharpest jabs at the bumbling male with performances of The School for Husbands, and The Imaginary Cuckold.
America's Poet Laureate Richard Wilbur provides new translations of these classic works, featuring Moliére's favorite buffoon, Sganarelle, that give modern soap operas a slapstick run for their money.
The School for Husbands, in a timeless tale of love overtaking common sense, tells the story of two brothers, Sganarelle and Ariste, who are guardians to young girls they hope to marry.
In The Imaginary Cuckold, Sganarelle is persuaded by pretty meaty evidence that his wife is sneaking around with a young suitor who, in turn, believes that his own lover has married Sganarelle.
Performances are 7:30 tonight through Saturday, October 25, with a 1:30 p.m. matinee on Sunday, October 26, in the UA Laboratory Theatre, located in the Drama West Building on the southeast corner of Speedway and Park Avenue. Performances continue at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, October 28 through November 1, and 1:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, November 1 and 2. Tickets are $14, $12 for seniors and UA employees, $9 for students, available at the UA Fine Arts box office. Call 621-1162 for information.

City Week includes events selected by Calendar Editor Tim Vanderpool. Event information is accurate as of press time. The Weekly recommends calling event organizers to check for last-minute changes in location, time, price, etc. To have material considered, please send complete information at least 11 days prior to the Thursday issue date to: Tucson Weekly, P.O. Box 2429, Tucson, Arizona 85702, or fax information to 792-2096, or email us at listings@tucsonweekly.com.

Home | Currents | City Week | Music | Review | Books | Cinema | Back Page | Archives