Weekender: Taproot Festival and Jazz on Tap; Watch a Memoir

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Joey Alexander
Joey Alexander will perform at Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts on the UC Davis campus Friday at 8 p.m. Tickets are still available. (Courtesy photo)

While there’s plenty to see at area museums, UC Davis starts Thursday with the Shinkoskey Noon Concert showcasing the weekend’s Taproot New Music Festival, a homegrown UC Davis event. The concerts are in two venues on campus. Also Friday night in Sacramento, UC Davis Professor Pam Houston’s memoir will be performed. (Yes, not read, performed). Read on.

  • Taproot New Music Festival Opening Concert, Recital Hall, Ann E. Pitzer Center, UC Davis, Thursday, Jan. 23, 12:05 to 1 p.m., free
    • This week’s Shinkoskey noon Concert is the kickoff to the biennial Taproot New Music Festival. It will feature three groups; Empyrean Ensemble, Quince Ensemble, and Spektral Quartet. Instruments will include vocals, violins, cello, and viola.
    • More information on this concert and other upcoming Shinkoskey Noon Concerts here

More Taproot on Thursday night, Friday night, Saturday and Sunday, read here for more information about the festival and here for specific concert information. Some concerts are free while others require purchased tickets.

Also on Friday, Mondavi Presents Jazz with Joey Alexander Trio

On Friday, 8 p.m., Joey Alexander takes the Mondavi stage at UC Davis. Alexander’s first appearance at the Mondavi Center introduced local audiences to an artist wise beyond his years, yet still fully enmeshed in the wonder of creative discovery. Born in 2003 in Bali, Alexander moved to New York City in 2014, where he has experienced one of the most ascendant careers ever seen in jazz. Jason Olaine, a Grammy-winning producer who serves as director of programming for Jazz at Lincoln Center and has produced all four of Alexander’s albums, says he continues to be impressed by the pianist’s fantastic gift. “Joey is such a huge talent coming out of a young player, however he wants to create and have fun by playing. It’s not about the accolades or the applause.”  More information and tickets.

Watch the video preview of his music.

 

Houston’s Memoir will be ‘Story on Stage’ Friday

A selection from Professor Pam Houston's memoir, Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country, will be performed Friday night, 7 p.m., at Stories on Stage Sacramento. Hear the interview with Houston earlier this week on Capitol Public Radio’s “Insight.” Houston is professor in the UC Davis Department of English and teaches in the Low Rez MFA program at the Institute of American Indian Arts.  She also cofounded and directs the literary nonprofit Writing By Writers.

Exhibitions at Manetti Shrem, Design, Gorman museums

In new exhibitions, the Design Museum presents an “Homage to Global Textiles” while the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art showcases Northern California artists who made significant contributions to modern art at pivotal moments in the 1960s and beyond.

Both exhibitions opened last week.

At the C.N. Gorman Museum, “Indigenous Futurisms: Explorations in Art and Play” continues through Friday, Jan. 31, and a new exhibition, works by Marwin Begaye, printmaker, painter and graphic designer, is set to run from Feb. 18 to June 19.

Admission to all three museums is free and open to the public. More details here.

Kaltenbach art
Stephen Kaltenbach, “Open After My Death,” 1970. Mild steel, engraved, with unknown contents, 3 x 6 x 3 inches is among the art on exhibition at the Manetti Shrem’s Stephen Kaltenbach: The Beginning and The End. Collection of the artist. Courtesy the artist.

$5 Admission Day at Crocker Saturday

On Saturday, Feb. 1, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento

Upcoming

Thiebaud Endowed Lecture: Leonardo Drew, Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, Thursday, Feb. 6, 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m., free

  • Artist Leonardo Drew will give a lecture about his “reflective abstract sculptural works that play upon the dystopic tension between order and chaos, recalling post-minimalist sculpture that alludes to America’s industrial past, as well as the plight of African Americans throughout U.S. history.” His works have been shown around the world. Light refreshments to follow the lecture. Free with registration, courtesy of the Betty Jean and Wayne Thiebaud Endowed Lecture.

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