ENTERTAINMENT NOTES : Top of the Rock Chorus warms up with concert
Posted on Sunday, September 23, 2007
Top of the Rock Chorus, Arkansas’ women’s barbershop chorus, will give a “Concert for Friends and Family” as a warmup and dress rehearsal for an approaching international competition, 7: 30 p.m. Tuesday at Woolly Auditorium, Arkansas School for the Blind, 2600 W. Markham St., Little Rock.
The chorus will compete as the Region 25 champion Oct. 9-13 against groups from Australia, New Zealand, Great Britain, Sweden, Canada and the United States in the 2007 Sweet Adelines International Convention and Competition in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The group beat out more than two dozen choruses from Arkansas, Oklahoma and parts of Texas, Missouri and Louisiana to get to the competition.
Admission is free; donations will be accepted. Call (501 ) 517-0059 or visit the Web site, www. topoftherockchorus. com. Village harmony Rock ’n’ roll harmony group The Diamonds — tenor Bobby Poynton, bass Jerry Siggins, lead Joe Finetti and baritone Gary Owens — will open the Hot Springs / Hot Springs Village Symphony Guild’s fall season at 7: 30 p.m. Wednesday in the Woodlands Auditorium, Ponce de Leon Center, DeSoto Boulevard and Balboa Drive, Hot Springs Village.
Tickets are $ 20. Call (501 ) 922-2475 or visit the Web site, www. symphonyguild. org. HSU Ballyhoo Henderson State University Theatre will stage The Last Night of Ballyhoo by Alfred Uhry, the 1997 Tony Award winner for best play, at 7: 30 p.m. Thursday-Saturday and Oct. 1 and 4-6 in the Studio Theatre, Arkansas Hall, HSU in Arkadelphia.
Uhry, also the award-winning writer of Driving Miss Daisy, set the play in Atlanta at Christmas 1939, just before the premiere of Gone With the Wind, while the town’s Jewish elite is preparing for Ballyhoo, the season’s major society event.
Tickets are $ 6, free with a Henderson student ID. Call (870 ) 230-5291. Poetry reading Poet and playwright Jeanne Murray Walker will read from her poetry at 6: 30 p.m. Thursday in the American Heritage Center Cone Chapel at Harding University in Searcy.
Walker, a professor of poetry and script writing at the University of Delaware at Newark, has written six volumes of poetry; one of them, Stranger Than Fiction, published in 1992, won the Princeton Quarterly Review of Literature.
Admission is free. Call (501 ) 279-4613. Wine time Chateau aux Arc Vineyards & Winery is preparing its first WineAux (pronounced Wi-nos ) Fest, 10 a. m.-6 p.m. Saturday at the winery, 8045 Arkansas 186, Altus.
Owner and winemaker Audrey House admits her toga-clad festival, an homage to classical celebration of wine, is timed to coincide with nearby Wiederkehr Wine Cellars’ Wein-Fest.
Several area music groups, including The Acoustic Refugees, will play starting at 11 a.m. Barbecue sandwiches will be available for sale; wine tastings will include the release of the winery’s 2006 native Cynthiana Admission is $ 10, but House says she will waive the cover charge for those who arrive in togas. There is also a $ 5 tasting fee. Attendees can pitch tents or park RVs on the grounds for the night. Call (800 ) 588-9463 (WINE ) or visit the Web site, www. chateauauxarc. com. Conway auditions Conway Community Arts Association will hold auditions for its production of Wonderful World by Richard Dresser at 6: 30 p.m. Oct. 1-2 at the Faulkner County Library, 1900 Tyler St., Conway.
The play is “a fast-moving, witty comedy which dares its audience to laugh at the dysfunctional family.” Auditions are open to everyone regardless of previous experience. Parts are available for two men, ages 25-40, and three women, ages 25-70. No preparation is necessary; the audition will consist of cold readings from the script.
Production dates are Nov. 15-18. Jim Harris will direct. Call (501 ) 908-3883, e-mail jamesalanharris@gmail. com or visit the Web site, www. con wayarts. org. Hot Springs auditions The Hot Springs Pocket Theatre will hold auditions at 2 p.m. Sept. 30 and 7 p.m. Oct. 1 for A Christmas Story, adapted by Philip Grecian from the movie screenplay by Jean Shepherd, Leigh Brown and Bob Clark, at the theater, 170 Ravine St. (at Ramble Street, just off Park Avenue ), Hot Springs.
Parts are available for five men, three women, six boys and two girls, plus extras. Production dates are Nov. 29-Dec. 2 and Dec. 6-9. Call (501 ) 262-2675.
The theater’s 2008 season will open Feb. 14-24 with Neil Simon’s The Odd Couple — Female Version at the theater.
The rest of the season: May 1-11: The Cemetery Club by Ivan Menchell July 17-27: Lend Me a Tenor by Ken Ludwig Oct. 9-19, 2008: Nunsense (musical ) by Dan Goggin Season tickets are $ 45; single-show tickets are $ 13, $ 5 for students through grade 12; $ 15 for all tickets to Nunsense. Call (501 ) 623-8585. CTLR season The Community Theatre of Little Rock will open its 2007-08 season with Becoming Memories by Arthur Giron, Nov. 9-11 and 16-18 at Woolly Auditorium, Arkansas School for the Blind.
The rest of the season: Jan. 25-27, Feb. 1-3: “Historical Show” to be determined, in conjunction with Historic Arkansas Museum. April 11-13, 18-20: The Odd Couple — Female Version by Neil Simon July 18-20, 25-27: Schoolhouse Rock Live, Too !, musical sequel to Schoolhouse Rock Live !, based on the ABC Saturday morning cartoon series created by George Newall and Tom Yohe, based on an idea by David McCall; book by Scott Ferguson, music and lyrics by Bob Dorough, Dave Frishberg, Dennis Curley, Kathy Mandry, Lynn Ahrens, Newall and Yohe.
Except as noted, all shows will be at 7: 30 p.m. Thursday-Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday, at Woolly Auditorium.
Season tickets are $ 40. Call (501 ) 663-9494 or visit the Web site, www. community theatreoflittlerock. com.
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