Jay Harvey Upstage

Another joke, perhaps? A way to signal the misdirections the play itself cultivates repeatedly? Probably a simple mistake, insofar as the printed programs for "Ms. Holmes and Ms. Watson, Apt. 2B" tell us that the production, which opened Friday night, runs "March 8-24,  2026."  We are probably all somewhat date-challenged in an era whose broad, dire scope has us wishing for its conclusion. In the real world of local performing arts, the public has until May 24 to see the Summit Performance Indianapolis show at the Phoenix Theatre Cultural Centre. Believe you me, it has an all-star cast and a production team operating at their best. Holmes in a moment of endless sleuthing Kate Hamill 's script is loaded with quotations from and allusions to high and low culture as it sends up the icon of fictional sleuthing. Shirley, sometimes Sherlock, Holmes (Frankie Jo Bolda) is shadowed by the trappings of female marginalization, personified by both title characters and neg...

 The glory of brass instruments fits well into an expansive definition of Eastertide, so Indianapolis Baroque Orchestra and the Second Presbyterian Church Sanctuary Choir joined forces Sunday afternoon for "O Radiant Dawn," a program of sacred music by J.S. Bach and Jan Dismas Zelenka. Three trumpets for Bach, four for Zelenka helped make sure there would be plenty of splendor in movements of both works where glory was being proclaimed. Michelle Louer, director of music and fine arts at Second Presbyterian, conducted the concert in the church's spacious sanctuary, which is acoustically sumptuous as well. The Indianapolis Baroque Orchestra revealed its historically informed performing acumen with Ingrid Matthews, a professor at Indiana University, as guest concertmaster. The spotlight turned on her to fine effect in the alto aria "Benedictus" of Zelenka's "Missa Paschalis," which revealed soprano soloist Madeline Apple Healey at her best level of t...

Though some of opera's loftiest achievements fit under the genre of tragedy, the art form had to escape the 18th-century strictures of opera seria   and set aside ancient gods for sad, stately operas to attract the public's esteem. It's more than sentimentality that reinforces our love for happy endings; it's also the perennial gift of music to raise our spirits uniquely.  Mozart is chief among the examples of comic genius in music, and "The Marriage of Figaro" stands at the summit, partly for skill at illuminating the emotions of real people without overstatement.  Indianapolis Opera opened a production worthy of this masterpiece Friday evening in the Tobias Theater at Newfields. Resourcefully put together from an original production at Northern Lights Music Festival  with stage direction here by Jessica Burton, the show has the special advantage of guest conductor Bernard McDonald. Director of Opera at Florida State University, McDonald brings a vast resum é...