Author: Liam Otten

Ten cutting-edge Sukkahs by architects and designers from around the nation were installed Oct. 17, just south of the Ann W. Olin Women’s Building. The projects, which remain on view through Saturday, Oct. 22, are winners of Sukkah City STL, an ambitious contemporary design competition that challenged participants to reimagine the traditional Jewish Sukkah through the lens of contemporary art and architecture

Patrick Henry Academy is an historic elementary school located in St. Louis’ Columbus Square neighborhood. Most Holy Trinity Catholic Church and School is a longtime Hyde Park anchor. Last summer, students and faculty in the Sam Fox School completed design/build projects at both locations under the auspices of CityStudioSTL, a new program offering community engagement and architectural outreach projects throughout the St. Louis area. On Oct. 19, visiting artist Theaster Gates Jr., who led the Hyde Park project, will discuss his work in a public lecture. 

Julie Andrews versus The Jackson 5? Bluegrass on the Swiss Alps? Led Zeppelin meets “The Lonely Goatherd”? Whatever has happened to “My Favorite Things”? Brooklyn Rundfunk Orkestrata, that’s what. On Oct. 28, this cutting-edge New York ensemble will make its St. Louis debut with The Hills Are Alive, a genre-bending adaptation of songs from Rodgers and Hammerstein’s The Sound of Music.

In a musical partnership stretching back nearly 40 years, the Fischer Duo has drawn critical acclaim for its performances of classical repertoire, for rediscovering neglected works of the past and for commissioning new works by contemporary composers. At 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 26, the Fischer Duo will showcase all three themes in a free concert for the Danforth University Center Chamber Music Series.

Legendary guitarist Ralph Towner is one of the finest improvisers in modern jazz and one of the few to specialize in acoustic guitar. At 8 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 27, Towner will present an evening of both standards and original music for Washington University’s Jazz at Holmes Series. In addition, on Oct. 26, Towner will take part in “The Music of Ralph Towner and The ECM Movement,” a symposium exploring both Towner’s work and the music of other artists associated with ECM Records.

Ward Stare is a rising star in the world of classical music, serving as both resident conductor of the St. Louis Symphony and as music director for the St. Louis Symphony Youth Orchestra. This fall, Stare adds to his portfolio as conductor of the Washington University Symphony Orchestra. On Oct. 23, Stare will make his regular-season debut with the WUSTL symphony in a performance featuring music of Ralph Vaughn Williams, Franz Liszt and Jean Sibelius.

Nationally acclaimed poet Lucie Brock-Broido will present a talk on the craft of poetry at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 11, for the Writing Program Reading Series. Brock-Broido is the author of three books of poetry: Trouble in Mind (2004), The Master Letters (1995) and A Hunger (1988). Her work often explores obsessions and anxieties — of influence, ritual, mortality and modernity — using shifting syntax and diction to create vivid, and sometimes disorienting, portraits of mind.

Ten cutting-edge Sukkahs by architects and designers from around the nation will be installed Oct. 18-22 on the campus of Washington University in St. Louis. The projects are winners of Sukkah City STL, an ambitious contemporary design competition that challenged participants to reimagine the traditional Jewish Sukkah — a small, temporary structure erected each fall during the weeklong festival of Sukkot — through the lens of contemporary art and architecture.

With its poodle skirts, bouffant hairdos and withering irony, John Waters’ Hairspray (1988) feels almost timeless. It could be set at any point after which the 1950s had ceased to be cool. It is actually set in 1962, the year James Meredith became the first African-American admitted to the University of Mississippi. That historical grounding is at the center of a new staging of Hairspray: The Musical, the 2002 Broadway extravaganza based on Waters’ film, by the Performing Arts Department in Arts & Sciences.

The Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts has announced the recipients of its 2011 Faculty Creative Activity Research Grants. Four art and architecture faculty members will each receive between $1,000 and $8,000 to support a variety of projects. These range from research about the Elizabethan “Lost Colony” of North Carolina and a monograph on Dutch architect Aldo van Eyck to a mobile art studio traveling the Gulf Coast and new methods of architectural fabrication in Jakarta, Indonesia.