WEST LONG BRANCH — The Center for the Arts at Monmouth University has announced that tickets are now on sale for its 2016-2017 Performing Arts Series at the Pollak Theatre, the flagship performance venue on the Monmouth campus.
This year, the theater received a makeover that included new carpeting, paint, seats and a larger, deeper stage area.
“We’re excited about our first full season since the renovations to our home stage,” said Vaune Peck, director of the Center for the Arts. “The improvements have really enhanced the live performance experience from both sides of the stage, with better sight lines all around and the ability to accommodate larger-scale productions like Benise and Rockin’ Road to Dublin.”
The Performing Arts Series opens Sept. 24, with installation artist and multi-instrumentalist master William Close and the Earth Harp Collective in a performance centered around his massive stringed inventions.
The artist known as Benise makes a Monmouth debut Oct. 15 as part of a “Strings of Passion” 10th Anniversary World Tour that teams The Prince of Spanish Guitar with a stage full of musicians and dancers for a globe-trotting musical journey that includes salsa, flamenco, samba, waltz, tango and classic rock anthems.
Roseanne Cash brings her passionate brand of American roots music to campus Oct. 21 for a concert event presented as part of the Grammy Museum Affliation series.
Another heir to one of America’s most formidable musical legacies, Arlo Guthrie also returns to the Shore with a full band Nov. 11 — a Grammy Museum Affliation event that spotlights standout cuts from “Running Down the Road” and other Arlo milestone hits of the late ’60s and early ’70s.
The husband-wife team of Broadway veterans Jarrod Spector and Kelli Barrett sound a salute to music’s greatest marriages (from Sonny and Cher to Beyonce and Jay-Z) in the Nov. 19 concert event “This Is Dedicated.”
The ever-popular annual holiday concert by Father Alphonse Stephenson and the Orchestra of St. Peter by the Sea will take place Dec. 2.
The music plays on in 2017, when the touring show Rockin’ Road to Dublin performs Feb. 9, melding the talents of Celtic rocker Chris Smith and dancer-choreographer Scott Doherty (Riverdance) for a stage spectacle that boasts a dynamic light show and electrified takes on traditional Irish anthems.
The musical treasures of Ireland’s southern counties are front and center on March 9 when the quintet Caladh Nua lends youthful energy and contemporary flair to traditional instrumentation and songcraft.
The human voice in all its glory takes center stage on Feb. 24 with an appearance by the Grammy winning, all-female a cappella troupe known as Sweet Honey in the Rock.
The a capella thrills continue on March 4 with Doo Wop Explosion II, a smorgasbord of soulful street-corner serenading that juxtaposes veterans The Spaniels (“Goodnight Sweetheart, Goodnight”) and Vito and the Salutations (“Gloria”) with contemporary masters like Philly’s Quiet Storm and others.
For World Autism Awareness Day on April 2, New Zealand tenor Geoff Sewell’s contemporary classical crossover vocal ensemble Bravo Amici returns to Monmouth for a special concert (co-presented by Autism Speaks New Jersey) that coincides with the opening of the exhibit “Art + Autism” at the Pollak Gallery.
Theater buffs can mark their calendars for Oct. 6, when New York City’s Aquila Theatre company returns to the Pollak with their acclaimed production of William Shakespeare’s comedic battle of the sexes, “Much Ado About Nothing.”
The Bard of Broadway gagmeisters — Neil “Doc” Simon — is the subject of Philadelphia’s venerable Walnut Street Theatre company and its Feb. 16 production of the vintage sex comedy “Last of the Red Hot Lovers.”
The ongoing mission to preserve and promote the Shore’s homegrown musical heroes continues on May 6 when the Performing Arts Series features the legendary “Storming” Norman Seldin, leading a multi-generational cast of all ages in the Bach to rock, jazz to ragtime program “The Piano Is the Attraction.”
The keynote at Monmouth’s Lauren K. Woods Theatre on the weekend of Sept. 9 and 10 is Shore music legend Jody Joseph and her band who will channel the sound and vision of Janis Joplin, Stevie Nicks, Carly Simon and Bette Midler in the special benefit show “Four Common Threads, One Heartstring.”
The big screen offers much interest to cinephiles in the new season, with the return of the On Screen/In Person series in September that spotlights independent documentary films and their producers. A World Cinema Series keyed to the theme “Breaking the Silence, Confronting the Past” begins Nov. 15 while 2017 will see the return of the annual Black Maria Film Festival on March 30 and a free “Women in the World” Women’s History Month Film Festival on April 3.
Tickets to all events in the 2016-2017 Performing Arts Series are available by calling the Monmouth University Performing Arts Box Office at 732-263-6889 or visiting www.monmouth.edu/arts.
