So much happening both here at the Palladium and at other hot spots, I needed to do a little collection of short subjects. Let’s start with:
BOOGIE WOOGIE BLUES PIANO STOMP: Saturday night’s show has sold almost 700 tickets. The Palladium only holds 850 people, so if you don’t have your tickets – get ’em now. This fourth incarnation of the Stomp could be the best yet.
Bob Seeley, the king of boogie woogie piano returns, along with California great Carl “Sonny” Leyland and Maryland’s own Daryl Davis. Liz Pennock, who came to me with the original idea for the Stomp and continues to help us pick the artists, will open the show with her partner in boogie – Dr. Blues.
We’ll have a camera crew on hand and a big screen showing you those piano hands pounding it out “8 To The Bar.” Show is Saturday, Feb. 23, 8 p.m.
PALLADIUM CHAMBER PLAYERS ARE A HIT: Wednesday night’s inaugural concert by the Palladium Chamber Players drew 480 folks for a thrilling night of music led by Jeff Multer. We will return with a full series of shows next season and subscription packages for the concerts. We’ll be looking for donors to support the series next season. If you’re interested call Cory Adler-Leidersdorff at 727 341-7918.
BILLY COLLINS, AMERICA’S POET, IS COMING TO THE PALLADIUM: Collins, the former U.S. Poet Laureate, who appears regularly on public radio’s Prairie Home Companion, will present a talk and a reading at the Palladium on Tuesday, March 12. It’s part of a new poetry series presented by SPC. the show is free to SPC students, staff and faculty and just $10 for the general public. Tickets should be on sale at our box office today (Thursday).
A GREAT NIGHT OF ACOUSTIC MUSIC: I was lucky enough to catch two great concerts in one night last week. I started at the Straz Center for the Carolina Chocolate Drops, an invigorating group that celebrates the history of African American string band music. Great singing, banjos, bones and guitars. We hope to get them here for a future show. Later, I raced across the bridge to the Hydeaway Cafe, where Noel Paul Stookey, of Peter, Paul and Mary, and John McEuen, of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, were doing a benefit. I caught McEuen’s late set and it featured his great stories and banjo virtuoisity. Loved his version of the hit – Mr. Bojangles. And Stookey, who has done two intimate show at the Palladium, was in great form and happy to be out of Maine in February.
The show closed with Stookey and McEuen, plus members of the acoustic group Firefall, on stage doing “Will The Circle Be Unbroken.”
CAROLINE GOULDING RETURNS WITH THE FLORIDA ORCHESTRA: It was great to see that Caroline Goulding, who we featured as a Young Concert Artist last season, is returning to the area, this time as a soloist with The Florida Orchestra. Remember, you saw her first at the Palladium!
SOME PALLADIUM WEB AND PHONE ISSUES: If you’ve had any trouble reaching us or using our website this past week, I apologize. We are making some changes and some intitial efforts ended up knocking us off the web temporarily. We’ve also had an overwhelming amount of calls to our box office and not all calls are being answered immediately. If you get a answer machine during normal box office hours please know that we will call you back ASAP and that all messages are returned before our box office closes for the day.
More to come soon.
Leave a Reply