‘He was like everybody’s grandfather,’ a politician declared when Ronald Reagan died—and a liberal Democratic politician at that! Well, no, he wasn’t. By many accounts he wasn’t even a good father, let alone grandpa. He might have been Father of the Nation to his adoring partisans and a Wicked Stepfather to his opponents but, for certain, he was the real father of Maureen, Michael and Ronnie Reagan and Patti Davis. Composer/librettist Eric Reda (formerly with About Face Theatre) takes the kids’ perspective in his opera-oratorio Reagan’s Children, which will receive its world concert premiere on Presidents’ Day, Feb. 18, 7:30 p.m. at Martyr’s Pub, 3855 N. Lincoln; 800-594-8499; $20. Reda has been working on Reagan’s Children for several years, with parts of it performed previously in workshops at the Around the Coyote Festival.
The DuPage Opera, at the McAninch Arts Center, 425 Fawell, Glen Ellyn, offers two performances of Verdi’s Otello on Thurs., Jan. 31, and Sat., Feb. 2, at 8 p.m.. Fully staged and accompanied by full orchestra, Otello will be sung in Italian with projected English titles. Based on Shakespeare’s play, Verdi’s second-to-last opera is considered one of his very best, pithy, powerful and dramatic—without a wasted note. Michael Ehrman is the stage director and Kirk Muspratt is the conductor. Tickets: 630-942-4000; $43.
Maestro Muspratt returns to the MAC with the New Philharmonic Orchestra and pianist Meng-Chieh Liu Feb. 22-23, 8 p.m., in a program of Rachmaninoff, Ravel and Revueltas, featuring solo piano and orchestral versions of Ravel’s La Valse, plus Revueltas’ Afro-Cuban Sensemaya and the Rachmaninoff Third Piano Concerto; 630-942-4000; $33.
Fresh from its annual, grand Martin Luther King, Jr., tribute program, the Chicago Sinfonietta partners with the National Museum of Mexican Art to present a much more intimate program in its Chamber Music Series. The concert, ¡Guitarra!, features guitar virtuoso Alfonso Ponticelli and Swing Gitan along with string players from the Chicago Sinfonietta. Together, they’ll explore the common antecedents of flamenco, jazz and classical in Mexican music and its Spanish influences. It sounds like a wonderful concert, but time is short: it’s this Friday night, Feb. 1, 7:30 p.m. at the National Museum of Mexican Art, 1852 W. 19th Street; 312-236-3681, ext. 2; $15.
Chamber Opera Chicago kicks into Latin gear as well with its Feb. 1 Te Amo-An Evening in Spain, a fiery blend of music and dance in tribute to virtuoso dancers Pascual Olivera and Angela Del Moral. The program will offer highlights from Carmen, Man of La Mancha, La Vida Breve, Granada and others, sung in tandem with traditional Spanish dances performed by the Ensemble Español Spanish Dance Theater and video clips of Olivera and Del Moral. The one-night event is at 7:30 p.m. at the Music Institute of Chicago, 1490 Chicago, Evanston; 312-951-7944; $15.
The Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs has announced 11 free winter/spring concerts in its continuing New Millennium/New Music series, which showcases avant-garde and improvised music by touring artists and local musicians. Said Cultural Affairs senior program director Michael Orlove, ‘We are thrilled that the New Millennium/New Music series not only continues to support the Chicago avant-garde jazz scene, but that it also encourages musical dialogue among Chicago musicians and like-minded musicians around the world.’
February concerts in the series are Daniel Levin’s Black Bear, Feb. 19, 7 p.m., and Pandelis Karayorgis & Ken Vandermark, Feb. 20, 7 p.m. For his Black Bear program, Daniel Levin (cello) will be joined by Nate McBride (bass), Frank Rosaly (drums) and Greg Ward (saxophone). The next night, pianist Karayorgis and reedist Vandermark take the stage. The two recently released a CD collaboration, Foreground Music. New Millennium/New Music concerts are held in the Claudia Cassidy Theater at the Chicago Cultural Center (77 East Randolph). For more info: 312-744-6630 or www.cityofchicago.org/CulturalAffairs.
Lyric Opera of Chicago has announced details of its 2008-2009 season, which will open next Sept. 27 with Massenet’s Manon and continue with Bizet’s The Pearl Fishers, Berg’s Lulu, Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess, Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde, the classic double bill of Cavalleria Rusticana (Mascagni) and Pagliacci (Leoncavallo), and Mozart’s The Abduction from the Seraglio. For its 54th season, Lyric has assembled a remarkably well-balanced repertoire with works from the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries by French, Austrian, German, Italian and American composers. It’s not a season that stretches artistic boundaries—all the works are familiar standard repertory operas—but still it should generate excitement and ticket demand. The performances of Porgy and Bess will mark that opera’s long-overdue Lyric Opera premiere in a production created for the Washington National Opera. The September, 2008-March 2009 season will offer 80 performances, with four-opera subscriptions from $96 and full eight-opera subscriptions from $192. Blessedly, once again all Lyric opening nights will be broadcast live on radio station WFMT, underwritten by the Bucksbaum Family Foundation.