O', the luck of the Irish. They get two weekends to celebrate St. Patrick's Day. The parade was last Saturday morning, and people were still staggering around in leprechaun hats well past midnight. Friday night the green beer will be flowing once again for the proper St. Patrick's Day.
Mullaney's Harp & Fiddle in the Strip will be party central with Mark Guiser starting the music at noon. At 4 p.m. it has Michael Murphy and the Shannon River Band inside and Hooley in the heated tent. At 7:30 p.m., Guaranteed Irish plays the tent, followed by Red Hand Paddy inside at 8 p.m. For more on Irish pubs, see Page 27.
Also on Friday, Mr. Small's becomes Mr. O'Small's for Mike Gallagher's second annual St. Paddy's Day Party at 8 p.m. The popular local tenor will be joined by Ceann, the Pittsburgh/New York-based Yankee-Irish Drinking Band that headlined the Irish Rock Fest in New York City in December. The band's latest record, "Almost Irish," features "The Worst Pirate Song," which has been a downloaded hit on the band's Web site, www.ceannmusic.com. Tickets are $10 advance; $12 at the door.
Calliope: The Pittsburgh Folk Music Society extends the St. Patrick's Day spirit to Saturday with Flook, an Irish/British quartet that combines the flutes of Brian Finnegan and Sarah Allen, the guitar of Ed Boyd and the bodhran of John Joe Kelly. Together, they churn out a mix of traditional jigs and a more modern jam-band sound that earned them the title of Best Group at the BBC's 2006 Folk Awards. Flook, with a new album called "Haven," is at the Carnegie Lecture Hall in Oakland at 8 p.m. with local artist Ellen Gozion. Tickets are $25 advance; $27 at the door; $12 student rush. Call 412-394-3353.
"Creative Forum: Extreme Canvas" is a community discussion that will provide insight into the August Wilson Center for African American Culture's "Extreme Canvas" exhibition -- a show of movie posters, hand-painted by local Ghanaian artists onto raggedy canvas or stitched-together flour sacks. It is hosted by WAMO's Anji Corley and will feature panelists Aisha White, Billy Jackson, Ralph Proctor and Kyle Holbrook. There will also be refreshments, music from DJ SMI and a performance by Nathan James and Steven Chatman. It is free and open to the public from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Center's 209/9th Street Gallery, 209 Ninth St., Downtown.
James Hunter, a singer who came to fame sharing stages with Van Morrison, brings his blue-eyed British soul to Club Cafe at 7 p.m. Hunter is touring in support of "People Gonna Talk," an album that owes a clear debt to the great Sam Cooke. See Page W-13.
Dora the Explorer gets us ready for Pirates season with a live production that's about, not bats and balls, but ships and swords. In "Dora's Pirate Adventure!," her best buddy, Boots the Monkey, cousin Diego and the whole Nick show gang embark on a trip to Treasure Island. They're going to need help from the audience to navigate over Music Mountain and through silly Singing Bridge where they confront the Pirate Piggies. It's going to require map-reading, counting, music and Spanish-language skills, so bring your thinking caps. The show is at the Benedum today at 10:30 a.m. and 7 p.m.; Friday at 7 p.m.; Saturday at 11 a.m. and 2 and 5 p.m.; and Sunday at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Tickets are $14.50 to $38.50. Call 412-456-6666.
The nomadic Quantum Theatre explores Mellon Institute in Oakland for "The Voluptuous Tango," described as "a surreal musical journey through Italian Futurism, where fried pink roses grace the dinner table and seduction is the main course." The "opera bouffe" in 11 scenes features Lenora Nemetz, Attack Theatre's Michele de la Reza and Peter Kope and a chorus of CMU music students. Shows this weekend are 8 p.m. Friday through Sunday. It runs through April 2. Tickets are $26. See Page W-16.
City Theatre opens the world premiere of "Opus," a play by Michael Hollinger ("Incorruptible" and "Red Herring") that depicts a string quartet that is seamless on stage but fiery behind the scenes. Preview week begins Friday at 8 p.m. It runs through April 9. Tickets are $15 to $40. Call 412-431-2489.
No vegetables will be harmed in the making of "Veggie Tales Live," a performance that will feature a tomato, a cucumber and a celery stalk on vocals. In this stage production playing Orchard Hill Church in Franklin Park, Bob the Tomato is a stage manager trying to get his Veggie friends to cooperate with the song list, but they all have their own ideas. In the end the kids get a lesson in friendship and a gentle reminder that "God made them special and He loves them very much." Shows are 2 and 6 p.m. Tickets are $22.50. Call 1-800-965-9324.
"Think outside the pencil box." That was the challenge of Associated Artists of Pittsburgh members for "Drawing," an exhibit opening at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts from 6 to 9 p.m. According to exhibit chair Marjorie Shipe: "Works could be submitted in any media and represent any subject. It might simply be a word on a page, a photo, a collage or a piece of ceramic. The options were wide open as long as 'drawing' was featured in the piece." Juror David Wilkins chose 55 pieces from 43 artists, including award winners Ken Beer, Carolyn Wenning and John Dorinsky. The exhibit runs through April 22.
Concertmaster Andres Cardenes replaces Robert Spano, music director of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, who was to conduct the Pittsburgh Symphony in presenting John Adams' "Naive and Sentimental Music." Spano was forced to cancel his appearance here because of bronchitis. Cardenes will conduct a Mozart concerto, Debussy's "Petite Suite," and Dvorak's Symphony No. 7. Call 412-392-4900 or go to www.pittsburghsymphony.org.
The Appalachian School, a Pittsburgh-based "network of international artists working together to redefine the experimental lexicon of art," gets to bloom at the Spring Event at the Three Rivers Arts Festival Gallery. The Spring Event is chock-full of film screenings, live performances, interdisciplinary collaborations and installation art by the likes of Willem Weissmann, Adam Sipe, Ian Williams, Lauri Mancuso, The Orgone Archive, Myrza Deva de Muynck, Jennifer Lee, Ed Um Bucholtz and Terry Young. The opening is from 5:30 to 9 p.m. at 937 Liberty Ave. There will be a performance by Michael Johnsen, an improvisational musician who uses homemade instruments, at 7 p.m. Call 412-281-8723 or visit www.artsfestival.net.
It's a po-e-try night in Lawrenceville! Sharon F. McDermott and Katherine A. Mariner will be featured in the Choice Cuts Reading Series at the Slaughterhouse Gallery & Studios, 5136 Butler St. McDermott is a visiting lecturer at the University of Pittsburgh and the lead singer of local classic rock band Cryin' Out Loud. Mariner is a Cleveland native who is a senior English and communications major at Grove City College. It begins at 7:30 p.m.
'Tis the season for talent shows. The latest is called, simply, the Variety Talent Show, presented by Moriarty Consultants and Mark C. Productions. It takes place at the Kelly-Strayhorn Theater in East Liberty and will focus on dance, rap, poetry and soloists. First place is $1,000. It begins at 5 p.m. Tickets are $5. For information or to enter, call 412-734-1067.
Moondog's offers an evening of British blues-rock with Ten Years After, featuring keyboardist Chick Churchill, bassist Leo Lyons, drummer Ric Lee and singer-guitarist Joe Gooch. Wait a minute, who's Joe Gooch? Where's Alvin Lee? Well, he's not with Ten Years After and he's not in Blawnox on Saturday night. Instead, you get Joe Gooch, who wasn't even born when Alvin tore up Woodstock with "I'm Going Home." The 28-year-old guitarist will lead Ten Years After in new and used material. Ric Lee says in the press material (which never mentions Alvin): " 'I'd Love to Change the World' is in the set, which it never was in the previous life of Ten Years After. There are other tunes that we have standing by in case anyone shouts for them, too." It begins at 9:30 p.m. Tickets are $18 advance; $20 day of show. Call 412-828-2040.
The U.S. Olympic skating team didn't produce a Scott Hamilton or a Sara Hughes at Turin, which has made it tougher for the 20th Anniversary U.S. tour of Smucker's Stars on Ice. The marquee name is Russian Olympic Gold medalist Alexei Yagudin, and it also features 2002 Olympic pair champions Jamie Sale & David Pelletier of Canada and Elena Berezhnaya & Anton Sikharulidze of Russia, plus world champion and six-time U.S. national champion Todd Eldredge, world champion and two-time Japanese Champion Yuka Sato. They skate at Mellon Arena at 7:30 p.m. in a tour titled "A Show ... about the show." Founder Hamilton won't be there, but through video he will be take audiences "on a journey that will give a humorous backstage look as to how Stars on Ice became America's most prestigious figure skating tour." Tickets are $25. Call 412-323-1919.
Pitt's Music on the Edge closes its season with percussion duo DoublePlay performing works by Maki Ishii, Elisabeth Hoffman and John Cage, the man whose pioneering compositions of the 1930s have been credited with having moved percussion to the foreground. It's at Bellefield Hall Auditorium at 8 p.m. Tickets are $10; $5 for students and seniors in advance; $5 more at the door; Pitt students free. Call 412-394-3353 or www.proartstickets.org.
How do you make Art From Chaos? Find out when this collective of artists, musicians, writers and performers celebrates its one-year anniversary with a show, in two "acts," at Modern Formations in Garfield. Act One is a "Collaboration for Peace" featuring music by Eve Goodman, Mark Dignam and Sonji Woodruff, poet John Reoli and writer boice-Terrel Allen. Act Two is the premiere of a new monthly dance party called "Equality" with DJ Ray. It runs from 8 p.m. to 1 a.m. Tickets are $10 or $5 with student ID. Call 412-362-0274.
On "Back to the Well," his latest record and first for Vanguard, country singer Lee Roy Parnell leans toward his Southern blues roots. You can check him out live at the Rex at 8 p.m. Tickets are $15. Call 412-323-1919.
If your main music format is the iPod, disregard this next item. There are still people who swear by the vinyl LP, and they will be out in full force, flipping more than a million 33s, 45s, 78s and, yes, those very modern compact discs. It's at the Pittsburgh Record & CD Convention XXII at the Radisson Hotel, Green Tree. It runs 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., when admission is free, but there are early bird hours from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. for $10. Call 412-331-5021.
John O'Donohue, Irish poet, scholar and author of "Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom," makes his second Pittsburgh appearance, speaking on "Spring: A Celebration of Life" at Chatham College's Eddy Theatre at 7 p.m. Tickets are $25; $10 for students and clergy. Call 412-394-3900.
Correction/Clarification: (Published Mar. 17, 2006) Andres Cardenes will conduct the Pittsburgh Symphony this weekend (March 18 & 19, 2006) at Heinz Hall in a program consisting of a Mozart concerto, Debussy's "Petite Suite" and Dvorak's Symphony No. 7. The conductor and program were incorrect in this Hot List story as originally published March 16, 2006.
First Published: March 16, 2006, 5:00 a.m.
