Texas band Explosions In The Sky visited the Mondavi Center at UC Davis Sunday night and provided a pure guitar wall of sound bliss. Their show is the first of a set of four concerts in Davis in April produced by the Bay Area's Another Planet Entertainment (books shows for the Outside Lands Festival (2012 lineup to be announced tomorrow), the Treasure Island Music Festival, The Independent in SF, and the Fox Theater in Oakland, among others) that I am dubbing "mini-Coachella" since the headlining bands (and many of the openers) are playing there both last and next weekend. Upcoming Davis shows are: Bon Iver on Tuesday, April 17th at Freeborn Hall; Florence and the Machine on Wednesday, Ap

The Mondavi Center in Davis hosted a Valentine’s Day party for fans of acoustic folk/blues guitar and irreverent topical tunes. Tuesday night’s concert featured two legends of the 1970s and ’80s, but not everyone in the audience was over 50, and even the 20-somethings came away from the show with an appreciation of acoustic music played with humility and savoir-faire. Loudon Wainwright III and Leo Kottke are prolific and talented musicians. Wainwright has released 28 albums over the past 41 years, and Kottke has 39 titles to his credit, including film soundtracks and compilation CDs. The two performers have garnered accolades including two Grammy nominations for Kottke and a Grammy win

Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo presented the best of classic ballet at the beautiful Mondavi Center in Davis Thursday night, playing to a near-capacity crowd. Tchaikovsky, “Swan Lake,” tutus, pink satin pointe shoes, lifts and pirouettes and breathtaking spins: This performance had it all. It was hilarious. Trockadero has been bringing the grace and discipline of ballet to enthusiastic audiences across the globe for 38 years and has become a major player in the world of ballet companies. The international cast is a wonderful troupe of serious dancers. Their athleticism and technical abilities are impressive, and the dancers have studied and performed with some of the best and

k.d. lang and the Siss Boom Bang delighted the capacity crowd at the Mondavi Center Thursday night with a wide-ranging show. Her legendary voice delivered everything from a sultry growl to a soaring soprano heartache. Throughout the 90-minute set and two encores, lang’s remarkable voice delivered each note with an impeccable sense of timing and emotional nuance. She never flinched from delivering a song with powerful bravado, as in her 1992 Grammy-winning “Constant Craving,” nor did she shy away from the almost unbearable tenderness and vulnerability of “The Perfect Word.” The concert was almost evenly divided between songs from lang’s latest CD, “Sing It Loud,” and some of her older tu

Tony Bennett, the 84-year-old award-winning singer, will be performing at the UC Davis Mondavi Center on Wednesday, May 25. Bennett has been performing for more than 60 years, and, through the ups and downs of a musical career, has continued to record and perform. Still more astonishing is his upcoming album release, set for Sept. 20 of this year. “Tony Bennett: Duets II” is an astounding collection of duets, including collaborations with Amy Winehouse, Faith Hill, Willie Nelson, Josh Groban, Mariah Carey, Sheryl Crow, Norah Jones and Alejandro Sanz, among others. Bennett's set, scheduled for 8 p.m. in Jackson Hall, will likely include hits from his more recent albums, as well as old fa

Just when the Kronos Quartet seemed like it couldn’t push the boundaries of contemporary string ensemble any further, this renowned group from San Francisco surprised its audiences with new sophisticated, eclectic string interpretations, guiding them through daring cross-genre explorations. Through its unique string arrangements, the Kronos Quartet has given homage for more than 30 years to a variety of composers – ranging from classical minimalists to modern, experimental rockers. In keeping with this fearless spirit, the Kronos Quartet—David Harrington, John Sherba (violins), Hank Dutt (viola) and Jeffrey Zeigler (cello)—astounded more than 500 listeners Thursday night with a live perf

 The Mondavi Center hosted a benefit concert for the L17 Community Arts Foundation in Davis Sunday, providing American music and a silent auction whose proceeds went toward the Central Downtown Food Basket. The concert, “Celebrate America," had plenty of energy from the beginning, and although it slowed a little after intermission, it was a wonderful concert with some amazing talent. The two bookend pieces performed for the 659 attendees were "The Star-Spangled Banner and "God Bless America," both done with superior choral arrangements. The latter was performed by the entire ensemble of vocal talent. The vocal groups performing ranged from a cappella stylings to more ensemble work, goin

A México with bundles of tassels. A Mexico that is tame, quiet, wild, incongruous, strident, lighthearted.-Amalia Hernandez A Mexico that is a pure expression of roots, that convert themselves into reality though emotional sentiment Ballet Folklorico de Amalia Hernandez

For people sick of hearing about "Avatar," the Mondavi Center at UC Davis provides low-cost alternative screenings with it's Focus on Film series held this winter and spring. Mondavi Center Executive Director Don Roth opened the series up to the public in 2008 with three nights of Ingmar Bergman retrospectives followed by three nights of films representing "Perspectives of War in Cinema." "We get a good mix of members of the community and students to these screenings," he said. For this installment, the series is broken into the themes of Replay and Graphic Novel. Roth described the films chosen for the Replay portion as representative of "two films based on the same story." Films fea