Sunday night my friend Amanda and I attended the Chanticleer
concert at Cathedral Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe in downtown Dallas.
Amanda moved back to Dallas from Manhattan this year, and she introduced me to
Chanticleer’s music, having heard them twice at The Met at Christmastime.
Chanticleer is a world renowned choir of twelve male a cappella voices whose
repertoire is largely sixteenth-century music, though they also perform
contemporary numbers that include jazz, gospel, and spirituals. The rotunda of
the Virgin of Guadalupe church, which celebrated its 110th
anniversary this weekend, has some of the city’s finest acoustic space. And the
seamless harmony bouncing off the rotunda reverberated in a fantastic mix of
sound.
Chanticleer is headed into its Christmas season, with
concerts mostly scheduled on the west coast, their home base. Check out their
web site to see if they’ll perform near you. Fantastic!
This weekend also marked the opening of Klyde Warren Park, a
5.2-acre green space that sits atop a recessed strip of Woodall Rogers Freeway.
Located across from the Dallas Museum of Art and connecting downtown with
uptown Dallas, the park has a performance pavilion, walking trails, a dog park,
a children’s park, a games area, and even an outdoor library section, where
kids can borrow books.
Yesterday I took my creative writing students on our trek to
the Dallas Museum of Art, and afterward some of us wandered over to the park,
conscious that we got to enjoy a balmy day during while much of the country endured snow, flooding, and misery. At Klyde Warren, kids on field trips tossed
footballs, people walked dogs, and we sat in the shade in comfy chairs enjoying
sack lunches and the green in the city. A great addition to Dallas’s arts
district.
BTW, if you haven’t had a chance to check out the DMA’s Posters
of Paris: Toulouse-Loutrec and His Contemporaries, or the Legacy of the Plumed
Serpent in Ancient Mexico exhibits, you have till January 20 and November 25
respectively. Members get in free;
non-members pay a fee in addition to museum admission. Worth a look.
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