By Charly SHELTON It’s 11 p.m. You are at Disneyland and it is crowded. You have ridden only four rides all day and the park closes in an hour. You had to sell a kidney to afford tickets, it’s almost two hours in rush hour traffic down Interstate 5 to get there and it’s so […]
By Ted AYALA At first glance, the lives and works of composers Xaver Scharwenka and Frank Bridge seem to have little in common. During the height of Imperial Germany, Scharwenka carved out a wide berth for himself among the forefront of the musical luminaries of his day. His glittering compositions and just as glittering pianism […]
Face Front,True Believers! It is I, your magnanimous leader, back once again to lay some knowledge on you from beyond the computer screen. Last weekend was a nerd fest. Peter Parker returned to the Amazing Spider-Man comic on Wednesday with almost 50 variants of issue 1, the release of The Amazing Spider-Man 2 in […]
By Ted AYALA Mozart may have died a premature death, but in his 35 years of life he packed an enormous amount of creative activity. Virtually no genre in existence during his lifetime did he leave untouched: opera, symphony, string quartet, liturgical music, even works for musical clocks and choral canons on humorous texts that […]
By Susan JAMES Full disclosure: I lived in India for several years. The sound of a sitar or a camera panning across an orange sunset behind the Taj Mahal can make me cry. So I was predisposed to like Disney’s new family, feel good film “Million Dollar Arm.” But here’s the good part: You don’t […]
By Ted AYALA If the Glendale Pops’ performance at the Alex Theatre last Saturday night proved anything, it was that you can’t keep a good band down. The ensemble’s fans may find themselves regretting that due to renovations done on the Alex in the past few months, that the Pops was forced to trim its […]
By Charly SHELTON In 2012, the world was introduced to Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker, the Amazing Spider-Man. Coming off of a three-movie run with interesting-as-Elmer’s Paste Toby Maguire as Peter Parker, it is this reviewer’s opinion that anyone would have been an improvement in the title role. But now, with the honeymoon phase wearing […]
By Ted AYALA Lovers of the rare and exotic, watch out! A “Gnarwhallaby” sighting is set to take place tonight at the Neighborhood Church in Pasadena. Before you reach for your rifle and supply of tranquilizer darts, just what exactly is a “Gnarwhallaby?” Well, for starters, it isn’t an “it,” but rather a “them.” As […]
By Sabrina WALENTYNOWICZ In a world of increasingly large, faceless companies, a small group of jewelers, seamstresses, and all around “crafty” people formed The Artisan Group. Their goal is to get their products noticed as being handmade and unique. They prepare gift bags for celebrities and VIPs at special events so that they will wear […]