Feb. 24 Entertainment Briefs

‘Porgy and Bess’ at Yardley Hall 

George Gershwin’s masterpiece “Porgy and Bess” celebrates its 75th anniversary in 2010 with a production featuring an all-star cast of 30 and a live orchestra at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, Feb. 26-27, in Yardley Hall of the Carlsen Center, Johnson County Community College, 12345 College Blvd., Overland Park.

Artists Insights by Bill Everett, musicologist, the University of Missouri-Kansas City, and Paul Laird, musicologist, the University of Kansas, begin at 7 p.m.

Based on a novel by DuBose Heyward, who collaborated with Ira Gershwin on the lyrics, the classic story is set in a fictitious slum in 1912 Charleston and follows the bittersweet love story of the crippled beggar Porgy who tries to save the beautiful, haunted Bess from the seductive life of dope and prostitution.

“Porgy and Bess” uses jazz, blues and Gershwin’s special orchestration to intertwine pride, prejudice, pathos and passions in favorites like “Summertime,” “I Got Plenty of Nuttin’” and “Bess, You Is My Woman Now.”

For tickets, call 469-4445 or visit www.jccc.edu/TheSeries.

JCCC hosts free concerts

Johnson County Community College hosts three free concerts in March in Polsky Theatre of the Carlsen Center. Concerts are free and open to the public.

• March 2 – The JCCC Concert Band performs Americana Part I at 7:30 p.m.

• March 3 – JCCC Jazz Night featuring the Midnight Blues Jazz Choir and the Midnight Express Jazz Ensemble is at 7:30 p.m.

• March 10 – JCCC Chamber Choir Concert, performs at 7:30 p.m.

For information, call 469-8500, ext. 3275.

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