Salt Lake City’s arts scene is roaring back to full steam: Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company’s Total Ellipse, Roger Benington’s Psychopomp, SONDERimmersive’s The Chocolatier

With live performances resuming on several fronts, the arts calendar for the fall season in Salt Lake City has returned to levels not seen since the fall of 2019. The Utah Review offers reviews of three shows, seen within the span of four days. RIRIE-WOODBURY DANCE COMPANY: TOTAL ELLIPSE Season openers for Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company … Read more

Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company returns to live performances in 58th season opener with premieres by Keerati Jinakunwiphat, Daniel Charon; Raja Feather Kelly’s Pantheon

It’s been nearly 20 months since Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company had a live concert — Allegory — in its regular season. This week, the company opens its 58th season in the Rose Wagner Center for Performing Arts’ Jeanne Wagner Theatre with Total Ellipse, a program featuring two world premieres and a work that premiered in 2017. … Read more

NOVA Chamber Music Series announces 2021-22 concerts, return to live regular season performances for first time since March 2020

The last live NOVA Chamber Music Series concert before the COVID-19 pandemic shuttered all live performances in the city occurred on March 1, 2020, a program featuring music by Nordic composers performed in the Utah Museum of Fine Arts’ Great Hall. In the last 18 months, NOVA has stayed visible with a series of virtual … Read more

Utah Museum of Contemporary Art continues 90th anniversary celebrations with exhibitions including murals by local street, graffiti artists; Yoriko Mizushiri animation; works inspired by Mormon culinary traditions, pandemic

The Utah Museum of Contemporary Art’s 90th anniversary year has been a splendid affair so far and exhibitions that are continuing through the early fall merit a thorough visit by patrons. This includes the seven impressive large-scale murals that signify the outstanding reputation for local public art in the street and graffiti forms. Likewise, two … Read more

Utah Arts Festival 2021: You Are Always 20 takes Fear No Film’s Grand Jury Best of Show; Fear No Filmmaker Award goes to Luis Fernando Puente for The Moon and The Hummingbird

Twelve awards have been announced in the 18th Fear No Film portion of the Utah Arts Festival, including a Grand Jury Prize, Fear No Filmmaker Award, three honorable mentions and seven audience awards. Winning Grand Jury Best of Show is the Swedish short film, You Are Always 20, directed by Christer Wahlberg, is based on … Read more

Plan-B Theatre’s newest Free Elementary School Tour production, Alli and #3, featuring alligator and heron characters, introduces K-3 children to basic science of nature and climate

Children attending school in Utah or the Intermountain West region might be surprised to learn that even in the southernmost Rio Grande River Valley, alligators and herons have been known to congregate together. In Alli and #3, the latest children’s play in Plan-B Theatre’s Free Elementary School Tour program (FEST), Alli is an alligator who … Read more

#SLACabaret, Salt Lake Acting Company’s summer debut, shows plenty of examples about leveraging comedic punch celebrating Utah’s peculiarities

Provocative comedy is an underappreciated, underutilized art form in Utah. The state’s social character and pop culture are sufficiently peculiar, offbeat and unusual to produce spot-on satires and farces. Some segments of Utah’s independent film industry (think of the HaleStorm comedies, for example) have aspired to achieve crossover appeal by highlighting weird, quirky aspects of … Read more

Utah Arts Festival 2021: Creative Zone, Art & Technology, Urban Arts venues set for three full days of activities

Although a bit scaled back this year, the Utah Arts Festival’s Art & Technology, Creative Zone and Urban Art venues will have plenty of activities for patrons and their families. Creative Zone Open all three days between noon and 8 p.m., the Creative Zone this year temporarily replaces the Kids’ Art Yard, out of prudence … Read more

Utah Arts Festival 2021: Music highlights include headliner Las Cafeteras from East LA; local standouts Fry Pan Band, La Calavera, Mel Soul, Brent Yo and The Messenger

Las Cafeteras (Aug. 28, 9:30 p.m., Festival Stage) It has been three years since Las Cafeteras, the acoustic alt-folk rock band from East Los Angeles, performed in Salt Lake City, at The University of Utah. They appeared then with the all-female mariachi crew Flor de Toloache, who had won a Latin Grammy just a year … Read more

Utah Arts Festival 2021: artÉmotion in collaboration with Ballet West set to premiere five dance commissions with live music

In the decade since the Utah Arts Festival added dance commissions to its chamber music and jazz world premieres, Ballet West artists have established stellar standards in the program. This year’s program (Aug. 27, 4:45 p.m., Festival Stage), however, takes the dance commissions to a new level, featuring more new works and artists than ever … Read more