It’s officially Thanksgiving, which means once the tryptophan wears off, you’ll be saying hello to December. But if you can shake off the turkey-induced haze, we recommend spending some time this weekend checking out our best bets. This week, we have a parade, a holiday tradition returning to the Houston Ballet stage, and the best of British adverts. Keep reading for these and more below.
It’s one of the oldest Turkey Day parades in the country, and today, Thursday, November 27, at 9 a.m., you can enjoy the pageantry of it when the 76th Annual H-E-B Thanksgiving Day Parade returns to Downtown Houston. This year, the grand marshals are the grand mascots, as Toro of the Houston Texans, Clutch of the Houston Rockets, Orbit of the Houston Astros, and Diesel of the Houston Dynamo take the honors. The parade will cover more than 20 downtown city blocks, with floats, new balloons, six marching bands, dance groups, and performances by artists like America’s Got Talent semifinalist Christina Wells, country singer Payton Howie, and Kam Franklin of The Suffers. Parade viewing is free and open to the public. If you can’t make it, you can always catch the parade on ABC13, the parade’s host and streaming partner.
Traditions continue on Friday, November 28, at 7 p.m., when the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, once again screens the British Arrows, a collection of award-winning advertisements from the United Kingdom. The ad spots, which range from humorous to touching, will feature some familiar faces, like those of A$AP Rocky and Benedict Cumberbatch, and familiar brands, including Uber, Balenciaga, and Nike, as well as some fun premises, like an ad for Virgin Media featuring a walrus nabbing a boat for a ride to Billy Ocean’s song Suddenly. The compilation will also be screened at 7 p.m. Saturday, November 29; Saturday, December 6; and Friday, December 12. Tickets to any of the screenings can be purchased here for $7 to $9. Note: The December 12 screening will be introduced by His Britannic Majesty’s Consul General, Keith Scott, and followed by a panel discussion.
Join young Clara Stahlbaum as she goes on a magical journey, from the Stahlbaum family living room to the Land of Snow and to the Kingdom of Sweets – all to Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s classic score – when the Houston Ballet opens their annual holiday production of Stanton Welch’s The Nutcracker at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, November 28, at the Wortham Theater Center. Performances will continue through December 28 at 1 and 6:30 p.m. November 30 and December 7, 14, 21, and 28; 7:30 p.m. December 10-12 and 16-18; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturdays and December 19, 22-23, and 26; and 2 p.m. December 24. Tickets can be purchased here for $30 to $220. Special VIP Green Room experiences are also available for select dates for an additional $70 per person, which include refreshments and photo opportunities.
Speaking of Tchaikovsky, in 1874, on Christmas Eve, he played his first piano concerto for virtuosic pianist Nikolai Rubinstein, who deemed it “worthless” and “absolutely unplayable,” with “passages so broken, so disconnected, so unskillfully written, that they could not even be improved.” Though devastated, Tchaikovsky premiered the work, as it was, one year later, and “it was a triumphant success.” You can hear it on Friday, November 28, at 7:30 p.m., when the Houston Symphony presents Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1, alongside work by Ľubica Čekovská and Richard Strauss, at Jones Hall. The concert will be performed again at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, November 29, and 2 p.m. Sunday, November 30. Tickets to these in-hall performances can be purchased here for $65 to $192. Saturday night’s show will also be livestreamed, and you can purchase access for $20 here.
TEATRX’s La Vida Es Cortos/Life is Shorts Festival, a celebration of Latinx voices in short plays and short films, will return to the MATCH on Friday, November 28, at 7:30 p.m. The weekend-long festival will feature 21 short films and eight plays, including Carl Gonzales’ folklore-based horror play, La Planchada; Samantha Vargas’ dark comedy, The Pretender; Jay Hernandez’s dystopian The Great Citizenship Game; and Katherine Bahena-Benitez’s immersive Morena. The festival continues at 2:30 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday, November 29, and 2:30 p.m. Sunday, November 30. La Vida Es Cortitos, showcases specifically programmed for young audiences, are also scheduled for 10:30 a.m. Saturday, November 29, and Sunday, November 30. Adult tickets are pay-what-you-can here, with a minimum price of $10, and children 12 and under can attend La Vida Es Cortitos free with the purchase of an adult ticket.
The German choral tradition takes center stage on Tuesday, December 2, at 7:30 p.m., when Ars Lyrica presents The Watchmen’s Song at St. Philip Presbyterian Church. Philipp Nicolai’s 1599 chorale based on the Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins, Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, is the starting point for the program, as it has inspired subsequent composers, including Dietrich Buxtehude, Hugo Distler, Franz Tunder, and Johann Sebastian Bach’s popular 1731 cantata of the same name. Soprano Erica Schuller, countertenor Michael Skarke, tenor Thomas O’Neill, and bass Tzvi Bat Asherah join the ensemble for the concert, which will also feature seasonal, Advent-themed pieces by German Baroque composers Heinrich Schütz and Nicolaus Bruhns. Tickets for the concert are available here for $15 to $50.
Playwright Isaac Gómez transports A Christmas Carol to a fast-food joint and turns Scrooge into a “burger flipper” named Margot in The Night Shift Before Christmas, which officially opens at the Alley Theatre on Wednesday, December 3, at 7 p.m. Briana J. Resa returns to star in the one-woman show, “a Houston-based knockoff” of the Charles Dickens’ holiday classic. Last year, the Houston Press noted that this show is “Resa at her best, feistiest, and most profane,” noting her “astounding performance as all the characters.” Additional performances are scheduled for 7 p.m. Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, and December 22-23; 1:30 and 7 p.m. Saturdays; 1:30 p.m. Sundays; and 6:30 p.m. November 30 through December 28 (with no performance Christmas Day). Tickets can be purchased here for $45 to $93.
The post Best Bets: Thanksgiving Day Parade, <i>The Nutcracker</i> and Life is Shorts appeared first on Houston Press.
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