Getting Local With Jane: Performance Edition
Here’s the latest listing of upcoming events of interest to Jane Austen fans. One of them might just be in your neighborhood! (And we love post-event reports!)
July 18, 2008, Pasadena, California: Laurie Viera Rigler will give a reading from her book, Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict, at Vroman’s Bookstore at 7 p.m.
August 8 and 11, 2008, Edinburgh: “An Evening at Pemberley“: As part of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, soprano Patrice Boyd will sing music from Jane Austen’s time period.
The music features classical selections from Mozart, Handel, Haydn, Purcell, Bishop and other composers of the era. To complete the historical mood, Miss Boyd will perform in period dress in the handsome Georgian oval of St. Andrew’s and St. George’s Church, one of Edinburgh’s premier classical music venues.
Gentle Readers not in the environs of Edinburgh might want to scroll down to the bottom of the page, which has a list of upcoming concerts in North America.
Note: Getting Local With Jane will be published on Thursday from now on. All part of our ongoing improvement efforts here at AustenBlog World Headquarters.
July 17th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
I am right in the middle of Edinburgh, and when the Fringe Box Office gets its act together and sends out tickets - they made the mistake of installing a lovely new computer system in June and it seems to have seized up on them - will be going to the concert. If my tickets aren’t there when I get back from Chawton I am going to go up to the High Street where they hang out and scream at them very loudly - of course there will be a queue of people wanting to do the same thing.
July 24th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
Dear Kathleen G,
I’m the producer of An Evening at Pemberley: The Music of Jane Austen’s Heroines. First, thank you for posting a comment about our upcoming Edinburgh performances. The Fringe Box office ticketing problem has certainly created a mess — we too are waiting for better information about how tickets will be distributed. Finding your post here has absolutely has made our day! I hope you will say “hello” to us after the performance so we can thank you in person.
If you, or anyone, has problems with your tickets to An Evening at Pemberley, please contact me directly through the Contact producer page on our website, where my email address is posted.
I do have an update for those who have not yet bought tickets. As you must know, St. Andrew’s & St. George’s church is not only an authentic Georgian-era venue, but it is also one of the Festival’s more gentle places. They have told us that their own box office for Festival performances held there will open on August 4th. They will be able to take orders by telephone then too.
I have put aside some tickets for sale there instead of through edfringe. Again, more information about this is on our website, for those who are in need of the address, phone number, etc. or who want to spread the word to interested friends. Two streaming music samples are there also, which even those unable to attend the Edinburgh performances are welcome to enjoy.
Initial interest in Edinburgh for “An Evening at Pemberley: The Music of Jane Austen’s Heroines” appeared to be very strong from our advance sales. But as the enormous scope of the ticketing system’s troubles has become apparent, we have consequently learned that the ticket reports sent to us by the Fringe Office may not have been reliable. We have had no updated information, so we are hoping for the best and trust that more tickets are still being bought, unknown to us, on edfringe, which is otherwise functioning as usual. However, as far as we know, telephone ordering and in-person ticketing at the Fringe office have not yet been restored. So, from a producer’s side of things, we too are unexpectedly operating almost entirely in the dark.
But we’ll be there and it will be a splendid performance, whether our audience numbers 3 or 300.
Many thanks to Austenblog.com’s kind moderator for posting this information.
– Tarpley Mott
July 27th, 2008 at 12:27 pm
Anything with an Austen connection on the Fringe tends to be a sell-out, Tarpley, so the information given on advance sales was probably right enough. And they are finally issuing tickets - I got mine on Thursday, which as it was precisely one week before the preview performance of a new musical which I am attending on the 31st was cutting it rather fine. St Andrew’s and St George’s is indeed one of the most most beautiful Fringe venues - the only one to rival it is the Assembly Rooms, also Georgian, on the same street and a popular venue for concerts all year round. It’s an Adam building and has an unusual circular nave, so that the Devil can’t hide in corners. (Allegations that it’s to stop the congregation hiding in corners at collection time are a baseless calumny). And the acoustics are very good. See you there - I will be (probably) the only person present carrying a Discover Emma in Vancouver tote bag. I’ll be writing up the performance for the Scottish Branch of the Jane Austen Society, too.