Culture worthy of your calendar

Gorey or not-so-Gorey … that is the question

As Halloween accompaniment to the hauntingly spooky Edward Gorey exhibit currently hanging at the Orlando Museum of Art (OMA), the Museum is offering storytelling for adults and families. On Sunday, Oct. 24 at 1:30 p.m., “Not-so-Gorey Stories with Bill Cordell” will be presented for children of all ages with slightly frightful stories. The half-hour program is free with admission. But then things get a lot spookier at 2:30 p.m. when ”Gripping, Gruesome & Gorey Stories” presents spine-tingling tales from Edward Gorey’s own work. The 2:30 program is not for the faint of heart or young children! The OMA is located in Orlando Loch Haven Park at 2416 N. Mills Ave. Parking is free. Call 407-896-4231 or visit omart.org

Back to the future with Wolfgang Amadeus

The Orlando Philharmonic keeps topping itself with their quality performances and inventive programming ideas. For serious Mozart-lovers (which is pretty much all of us), the Philharmonic begins its Focus Series by taking us back to the time of Mozart for an evening of the composer’s music. Titled “Time Machine: Mozart in Prague 1787”, the program promises Maestro Christopher Wilkins leading the orchestra in a concert program just as Mozart would have in 1787. Excerpts from ”The Abduction from the Seraglio”; “The Marriage of Figaro”; ”Don Giovanni”; and “Symphony No. 38” (The Prague) will be performed. Soprano Susana Diaz, who thrilled Philharmonic audiences in “Carmen”, will perform several arias. The concert takes place on Monday, Oct. 25 at 7 p.m. in the Lowndes Shakespeare Center, 812 E. Rollins Street (Loch Haven Park). Visit OrlandoPhil.org or call 407-770-0071.

Celery Soup — all over the stage

The long-awaited Sanford community performance “Celery Soup” will debut on Thursday, Oct. 21 at the Princess Theater in Sanford. This historic opening night brings together the purest form of community creativity with the “Soup’s” unique ingredients, including a script drawn from first-hand stories of residents, a score of original music, a cast of 70 volunteer actors drawn from the community and the rebirth of a historic theatre — all under the direction of professional theater consultants. ”This has been four years in the making,” says Trish Thompson, president of Creative Sanford, the nonprofit producers. The script, called “Touch and Go”, celebrates the resilience early residents had in the face of repeated adversity. The play includes workers on the mule train, Uncle Dieter’s Rooster, a downtown fire, the Knot Hole Gang, Willie Saunders and even the Lion from the Zoo. Over time, the orange groves froze, the celery crop went south, the naval base left and yet Sanford found the strength to go on. This original play runs from Oct. 21 to Nov. 13 at The Princess Theater in downtown Sanford. Purchase tickets by calling 407-314-6750 or visit www.celerysoupsanford.com

Artists have their day

While we don’t always appreciate the fact, pretty much everything we use in our daily lives has an artistic design at its root. Since pre-recorded time, art has been the single most important defining characterization of a culture, surviving dynasties, tyrants and civilizations. Artists are pioneers — they are conduits to and from our culture and humanity. Now, a day has been chosen to honor artists worldwide, and the day is Monday, Oct. 25 (which also happens to be Picasso’s birthday). This iconic artist was instrumental in bringing art to the “public eye” more than any other artist up to that time. As we are globalized by TV and the Internet, our common humanity needs to be accessed and inspired by the arts. On this one day, let us consider what is timeless in our civilization. Oct. 25 gives each of us a reason to visit a museum or gallery, attend an art show, take an artist to lunch or visit his/her studio, and here in Florida, we can go online to museumoffloridaart.com and bid on original art that has been donated by Florida artists to assure that Florida’s own art museum will go on with its programming. Hail art!