This week on Open Air, KALW’s radio magazine for the Bay Area Performing Arts in Times of Corona, we raise the virtual curtain of our Corona Radio Theater for the members of BATS Improv; host David Latulippe talks with members of the Friction Quartet about their new album, Rising; and Peter Robinson reviews books and movies, among others The Crown.
Returning for the second time to the virtual stage of Open Air’s Corona Radio Theater are the actors of BATS Improv, presenting RadioVenture - an original audio play in the style of the Golden Age of Radio, performed live and created spontaneously on the air.
Their performance will be an example of BATS Improv’s one-of-a-kind blend of theatre, comedy, and acting. Founded in 1986, BATS Improv is the most highly acclaimed and longest-running improvised theatre company and school in San Francisco and all of Northern California.
The BATS actors will be accompanied with music and sound effects by Joshua Raoul Brody.
We talk about Friction Quartet’s new album, Rising, with violinist Kevin Rogers. The album is the quartet’s musical love letter to the beautiful state they call home - California - and a call-to-action against the devastation resulting from climate change. The cd features three commissioned works, written by composers Gabriella Smith, Alex Van Gils, and Max Stoffregen, who take the listener on a sonic journey across the state.
Alex Van Gils’ A Sleeptalker Describes the Rising of the Seas starts the album at the coast with a work depicting a vision by the composer during a meditation, of San Francisco consumed by rising sea levels; Max Stoffregen’s four-movement piece California Crest is an exploration of California’s stretch of the Pacific Crest Trail, which spans 2,650-miles from New Mexico to Canada; and Inyo reflects Gabriella Smith’s impressions of the expansive wilderness of the Inyo National Forest.
Plus, Open Air’s regular contributor and critic at large, Peter Robinson, discusses the latest season of The Crown on Netflix, and the new movie The Last Vermeer; and he reviews the book Murder and the Movies by David Thomson.
Open Air with host David Latulippe; heard live on Thursday, December 3 at 1pm, and archived thereafter at this location. Listen now or anytime…