The 9:30 Club is raffling off 2 tickets to every one of its shows in 2012. All you have to do to enter is donate new or clean previously-loved clothes, a canned food item or make a monetary donation of $5 at the 9:30 Club and you'll be given a raffle ticket and get the chance to win a music ... [Read]

Alexandra Silber is Barbara Cook's latest performer in the Spotlight cabaret series, highlighting those singers Cook considers among Broadway’s best today. Silber, with her sweet soprano voice, has performed alongside Tyne Daly in Kennedy Center’s recent staging of Terrence McNally's Master Class, and has also performed in Carousel and Fiddler on the Roof on London's West End. Friday, Dec. 2, ... [Read]

On World AIDS Day, Thursday, Dec. 1, the DC Center HIV Working Group and Us Helping Us will present a reading of The Infection Monologues, an original comedy about the personal stories of five HIV-positive men and written by Eric Rofes and Alex Garner. The play features a cast including Justin B. Terry-Smith, Patrick Zornow, Michael Sainte-Andress, Henry Maticorena and ... [Read]

Two area Kimpton properties offer events benefiting local AIDS organizations this Wednesday, Nov. 30, on the eve of World AIDS Day. The Urbana Restaurant at the Hotel Palomar hosts Kimpton's Red Hot Night in the Nation's Capital, a cocktail party benefiting Whitman-Walker Health. Complimentary hors d'oeuvres and special cocktails will be available, as will an auction including a weekend getaway ... [Read]

Jane Austen’s world of desperate spinsters, determined bachelors, nosy neighbors, embarrassing relatives and a smarmy cad or two is brought to life in this adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, written by Joseph Hanreddy and J. R. Sullivan and directed by Blake Robison. The cast includes Kate Cook, Michael Brusasco and Rick Foucheux. Opens Wednesday, Nov. 23, at 7:30 p.m. To ... [Read]

Shirlington’s Signature Theatre offers yet another world premiere musical this season -- A Second Chance, with book, music and lyrics by Ted Shen (director of Signature’s Giant). Shen’s intimate musical is about finding love when you're least looking for it. Isn’t that always the case? It stars real-life couple Brian and Diane Sutherland. To Dec. 11. Signature Theatre, 4200 Campbell ... [Read]

The music of Cole Porter and Hoagy Carmichael kicks off this year's three-part series on American pop and jazz standards at Wolf Trap, ably led since 1988 by local jazz veteran and pianist John Eaton. "Indiana On Our Mind" is the name of the program, signifying that both composers were Hoosiers, and referencing Carmichael's composition "Georgia On My Mind." "Night ... [Read]

Ford's Theatre remounts its music-filled production of the Dickens classic, A Christmas Carol, adapted by Michael Wilson and directed by Michael Baron. Edward Gero returns as Ebenezer Scrooge, and the production features imaginative special effects, familiar carols and themes of giving back and living with grace. To Dec. 31. Ford's Theatre, 511 10th St. NW. Tickets are $41 to $65. ... [Read]

Patrons interested in this weekend's They Might Be Giants concert at the 9:30 Club are informed by the club that they "must be 14+." For the past seven years or so, you see, the group led by John Linnell and John Flansburgh, which gained popularity in the alt-rock world of the late '80s and early '90s, have gained new fame ... [Read]

The cast of Jersey Boys performs a one-night-only concert at the DC Improv called "Rock Like A Man 50's-60's Edition," a benefit for the national Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS and the local Food & Friends. The music will cover more than just the many hits of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons -- Jersey Boys's focus -- to include hits ... [Read]

Before The Book of Mormon, before South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut, actually before even South Park, Trey Parker created the Broadway-spoofing Cannibal! The Musical while in college in 1992. What's it about? Well, it's a black comedy loosely based on the story of convicted cannibal Alfred Packer, who reveals all to news reporter Polly Pry while awaiting execution. Yes, even ... [Read]

Is LMFAO a fad? Well, if the dance-rap crew that goes by the Internet acronym doesn’t prove to have staying power, it’s at least taking full advantage of the moment, with sky-high popularity of its carnival-like, over-the-top antics. In concert, LMFAO comes across like the Black Eyed Peas on speed -- and not just because the group offers an even ... [Read]

In the title role in Othello at Folger Theatre, gorgeous Owiso Odero -- all rippling robes and rippling abs -- carries himself like a man more at home on the catwalk than on the battlefield. This raises the possibility that villainous Iago doesn't hate Othello because he's black, or because of his superior military rank. Maybe he just hates him ... [Read]

Founded by a violinist and a harpist, both associated with the Boston POPS Esplanade Orchestra, the Ibis Chamber Music Society includes members from various local orchestras, including the Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra and the National Symphony. They will perform string quartets by Barber and Tchaikovsky on Tuesday, Nov. 22, at 7 p.m. IOTA Club and Cafe, 2832 Wilson Blvd., ... [Read]

German playwright Roland Schimmelpfennig uses the 80 minutes of The Golden Dragon to reflect on globalization and remind us that there are human beings who are invisible and exploited in today's blurred-boundary world. The playwright has concocted an engagingly intricate theatrical exercise with which to convey his points, however broad and obvious they may be. Five actors (Amir Darvish, Joseph ... [Read]

Xavier Durringer's documentary The Conquest chronicles the rise of right-leaning Nicolas Sarkozy as President of France, whose wife left him for another man the very day he won election. In French with English subtitles. Now playing in Washington, D.C. at the West End Cinema, 2301 M St. NW. Call 202-419-FILM or visit westendcinema.com. Vote for the 2011 Coverboy of the ... [Read]

The radical theater company Dog & Pony DC, responsible for the popular Fringe Festival twisted vaudeville show Bare Breasted Women Sword Fighting, now offers a twist on traditional theater by engaging the audience as participants. Specifically, Beertown transports the audience to a small American town on the day of its "20th Quinquennial Time Capsule Ceremony," as citizens -- both audience ... [Read]

The gay-owned Vitruvian Gallery, located near Eastern Market and focused on male figurative art, offers its first official exhibit with over 20 male figurative paintings by local artist Rob Vander Zee. The exhibit closes tonight, Saturday, Nov. 19, at 7:30 p.m. with a concert by local electronic composer Elliott Grabill. Vitruvian Gallery, 734 7th St. SE. Call 202-241-2563 or visit ... [Read]

Virginia's Alden Theatre presents one performance of The Man Who Planted Trees from the Puppet State Theatre Company of Scotland. Based on Jean Giono's classic novel, this child-friendly, multi-sensory play blends comedy and puppetry to tell the ecologically minded story of a brave man who sets out with his dog to plant a forest and transform a barren wasteland. One ... [Read]

"Deck the halls with lots of showtunes," goes the opening number of Kathy Feininger's A Broadway Christmas Carol. And that, the show, now in its second year at Alexandria's MetroStage, does. By the end of it, the halls are overstuffed with parodies of popular showtune snippets -- 40 or so in all. They're presented in a hurried, altered, name-that-tune kind-of-way, ... [Read]

Pure musical yum. The New Yorker calls the energetic Catie Curtis, part of Massachusetts' thriving lesbian folk scene, a "folk-rock goddess." She puts on a lovely show, and her loyal local fan base is legion. Fellow acoustic songwriter Meg Hutchinson, compared to Mary Chapin Carpenter and Joni Mitchell, opens. Friday, Nov. 18, at 8 p.m. The Barns at Wolf Trap, ... [Read]

Trance is still kicking, even if it has gone totally corporate. Dutch producer Armin Van Buuren is the keeper of the flame and glowsticks, and LiveNation is a co-sponsor for his show this Saturday, Nov. 19, when he'll occupy the DC Armory along with Pleasurekraft and Robert Gonzalez. For years ranked the world's most popular DJ -- surpassing his compatriot ... [Read]

Arena Stage will launch the national tour of the 2011 Tony Award-winning production of Larry Kramer's The Normal Heart, to coincide with AIDS 2012, the international AIDS conference. The show is replacing Like Water for Chocolate, which will be postponed. "The creative process for a new musical and the economic climate can sometimes be nearly impossible to predict," said Artistic ... [Read]

Lady Gaga just released a clip of her performance of "You and I," from Lady Gaga Presents The Monster Ball Tour at Madison Square Garden. The BluRay and DVD of the HBO Special will be released on Nov. 21. Follow @metroweekly ... [Read]

Congratulations to our hometown's iconic 9:30 Club, which won the Top Club honor at the 2011 Billboard Touring Awards. The award is attendance-based, so clearly it's a favored destination in our city. Full details follow: WASHINGTON, D.C. Nov. 11 -- The 2011 Billboard Touring Awards have just been handed out in New York, and the coveted Top Club prize went ... [Read]

WSC Avant Bard -- the new, edgier, fitting name for the old Washington Shakespeare Company -- presents a one-evening adaptation of Shakespeare's history plays Henry IV, Parts One and Two, under the rubric The Mistorical Hystery of Henry (I)V. The plays gave to the world the enduringly popular character Sir John Falstaff. Tom Mallan adapts and directs the works. To ... [Read]

Two years after its debut, the Washington Ballet revives The Great Gatsby, set in the roaring '20s and based on the F. Scott Fitzgerald novel, choreographed by its own artistic director Septime Webre. Webre told Metro Weekly in last week's cover story that the second-go-round "everything is much more refined and clear. What I was seeking was to embody the ... [Read]

"The Privileged Series" features Anthony Dortch's mixed media images in which he paints directly on top of photos to change the skin tones of people portrayed depending on if they're upper class (yellow) or lower (blue), which he tells Metro Weekly "gives this comic book kind of surreal look to it, or graphic novel feel." Dortch drew inspiration from other ... [Read]

Director Allison Arkell Stockman instructs her Constellation Theater cast to accentuate the satire by acting in exaggerated fashion in its production of George Bernard Shaw's Arms and the Man. The targets here are chiefly war and romance, two things that 117 years later are still overly glorified and swooned over. Class comes in for a drubbing, too. Once again Constellation ... [Read]

The E Street Cinema continues its first-ever "Capital Classics" series this weekend with two very different films. There's what many consider to be the greatest Hollywood musical -- and certainly the form's trendsetter -- 1952's Singin' In The Rain starring Gene Kelly and Debbie Reynolds. The other screening is Giorgio Moroder Presents Metropolis, the electronica pioneer's 1984 alterations to Fritz ... [Read]

One of the world's most beloved ballerinas, having danced with the Kirov Theatre, the Royal Danish Ballet, the London Royal Ballet and the New York City Ballet, to name a few, Nina Ananiashvili stops at Lisner Auditorium to perform choreography by Alexei Ratmansky of the Bolshoi Ballet and the American Ballet Theatre. Ananiashvili performs with principal dancers from the State ... [Read]

Daniel Spalding leads an orchestra consisting of students aspiring to become classical professionals, along with guest artist pianist Jeffrey Jacob in an "Orchestral Brilliance" program including Brahms and a world premiere of Jacob's own Wanderer Fantasy for Piano and Large Orchestra (Symphony No. 4). The American Youth Philharmonic OrchestraSunday, Nov. 6, at 3 p.m. Rachel M. Schlesinger Concert Hall and ... [Read]

Why would the Shakespeare Theatre Company offer a musical concert version of the Rodgers and Hart musical The Boys From Syracuse? Because it's based on a Shakespeare play, naturally -- specifically The Comedy of Errors. The story revolves around identical brothers separated in a shipwreck as children but who wind up in the same town as adults, confusing the people ... [Read]

The British chanteuse V V Brown -- like a poppier Estelle -- returns to DC9 a year and a half after touring in support of her exuberant debut Traveling Like The Light and the catchy hit "Shark In The Water," a fiery R&B number about a relationship in peril. (She also opened for Maroon 5 and Owl City since her ... [Read]