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Weekend spotlight: Country Thunder lands in Clearwater
The Catalyst’s every-Thursday guide to Tampa Bay entertainment and the arts.
Kane Brown, Gavin Adcock, Zach Top and Shaboozey are the headline acts at the Country Thunder country music festival, Friday through Sunday at Coachman Park in Clearwater.
Other performers include Gretchen Wilson, Randy Houser, Max McNown and well over a dozen more, on two stages.
This, of course, is the event moved, at the 11th hour, from St. Pete Beach over concerns about potential impacts to the environment.
Country Thunder info and tickets are at this link.
Symphonic sweets
Chelsea Gallo conducts The Florida Orchestra for Sunday’s Free Pops in the Park which, you guessed it, does not require a ticket or admission fee. The 7:30 p.m. concert takes place at Julian B. Lane Riverfront Park, Tampa – across the Hillsborough River from the Straz Center (here’s a map). Bring a blanket and a picnic (no glass please). Happy Mother’s Day from TFO.
Fate and Fantasies is the new program from conductor Mark Sforzini and the Tampa Bay Symphony. Concerts are Friday (8 p.m.) at New Tampa Performing Arts Center, and Sunday (2:30 p.m.) at the Palladium Theater’s Hough Hall (the big room).
Live theater, music and lots of close-up magic are part of the package wih Great Britain’s “The Magician’s Table,” through May 31 in the Straz Center’s Jaeb Theatre. Photos provided.
On theater stages
Actor Matthew McGee has a Mother’s Day cabaret at 2 p.m. Sunday at freeFall Theatre, pre-empting the Sunday show of And Then They Came For Me: Remembering the World of Anne Frank, which otherwise continues through May 17.
McGee and his mother, actress and singer Debbie McLeod, call their show Mama, I’m Coming Home. It’s to be an afternoon of showtunes and stories, “reminiscing and laughing about 50 years of unforgettable memories.” Find all freeFall tickets here.
Jobsite Theater is opening its new production, John Patrick Shanley’s Danny and the Deep Blue Sea, Friday in the Straz Center’s Shimberg Playhouse (there’s a preview performance tonight). Summer Bohnenkamp directs Georgia Mallory Guy and Alex Teicheira as troubled Roberta and troubled Danny, in a one-act drama Variety calls “A dark and dirty riposte to meet-cute Hollywood romances about lovable losers finding each other.”
Find showtimes and tickets at this link.
Actor, writer, rapper (and middle school history teacher) Lance Markeith Felton – he starred as Malcolm X in the recent Stageworks production of the play The Meeting – will debut songs from his new album Emancipation Friday (7-10:30 p.m.) at the Fringe Theatre, Ybor City (1624 East 7th Ave., Suite 211). It’s part of the Get Free Open Mic Night.
Felton, accompanied by the band Maturity, will intersperse the music with monologues.
His next stage project is American Stage’s The Hot Wing King (opening June 3).
Soccer superstar
Legendary soccer player Clyde Best, whose career spans many successful years in England, as well as an especially prolific few years with the Tampa Bay Rowdies in the 1970s, will be at the Palladium Theater Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Best will speak and answer questions following a nightly screening of the documentary Transforming the Beautiful Game: The Clyde Best Story. Read more, and find tickets, at this link.
Art openings
Dali in America opens Friday at the Dali Museum, on the heels of the May 2 opening of The Architecture of the Dali. The former traces the artist’s transformative relationship with the United States, while the latter explores the groundbreaking art museum’s past, present and future here in St. Petersburg.
To discuss them both, Curator Peter Tush guests on Friday’s edition of our Arts Alive! podcast.
The National Geographic exhibit Wolves: Photography by Ronan Donovan opens Saturday at the James Museum of Western & Wildlife Art. Read about it, and view some of the stunning images, at this link.
Twenty-eight artists provided works for REALM, opening Friday in the FloridaRAMA Gallery. The exhibition, curated by Chad Mize, opens with a reception, 7-9 p.m.
David Lucas is part of the Killers of Kill Tony comedy show Saturday at the Mahaffey Theater. Photo: Facebook.
Comedy
Heroes Off Duty (comedy from first responders – police, firefighters, doctors, nurses, EMTs, pharmacists and military veterans) is at the Capitol Theatre Friday at 7:30 p.m. Find tickets here.
Podcast comedians collectively known as Killers of Kill Tony have two shows (7 and 9:30 p.m.) Saturday at the Mahaffey Theater. Find tickets here.
Concerts
Rapper Kid Cudi touches down Friday at Benchmark Arena. The artist, real name Scott Mescudi, fired opening act M.I.A. from his tour Monday, after she made incendiary comments about illegal aliens during the May 2 show in Houston. She was roundly booed from the audience. “After the last couple of shows, I’ve been flooded with messages from fans that were upset by her rants,” Kid Cudi wrote on social media. “This, to me, is very disappointing and I won’t have someone on my tour making offensive remarks that upsets my fanbase.”
Big Boi and A-Trak remain on the bill for Friday’s 6:30 concert; tickets are here.
Cuban singer, writer, actor and producer Leoni Torres performs Sunday in Morsani Hall, at Tampa’s Straz Center. Tickets for the Mother’s Day show, at 7:30 p.m., can be found here.
Metal at Jannus Live Sunday, 6 p.m., from Exodus and Biohazard. Tickets are at this link.
Coming up next
May 11 Kings Kaleidoscope at the Palladium Theater
May 12 Tampa Bay Symphony: Fate and Fantasies at Straz Center Ferguson Hall
May 12-15 Six (Broadway tour) at Straz Center Ferguson Hall
May 13 Bush at the BayCare Sound
May 13 Cellist Luka Sulic at the Mahaffey Theater
May 14-21 Dead Canary Productions’ HIR at The Studio@620
May 14 Classic Albums Live Creedence Clearwater Revival “Chronicle” at the Capitol Theatre
May 14 Sit Down for Stand Up (comedy) at the Palladium Side Door Cabaret
May 15 Foghat & Nazareth at Ferg’s
May 15 Ruslan KD (Christian podcaster) at the Capitol Theatre
May 15-17 Dream Child: The Trial of Alice in Wonderland at Powerstories Studio
May 15 Journey at Benchmark Arena
May 16 Jason Mraz at Ruth Eckerd Hall
May 16 Pitbull at the Mid-Florida Credit Union Amphitheatre
May 16 Our House: The Music of CSNY at the Capitol Theatre
May 16-18 I, Banquo at Straz Center Shimberg Playhouse
May 17 Willie Nelson at the BayCare Sound
May 20 Bill Wharton The Sauce Boss at the Palladium Side Door Cabaret
May 21 Sam Barber at the BayCare Sound
May 21 Josh Gates at Ruth Eckerd Hall
May 21 Forever Young/Bob Dylan Birthday Bash with Have Gun Will Travel, Grant Peeples, The Currys, Bad Dog Mama at the Palladium Theater
See the full list of announced May events here.
Your Weekend Spotlight appears every Thursday in the Catalyst’s CREATE section.
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