Plenty of orchestras can deliver fine performances, but too few take an intelligent, purposeful approach to programming. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra, for example, is notoriously lackadaisical in this department, often slapping unrelated pieces together at the whim of a conductor. Concertante di Chicago, on the other hand, prides itself on grouping works that shed light on a certain style, period, or trend. Its willingness to inform, rather than merely entertain, has garnered this first-rate conductorless chamber ensemble an appreciative following....

As rousing as our homegrown African-American troupes often are, I’ve noticed a difference between them and African groups, who dance and play their music in a way that’s at once smaller and more intense, as if the performers had imploded and concentrated and complicated their energy. When the youth division of the Ghana Dance Ensemble took the stage at the Art Institute for a DanceAfrica preview performance last Sunday, after it was announced they’d been traveling for three days to get here from Accra, I think everyone expected something less than top-of-the-tach intensity–and was astounded by their ferocity in a war dance, their vaudevillian high spirits in an all-male belly dance (men in skirts imitating women), their playfulness in a flirtation dance, their aggressive charm in an audience-participation dance....

Using text, music, still images, and acted scenes as well as movement, David Rousseve creates dance theater that shows a lot of savvy about what’s dramatic and what’s not: he knows that a whisper can be more riveting than a shout, that humor will carry an audience further than haranguing, that words offer music as well as meaning. Working with pop songs, both contemporary and classic, he transforms them with choreography in a modern-dance idiom or in pop styles inflected by modern dance....

ANTIGONE It’s a far cry from the cathartic, elevated cadences of Greek tragedy. Writing for the Athenians of 442 BC, Sophocles set up Antigone and Creon as clear-cut representatives of right and wrong thinking. Antigone insists on burying Polynices, a noble youth who died battling his treacherous brother; but Creon decrees that Polynices’ corpse must lie exposed as a warning to would-be rebels. Though Antigone’s defiance brings her to her death, she obeys the laws of god and family–which, Sophocles says, far outweigh the rules of earthly government....

FOUR CLOWNS & A BENCH It’s difficult to know where to place Ian Pierce in the current crop of young playwrights. Too linguistically playful to be classified with straightforward storytellers but putting function ahead of form too often to be counted with the word jugglers, Pierce seems to enjoy playing with both elements, forcing his audience to choose their own focus. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Four Clowns & a Bench, Pierce’s latest offering, is set in a secluded corner of a public park....

When Stephen Szoradi was in college at Bennington he heard that a drawing class was taking a field trip to a nearby quarry. Attracted by the prospect of seeing a large explosion, he tagged along, only to find himself fascinated by the whole scene. “I’d never seen raw materials before, growing up in D.C.” He returned with his camera and began photographing the quarry, but found he wanted more. “It seemed like a natural progression to go from photographing the plant itself to get the whole picture,” and soon he was photographing and interviewing workers....

LET THE DOLLY DO THE WORK You sip your San Pellegrino and try to maintain a neutral expression. “And what do these movers do?” “Floor to ceiling.” Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Thankfully O’Reilly has never had to pitch his inexplicable Let the Dolly Do the Work to anyone except his colleagues at Curious Theatre Branch. Yet he’s taken this seemingly insipid premise and constructed an adventure of giddy theatrical heights....

Perhaps the most famous and beloved operetta of all time, Johann Strauss’s Die Fledermaus is quintessential Viennese schmaltz disguised as a lighthearted cautionary tale against overindulgence. Its narrative is convoluted, as marital infidelities, friendly rivalries, and assorted past grievances are aired at a masked ball on New Year’s Eve. And of course on the morning after all is blamed on the wickedness of champagne. As much as it pretends to be Mozartean, Fledermaus doesn’t have the emotional heft and melodious gift of the originals nor does it have the charm and world-weariness of Richard Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier....

Peace Patroller Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Paradoxically, the Star bus was in its element, Figueroa notes with no little pride. “We’re trained for a quick reaction.” While some kept an eye on the driver, who was crushed behind the wheel, Figueroa and others helped injured passengers off the bus. Outside, as help began arriving, he worked on a chain to get the luggage and bags off, then helped fire fighters lay down absorbent mats for the leaking fuel and antifreeze....

Founded as a component of the Bucktown Arts Fest but now independent of that event, this annual summer showcase of fringe theater, performance, and music has relocated farher north over the past few years. This edition, which runs through September 23, is housed at the Lunar Cabaret and Full Moon Cafe 2827 N. Lincoln, and the Famous Door Theatre Company, Jane Addams Center Hull House, 3212 N. Broadway. Directed this year by Beau O’Reilly, the event takes it’s name from surrealist painter Salvador Dali’s use of the term “rhinocerontic” (it means real big); more than 20 companies and individual artists are featured, among them Famous Door, the Curious Theatre Branch, Retro Theatre, Theater Oobleck, Betty’s Mouth, Ler Noot Fiesta, Studio 108, David Hauptschein, Terri Kapsalis , Frank Melcori, Julie Laffin , David Kodeski, Warren Leming’s Cold Chicago Dance Theater, and Cleveland’s New World Performance Laboratory....

I’m not sure who first used the term “No Depression”–the title of Uncle Tupelo’s debut album–to describe country-friendly rock bands like the Jayhawks, Bottle Rockets, and Wilco, but it’s a pretty silly notion. Rock bands have incorporated the sounds of country music for as long as rock’s been played, if not longer; country mothered rock. So what’s the big fuggin’ deal? Wilco, the quintet led by former Uncle Tupelo coconspirator Jeff Tweedy, don’t make a fuss about their infectious twang quotient, just as most folks don’t point out that they keep their hair trimmed to a certain length; it’s just a given....

Veteran saxophonist A.C. Reed is something of an anomaly among contemporary blues hornmen: his style seems to owe more to the raucous guitar sound of early-60s Chicago guitarists like Buddy Guy than to the roadhouse honkers who usually provide the inspiration for blues horn blowers. His repertoire consists primarily of straight-ahead Chicago-style burners interspersed with the occasional soul or R & B classic (“Knock on Wood”). Reed’s most unique quality, though, is his way with lyrics: sometimes bitingly topical (“Hard Times,” “Moving out of the Ghetto”), other times oddly self-deprecating and even self-defeating (“I’m in the Wrong Business”), his songs walk a thin line between righteous outrage and whiny self-pity....

Henry Rollins, Exene Onstage Henry Rollins looks too perfect, as if he’s been digitally enhanced by some west-coast art director: dimpled chin, high cheekbones, intense eyes, major eyebrows, angular haircut, muscular neck. And his body–shirt stretched tight across his broad shoulders and pronounced pectorals–glides with the eerie fluidity of a computer-generated character. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Last Sunday night at the Vic, Rollins performed a single 80-minute piece and never seemed to come up for air....

BLACK SNOW From James Joyce’s Stephen Dedalus to the Who’s Tommy, the frustrated artist incarnates the corruption of genius by power. Bulgakov (author of The Master and Margarita and Heart of a Dog) knew this scenario well; the state virtually silenced him following the 1926 failure of Days of the Turbins, a play that seemed to sympathize with the despised White faction in the postrevolutionary civil war. But Bulgakov also worked to silence himself, burning his own manuscripts and demanding permission from Stalin to leave the country....

“Bob Greene is on assignment.” Yes, a string ensemble. I knew we’d be in for a treat once Bob finally let go his white-knuckle grip on Richard and ventured back into the world, like a frightened rabbit poking its head outside its hole after a storm. But nothing prepared me for the insipidness of Bob’s first post-Richard column, “It’s the best thing I can do” (June 26). Best of Chicago voting is live now....

“Geologically, the strata bearing our civilization will be found with a Geiger counter,” reflects Chicago Green Party activist Bob Rudner in Green Politics (Summer). “In 24,065 years A.C. (After Chernobyl), when half of the Pu-239 [plutonium] decays, archaeologists (if there are any) will also see other markings of our industrial civilization.” Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » That rock that just came through my window was a resentment rock, not a racist rock–so it’s OK, right?...

The fate of pure funk in the postfusion era has been rather gruesome. Jazz-funk figureheads like drummer Billy Cobham and bassist Jaco Pastorius gave the verb “to funk” new meaning: their pyrotechnic excesses called forth a solipsistic cult of speed, flash, and technique for technique’s sake. But at one time funk was a minimalist art. Rhythms introduced by James Brown weren’t show-offy, but kept the joint moving by setting up expected rhythmic emphases and then leaving something out....

By Jerry Sullivan My bespectacled eyes were all I needed to name the bird at those distances. The breeding plumage of the western tanager features a black tail, black wings decorated with yellow bars, a bright yellow body, and a head of bright cherry red. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » This bird was big news for me. Western tanagers nest in the coniferous forests of western mountains....

By Jerry Sullivan So my list had a schizoid quality. It combined a number of species from the endangered and threatened list with species that are common as dirt. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » When I wrote the list there was little opportunity for testing its accuracy. “Yes! We have no savannas” could have been our state song. But lately ecological-restoration projects have been helping the native landscape make a comeback....

Kissing Off the Sun-Times Last Friday was TV critic Ginny Holbert’s final day. She left with nothing in sight but the opportunity to spend more time with her kids. A week earlier former day city editor Dick Mitchell, who’d been laying out the Sunday news pages, AutoTimes, and Medlife, took a buyout and called it quits. He’d wanted to add his black, male voice to the editorial board; management wasn’t interested....