Krannert Center Launches Spring Performance Ticket Sales

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Krannert Center for the Performing Arts' spring season will feature cellist Yo-Yo Ma and pianist Kathryn Scott, jazz from Branford Marsalis, dance, theater, classical music, shows appealing to young people and an ELLNORA Reverb performance. Tickets for spring performances went on sale Nov. 15 online only.

In one of the highlights of the spring season, cellist Yo-Yo Ma and pianist Kathryn Stott will perform April 6, part of their final recital tour together. The longtime collaborators have released multiple albums, including "Songs of Comfort and Hope," which they created and recorded in 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Tickets for their performance sold out immediately, but KCPA has established a waiting list in case any tickets are returned.

Other highlights:

Grammy Award-winning saxophonist Branford Marsalis will perform with his quartet on Jan. 27.

The India Ink Theatre Co. tells the story of "Mrs. Krishnan's Party" with cooking and music on Jan. 18-20.

The Mark Morris Dance Group and Music Ensemble will perform Feb. 9-10 at its Midwest home.

A performance by Grammy-winning singer-songwriters Mary Chapin Carpenter and Shawn Colvin has been rescheduled from October to Jan. 25.

Tony Award winner John Cameron Mitchell and cabaret star Amber Martin bring cabaret to Krannert Center in "Cassette Roulette" on Feb. 17.

Bruce Hornsby will appear with the ensemble yMusic on March 7.

Joy Harjo, the U.S. Poet Laureate from 2019-2022 and a member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, will join Jenny Davis, the director of U. of I.'s American Indian Studies Program and a member of the Chickasaw Nation, for a CultureTalk on April 23.

Classical music performances during the spring include the third concert of a three-part series by Jupiter String Quartet, artists-in-residence with the School of Music. They'll perform Feb. 6 with pianist Soyeon Kate Lee - a Naxos recording artist and the first woman of Asian descent on the piano faculty at the Julliard School. The chamber orchestra Sinfonia da Camera will perform with violinist Lucia Lin on Feb. 17, and it will present "From Ukraine to the Great Gate of Kiev" with music from Ukrainian and Russian composers on March 23 as the finale of its 40th season. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra performs with Uzbek pianist Behzod Abduraimov on Feb. 22, and the Sofia Philharmonic Orchestra - the national orchestra of Bulgaria - will perform Mozart and Mendelssohn on March 2. Soprano and pianist Chelsea Guo, a Young Concert Artists winner, performs Feb. 25.

Krannert Center's 2023-24 season began with ELLNORA: The Guitar Festival, and the spring season includes two ELLNORA Reverb events. Kora virtuoso Ballaké Sissoko plays music in the Malian griot tradition on the West African stringed instrument. He'll perform with South African classical guitarist Derek Gripper on March 21, and Gripper will hold an Improvisers Exchange workshop on March 22. Both events are free.

Several spring shows hold special appeal for young people and will include school performances. Manual Cinema uses hundreds of illustrated paper puppets, furry monster puppets and other props in its February show "Leonardo! A Wonderful Show About a Terrible Monster," based on the Mo Willems book. In March, the Honolulu Theatre for Youth uses music, dance and stories to introduce audiences to Hawaiian traditions around the cultivation of pa'akai, or salt. In April, the Acrobuffs combine comedy, sculpture, circus and theater in "Air Play."

Krannert Center also will host spring productions of the U. of I.'s music, theatre and dance programs.