TEXAS PERFORMING ARTS ANNOUNCES TEXAS MIXTAPE – A CURATED CONCERT SERIES BY GRAHAM REYNOLDS LIVE UNDER THE TEXAS BIG TOP ON BASS CONCERT HALL PLAZA WITH HEALTH AND SAFETY MEASURES
November 20
The Brannen Temple ElecTriO with Bobby Sparks and James Robinson
December 4
Gina Chavez & Special Guests
December 11
Josh Baca (Los Texmaniacs), Orión García (Peligrosa), Andre Hayward (Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra), and
Beto Martinez (Grupo Fantasma/Brownout/Money Chicha)
TICKETS ON SALE FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 13 AT 10 AM CST
Austin, TX (November 11, 2020) – Texas Performing Arts announced today Texas Mixtape, a curated series by Austin’s own composer and bandleader Graham Reynolds. The concert series features unusual combinations of Austin artists who are inspiring Reynolds right now. As Texas Performing Arts’ first in-person public performances since March 2020, Texas Mixtape will be hosted under the Texas Big Top – a new covered outdoor performance space on the Bass Concert Hall Plaza created for live performances with extensive health and safety measures, including strictly limited capacity and socially distanced seating pods. Tickets go on sale Friday, November 13 at 10 am CST.
“The ongoing, severe disruption of live performance demands that we create new possibilities,” said Bob Bursey, Executive Director of Texas Performing Arts. “For TPA, that means presenting in a new outdoor venue and bringing other viewpoints into our programming. With this series, we’re continuing our focus on supporting Austin artists during the pandemic and creating an opportunity to experience live music with careful attention to health and safety.”
TEXAS MIXTAPE
A Curated Series by Graham Reynolds
“In the spirit of this new Texas Big Top venue, experimenting and discovering its role in this pandemic era of the Austin music scene, I’ve asked the players to stretch themselves, playing with musicians they’re either just getting to know or perhaps have never played with before” stated Reynolds. “Mixtapes are my roots. They’re the way I love to listen, bouncing from one style to another, creating meaning through new contexts. Growing up, they were a way to share a part of yourself with others. This series is a mix of several of my favorite musicians in Austin and around Texas, many of whom I’ve been lucky enough to work with, artists who inspire and excite me” Reynolds added.
November 20, 2020 at 7 pm
Featuring Brannen Temple ElecTriO with Bobby Sparks and James Robinson
“Brannen is my favorite kind of artist: one who has a deep sense of craft mixed with a spirit of curiosity and exploration. This new trio is at the beginning of their music making together, allowing the listener to hear their first ideas and musical conversations.”
December 4, 2020 at 7 pm
Featuring Gina Chavez and Special Guest
“I’ve admired Gina’s work from a distance for a long time. Her recordings are all compelling but this year she took another leap forward, releasing “La Que Manda”, my favorite album to come out of Austin this year and a Latin Grammy Album of the Year Nominee.”
December 11, 2020 at 7 pm
Featuring Josh Baca, Orión García, Andre Hayward, and Beto Martinez
“Four fantastic players that have never been on a stage together. This series throws them into the fire to hear what magic they can make together. Taking risks is at the heart of making great art, and that is what we, as an audience, will be doing with the musicians on stage.”
The Texas Big Top venue has been hosting University events since September and is now ready to welcome the general public for live, in-person performances. Capacity for Texas Mixtape is strictly limited. Tickets will be sold in “pods” of 2 seats with a minimum 6 ft spacing between pods. Tickets for each concert are $20 per pod and available at texasperformingarts.org. Masks are required for staff and attendees at all times and sanitization stations will be available at all entrances. Additional health and safety guidelines are listed below.
COVID-19 Health and Safety Information and Guidelines
What to expect:
- Everyone (2 years and older) must wear a face mask covering their nose and mouth while in Texas Performing Arts’ event spaces.
- Outdoor tent capacity is very limited. Tickets are sold in “pods” for up to two people. There will be a minimum of 6 foot spacing between each pod.
- Seating will be provided in the tent – attendees do not need to bring their own chairs.
- Social distancing markers will be placed at the venue entry.
- All tickets will be sold online at texasperformingarts.org and be delivered via email for mobile contactless entry.
- Sanitization stations will be available at all entrances, under the tent, and inside the Bass Concert Hall restrooms.
- Food and beverages will not be offered for sale. Patrons may bring in a water bottle (no glass) and remove their mask to consume beverages only while in designated seating pod.
- Restrooms will be available in the Bass Concert Hall lobby.
To keep our community safe, Texas Performing Arts asks that:
- Patrons conscientiously practice social distancing, frequently wash hands, use hand sanitizer, and wear a face-covering as required.
- If patron is not feeling well or has been in close contact with someone they suspect may be infected, that they please stay home and contact a doctor. Contact the Ticket Office at 512.471.1444 or [email protected] by performance time to request a credit.
- Patrons be prepared to scan mobile tickets at free-standing pedestal ticket scanners.
- After the performance, patrons listen for timed exit instructions.
If a performance is postponed or canceled, ticket holders will be offered a choice of refund, credit for future use, or the opportunity to donate ticket value to Texas Performing Arts.
ABOUT GRAHAM REYNOLDS
Called “the quintessential modern composer” by the London Independent, Austin-based composer-bandleader-improviser Graham Reynolds creates, performs, and records music for film, theater, dance, rock clubs, and concert halls with collaborators across a multitude of disciplines.
Heard throughout the world in films, TV, stage, and radio, he recently scored Richard Linklater’s Where’d You Go, Bernadette with Cate Blanchett, Kristen Wiig, and Laurence Fishburne for Annapurna Pictures, Happy Jail for Netflix, the Rude Mechs’ Stop Hitting Yourself for Lincoln Center Theater, Ballet Austin’s Grimm Tales, and a multi-year commission from Ballroom Marfa, The Marfa Triptych. He has performed on an array of legendary stages, from the Kennedy Center to the Green Mill Tavern to the Conan O’Brien Show. His Creative Capital Award winning project, Pancho Villa from a Safe Distance, a bilingual cross-border opera created with librettists Lagartijas Tiradas al Sol (Mexico City) and director Shawn Sides (Rude Mechs), has been staged in over a dozen cities in North America.
As Artistic Director of the non-profit Golden Hornet, he leads efforts which draw on the collaborative spirit of rock bands and the composer-led nature of classical music, with a focus on commissioning new music, fostering young and emerging composers, and presenting adventurous works in non-traditional settings. Alongside Kronos Quartet’s longtime cellist Jeffrey Zeigler, he curated The Sound of Science, an interdisciplinary, multimedia performance that is touring internationally.
Reynolds leads the jazz-based but far reaching Golden Arm Trio. He is a company member with the internationally acclaimed Rude Mechs theater collective and resident composer with Salvage Vanguard Theater and Forklift Danceworks. His accolades include a Creative Capital Award, an Independent Music Award, two Frederick R. Loewe Music Theatre Awards, ten Austin Critics Table Awards, the John Bustin Award, multiple Austin Chronicle Best Composer wins, and a B. Iden Payne Award. His latest studio effort, MARFA: A Country & Western Big Band Suite, was released in fall 2019. Graham recently signed with the London based label Fire Records and is set to release his original score for Alfred Hitchcock’s silent classic, The Lodger.
ABOUT TEXAS PERFORMING ARTS
Texas Performing Arts is the performing arts presenting program of The University of Texas at Austin and operates campus venues including Bass Concert Hall and McCullough Theatre. It is the home of the Lexus Broadway in Austin series. In calendar year 2019 Bass Concert Hall had the highest number of tickets sold of any theater in Austin, was #2 in the State of Texas and #22 in the world, according to industry publication Pollstar. Following a national search, Tony Award-winning producer Bob Bursey was appointed Executive Director in January 2020.