On Sunday, January 27 at 8:30 p.m., the Los Angeles Philharmonic presents a unique event, A Schoenberg/Gershwin Cabaret Evening, featuring renowned cabaret artist Michael Feinstein and others, at the Knitting Factory, 7021 Hollywood Blvd. in Hollywood. The words and music of Arnold Schoenberg and George Gershwin are woven together in this one-of-a-kind event. Feinstein sings the surprising and delightful cabaret music of musical giant Schoenberg along with the Gershwin songs that made Feinstein famous. Pianist Armen Guzelimian will accompany Mr. Feinstein for the Schoenberg songs.

The evening also includes a lively staged reading, created by Christopher Hailey and directed by John de Lancie, that captures the unlikely friendship between the two great composers. Actor Kurtwood Smith (Fox’s That 70’s Show) will portray Arnold Schoenberg.

Tickets ($15), now on sale, can be purchased on the web at www.knittingfactory.com or at the Knitting Factory box office. Buy in person or charge by phone (open 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) by calling 323/463-0204. For information, call 213/972-0704. No reserved seating; dinner is available. Parking is $5, enter on Sycamore, 1 ½ block north of Hollywood Blvd.

The performance is part of this season’s Schoenberg Prism, a city-wide celebration of the composer’s music in honor of the 50th anniversary of his death. The Prism places Schoenberg’s works alongside those of other great composers, revealing his debt to the towering figures of the past, as well as his own stature as a revolutionary and visionary.

As a newlywed in his mid-twenties, Arnold Schoenberg moved with his wife to Berlin in 1901 and took a job in a cabaret at the Buntes Theater. There, he first wrote cabaret material, being part of a movement to use the popular mode to serious ends. Other well-known men of letters of the time joined him in this endeavor. Although he only worked there until the following summer, he continued to compose songs on and off for the next ten years.

Performer, composer and arranger MICHAEL FEINSTEIN is known for his passion for classic American song, big band and jazz. Throughout his career, which began when as a child he played piano by ear, this Grammy-nominated artist has continually updated and preserved the American songbook through his performances. Having started out as Ira Gershwin’s assistant, he became a friend and confidant to the lyricist. He subsequently sang some unpublished Gershwin material once he started performing in New York in 1986. His one-man show, Isn’t It Romantic: Michael Feinstein in Concert, played on Broadway in 1988. Known as “America’s Ambassador of Song,” Feinstein has performed both at the White House and for the Queen of England. He has made more than 20 recordings including his most recent, Romance on Film, Romance on Broadway (a double CD), on the Concord label. He has opened his own club in New York, Feinstein’s At The Regency.

EDITORS- PLEASE NOTE:

Sunday, January 27, 8:30 PM

Knitting Factory Hollywood, 7021 Hollywood Blvd. (one block east of La Brea at Sycamore)

MICHAEL FEINSTEIN, vocals

ARMEN GUZELIMIAN, piano

KURTWOOD SMITH, actor

Program to include:

SCHOENBERG:
Gigerlette

Galathea

Advice to Young Girls

To Each His Own

The Sufficient Lover

Each Time I see a Maiden Fair

Tickets ($15), now on sale, can be purchased on the web at www.knittingfactory.com or at the Knitting Factory box office. Buy in person or charge by phone (open 11 a.m.-9 p.m.) by calling 323/463-0204. For information, call 213/972-0704. No reserved seating; dinner is available. Parking is $5, enter on Sycamore, 1 ½ block north of Hollywood Blvd.