Full Performance Calendar

Important Note: Masks are recommended in all Drexel performance spaces.

Fall 2022-23

Dance

Fall Dance Lecture
with guest Dr. Ana Sanchez-Colberg

October 11, 2022 | 6PM | Mandell Theater

Rethinking Choreography will introduce students of dance to the concept of expanded choreography. This approach sees the choreographic act as one involving bodies and spaces, out of which movement emerges. Therefore, it is critical of the idea that dance is a language of movement. Any movement, human and non-human can inhabit the choreographic realm, where movement as the matter of choreography is not limited to the performance of the dancer. This approach has informed current innovations in dance that aim for participation, inclusivity, and diversity, important as well in current shifts toward digital realms and challenges dance practitioners to rethink notions of presence and embodiment.

This event is free and open to the public.

Theatre

Drexel Theatre Program presents:
Mantua Theater Project’s

Who's The Butler Now?
Featuring plays written by the young playwrights of the Mantua Theater Project and Belmont Charter School
Directed by Nick Anselmo

Join us for these insightful, whimsical, and touching stories featuring characters based on animals, inanimate objects, and forces of nature. You will love the creativity of these talented youth brought to life by our Theatre Program artists.

The Mantua Theater Project addresses the needs of Mantua/Powelton youth with self-affirming activities where they can realize their self-worth and the diversity of their imagination, using theater arts to foster positive experiences of success.

Saturday, October 29, 2022 at 3:30pm & 7pm
URBN Annex Black Box Theater

Tickets are free but registration is required. Register here!

Check out the program!

Pac And Biggie Are Dead
By Biko Eisen-Martin
Directed by Carlo Campbell
A Co-Production with Theatre In The X in residence

*Please note this performance includes:
Mature subject matter and language
Prop weapons and gunshot sound effects
Suggestive sexual acts
The use of the N-word
Smoking onstage with nicotine free electronic cigarettes
Flashing lights

This performance is intended for adult audiences.

Read the program here!

A spin-off of Tom Stoppard’s classic, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, starring rap’s two biggest artists/martyrs. But instead of existentially romping through Shakespeare’s Hamlet, their purgatory extends through classic moments in hip hop, drama, and Black history. A vision quest through ghetto heaven to come to deeper truths about themselves and each other.

Show Schedule
Preview: November 10, 2022 | 8PM
Opening: November 11, 2022 | 8PM
November 12, 17-19, 2022 | 8PM
November 13, 2022 | 2PM

Location
Mandell Theater

Tickets
General Admission: $25
Industry/Non-Drexel Students: $15
Drexel Student/Faculty/Staff: $10
Access Card/Art-Reach: $3

Tickets can be purchased here.

Facebook: @drexeltheatreprogram
YouTube: Theatre Program at Drexel
Instagram: @drexeltheatreprogram

Fall Music Concert Series

Percussion Ensemble
November 27, 2022 | 4PM | Creese Student Center

Fusion Band and Rock Ensemble
November 29, 2022 | 7:30PM | Mandell Theater

Read the program!

Chamber Strings
November 29, 2022 | 7:30PM | Main Auditorium

Jazz Orchestra
December 1, 2022 | 7:30 PM | Mandell Theater

Featuring: the Philadelphia Clef Club and Rutgers University Camden

The Drexel University Jazz Orchestra and Jazztet host Rutgers University’s RU Project and the Philadelphia Clef Club Youth Ensemble. This collaboration celebrates the vibrancy of the musical art form of Jazz in the greater Philadelphia region.

Drexel University Symphony Orchestra
December 2, 2022 | 7:30 PM | Main Auditorium

Musical Potpourri
Join DUSO as it opens its 2022/2023 season with works representing varied historical periods of western music, featuring Daniel Bolton, clarinet (alumnus) and winner of the 2022 DUSO Solo Competition.

Mediterranean Ensemble
December 3, 2022 | 7:30 PM | Mandell Theater

All College Choir and Chamber Brass and Winds
December 3, 2022 | 7PM | Main Auditorium

University Chorus and Chamber Singers
December 4, 2022 | 3PM | Great Court, Main Building

Requiem
Witness the power of Mozart’s Requiem in the cathedral-like setting of Drexel’s Great Court accompanied by a festival orchestra.

Concert Band
December 4, 2022 | 7PM | Mandell Theater

From The East Coast; Stories Past and Present
The Concert Band will present a program of composers with East Coast connections: Maslanka, Bernstein, Copley, and Hansen.

All events are free but registration is required. Register here.

Winter 2022-23

Mandell Presents

Dahlak Brathwaite: Spiritrials
February 15, 2023 | 7PM | Mandell Theater

Written and performed by Dahlak Brathwaite
Musical accompaniment by Dion Decibels
Directed by Marc Bamuthi Joseph and Sean San José
Produced by The Living Word Project

Addiction, religion, and the law intersect in a timely and personal exploration of the criminal justice system. This multidimensional play takes its inspiration, as well as its name, from one of Dahlak’s most recent hip-hop albums, layering characters, poetic verse, and dialogue over the content of the songs to create a theatrical piece that blurs the lines between hip-hop and dramatic performance. A timely exploration of the criminal justice system, Spiritrials chronicles the journey of Dahlak’s own criminalization along with his struggle to be vindicated and decriminalized in the eyes of the law and society. The piece works through the personal shame of criminal stigmatization to examine the factors – both internal and external – that have misplaced him in what appears to be a cultural rite of passage.

Tickets are free but registration is required.

Dance

Drexel Dance Ensemble Winter Performance - Obscuring of One

Come see an exciting evening of dance featuring guest choreographers Omar Roman de Jesus, Chandra Moss-Thorne, Rebecca Malcolm-Naib, and dance faculty Jennifer Morley. Bodies exchanging ideas, dancing in community, and a visual landscape for all!

February 10-11, 2023 | 7:30 pm
Mandell Theater

FreshDance Winter Performance - Etchings in Time
Featuring: Our first-year dance ensemble students explore dance that is captivating and passionate. This concert will feature choreography by guest Kelli Moshen and dance faculty Blanca Huertas-Agnew and Valerie Ifill.

February 9, 2023 | 7:30 pm
February 11, 2023 | 2pm
Mandell Theater

General Admission: $15

Drexel Students: $5

Tickets will be available here.

Theatre

Drexel Theatre Program Presents:

Resilient: Black Bottom

A devised show about West Philadelphia’s Black Bottom Neighborhood
Created by Carlo Campbell, Brett Ashley Robinson and the Company along with Playwright/Dramaturg Adrena Williams
Directed by Brett Ashley Robinson

A deep dive of discovery into the Mantua neighborhood of West Philadelphia that was formerly known as the Black Bottom. Once a thriving neighborhood of middleclass Black residents, this neighborhood has forever been changed by the growth of University City. This piece will look at building community and how we all work together to make that a reality.

Show Schedule
February 24, 25, March 2-4, 2023 | 8pm
February 26, 2023 | 2pm

Location
Black Box Theater | URBN Annex

Tickets
General Admission: $20
Non-Drexel Students: $15
Drexel Student/Faculty/Staff/Industry: $10

Buy tickets here.

Mandell Presents

Brent White Jazz Ensemble: Broken Toy
March 1, 2023 | 7PM | Mandell Theater

Broken Toy is a suite of jazz children’s music dedicated to all those who suffered emotional damage caused by losing a parent to incarceration. The arc of the compositions collected here both express and deconstruct the innocence, joy, and safety that children find in music. Brent White articulates his aesthetic sense, much of which issues from personal experience, in the traditions and historically responsive veins that flood into the recent 2021 recording, Broken Toy. As suggested by the title, the composition takes up the work of repairing what is precious in a child’s life. The music reveals Brent White’s constructive method in the madness that flows from the prison industry, from violence, and from poverty into our families and communities. Ultimately, the Broken Toy suite, offers children and adults alike a lesson on how to listen and heal.

Audiences of all ages invited to attend.

Journeying to Justice in Global Prisons with Dr. Baz Dreisinger
March 2, 2023 | 6PM | Mandell Theater

Dr. Baz Dreisinger is the Founding Executive Director of Incarceration Nations Network, a global network that promotes prison reform and justice reimagining worldwide; a Professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York; the founder of John Jay’s groundbreaking Prison-to-College Pipeline program, which provides university-level education and reentry assistance to incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people throughout New York State; the author of the critically acclaimed book Incarceration Nations: A Journey to Justice in Prisons Around the World, named a notable book for 2016 by the Washington Post; and the director of Incarceration Nations: A Global Docuseries, which had its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival 2021.

A 2018 Global Fulbright Scholar and current Fulbright Scholar Specialist, Dr. Baz speaks regularly about justice issues on international media and in myriad settings around the world and is also a journalist who writes and produces for such outlets as The New York Times and National Public Radio (NPR).

Tickets are free but registration is required.

Winter Music Concert Series

Percussion Ensemble
March 12, 2023 | 3PM | Mandell Theater

Fusion Band and Rock Ensemble
March 14, 2023 | 7:30PM | Mandell Theater

Chamber Strings
March 14, 2023 | 7:30PM | Main Auditorium

Jazz Orchestra
March 16, 2023 | 7:30 PM | Mandell Theater

Featuring composer Anthony Tidd

The Drexel University Jazz Orchestra features musician, educator, clinician, audio engineer, and producer Anthony Tidd. Tidd has recorded and produced several records for multiplatinum artists such as The Roots, Macy Gray, and Lady Gaga. He also has a career composing scores for notable film and television projects, including Jay-Z's Paramount/BET docuseries Rest in Power – The Trayvon Martin Story and Seven Years. As an educator and long-standing member of the M-BASE collective, Anthony has taught and presented masterclasses at several prestigious institutions, including Berklee College of Music, The Lincoln Center, Durban University (South Africa), and Paris Conservatory (France). In 2022, Tidd was part of the creative team that wrote and premiered the new Off-Broadway sensation Black No More, along with John Ridley, Tariq Trotter, James Poyser, Daryl Waters, and Bill T. Jones. Anthony will perform with the Jazz Orchestra featuring contemporary jazz arrangements.

Drexel University Symphony Orchestra
March 17, 2023 | 7:30PM | Main Auditorium

Virtuosity!
Virtuosity in orchestral music comes in many guises. Join DUSO as we perform several of the virtuosic gems from the 19th through 20th century library. Featuring the music of Rimsky-Korsakov, Holst and Brahms

Mediterranean Ensemble
March 18, 2023 | 7:30PM | Mandell Theater

All College Choir and Chamber Brass and Winds
March 18, 2023 | 7PM | Main Auditorium

University Chorus and Chamber Singers
March 19, 2023 | 3PM | The Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill

Dona Nobis Pacem
The featured work on the program is British composer Ralph Vaughan Williams' Dona Nobis Pacem, written in the years preceding WW2. Poetry from Walt Whitman's collections Leaves of Grass and Drumtaps are set along with biblical texts for chorus, orchestra, and baritone and soprano soloists. Both Vaughan Williams and Whitman tended to the wounded in WW1 and the Civil War, respectively, and had great compassion for the individual suffering caused by war. This piece is written as a plea for peace and as a reflection on war and the evil that it brings.

A few quotes from the piece:

"Nation shall not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore, and none shall be afraid."

"That the hands of the sisters, Death and Night, incessantly, softly, wash again and ever again this soiled world."

"For my enemy is dead—a man divine as myself is dead; I look where he lies, white-faced and still, in the coffin"

Concert Band
March 19, 2023 | 7PM | Mandell Theater

From Darkness, Light
The Concert Band demonstrates the wide range of expression in band music of the modern era. Pieces from composers like Perkins, Maslanka, Copley, and Thomas connect the themes of darkness and light.

Spring 2022-23

Womb: The Black Wealth Project
with Maria Bauman

An interdisciplinary project between Dance, Digital Media, the Pearlstein Gallery, the Writer’s Room, and students from West Philadelphia High School and lead artist and Rankin Scholar, Maria Bauman.

Bauman is an international dance artist specializing in humanistic, anti-racist community organizing embedded in creative process. The work furthers her research on various kinds of wealth and abundance and offers the students a formative experience in being part of an original, research-based artwork. With this new dance piece, she is probing themes of luxury, abundance, and the politics of Black wealth while examining Jillian Hernandez’s Aesthetics of Excess: The Art and Politics of Black and Latina Embodiment, using autoethnography as her methodology.

Thursday, April 27, 2023
6pm-8pm
Pearlstein Gallery

Free and Open to the Public

Theatre

Drexel Theatre Program Presents:
Songs For A New World

Music and Lyrics by Jason Robert Brown
Directed by Bill Fennelly

With a soaring, vibrant score that blends pop, gospel and jazz, Songs for a New World transports the audience from the deck of a 1492 Spanish sailing ship to the ledge of a Fifth Avenue high-rise. Jason Robert Brown’s stunning song cycle examines life, love, and the choices ordinary people make when faced with extraordinary moments.

Show Schedule
Opening: May 12, 2023 | 8pm
May 13, 18, 19, 20, 2023 | 8pm
May 14, 2023 | 2pm

Location
Mandell Theater

Tickets
General Admission: $20
Non-Drexel Students: $15
Drexel Student/Faculty/Staff/Industry: $10

Tickets are available here.

Dance

Sites Of Dance
June 1-3, 2023 | 6:30pm | Drexel's Campus

Rain Dates:
June 3 | 2:00 pm
June 4 | 12:00 pm

Tickets are available here.

This special site-specific concert will happen on Drexel’s campus and serve as a novel way to witness dance in relationship to architecture. For this unique event Dance Ensemble and FreshDance students will collaborate with University Chorus and Chamber Singers. Through mentorship and creative research, students will dive into their own artistic impetus. Come see emerging artistic voices as they develop unique dance and performance. You won’t want to miss this captivating evening of dance!

Facebook+Instagram: @DrexelDance

Spring Music Concert Series

Chamber Strings
June 6, 2023 | 7:30PM | Main Auditorium

Jazz Orchestra & JazzTet
June 8, 2023 | 7:30PM | Mandell Theater

Send-Off Concert!
Come celebrate with the Jazz Orchestra as we wish luck to the 2023 graduating seniors! This concert commemorates the long history of the Jazz Orchestra with alumni special guests and by connecting graduating seniors with the greater community of alumni with a festive jam session like send-off.

Outdoor Music Jam
June 9, 2023 | 1PM-4PM | Chestnut Square

Performances by Percussion Ensemble, Rock Ensemble, and Fusion Band

Gospel Choir
June 9, 2023 | 7PM | Mandell Theater

Drexel University Symphony Orchestra
June 9, 2023 | 7:30PM | Main Auditorium

Phoenix Rising
DUSO will wrap up the year with a concert certain to excite all orchestral music lovers. Featured soloist will be the winner of the 2023 DUSO Solo Competition. Performing works by Sibelius, Hindemith, Marquez, and featuring Stravinsky's Firebird Suite.

All College Choir and Chamber Brass and Winds
June 10, 2023 | 7PM | Main Auditorium

Mediterranean Ensemble
June 10, 2023 | 7:30PM | Mandell Theater

University Chorus and Chamber Singers
June 11, 2023 | 3pm | Great Court, Main Building

Spring!
With spring comes newness. Join the University Chorus and Chamber Singers for a world premiere of a commissioned work by Philadelphia composer, Melissa Dunphy.

Concert Band
June 11, 2023 | 7PM | Mandell Theater

Phrom Philly
The Concert Band welcomes special guests, Philadelphia Brass, for a program of composers with a Philadelphia connection. Works by composers such as Barber, Bernstein, and Persichetti.

Tickets are available here.