Stay focused on the front row.
Eleven women, all African American, parade down a wide street during the 1978 March on Washington for the Equal Rights Amendment. They look confident and self-possessed. All but one wears sensible shoes. This is not their first march.
Enlarged and posted at the entryway, this cadre of women welcomes guests to a sharply devised show, On With the Fight, at the newly reopened Briscoe Center for American History on the University of Texas campus. The exhibit, curated by Jill Morena and Sarah Sonner, originally opened in March 2020, timed to the 100th anniversary of the passage of the 19th Amendment, which broadly gave women the legal right to vote.
Did you know there were two big films titled “Lone Star”?
We’ve added an alphabetized list of key movies about Texas.
Texans adore movies about Texas and Texans.
In my May 10 “Think, Texas” column ( Starring Texas: What you can learn about the state through its movies ), I tried to sort out what it means to be a “Texas movie,” and argued that such a film must be about our state, not just shot here. It must tell us something about who we are.
I applied that standard to 32 movies, starting with the two versions of “The Trip to Bountiful,” one starring Geraldine Page, the other Cicely Tyson, and ending with the never-ending “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” franchise.
Despite a strain of political poison left over from the presidency of Lyndon Baines Johnson, as well as tensions on the University of Texas campus about the ongoing Vietnam War, the LBJ Presidential Library was dedicated in windy, muggy conditions at 11:30 a.m. May 22, 1971.
Friends and enemies alike, including President Richard Nixon, gathered 50 years ago on what was then the eastern edge of the UT campus to marvel at the monolithic, marble-clad tower that held the presidential papers, library and museum, and its long, low-lying companion building, Sid Richardson Hall, which housed what would become the LBJ School of Public Affairs, Briscoe Center for American History and Benson Latin American Collection.
Not during the booming, brassy Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman, No. 1 by Joan Tower.
Nor during the opening passages of the saucy, sassy Huapango by José Pablo Moncayo, as arranged by Ernesto Enriquez.
The shock of hearing an orchestra play in person for the first time in 15 months came later during Huapango with the unexpected rattle of maracas.
Like a rattlesnake s warning, this tingling sound ricocheted through my nervous system, reminding me that certain responses to orchestral music cannot be duplicated by listening to recorded or streaming versions of it.
Austin Symphony returns in-person
The Austin Symphony Orchestra played its last concerts of the season also its only concerts in person at Riverbend Church in West Austin. The customary venue for the group s annual performances of Handel s Messiah, the room is tall, wide and comfortable. The stage is copious although not big enough for the entire orchestra to to sit together within the protocols of soc