Thanksgiving is here, and while you’re making your weekend plans between football games and tryptophan naps, let us suggest some things for you to do. This week, we’ve got a downtown parade, holiday music, a visit from a critically acclaimed author, and more. Keep reading for these and more.
Four-time Olympian and nine-time gold medalist Carl Lewis, who is currently the head track and field coach at the University of Houston, will serve as the grand marshal for the 75th Annual H-E-B Thanksgiving Day Parade today, Thursday, November 28, at 9 a.m. This year’s parade will cover 20 downtown city blocks and celebrate both the Thanksgiving holiday and Houstonians who competed during the 2024 Paris Olympics and Paralympics with a performance by Theatre Under the Stars, six marching bands, dance companies, 19 floats, and high-flying balloons. Parade viewing is free and open to the public, and don’t forget a lawn chair or blanket. If you can’t make it, you can always catch the parade on KHOU 11, the parade’s broadcast and streaming partner.
Accompany little Clara Stahlbaum on a magical journey to the Land of Snow and the Kingdom of Sweets, set to a classic score by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, when the Houston Ballet opens their annual holiday production of Stanton Welch’s The Nutcracker at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, November 29, at the Wortham Theater Center. Performances will continue through December 29 at 1 and 6:30 p.m. December 1, 8, 15, and 22; 7:30 p.m. December 12-13 and 17-19; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturdays and December 20, 23, and 26-27; 2 p.m. December 24; and 1 p.m. Sunday, December 29. Tickets can be purchased here for $22.50 to $240. Special VIP experiences are available for select dates for an additional $60 per person, which include receptions before and during the performance and a commemorative gift.
Houston Symphony, with pianist Yefim Bronfman, will present Ludwig van Beethoven’s final piano concerto, Piano Concerto No. 5, alongside works from Franz Schubert and Alban Berg, on Friday, November 29, at 7:30 p.m. during Beethoven’s Emperor Concerto at Jones Hall. Rebecca Zabinski, the Symphony’s senior director of artistic planning, described the piece as “a very symphonic concerto” that is “much more a partnership of the orchestra and the soloist,” though Zabinski says it “lends itself” to Bronfman’s “consummate artistry.” The concert will also be performed at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, November 30, and 2 p.m. Sunday, December 1. In-hall tickets are available here for $42 to $120. Saturday night’s performance will also be live-streamed, and you can purchase access here for $20.
On Sunday, December 1, at 2 p.m., Dance Afrikana will present the 3rd Annual Kuumba Festival at the MATCH, a celebration of Black creativity in honor of Kwanzaa. Kuumba, the Kiswahili word for creativity, is one of the seven principles of Kwanzaa, and it will be on display through a lineup that includes poetry and spoken word artists, an Afro-Brazilian percussion band, and a world premiere dance piece by Dance Afrikana and commissioned artist Lindi Yeni. Dr. Lindsay Gary, the founder and artistic and executive director of Dance Afrikana, recently told the Houston Press that because the Black experience “is also about being multicultural,” there are “many different manifestations of Black and African culture” that will be seen in one night. Tickets to the festival are available here for $35.
The New York Times has said Creation Lake, the latest novel from critically acclaimed author Rachel Kushner, “consolidates Kushner’s status as one of the finest novelists working in the English language.” The France-set thriller, narrated by a 30-something “American spy-for-hire” trying to “infiltrate a radical farming commune bent on violence,” also features “one of the coldest customers serious American fiction has seen in recent years.” On Monday, December 2, at 7:30 p.m., Kushner will read from Creation Lake at the Alley Theatre as part of the 2024/2025 Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series. Following the reading, Kushner will participate in an on-stage conversation with Houston’s Christa M. Forster before the evening ends with a book sale and signing. Tickets to the reading are available here for $5.
Company Christmas parties can be bad enough, but for the characters in The Ugly Xmas Sweater Musical, it’s even worse when their boss uses the opportunity to inform them that a.) the company’s been sold and b.) they’re all losing their jobs. Unless that is, they can save the company by making the ugliest Christmas sweater ever. Following its 2023 world premiere, Theatre Under The Stars will bring the holiday musical, with a book by Megan Larche Dominick and TUTS Artistic Director Dan Knechtges, back to the Hobby Center for the Performing Arts stage on Tuesday, December 3, at 7 p.m. Performances will continue through December 22 at 7 p.m. Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, 7:30 p.m. Fridays, 1:30 and 7:30 p.m. Saturdays, and 1:30 and 7 p.m. Sundays. Tickets are available here for $35 to $50.
Some things go together naturally, like peanut butter and jelly, apple pie and ice cream, and jazz and Christmas carols. On Tuesday, December 3, at 7:30 p.m., you can hear some of the season’s favorite tunes, like “Jingle Bells,” “I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” and “The Little Drummer Boy,” at Jones Hall for the Performing Arts during Swingin’ Christmas with Houston Jazz Orchestra. The ensemble, under conductor Rich DeRosa, will be joined by vocal trio SASS (Sharon Montgomery, Becky Williams, and Gigi Welling Nitzberg) for a program that will also include classic holiday songs like “Deck the Halls,” “Joy to The World,” and more. Tickets to the concert are available here for $56 to $125.
There’s a Sister’s Catechism for every season, and on Tuesday, December 3, at 7:30 p.m. Denise Fennell-Pasqualone will return to Stages to don the habit one more for Sister’s Catechism Christmas: The Mystery of the Magi’s Gold. In the show, by playwright Maripat Donovan in collaboration with Marc Silvia and Jane Morris, Fennell-Pasqualone’s Sister will not only retell the nativity story but also attempt to solve an age-old mystery: The Wise Men came bearing gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, but what exactly happened to the gold? Additional performances are scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays and 2:30 p.m. Wednesdays, Saturdays, and Sundays through December 22. Tickets are available here for $84 to $112.
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2024.
