Pritzker Pavilion at Millennium Park
It’s been 100 years since the premiere of Igor Stravinsky’s masterpiece, the “Rite of Spring,” which notoriously ended in riots. As such, 2013 has seen a marked Stravinsky resurgence, though perhaps none as sweet and strangely appropriate as seeing that piece at Grant Park Music Festival’s Summer Concert Series. The stage decorated with shattered photographs of Joanna Wozniak dancing the lead in the Joffrey performance, the crowd that evening was wonderfully diverse; young and old, tourist and native, classical nerds and curious. A forceful but sublime performance (with no recorded riots afterwards), one gets the notion that Stravinsky, enfant terrible, would approve.
201 East Randolph, millenniumpark.org
Best of Chicago 2013