Arts Planner: Famous bassist visits, five new art shows open

‘All About the Bass’

No, “All About That Bass” singer Meghan Trainor isn’t coming to Columbia. But a musician with equally impressive bass cred is.

Edgar Meyer, the world’s pre-eminent double bassist, will solo at the South Carolina Philharmonic’s next show, aptly titled “All About the Bass” at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 9 at the Koger Center.

Meyer is a five-time Grammy Award winner and has worked with some of the biggest names in classical and instrumental music, including Yo-Yo Ma, Joshua Bell and Bela Fleck. The New Yorker has called him “the most remarkable virtuoso in the relatively unchronicled history of his instrument.”

At the S.C. Phil show, he will perform his own Bass Concerto No. 1 solo and the Bottesini Bass Concerto No. 2.

The Masterworks Series concert also includes Zoltán Kodály’s “Dances of Galanta” and ends with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Symphony No. 38, “Prague.”

Meyer will join S.C. Phil director Morihiko Nakahara for a post-concert talk-back session immediately following the concert in the Koger Center auditorium.

Tickets are $23-$53, available at the Koger Center Box Office at Park and Greene streets, by calling (803) 251-2222 or visiting kogercenterforthearts.com. Student and military discounts are available.

OTHER ARTS EVENTS AROUND THE MIDLANDS

TOMMY THOMPSON, TEXTURE TINKERER

City Art’s newest exhibition features work by Tommy Thompson, a watercolor artist who has been experimenting with acrylic painting on board and canvas.

“I have always been fascinated by the intensity of colors and the representation of light and shadow in my work,” Thompson said. “Now, the new [advances in] acrylic mediums have allowed me to introduce another dimension to the paintings – texture and relief surface work.”

The exhibit, “Art 2007-2015,” opens Thursday with a reception from 5-8 p.m. and runs through Feb. 27.

WOMEN PHOTOGRAPHY EXHIBIT

“Family Ties: South Carolina Women Photographers on Family” is a contemporary photography show from eight established and emerging South Carolina women artists who explore the concept of family in their work. The exhibition is held in collaboration with USC’s School of Visual Art and Design and will run from Monday through April 2 at the third floor lobby in McKissick Museum, 816 Bull St. artsandsciences.sc.edu/mckissickmuseum

FRUIT FOR THOUGHT

The latest photography exhibition from Columbia artist Meg Griffiths provides an intimate view of domestic and familial culture in Cuba, where Griffiths first visited in 2011 to explore domestic life at the edge of capitalism.

The exhibit, “Casa de fruta y pan,” (“House of fruit and bread”) is a collection of photographs Griffiths took while visiting private homes in Cuba over several years.

Griffiths is an adjunct professor of photography in the School of Visual Art and Design at the University of South Carolina.

There will be an opening reception for “Casa de fruta y pan” from 6-9 p.m. Thursday at Anastasia & Friends Gallery, 1534 Main St. www.facebook.com/events/748378618625843/

New work from Michaela Pilar Brown

Two exhibits by Columbia artist Michaela Pilar Brown open this week.

“Where They Cut Her I Bleed” is a residential research project that explores generational trauma using theories of materiality and memory carried out in two-dimensional, three-dimensional and performance art. There will be an opening reception at Tapp’s Art Center, where Brown is an artist in residence, from 6-10 p.m. Thursday at 1644 Main St. www.facebook.com/events/997332110324807/

“The Space Between,” which Brown describes as an “intense personal exploration of psychological and physical disease rooted in the oppression of black women,” opens Monday at McMaster College, 1615 Senate St. artsandsciences.sc.edu/art/space-between-exhibition-michaela-pilar-brown

This story was originally published January 2, 2016 at 11:30 AM.