‘Boundless imagination’

The MOMIX company’s dancers and illusionists promise the moon in a production called Lunar Sea, scheduled to be performed at 3 p.m. Oct. 29 and 11 a.m. Oct. 30 in Jackson Hall at Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts.

“Staged to reflect a fanciful vision of life on the moon, Lunar Sea is a multimedia work of wild invention and stunning beauty, as dancers glow in the dark, swim in the air, and perform a variety of uncanny feats in a dreamlike landscape of boundless imagination,” a news release states.

The Oct. 30 presentation is part of the Wells Fargo School Matinee Series.

Campus costumes for sale, rent

Shopping for a Halloween costume? Do you picture yourself as a powerful wizard or an elfin queen, a pirate or a pirate wench, a samurai warrior or a geisha? How about Elvis, Dracula or the Grim Reaper? The UC Davis costume shop announced that all these costumes and more will be available for sale or rent, or up for auction, in the Arena Theatre, 140 Wright Hall.

The event is set to begin the weekend of Oct. 21 and 22, with sales from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. and silent auctions from 11 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. The public is invited, and light refreshments will be served. Sales and rentals are planned from 3 to 7 p.m. daily the week of Oct. 23 to 27, with rentals by appointment only.

For this third annual event, the costume shop's professional staff has assembled more than 60 costume kits with wigs, headpieces, jewelry, makeup directions and more. Also, 16 special costumes will be up for auction.

For more information, or to arrange appointments for rentals, contact Roxanne Femling, costume shop manager, (530) 752-0740 or rcfemling@ucdavis.edu.

Grisman unleashes the 'dawg'

He calls it "dawg music" — a unique blend of swing, bluegrass, Latin, jazz, gypsy and more. The artist is David Grisman, a mandolin player, who is due on Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts' Jackson Hall stage with his quintet at 8 p.m. Oct. 26. The program lists Old School Freight Train, an acoustic band, as the opening act. A preperformance lecture is set for 7 p.m. in the AGR Room at the Buehler Alumni and Visitors Center.

Manze and The English Concert

Violinist Andrew Manze is scheduled to be at UC Davis on Oct. 28 to participate in an afternoon forum, "Mozart in Real Time," and to perform that night with The English Concert, the early-music ensemble that he leads.

"Mozart in Real Time," part of the Forum@MC series, is set for 2 p.m. in Mondavi Center's Jackson Hall, with admission free and open to the public. Other forum participants are listed as Julia Simon, chair of the Department of French and Italian; Christopher Reynolds, music professor; and Georges Van Den Abbeele, former director of the Humanities Institute.

The English Concert performance is set for 8 p.m., also in Jackson Hall. The group typically performs with 14 strings plus continuo, using stringed instruments made in the 17th and 18th centuries, though a few members play more recently made copies.

For the Mondavi concert, the ensemble plans to perform one of Mozart's best-loved works, Symphony No. 40 in G Minor, K. 550; his Violin Concerto No. 3 in G Major, K. 216, with Manze as soloist; and Adagio in E Major, K. 261; plus Carl Phillip Emanuel Bach's Symphony No. 3 in F Major.

Young Artists contest opens

Entries are due by Nov. 1 for the second annual Young Artists Competition at Mondavi Center. The competition is open to pianists and instrumentalists 8 to 17 years old, and vocalists 14 to 17. Mondavi Center announced that cash scholarships of up to $3,000 will be awarded, along with a summer fellowship and Mondavi performance opportunities. Details: www.mondaviarts.org/youngartists/index.cfm.

Stage sweetener: Willy Wonka

A "scrumptious treat" for the whole family is how Mondavi Center describes a musical based on Roald Dahl's book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

The stage adaptation, titled Willy Wonka, is to be presented here next month by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts' Imagination Celebration on Tour program. Performances in Mondavi's Jackson Hall are scheduled at 11 a.m. Nov. 5 as part of the Wells Fargo School Matinee Series and at 3 p.m. the same day as part of Mondavi's regular season. Teachers, educators and others interested in purchasing blocks of tickets for the Matinee Series are advised to call (530) 754-4689.

Volunteers and native culture

Besides its regular tours, the UC Davis Arboretum announced a special event focusing on plants important to native Californians, plus a volunteer training session:

• Volunteer training — 9 a.m.-noon Fridays, Oct. 20-Dec. 15 (except for Nov. 10 and 24). Materials fee $55, or $45 for members of Friends of the Arboretum. Advance registration required; contact Amy McGuire, (530) 754-9126 or almcguire@ucdavis.edu.
• Special event — 2-4 p.m., Oct. 22, Practicing Native Culture, Wyatt Deck, adjacent to the redwood grove and across from Wyatt Pavilion, Old Davis Road. Participants will be given opportunities to make cord from cattail leaves, and to grind acorns.