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‘Prairie Home’ returns for NYE
BY STEVEN MARK / smark@staradvertiser.com
Garrison Keillor is bringing his famous radio stage production “A Prairie Home Companion” back to Blaisdell Concert Hall for two shows Dec. 31, courtesy of Hawaii Public Radio and Hawaii Pacific University, said Judy Neale, director of promotions for HPR.
Garrison Keillor is returning to Honolulu for two New Year's Eve shows. (Associated Press)
“New Year’s Eve is supposed to be lighthearted, optimistic, even joyful, and for our listeners across America and overseas, Hawaii represents those things … ,” Keillor said in a statement.
“New Year’s Eve tends to be a disappointing night, too much alcohol in crowded rooms with loud people. I can imagine someone sitting on a farm in Minnesota on Dec. 31 and hearing soft-voiced Hawaiian singers and slack-key guitars and smelling the flowers and imagining beautiful people and deciding that 2012 may be a happy year after all.”
Keillor and his colleagues, who last performed in Honolulu in 2006, will give a two-hour show at 12:45 p.m. to coincide with its normal broadcast time and then a three-hour show at 4:45 p.m. That show, billed as “A Prairie Home Companion’s Hawaiian New Year’s Eve with Garrison Keillor,” will include a countdown at the end of the second hour to sync up with midnight on the East Coast.
The local audience will prematurely ring in the new year, but HPR will broadcast the shows at 6 and 10 p.m., so audience members “can actually go home and listen to themselves clapping,” Neale said.
Keillor plans to use local talent, but a lineup was not announced.
Tickets are $35 to $65 and will be available first to HPR members, Nov. 1 to 18, through Ticketmaster outlets at Walmart, Sports Gear Warehouse in Windward Mall, charge-by-phone at 800-745-3000, or online at ticketmaster.com; HPR members will receive a password to buy tickets. General sales will begin Nov. 19 if any tickets are left.
