World City Guide

Culture

Dallas lays claim to the biggest urban Arts District (tel: (214) 953 1977; website: www.artsdistrict.org) in the US. Founded in 1983 and located on the north side of the town, the district includes the Dallas Museum of Art (see Key Attractions), the Morton H Meyerson Symphony Center (the major performing arts venue in Dallas) at 2301 Flora Street (tel: (214) 670 3600), and the Arts District Theater, 2401 Flora Street (tel: (214) 922 0427).

To obtain tickets to cultural events, visitors should contact the individual venues, by telephone or via their website. Useful information points include the weekly Dallas Observer (website: www.dallasobserver.com) and a cultural website (www.dallasculture.org).

Music: The Dallas Opera (tel: (214) 443 1000/43; website: www.dallasopera.org) plays at the Fair Park Music Hall, Fair Park, 909 First Avenue (tel: (214) 565 1116), all year. The Dallas Symphony Orchestra (tel: (214) 692 0203; website: www.dallassymphony.com) is based at the Morton H Meyerson Symphony Center, 2301 Flora Street (tel: (214) 670 3600), but also gives free performances in various parks throughout the summer. Also based at the Morton H Meyerson Symphony Center is the Dallas Wind Symphony (tel: (214) 565 9463; website: www.dws.org) and the men’s chorus, the Turtle Creek Chorale (tel: (214) 526 3214; website: www.turtlecreek.org). The range of classical music performances available is represented by the Dallas Bach Society, 2300 Auburn Avenue (tel: (214) 320 8700; website: www.dallasbach.org), the Dallas Chamber Orchestra (tel: (214) 321 1411; www.dallaschamberorchestra.org) and the Dallas Classic Guitar Society (tel: (214) 528 3733).

Theatre: The Dallas Theater Center (tel: (214) 526 8210 or 522 8499 (box office); website: www.dallastheatercenter.org) is based at the Kalita Humphreys Theater, 3636 Turtle Creek Boulevard (designed by Frank Lloyd Wright) but also performs at the Arts District Theater, 2401 Flora Street (tel: (214) 922 0427). Theatre Three, 2800 Routh Street (tel: (214) 871 3300), and the Majestic Theater, 1925 Elm Street (tel: (214) 880 0137), a restored 1920s movie palace and vaudeville hall, are other options. The type of theatre presented ranges from mainstream shows to fringe theatre.

Dance: The Texas Ballet Theater (tel: (214) 369 5200; website: www.texasballettheater.org) performs, along with the opera, at Fair Park Music Hall (see Music above) and the Majestic Theater (see Theatre above). The Dallas Black Dance Theatre, 2627 Flora Street (tel: (214) 871 2376; website: www.dbdt.com), performs highly acclaimed modern dance. For a Hispanic flavour, there is the Anita N Martinez Ballet Folklorico, 4422 Live Oak Street (tel: (214) 828 0181 or (888) 223 0191; website: www.anmbf.org).

Film: Apart from the usual range of mainstream cinemas, there are also two specialist venues – The Granada Theater, 3524 Geenville Avenue (tel: (214) 824 9933; website: www.granadatheater.com), a 1940s ‘movie theater’ with a dinner menu and drinks, and the IMAX Theater, 11819 Webb Chapel Road (tel: (972) 888 2629). The Inwood Theater, 5458 West Lovers Lane (tel: (214) 764 9106; website: www.landmarktheatres.com), Angelika Film Center, 5321 E Mockingbird Lane, (tel: (214) 841 4700; website: www.angelikafilmcenter.com), and The Magnolia, 3699 McKinney Avenue (tel: (214) 764 9106; website: www.landmarktheatres.com) show arthouse movies.

Movies that have been filmed in Dallas over the years include Bonnie and Clyde (1967), RoboCop (1987), JFK (1991), The Bridges of Madison County (1995), The Apostle (1997) and Batman and Robin (1997).

Literary Notes: It is not easy to find specific references to Dallas in literature. Most writers speak more generally of Texas. One early example is Amelia E Barr’s Remember the Alamo (1888), in which a mixed Anglo-Mexican family in San Antonio overcomes its own cultural differences while tensions mount between revolutionary Texans and the Mexican government. The short story, Last of the Troubadours, by O Henry (first published in the July 1908 issue of Everybody's Magazine) deals with a strolling minstrel in turn-of-the-century South Texas and divides the world into three types of people – the barons, the troubadours and the workers. Neither of these accounts is easy to come by, except in special library collections.

Again taking the wider Texan theme but this time from a child’s perspective, is Janice Jordan Shefelman’s A Paradise Called Texas (1983), about searching for a better life when Mina and her parents leave Germany in 1845 and travel to Texas. The story is based upon the author’s own family history. Simone de Beauvoir travelled in Texas in 1947 and wrote her whole US diary as America Day by Day (1954). Her route through the state took her from San Antonio to Houston. She observed: ‘Texans are proud to be Texans. They have the reputation of being the biggest braggarts in America, and they even brag about this. In their vast territory they’ve gathered all the world capitals: Paris, London, Madrid, Toledo, St Petersburg, Moscow & and some can even be found more than once.’

Dallas has also been celebrated in song. The 1956 Big D, by Frank Loesser (1910-1969), composer of Baby, It’s Cold Outside, has this to say:

You’re from Big D
My, oh yes, I mean Big D, little a, double l, a-s
And that spells Dallas, my darlin’, darlin’ Dallas
Don’t it give you pleasure to confess
That you’re from Big D
My, oh yes!