You might think, with the constant din of news about the economy and cutbacks in just about every aspect of our lives, that Sarasota’s 2009-10 arts season would be a puny one. You might think wrong.

After shuffling through schedules, talking with artistic directors and discovering the wealth of performers, choreographers, speakers and artists who will be staging work here this season, I realized the problem wasn’t coming up with enough to write about. No, the problem was agonizing over what shows or events not to include in order to pare down the list to 26 top tickets from November to May. The economy may be constraining our cultural groups, but they’ve still managed to mount a rich and vibrant range of artistic offerings, and that’s reason for our culture-crazy city to rejoice.  

You’ll also find a comprehensive year-round calendar of upcoming arts events in our season preview package (see page 67). We hope you’ll hang onto it and it will help you in planning your own cultural schedule. Of course, more shows and concerts are always being added throughout the year; for the latest information, check out our arts and event calendar at sarasotamagazine.com, where we’ll try to keep a handle on the ever-changing arts scene.

In the meantime, give thanks this upcoming holiday season for the bounty of cultural blessings that continue to entertain, uplift and engage us all here in Sarasota. Here’s a month-by-month look at the 26 that top my list.  

November

One of the most highly visible samples of our artistic energy here is the Sarasota Season of Sculpture exhibition, which takes place along our downtown bayfront every two years. Whether you love or hate the monumental works that line the shores, chances are you’ll be talking about them. It’s hard to predict which piece will generate the most discussion, à la Unconditional Surrender, this time around; but the show, with the theme of Organic Lyricism, offers 12 large-scale sculptures in a variety of styles and media by such artists as Robert Ressler, David E. Davis, Larry Bell, Peter Voulkos and Magdalena Abakanowicz. All pieces are from The Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton, N.J. Oh, and that sailor still stands as well.

On the theatrical side, the Asolo Rep’s much awaited collaboration with the Sarasota Ballet on Susan Stroman’s Tony-winning Contact actually opened last month, but if you haven’t caught it yet you have until Nov. 22 to appreciate this unique fusion of music, theater and dance, all tied together in three stories about our basic need for love and human connection. It’s directed and choreographed by Tomé Cousin, the only person sanctioned by Stroman to re-create the piece; and it features a mix of Broadway vets (Shannon Lewis, Nadine Isenegger, Wilson Mendieta, Steve Sofia), Sarasota Ballet dancers (Octavio Martin, Kate  Honea and Logan Learned among them) and returning Asolo Rep performers (James Clarke, Matt Baker).

More musical theater, albeit of a different variety, with Venice Theatre’s area debut of Tony-nominated Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, a Broadway hit based on the film starring Michael Caine as a debonair con man who teams up with a younger, cruder version of himself (Steve Martin in the film) to take a bunch of wealthy old ladies for all they’re worth on the French Riviera. Our local version of the suave Caine, theater veteran (and attorney) Chris Caswell, plays the lead here, with fellow VT actor Doug Landin as his cohort in crime. It’s one of those droll, slickly done comedies that manages to entertain at every twist and turn. On the mainstage Nov. 10 through Dec. 6.

Doctor My Eyes, Take It Easy, Somebody’s Baby, Running on Empty—all you have to do is hear one of these songs on the radio to summon up memories of just where you were when you first heard them. Singer-songwriter Jackson Browne, the creator of these and many more iconic songs, himself appears never to have run on empty; he’s been penning meaningful rock tunes for four decades and shows no sign of stopping. He takes to the Van Wezel stage for the first time Nov. 18; try to snag your tickets before the baby boomer herd hits the box office.

December

Another Van Wezel first is the touring production of Avenue Q, the slightly subversive Broadway hit that blends real people and puppets to tell the story of some young wannabes struggling to find themselves in a rundown tenement neighborhood of New York. Don’t think those puppets mean that it’s kiddie fare; Avenue Q is recommended for ages 13 and up thanks to some adult language and content, but for teens and young adults—or older ones who appreciate hip humor—it’s a hoot. Onstage Dec. 10 and 11.

Ringling Museum curator of European art Virginia Brilliant is excited about the Gothic Art in the Gilded Age exhibition opening there this month, and it does sound like a great chance to see the 300 or so Medieval and Renaissance treasures—paintings, sculptures, ceramics, miniatures and more—that first formed the collection of 19th-century Parisian art dealer Emile Gavet, then made their way to the Newport mansion of William and Alva Vanderbilt, and finally ended up in the hands of John Ringling. Probably a quarter of the pieces on display here, Dec. 16 through April 4, have not been glimpsed by Ringling patrons before, and none has ever been seen in the context they will be for this show, which re-creates the extravagant way they were grouped in Gavet’s apartment and the Vanderbilts’ own Gothic room. No wonder Brilliant calls the installation “mind-boggling.”

I don’t believe any area theater has ever presented Bertolt Brecht’s Life of Galileo before (let’s face it, you don’t see much Brecht here at all), so it’s kind of cool that the Asolo Rep is presenting it during this International Year of Astronomy and the 400th anniversary celebration of the first telescope viewing of the heavens by the play’s subject, Galileo Galilei. (Apparently the Asolo is the only theater in the country doing the play this year, too.) Should be interesting to see how director Michael Donald Edwards brings this tale of a man persecuted in the battle between science and religion to the stage, probably with sort of a bare bones set, à la his earlier productions of Equus and Amadeus. Onstage in rotating rep Dec. 11 through Feb. 23.