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Houston hero Solange Knowles comes home for weeklong performance series

Solange Knowles is coming home.

From June 10-20, the Grammy-award winner and her artist collective, Saint Heron, will present six distinctive performances as part of Eldorado Ballroom Houston at three renowned venues: Eldorado Ballroom, Jones Hall, and The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.

The Houston native launched the Eldorado Ballroom series in 2023 at the Brooklyn Academy of Music as a tribute to her hometown. Since that initial performance, Knowles has reimagined Eldorado Ballroom, including a performance at Walt Disney Hall in Los Angeles in October 2024. Now, Knowles is bringing the series to its inspiration and namesake.

Eldorado Ballroom Houston serves as a reflection and time to honor pioneering Black artists, while also showcasing current creatives. Houston takes center stage with a forward-looking celebration of its musical roots, spotlighting Chopped and Screwed's lasting influence and the creative impact of the city’s Nigerian and African communities.

The series also honors Black folk and Zydeco music, Black female classical composers, devotional gospel traditions, and contemporary performance art.

Several artists will represent Bayou City during the weeklong event, including musicians from the Houston Symphony, interdisciplinary Houston-born artist Autumn Knight, Nigerian-American artist and Houston native Dozie Kanu, and Houston-based sound selectors HYPERFEMME and Big Ace.

“We’re thrilled to work with Solange and Saint Heron to present her vision right here in her hometown,” said Performing Arts Houston president and CEO Meg Booth in a statement. “Collaborating with Solange, Saint Heron, and Project Row Houses to shine a light on the Eldorado’s legacy of inspiring Black creativity and community with so many great artists is an enormous honor.”

In addition, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, will host two free screenings of Saint Heron’s film Monuments are Here. The film centers on Gene “Shady the Great” Thomas, a vocalist for Parliament Funkadelic.

“Project Row Houses appreciates that Solange makes sure our community is always part of her story,” Wilson said. “Solange has given us another great gift with this event — the opportunity to work with Performing Arts Houston. We look forward to exceptional artists from around the world empowering people and enriching our community through engagement, art, and direct action.”

Fans were first introduced to Saint Heron in 2013, when Solange Knowles released a compilation album of the same name through her record label. What began as a digital hub for amplifying Black artistry in music and culture has since evolved into an institution encompassing a studio, creative agency, library, and art gallery.

“We could not be more excited about Solange Knowles' return to Third Ward and the Eldorado Ballroom at Project Row Houses,” said Danielle Burns Wilson, Project Row House’s executive director. “She is so much a part of this building's history — her creative energy has reverberated in the ballroom's air since A Seat at the Table. Now, she'll be back to deepen that connection and supercharge the energy in this historic venue.”

Courtesy of Performing Arts Houston

Solange Knowles is coming home for six performances in June.

Knowles has remained connected to her roots through generous donations to Project Row Houses and nine simultaneous screenings across the Third Ward of her 2019 short film, When I Get Home.

Early access is now open for Performing Arts Houston members. General admission opens at 10 am on April 22 at performingartshouston.org/eldorado.

On Dissonance (An Evening of Classical, Symphonic, and Opera Works); Tuesday, June 10 at 7:30 pm; Jones Hall
Type of Guest; Wednesday, June 11 at 7:30 pm; Eldorado Ballroom
Monuments Are Here; Thursday, June 12 at 5 pm & 7:30 pm; The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
Paper in My Shoe; Saturday, June 14 at 7:30 pm; Eldorado Ballroom
Glory to Glory (A Revival for Spiritual and Devotional Work); Sunday, June 15 at 6:30 pm; Jones Hall
Go Slow; Friday, June 20; Location TBD

performing-arts celebrities eldorado ballroom solange knowles

Movie Review

Avatar: Fire and Ash returns to Pandora with big action and bold visuals

Photo courtesy of 20th Century Studios

Oona Chaplin in Avatar: Fire and Ash.

For a series whose first two films made over $5 billion combined worldwide, Avatar has a curious lack of widespread cultural impact. The films seem to exist in a sort of vacuum, popping up for their run in theaters and then almost as quickly disappearing from the larger movie landscape. The third of five planned movies, Avatar: Fire and Ash, is finally being released three years after its predecessor, Avatar: The Way of Water.

The new film finds the main duo, human-turned-Na’vi Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) and his native Na’vi wife, Neytiri (Zoë Saldaña), still living with the water-loving Metkayina clan led by Ronal (Kate Winslet) and Tonowari (Cliff Curtis). While Jake and Neytiri still play a big part, the focus shifts significantly to their two surviving children, Lo’ak (Britain Dalton) and Tuk (Trinity Jo-Li Bliss), as well as two they’ve essentially adopted, Kiri (Sigourney Weaver) and Spider (Jack Champion).

Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang), who lives on in a fabricated Na’vi body, is still looking for revenge on Jake, and he finds help in the form of the Mangkwan Clan (aka the Ash People), led by Varang (Oona Chaplin). Quaritch’s access to human weapons and the Mangkwan’s desire for more power on the moon known as Pandora make them a nice match, and they team up to try to dominate the other tribes.

Aside from the story, the main point of making the films for writer/director James Cameron is showing off his considerable technical filmmaking prowess, and that is on full display right from the start. The characters zoom around both the air and sea on various creatures with which they’ve bonded, providing Cameron and his team with plenty of opportunities to put the audience right there with them. Cameron’s preferred viewing method of 3D makes the experience even more immersive, even if the high frame rate he uses makes some scenes look too realistic for their own good.

The story, as it has been in the first two films, is a mixed bag. Cameron and co-writers Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver start off well, having Jake, Neytiri, and their kids continue mourning the death of Neteyam (Jamie Flatters) in the previous film. The struggle for power provides an interesting setup, but Cameron and his team seem to drag out the conflict for much too long. This is the longest Avatar film yet, and you really start to feel it in the back half as the filmmakers add on a bunch of unnecessary elements.

Worse than the elongated story, though, is the hackneyed dialogue that Cameron, Jaffa, and Silver have come up with. Almost every main character is forced to spout lines that diminish the importance of the events around them. The writers seemingly couldn’t resist trying to throw in jokes despite them clashing with the tone of the scenes in which they’re said. Combined with the somewhat goofy nature of the Na’vi themselves (not to mention talking whales), the eye-rolling words detract from any excitement or emotion the story builds up.

A pre-movie behind-the-scenes short film shows how the actors act out every scene in performance capture suits, lending an authenticity to their performances. Still, some performers are better than others, with Saldaña, Worthington, and Lang standing out. It’s more than a little weird having Weaver play a 14-year-old girl, but it works relatively well. Those who actually get to show their real faces are collectively fine, but none of them elevate the film overall.

There are undoubtedly some Avatar superfans for which Fire and Ash will move the larger story forward in significant ways. For anyone else, though, the film is a demonstration of both the good and bad sides of Cameron. As he’s proven for 40 years, his visuals are (almost) beyond reproach, but the lack of a story that sticks with you long after you’ve left the theater keeps the film from being truly memorable.

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Avatar: Fire and Ash opens in theaters on December 19.

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