As a correspondent and broadcaster,Cleverley Stone covers food, wine and dining like no one else in town. She started her newsletter, Cleverley’s Newsletter, in 1997. On the radio since 2003, she hosts “The Cleverley Show” on Talk 650/CBS Radio in Houston, Texas. She has been a regular contributor to Fox 26 Morning News since February 2008, cooking up delicious dishes with Houston’s top chefs.

On May 16, Executive Chef Giancarlo Ferrara of Arcodoro Risorante will join Cleverley on Fox 26 Morning News to prepare one of the dishes featured on the ICCC’s May Chef Dinner and Demonstration menu. The segment will air between 9 a.m.-10 a.m. on Fox 26 and live stream at: www.MyFoxHoustonLive.com.

This month at the ICCC, Chef Giancarlo Ferrara will lead us through a culinary tour Sicilia, the third region to be featured in the ICCC Chef Dinner and Demonstration series. Be sure to tune in to FOX 26 Morning News on Wednesday, May 16 for a preview of what’s to come at our exclusive May 25 cooking series.

Your segment will air on TV on Fox 26 and live stream at: www.MyFoxHoustonLive.com

For more information on the ICCC’s Chef Dinner and Demonstration series, click here .

Tickets are available beginning Monday, March 12 @ 10 a.m. To access this ticket offer, click here. The USA Rugby Men’s National Team, the Eagles, will host Italy at BBVA Compass Stadium on Saturday, June 23, 2012. The last time the two nations clashed was in September 2011, when Italy knocked the USA out of contention for the 2011 Rugby World Cup quarterfinals in New Zealand, defeating the Americans 27-10 in the last match of pool play match. Newly hired USA Head Coach, Mike Tolkin, and his team will look to correct problems in their RWC exit and put a stamp on the new coaching era.

Tickets for the USA Rubgy Men’s National Team, The Eagles versus Italy will go on-sale to the general public beginning Monday, March 12 at 10 a.m. and will be available online at www.axs.com or www.bbvacompassstadium.com or by calling 888-929-7849. The axs Ticketing service also is available on all mobile platforms, and features Facebook and Twitter integration. Prices start at $15.

Thursday, March 22, 2012 – 6:30 pm
University of St. Thomas – Jones Hall Theatre
A theatrical performance based on the novel of the same name
Directed and performed by
Massimiliano Finazzer Flory

Introductory readings David Gibbons
Choreography Gilda Gelati, prima ballerina of La Scala Theatre Ballet Company, Milan
Music of Giuseppe Verdi, Pietro Mascagni, Vincenzo Bellini, Niccolò Paganini and Luciano Berio, performed by Elsa Martignoni, violinist of the Orchestra Giuseppe Verdi of Milan

Performance in Italian, with English supertitles
Duration: around 75 minutes

As part of the celebrations to mark 150 years since the unification of Italy, this performance seeks to bring together the words of Alessandro Manzoni, the best-known writer of united Italy, with music by some of the leading contemporary composers, to present a world to us which is still our own, a world which, with all its virtues, vices and contradictions, is still able to move us.

MASSIMILIANO FINAZZER FLORY, author and actor will star in this theatrical performance based on “I promessi sposi”, in Italian with English supertitles. He will be accompanied by GILDA GELATI, first ballerina of the ballet company of Teatro alla Scala, and by ELSA MARTIGNONI, violinist of the Orchestra Giuseppe Verdi of Milano.

“The Betrothed” (”I promessi sposi”) is a love story that takes place in 17th century Italy. A couple on the eve of their wedding discovers that the local baron has his eye on the girl. While famine and plague destroy an oppressed people, their love story takes on Shakespearean overtones.

The readings are from chapters I, VI, VIII, XII, XXI, XXXIV and XXXVIII of Manzoni’s novel “The Betrothed”. The challenge here is twofold: first, to allow figures such as Don Rodrigo, Padre Cristoforo, Lucia, the Unnamed, Renzo, and the people of Milan to take center stage, as though characters in a Shakespearean drama, each of them struggling with themselves first and foremost; second, to show how the language of Manzoni to this day remains choral, controversial, poetic, theatrical, and astonishingly relevant – indeed, perhaps more so now than ever before.

This blend of words, dance and music teases out the golden thread running through the novel, which is the author’s gaze – implacable, yet at the same time implicated – through which mankind is observed in its transformation from individual to collective, showing the way in which the story of each of us, whether consciously or unconsciously, is the story of us all.

Free and open to the public.
Reservations kindly suggested. Seating available on a first come basis.

Information
Date: Thursday, March 22, 2012
Hours: 6:30 pm
Site: University of St. Thomas – Jones Hall: Drama, Theatre
Address: 3910 Yoakum – Houston, Texas 77006

The Italian Cultural & Community Center Presents “Puccini Near the End: His Late Life and Works”

HOUSTON—February 6, 2012: The Italian Cultural & Community Center (ICCC) is proud to announce the lecture “Puccini Near the End: His Late Life and Works,” given by Dr. Andrew Davis on Thursday, February 16 at 7 p.m.

Dr. Davis, Director of Graduate Studies at Moores School of Music at the University of Houston, will discuss Puccini’s late operas, in particular Il Trittico and Turandot. The presentation will be multi-media in nature, including musical recordings and photos. The lecture will be followed by a question and answer period. After the presentation aspect of the lecture, the ICCC will show the film Puccini: His Environs and His Opera.

Davis is a professor of music theory at the University of Houston’s Moores School of Music, where he teaches graduate and undergraduate courses in the history and analysis of opera and romantic music. He is Director of the graduate program in the Moores School of Music, he is an honorary Fellow of the Honors College at the University of Houston, and he serves as treasurer of the Texas Society for Music Theory, a regional professional organization.

The Italian Cultural & Community Center is a 501c3 whose mission is to preserve, celebrate and advance Italian culture and heritage. The ICCC offers scholarships and presents cultural events such as film screenings, lectures, and wine tastings.

OFFICIAL NIAF STATEMENT: Appointment of Ambassador Claudio Bisogniero as Italy’s Ambassador to the United States

Attribute to Joseph V. Del Raso, Esq., National Italian American Foundation President (NIAF)

“On behalf of the National Italian American Foundation’s Board of Directors, we welcome the appointment of Claudio Bisogniero to the post of Ambassador of the Republic of Italy to the United States.

The Foundation looks forward to working with Ambassador Bisogniero and to enhancing the already outstanding relationship between the United States and Italy. The NIAF has enjoyed a close working relationship with the former Ambassador Giulio Terzi di Sant’Agata, who now serves as Italy’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, and we look forward to continuing that relationship with the new ambassador.

His experience, most recently as the NATO Deputy Secretary General, First Secretary for the Economic and Commercial Affairs at the Embassy of Italy in Beijing, as well as Counsellor at the permanent Mission of Italy to NATO in Brussels, is a testament to his skills as a world-class diplomat.

Ambassador Bisogniero is expected to take his post on February 6, 2012, in Washington, D.C. Yesterday, January 18, 2012, President Barack Obama received the credentials from foreign ambassadors recently posted in Washington, D.C., during a traditional ceremony at The White House. Ambassador Bisogniero was joined by Carlo Maria Vigano, the newly appointed Apostolic Nuncio to The Holy See.”

Washington, D.C. 1/19/12