JUST ADDED: Lisa Lampanelli

WHAT: Lisa Lampanelli

WHEN: Saturday, May 19, at 8 p.m.

WHERE: Carol Morsani Hall at the Straz Center

DETAILS: Lisa Lampanelli is Comedy’s Lovable Queen of Mean. Heralded as “more than a standup – a standout,” by comedy legend Jim Carrey, Lampanelli is a cross between Don Rickles, Archie Bunker and a vial of estrogen. She has won accolades from The King of All Media Howard Stern, who called her “a true original and a brilliant comedy mind who’ll steal the show every time.”

This equal opportunity offender is a regular on late night television and a frequent guest and guest host on Howard Stern’s Sirius satellite radio shows. Using her saucy personality and love of reality shows, Lampanelli has recently joined Mario Lopez and the EXTRA-TV cast as a guest correspondent. She can be seen on current edition of NBC’s Celebrity Apprentice.

Lampanelli joined the ranks of comedy greats with her 2009 HBO comedy special, Long Live the Queen, and starred in her one-hour comedy special Glamour-Puss for Comedy Central. In addition, her first autobiography, Chocolate, Please: My Adventures in Food, Fat and Freaks, is available in paperback. Known for saying things that most people are afraid to think, her raunchy, gut-busting performances are wildly popular at theaters across the United States and Canada. On a continuous ride to comedic stardom, she has taped several specials for VH1, MTV and CMT.

TICKETS ON SALE FRIDAY, MARCH 2, AT NOON

Regularly priced tickets start at $39.50 and may be purchased by calling 813.229.STAR (7827) or 800.955.1045 outside Tampa Bay, in person at the Straz Center Ticket Office or online at www.strazcenter.org.

JUST ADDED: WILCO

WHO: David A. Straz, Jr. Center for the Performing Arts

WHAT: Wilco

WHEN: Monday, May 14, at 7:30 p.m.

TICKETS ON SALE SATURDAY, FEB. 25, AT NOON

Wilco’s Grammy®-nominated album The Whole Love was released in September 2011. The record is Wilco's eighth studio album and the first for the band's newly-formed dBpm Records. Recorded at the band’s Chicago studio, The Loft, The Whole Love features 12 new original tunes, produced by Jeff Tweedy with Patrick Sansone and Tom Schick.

Wilco has collaborated with King Features to present the first hand-drawn Popeye cartoon in more than 30 years. This video for “Dawned On Me” from Wilco’s The Whole Love was directed by Darren Romanelli. More information is available at www.wilcospinach.com

For Wilco’s upcoming North American tour dates, they have launched the Wilco Fan Video Project, which presents fans with a new way to interact with the concert experience. Using Vimeo, fans film and submit footage of their cities – footage which may then be projected behind the band on stage. Link: http://vimeo.com/groups/wilcofanvideoproject.

Fans may take advantage of the popular song request (and dedication) function hosted on the band's website, www.wilcoworld.net.

Regularly priced tickets start at $45.50 and may be purchased by calling 813.229.STAR (7827) or 800.955.1045 outside Tampa Bay, in person at the Straz Center Ticket Office or online at www.strazcenter.org.

JUST ADDED: The Beach Boys

The Beach Boys bring historic 50th Anniversary Tour

to the Straz Center in Tampa

Brian Wilson, Mike Love, Al Jardine, Bruce Johnston and David Marks to tour together

for the first time in more than two decades

Saturday, May 5, at 8 p.m.

Carol Morsani Hall at the Straz Center

Regularly priced tickets start at $49.50

TICKETS ON SALE FRIDAY, FEB. 24 AT, NOON

TAMPA, Fla. — The Beach Boys, one of the world’s most legendary and influential bands, have reunited for a global 50th Anniversary Tour. Brian Wilson, Mike Love, Al Jardine, Bruce Johnston and David Marks will tour together for the first time in more than two decades. The 40+ city tour, which will begin in April, will feature a headlining date at New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival on April 27 and a performance at the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival on June 10. A second show at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Conn., has already been added for May 13 due to overwhelming demand. The previously announced May 12 performance at the Mohegan Sun Arena sold out in one day.

The band, who performed together at the 2012 Grammy® Awards, will also release a new studio album and commemorative 50^th Anniversary catalog with Capitol/EMI.

On Saturday, May 5, at 8 p.m., the Beach Boys will take the Morsani Hall stage in Tampa presented by the David A. Straz, Jr. Center for the Performing Arts and Live Nation.

The Beach Boys have recorded new songs for the as-yet-untitled album to be released in 2012. It will be the first to feature all of the band’s surviving original members in decades and is being produced by Wilson and executive produced by Love.

The Beach Boys and Capitol/EMI have also teamed up for a 50th Anniversary campaign spotlighting the band’s entire catalog, with several new commemorative releases planned for 2012, including a new hits collection and a career-spanning box set.

America’s first pop band to reach the 50-year milestone has recorded and performed the music that has become the world’s favorite soundtrack to summer. The Beach Boys continue to hold Billboard/Nielsen SoundScan’s record as the top-selling American band for albums and singles, and they are also the American group with the most Billboard Top 40 chart hits with 36. Sounds of Summer: The Very Best of the Beach Boys is fast approaching triple-Platinum sales status, and The SMiLE Sessions, released to worldwide critical acclaim in November, has been heralded as 2011’s “No.1 Reissue of the Year” by Rolling Stone magazine.

Inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988 and recipients of the Recording Academy’s Lifetime Achievement Grammy Award, the Beach Boys are an American institution that is iconic around the world.

The Beach Boys 50^th Anniversary Tour comes to the Straz Center’s Carol Morsani Hall on Saturday, May 5, at 8 p.m. Regularly priced tickets start at $49.50. A limited number of exclusive VIP ticket packages – including premium seats, a meet and greet, sound check access, exclusive merchandise and more – are available for $295.50. Tickets, which go on sale Friday, Feb. 24, at noon, may be purchased by calling 813.229.STAR (7827) or 800.955.1045 outside Tampa Bay, in person at the Straz Center Ticket Office or online at www.strazcenter.org.

Up to the minute tour information can be found at www.thebeachboys.com.

For more information about the David A. Straz, Jr. Center for the Performing Arts and its upcoming events, please visit www.strazcenter.org.

The Grammy Awards

DVR Alert: The Grammy Awards are this Sunday and if you were thinking of missing it, here are some reasons you shouldn’t.

The Beach Boys will share the stage with current Grammy nominees Foster The People and Maroon 5 for a special performance. Previously announced performers include The Civil Wars, Adele, Jason Aldean and Kelly Clarkson, Tony Bennett and Carrie Underwood, Chris Brown, Glen Campbell with The Band Perry and Blake Shelton, Coldplay and Rihanna, Deadmau5, and Foo Fighters.

LL Cool J is hosting the 54^th annual awards show and will be broadcast on CBS, on Grammy.com, CBS.com and YouTube. Check your local listings.

La Cage coming on Feb. 21

Before “The Birdcage” there was “La Cage”

That’s not la cage, or even this cage. But this one – La Cage Aux Folles, starring George Hamilton and Christopher Sieber.

Winner of three 2010 Tony Awards® including the award for BEST MUSICAL REVIVAL, this hilarious new production of LA CAGE AUX FOLLES was the biggest hit of the 2010 Broadway season, leaving audiences in stitches night after night!

LA CAGE starring George Hamilton and Christopher Sieber tells the story of Georges (George Hamilton), the owner of a glitzy nightclub in lovely Saint-Tropez, and his partner Albin (Christopher Sieber), who moonlights as the glamorous chanteuse Zaza. When Georges' son brings his fiancée's conservative parents home to meet the flashy pair, the bonds of family are put to the test as the feather boas fly! LA CAGE is a tuneful and touching tale of one family's struggle to stay together ... stay fabulous ... and above all else, stay true to themselves!

With a glorious score of hummable melodies and a dynamite cast featuring the "notorious and dangerous Cagelles," LA CAGE is an indisputable musical comedy classic ... and this extraordinary new version shows you why!

Playing Feb. 21 – 26 (There will be a postshow talk-back following the Feb. 22 performance)

Click here for tickets!

Hot Tuna - Acoustic

JUST ADDED!

Hot Tuna - Acoustic

TICKETS ON SALE SATURDAY, FEB. 11, AT NOON

* * *

WHO: David A. Straz, Jr. Center for the Performing Arts

WHAT: Hot Tuna – Acoustic

WHEN: Saturday, July 14, 8 p.m.

WHERE: Ferguson Hall

David A. Straz, Jr. Center for the Performing Arts

DETAILS: From their days playing together as teenagers, to their time with Jefferson Airplane, to their current acoustic and electric blues, Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady, the founders and continuing core members of Hot Tuna, have consistently been leaders in American music for more than 50 years.

Album after album – more than two dozen in all, not counting solo efforts, side projects and appearances on the albums of other bands and performers – Kaukonen and Casady have continued to develop their interests and styles, both together and in individual pursuits. In an era in which old bands reunite for one last tour, Hot Tuna can’t because Hot Tuna never broke up.

In April 2011, Hot Tuna released Steady As She Goes, their first all-new studio album in 20 years.

Regularly priced tickets start at $32.50 and may be purchased by calling 813.229.STAR (7827) or 800.955.1045 outside Tampa Bay, in person at the Straz Center Ticket Office or online at www.strazcenter.org.

For more information about the David A. Straz, Jr. Center for the Performing Arts and its upcoming events, visit www.strazcenter.org.

JUST ADDED: Kevin James

JUST ADDED!

Kevin James Live

TICKETS ON SALE MONDAY, FEB. 6, AT NOON

***

WHO: David A. Straz, Jr. Center for the Performing Arts and Live Nation

WHAT: Kevin James Live

WHEN: Thursday, April 12, at 8 p.m.

WHERE: Carol Morsani Hall at the Straz Center

DETAILS: Kevin James, producer, co-writer and star of the hit comedies Paul Blart: Mall Cop (2009) and Zookeeper (2011) can be seen this October in his latest film, Here Comes The Boom. James starred with Adam Sandler in Columbia Pictures’ blockbuster Grown Ups (2010) and I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry (2007) and he broke into the film world in 2005 in Columbia Pictures’ Hitch starring opposite Will Smith.

The King of Queens, which premiered in 1998, ran for nine seasons on CBS with James starring and executive producing, and it garnered him an Emmy® nomination in 2006 for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series. The show concluded its run in 2007 but continues to air daily in syndication across the country and around the world. In 2001, James brought his stand-up act to television with Sweat the Small Stuff, a one-hour special for Comedy Central. For more on James visit www.KevinJames.com.

Regularly priced tickets start at $39.50 and may be purchased by calling 813.229.STAR (7827) or 800.955.1045 outside Tampa Bay, in person at the Straz Center Ticket Office or online at www.strazcenter.org.