Music Center will go mobile

The Music Center is hitting the road. The downtown Los Angeles performing arts campus that includes the Ahmanson Theatre, Mark Taper Forum and Walt Disney Concert Hall has announced a new initiative, “The Music Center on Location.”

Or locations, as the case may be.

Starting this summer, the Music Center will present arts events beyond its Grand Avenue plaza — not only outdoors at the adjacent Grand Park, where it previously held concerts, but also at the Ford amphitheater in Hollywood and the Culver Studios in Culver City.

The Music Center will stage three dance performances and one concert at the Ford. Confirmed is the contemporary dance company Aszure Barton & Artists as well as Jacob Jonas the Company and singer-songwriter Rufus Wainwright. Its summer series, “Dance DTLA,” will continue at Grand Park over 11 evenings. In the fall, the Music Center will stage choreographer Akram Khan’s “Until the Lions,” based on a book by poet Karthika Naïr, at the Culver Studios.

Traveling beyond the Music Center’s geographic boundaries, CEO Rachel Moore said, is part of an effort to connect with existing and new audiences. It also addresses the increasing importance of collaboration between artists, presenting partners and community members, she said.

“We have ‘opened the architecture’ of the Music Center,” Moore said in a statement. She called the initiative a natural step in the Music Center’s evolution. Home isn’t so much a place as a state of mind.

The Music Center isn’t the only arts organization looking to expand its reach by programming performances in new locations. The Center for the Art of Performance at UCLA, which presents live theater, dance, music and experimental works at Royce Hall, has joined forces with the Ace Hotel in downtown L.A. CAP UCLA will stage a third of its programming at the Ace next season.

More details of the Music Center program can be found at www.musiccenter.org/onlocation.