HOUSTON RESTAURANTS, BARS and other venues are getting in on the month of fun with specials and donation opportunities in celebration of the LGBTQ+ community. From glittering rainbow cake to eye-popping cocktails and rooftop movies, check out these local spots.
Bagel Shop Bakery
Bagel Shop Bakery (photo by Becca Wright)
For guests observing Pride Month, the classic, plain-flavored Rainbow Bagel ($2.50) is a festive menu option or colorful surprise for friends and loved ones you want to treat. Bagel Shop Bakery is closed on Saturday.
Common Bond
Common Bond
With its flagship location situated in the heart of Montrose, Common Bond is giving back to the supportive LGBTQ community that helped grow the restaurant group. This month, the bakery-café will donate a portion of proceeds from Pride themed desserts to the Montrose Center. Desserts include Rainbow Pride Cake: an 8-inch diameter vanilla layered cake filled with vanilla buttercream and topped with white chocolate ganache drip and rainbow sprinkles (available at Bistro Locations, sold whole and by the slice). There’s also a Pride Mini Loaf Cake (available at On-The-Go locations), and Fruity Pebbles Macarons (all locations).
Dessert Gallery
Dessert Gallery
Dessert Gallery is proud to announce that 20 percent of all purchases from this menu will be donated to community partner, Allies in Hope (formerly known as AIDS Foundation of Houston.) This year’s Pride Month menu includes Pride cake (9-inch) or by the slice, Pride hand-decorated butter cookies, chocolate petit fours, and chocolate and vanilla cupcakes.
Hilton Americas-Houston
Hilton Americas
All month long, buzzy lobby bar and rooftop lounge R24 will offer the Citrus Rainbow Fizz, a refreshing cocktail made with sparkling wine, Kettle One Botanical Rose, grapefruit juice and pamplemousse liqueur ($16). Layered rainbow cake is also on offer by the slice ($12).
Arnaldo Richards' Picos
Guests of the authentic Mexican restaurant can choose a donation table when making reservations via resy.com and 20 percent of their dinner tab will be donated to Montrose Grace Place in support of the organization’s ongoing efforts to provide youth experiencing homelessness of all sexualities and genders. The featured cocktail of the month is the Bacardi Mojito Bucket, a combo of Bacardi Superior, lime, mint and Topo Chico ($15).
Rooftop Cinema Club
Rooftop Cinema
Craving the great outdoors while the weather is still mild? Catch a flick on the spacious rooftop at this Uptown club. This month’s Pride series will include titles such as The Rocky Horror Picture Show, She’s the Man, Set it Off, Jennifer’s Body and more. For every ticket sold, Rooftop Cinema Club will donate $1 to Lambda Legal, a civil rights organization.
POST Houston
Post Houston Skylawn
Throughout the month of June, POST will display rainbow lighting on the exterior of its sprawling building. On June 3, grab a yoga mat and a friend for Pride Yoga on the Skylawn with Black Swan Yoga at 11am. It’s free!
Postino
Postino
Celebrate Pride with everyday happy hour: $6 glasses of wine and pitchers of beer until 5pm. Previously the Montrose Mining Co., the Postino Montrose location was also formerly home to other safe havens such as Uncle Charlie’s, Pacific Street Station, and the Tattooed Lady.
The Original Ninfa's
The Original Ninfas
Throughout the month of June, both The Original Ninfa’s locations will offer a juicy Watermelon Mojito (white rum, watermelon juice, lime juice, simple syrup, mint leaves) for $13. One dollar of each beverage sold will be donated to GLAAD, the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation.
Gong Cha
Gong Cha's Pride Lemon Ai Love Yu bubble tea (photo by Jayna Kropas)
Specializing in bubble tea, Gong Cha now has four stores in the Greater Houston area. This month, a portion of every purchase of its special Lemon Ai Love Yu bubble tea will directly benefit the National Queer Asian Pacific Islander Alliance (NQAPIA) in name of #Equalitea. The Pride drink is a sweet and tart bubble tea with white pearls and edible glitter for some extra festive sparkle.
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PENNSYLVANIA-BORN MEZZO-soprano Jillian Krempasky relocated to Houston in 2020 to get her master’s in Voice Performance at Rice University, and like many classical musician transplants, decided to stay upon completing her degree. “It’s not the weather or the cockroaches,” laughs Krempasky when asked what compelled her to stay in H-Town. “It’s definitely the music."
Krempasky has since enjoyed acclaim for her performances with Musiqa and on chamber music concerts as a DACAMERA Young Artist. Last summer, she traveled to Croatia to record Dancing in the Palm of God’s Hand, a song cycle in five movements for voice, alto saxophone, and orchestra composed by her former fave undergrad music theory teacher from Westminster Choir College, J.A. Kawarsky. The recording was released both physically and digitally last Friday on Navona Records, the classical imprint of music production house PARMA Recordings. (Other Houston artists who have released albums on Navona include Duo Dramatique and the Axiom Quartet.)
The text for Dancing in the Palm of God’s Hand is by poet Stacey Zisook Robinson, who died in 2021 at age 59 of Covid-19. Recording the song cycle became a way to honor Robinson, who was a close friend of Kawarsky, and much of the text concerns preparing the let go of life and the journey to wherever one goes next after death. But Krempasky feels the lightness and seriousness of the work’s title speaks volumes. “Dr. Kawarsky is a very funny man,” says Krempasky. “While there are beautiful, serious moments in the music, there are also really funny moments.”
Dancing in the Palm of God’s Hand was recorded with the Zagreb Festival Orchestra in a concert hall designed for chamber music performance. While Krempasky had traveled previously to Italy, Croatia was an entirely new experience for her. “I was so excited,” says Krempasky, remembering how she felt on the flight, which took 11 hours with a stopover in Frankfurt. She found the people in Croatia and the team at Parma to be “kind and welcoming,” and the orchestra ready to play, despite not having looked at the music until shortly before the recording and Dian Tchobanov coming in at a last minute to conduct the piece. “They really pulled it together,” says Krempasky of all of the musicians involved. “I was amazed by their professionalism and their ability to just step up and do it.”
The recording process went fast, with no time for Krempasky to stop to listen back to takes and mull over what she liked or didn’t like about her singing. Having thoroughly studied and rehearsed the music beforehand, Krempasky decided to just “let go,” and trust that what she was doing was right. “My goal vocally was to find a sound that serves the music,” says Krempasky. “I worked to make my voice more intimate; like a sound that’s expressive, and not just about being ‘correct.’”
Like many young musicians, Krempasky listens to music on Spotify or YouTube, and finds owning physical media, like a CD or a vinyl record, a little unusual. “Now I have these CDs with my name on the back,” says Krempasky, who is very pleased with how the final recording turned out. “I’m just going to place them on the mantel and be proud of them.”
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