Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, June 16, 1990 TAG: 9006160228
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: E1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Jeff DeBell
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The catalyst was a fierce rain. It struck about an hour before curtain time on a performance by the visiting American Dance Theatre of New York, then rudely hung about instead of moving along so the performance could begin.
The show had to be moved indoors. At Lime Kiln, that means under a circus-style tent. It means the performers must adapt to a smaller stage and duck behind wobbly screens to change costumes. For the audience, it means a sawdust "floor" and folding chairs arranged in rows across the slightly canted terrain.
Not ordinarily the best of conditions for theater-going, but in this instance the alchemy took hold. Far from allowing the stage constraints to diminish their work, the dancers performed with a verve and daring to which the audience quickly and repeatedly responded.
In turn, the dancers made clear their own appreciation of an audience that was undeterred by soggy weather. The result was an intimate, we're-in-this-together atmosphere and a bracing two-way flow of energy between the entertainers and the entertained.
It didn't hurt that the dancers were of a caliber rare in these parts or that the show, an acrobatic and sexy anti-drug parable called "Lost Luggage," was brilliant in its own right.
Here's to Lime Kiln's first American Movement Festival, of which "Lost Luggage" was a part. And here's to the troupers on both sides of the footlights last Saturday night.
Family affair
The Roanoke Symphony Orchestra concert next Feb. 24 will be something of a family affair. The guest vocalist will be Philip Bond, father of orchestra conductor Victoria Bond.
Bond, a bass, has sung in Carnegie Hall and with the New York City Opera. He is a retired radiologist.
His Feb. 24 appearance with the orchestra will be part of its Sunday With the Symphony series of concerts at Cave Spring High School. He will sing an aria from Mozart's "The Marriage of Figaro" and will team with bassist William Johnston on a performance of Mozart's "Per Questa Bella Mano."
Peoples Choice
The Peoples Choice Award from the 1990 Roanoke City Art Show went to Wendy R. Watkins of Roanoke for her oil painting "Gotterdammerrung."
It is a view of what used to be Hotel Roanoke from what used to be the Jefferson Street viaduct.
The award is worth $100 to Watkins. The selection was made by vote of the some 7,200 visitors to the 11th annual exhibit, which recently concluded.
Photographs or photo-process works, which were numerous in the show, walked away with all of the corporate and government purchase awards. The city bought pieces by Stephanie Klein, Jefferson Steele, Linda White and Don Petersen for its public collection. Corporate purchase awards went to photographers Petersen and Bob Sulkin.
Yeatts tour
Jim Yeatts will lead an informal tour through his exhibition at the Roanoke Museum of Fine Arts on Saturday, June 23.
The tour will start at 11 a.m. and is open to the public at no charge.
The exhibition, which spans Yeatts' career of 50 years in his native Roanoke, has proved to be one of the most popular in the museum's history. There have been almost 8,000 visitors at last count.
The show will remain in place until July 15 in the museum's first-floor gallery in Center in the Square.
The museum, which has been closed Mondays since the opening of Center in the Square in 1983, will end that policy starting July 9. Monday hours will be 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
RSO Youth Institute
The Roanoke Symphony Orchestra's Summer Youth Institute starts today at Ferrum College. Fifty-four musicians, including members of the Roanoke Youth Symphony and other young players from the area, are enrolled for the week of private lessons and ensemble and orchestral training.
Faculty and student recitals will take place the evenings of June 21 and 22, respectively, and the weeklong residential institute will conclude the morning of June 23 with the youth symphony summer performance.
All performances are open to the public at no charge. For details, call the symphony office in Roanoke at 343-9127.
Mill Mountain budget
Mill Mountain Theatre has adopted a budget of $980,755 for fiscal 1991. The fiscal 1990 budget was $932,496.
Based on the experience of this season, during which attendance has fallen below expectations on a number of plays, theater officials have lowered 1991 ticket sales projections by nearly $100,000. They have raised unearned income projections by a roughly corresponding amount, encouraged by the results of this year's newly aggressive campaign for donations and underwriting.
On the expenditure side, most of the budget increase is accounted for by salaries and raises.
There will be five plays on Mill Mountain's main stage and five in the smaller Theatre B during fiscal 1991. Two of the Theatre B productions will be part of the second annual Norfolk Southern Festival of New Works.
by CNB