Copious Notes

Laura Campbell, 18; Bryce Hood, 17; and Emily Curtis, 16, perform the title song from "Rent" during a workshop at the University of Kentucky's Schmidt Vocal Arts Center, Jan. 3, 2009. Photos by Rich Copley | LexGo.com.

The workshop participants are singing “Will I lose my dignity?” the chorus from “Rent” in which members of an HIV support group wonder what lies ahead for them.

“What does making contact mean?” director Tracey Bonner asks the participants in the workshop, who have given up a holiday weekend to be in this pre-audition tune-up for SummerFest’s production of “Rent.”

To some, contact means eyes meet. Others say it is just a matter of feeling someone’s presence. Others feel left out.

Tracey Bonner talks to workshop particpants.

Bonner guides the participants into another rendition of the chorus, trying to push them to move beyond singing and acting and find connection.

To Bonner, that’s what “Rent” is about: “being those open, vulnerable human beings, willing to show all these scars.”

In directing “Rent,” her first Lexington production since Paragon Music Theatre’s inaugural production of “State Fair” in 2004, Bonner knows she is taking on a show fraught with emotion. Jonathan Larson’s Pulitzer Prize- and Tony Award-winning musical tells the story of a group of artists living in New York’s Lower East Side at the dawn of the AIDS epidemic. Her production will be the first one presented by a Central Kentucky theater group.

“I want to create our ‘Rent’ for our community and how it speaks to our community,” Bonner says over a latte at Common Grounds Coffee Shop, the morning after the workshops.

Not that she instantly took the job.

Brandon Smith leads a movement class during the musical theater workshop. Tracey Bonner says more choreography may be a signature of her "Rent."

Bonner, a Paul Laurence Dunbar High School graduate, actually witnessed “Rent” mania first hand living in New York, close the to Nederlander Theatre in the early days of the show’s almost 13-year run. She didn’t become a “Renthead,” but directed many friends to the theater when they came to town and sometimes accompanied them.

When SummerFest artistic director Joe Ferrell called Bonner in California, where she teaches at three colleges including the University of California at Irvine, she asked to think about it and went to a Long Beach production to refresh her memory.

Two other things gave her pause: The prospect of coming home to direct, “because people view you as you were as a kid,” and the question of whether the talent was here to pull off a production.

The workshop, she said, really helped answer her questions about whether the talent was here to credibly present the show, which is not a typical musical.

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Patricia Clark, director of the Kentuckly Classical Theatre Conservatory, talks to students in a musical theater workshop Jan. 3, 2010 in the Schmidt Vocal Arts Center on the University of Kentucky Campus. Photos by Rich Copley | LexGo.com.

Instructors and directors would come up to her and talk about students that had gone through the Kentucky Classical Theatre Conservatory and its former incarnation as the Lexington Shakespeare Institute, which Clark has overseen. They would comment on how well versed the students were on things like Ann Bogart’s Viewpoints method and skills like stage combat.

“They’d say, ‘Whatever you’re doing, you’re doing it right,’” Clark said.

But, for the most part, the conservatory was doing it only in the summertime, in conjunction with Summerfest, the three-week outdoor theater festival in the Arboretum on Alumni Drive.

That’s been changing the past few months, though. The conservatory and the organizations’ stage productions aim to become a year-round enterprise.

“We have wonderful talent here that needs as many opportunities to develop as possible,” Clark said. “To do that, we need something solid and consistent we can build on.”

KCTC and SummerFest president Joe Cannon Artz said, “The goal is to be a full-time, year-round producing organization by 2011. This will include a full calendar year of performing arts training opportunities for high school, college students and adults, plus SummerFest and two other indoor productions, one prior to SummerFest and one after.”

Artz said that the organization has been working with a consultant from the Kentucky Arts Council for a year to plan for the next steps, and the full plan will be revealed after this year’s SummerFest, July 7 to 25.

That planning will include a new name for the overall organization, including the educational outlets, though SummerFest will remain the name of the July festival.

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I was trying to break a wide-angle addiction when I took this shot of Luther Lewis III rehearsing for UK Opera Theatre's "It's a Grand Night for Singing." But here, the14mm lens caught the majesty of Luther's voice and the moment.

When producer Jeffrey Day (left) and director Jason Epperson (right) suggested we meet at the pool of a horse farm where they would be shooting their forthcoming feature, "Unrequited," it seemed like a cool opportunity for a portrait with a little "Hollywood in the Bluegrass" feel.

This was the second year I spent covering my beat with a camera in my hands a lot of the time. As I said, last year, covering stories as a writer and a photographer is an interesting approach, because you are instinctively trying to match these images to the story you are writing in your head. Or, in the case of slide shows I put together, you are trying to come up with images that tell the story.

Here are some of my favorite shots from 2009 and the stories behind them. Over the holiday weeks, I also encourage you to look out for year end packages from our amazing staff photographers. I know at least one great Lexington arts image is in that group too.

I have to confess, one of the reasons to get out the Lexington Children's Theatre's "Celebrity Celebration" show was the prospect of seeing State Sen. Kathy Stein and Lexington Legends founder Alan Stein as Becky Thatcher and Tom Sawyer.

Shooting shows has really enhanced my appreciation for set and lighting design, and I thought these next two shots of Jennifer Parr singing "Hello Young Lovers" in Paragon Music Theatre's "The King and I" (above) and Adam Luckey in SummerFest's "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" (below) really showed exquisite work.

Shooting Lexington Philharmonic guest conductor Mei-Ann Chen in a March rehearsal, at one point I chose a spot next to the violins to capture some of Chen's big expressions as she was exhorting the orchestra. I think my positioning really annoyed one of the violinists, so I tried to make quick work of the shot, which Chen helped with by concentrating on the violins for a moment. When Weekender page designer Randy Medema chose this shot to run with the story, I was really happy he validated my choice of locations -- apologies to the violins.

I don't think any actor ended up in front of my lens this year as much as this UK kid, Jeremy Gillett -- this would also indicate he's a really good actor who keeps getting cast. This moment was from a rehearsal of UK Theatre's "The African Company presents Richard III" in which Jeremy played the passionate Papa Shakespeare.

A few weeks before Studio Players' production of "Always Patsy Cline" opened, I went out to see Patsy, aka Heather Parrish, perform with her band, June July at Lower 48, which is now closed. It gave us a chance to see some of that Patsy spirit in Parrish, and another dimension to her music. Manning the bass is Ethan Hayen.

One of the cool things about being on the set of "Unrequited" in July was seeing some local talent I've covered for years, like sound engineer Wes Kawaja here, working with Hollywood talent like "Twilight's" Michael Welch, who Wes is wiring up.

Shooting drama, you like to get a picture that tells the story, and I thought this one did it for SummerFest's "Once on This Island." The Gods -- Erzulie (Alicia Helm McCorvey), Papa Ge (Jason Thompson) and Asaka (Tamera Izlar) -- conspire to play havoc with the life of Ti Moune (Tai-Kristin Smedley).

A cool thing about this job is when someone calls you up and says something like, "Want to come hear one of the first readings of Silas House's new play." Here, House listens as Missy Johnston reads some of his words in "Long Time Travelling."

And then, a few weeks later, you see the show on stage. In the world premier production of House's play at Actors Guild, Josiah Correll and Hayley Williams were Adam and Lora, childhood sweethearts who've grown apart in marriage.

Sad story behind this image. After an interview with Actors Guild artistic director Richard St. Peter and managing director Kimberly Shaw to talk about the theater's plans for the future, we went down to the Distillery District to see their new Manchester Street office, which was formerly Theo Edmonds' gallery. A month later, the theater lost its funding from LexArts and both St. Peter and Shaw left to pursue other opportunities.

I went out to shoot The City, a new band formerd to play fundraising gigs for not-for-profit groups, the day after Derby. Usually, the day after Derby, you want to just sit and stare out into space. But the music and moments like this one with drummer Arthur Rouse made the shoot a lot of fun.

Another cool thing about this gig is getting to go hear the new voice professor, soprano Cynthia Lawrence, rehearse with the UK Symphony.

In the UK Opera Theatre's world premier production of composer Joe Baber and librettist James W. Rodgers "River of Time," Billy the Barber (Reginald Smith Jr.) reminded Abraham Lincoln (Nick Provenzale) of his promise to end slavery.

I love getting great looks, great expressions, and Brittny Congleton delivered here, singing "A Little Priest" from "Sweeney Todd" with Alex Parker in a rehearsal for the UK Musical and Operetta Organization "A Night with Stephen Sondheim."

So, I'm heading out to interview iconic Kentucky photographer James Archambeault at his Scott County home, and my editor Scott Shive asks me to get a new shot of him. The one we had on file was more than a decade old. Photographing James Archambeault -- as one person said, that's sort of like cooking for Bobby Flay. But Archambeault was a prince about it, and meeting him was one of the highlights of the year for me.

If you are a musical theatre performer, Kentucky Classical Theatre Conservatory literally has a way for you to start the year off on the right foot.

Tracey Bonner, who will direct this summer’s production of “Rent” for KCTC’s SummerFest, will be leading a three-day musical theater intensive starting at 1 p.m. Jan. 1 and running through Jan. 3. Admission is $50 to the workshop, open to high school students and up.

Bonner is a Lexington native who has performed in national touring companies and regional productions as well as choreographed and directed across the country. She is currently adjunct faculty at Azusa Pacific University and Miracosta College in California.

The workshop, held at the Schmidt Vocal Arts Center across from the Singletary Center for the Arts on the University of Kentucky Campus, will focus on Rent in both individual and ensemble classes.

For an application, visit the KCTC website. For more information, call KCTC education director, Trish Clark at 859.806.7429 or kctcsummerfest@yahoo.com.

Jefferson Johnson, director of choral activities at the University of Kentucky, leads the choirs and the audience in singing "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing" at Saturday night's "Collage" performance. Photo by Rich Copley | LexGo.Com.

The University of Kentucky choirs’ holiday “Collage” concert has always been a little hard to get a handle on. No specific group is highlighted beyond a few minutes and there is no defined style, except really good music.

It’s just something you have to see, and this year’s edition is something to see.

More than 330 musicians are involved in the show that was presented Saturday night at UK’s Singletary Center for the Arts and will be presented again at 3 p.m. Sunday.

It’s a wide range of musicians. The UK Choirs are ostensibly the stars of the show, but they constantly cede the stage to other acts such as the UK Steel Band, the Lexington Singers Children’s Choir, the Alluring hand bell ensemble and some of UK’s newest faculty.

The show started in grand fashion with the combined choirs and organist Schuyler Robinson’s rendition of “Adeste fideles” (”O Come All Ye Faithful”). Then the show quickly minimalized to new UK guitar instructor Dieter Hennings with a classicaly intricate rendition of “O Little Town of Bethlehem” that had a bluesy warmth. Then the show built up again to the Steel Band, the Children’s Choir and a performance of “Santa Baby” by Paws & Listen — one of several numbers with that distinct mid-20th Century pop Christmas vibe we remember from things like celebrity holiday TV specials.

And that’s how the evening went, shifting styles and ensembles to create a show that truly lived up to its picturesque title.

The highlights included a sumptuous “Ave Maria” by the UK Men’s Chorus which highlighted their precision and sensitivity; the UK Chorale’s “Estampie natalis” with the UK Chorale and viola faculty Deborah Lander  leading an intriguing ensemble of cello, piccolo and percussion; and new voice faculty Cynthia Lawrence making you forget all those other “O Holy Nights” you’ve heard.

A few years ago, UK President Lee Todd said the UK School of Music was “on fire,” and “Collage” served as an apt illustration of that. Since then, UK has hired some stunning faculty like Lander and Lawrence, and “Collage” served as sort of this mirror showcase where the audience could see the quality of the program and how it must be attracting high quality new faculty members.

Several UK students also got to cap off very good performance years, including violinist Jessica Miskelly in a rich “Carol of the Bells” that altered my perception of it as strictly a vocal piece, SummerFest’s “Once on This Island” star Tai-Kristin Smedley singing “Somewhere in my Memory” and Reginald Smith Jr. as a featured soloist in the concert closer “Betelehemu.”

A lot of directors might have flipped the Act I finale of Handel’s “Hallelujah” chorus with the African number performed by the combined choirs and the UK African Percussion Ensemble. But with that lineup, UK director of choral activities Jefferson Johnson ended the evening showing off the great skill and diversity of the School of Music.

All that, and it was a great Christmas concert too. That’s really all we need to know.

Tracey Bonner, shown in 2000 at the Lexington Opera House, will make her Arboretum directorial debut with SummerFest's production of 'Rent.' Herald-Leader file photo by Sam Richie.

You don’t have to wait five-hundred, twenty-five thousand, six-hundred minutes for the first local production of “Rent” in Central Kentucky.

SummerFest will present Jonathan Larson’s groudbreaking Broadway musical July 21 to 25 at the Arboretum on Alumni Drive to close out a lineup that includes William Shakespeare’s “Merchant of Venice” July 7 to 11 and Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice” July 14 to 18.

Ave Lawyer (left), shown in rehearsals for Studio Players' 2003 production of "Proof." HL file photo by Joseph Rey Au.

In addition to being the first local production of “Rent,” 2010 will also be the first SummerFest/Lexington Shakespeare Festival to feature an all-female lineup of directors. Ave Lawyer will open the fest with “Venice,” Sullivan Canaday  White will direct “Pride” and Tracey Bonner will make her Arboretum directing debut with “Rent.”

Auditions for “Venice” and “Pride” will be March 26 to 28 and “Rent” will be April 9 to 11at the Schmidt Vocal Arts Center, across from the Singletary Center for the Arts on the University of Kentucky campus. All are welcome to audition, and Summerfest is specifically looking for rock vocalists for “Rent.”

Sullivan Canaday White, photographed at Actors Theatre of Louisville in 2002. HL file photo by John Sommers II.

For more information on SummerFest, go to the SummerFest website.

In addition to the SummerFest lineup, the Kentucky Classical Theatre Conservatory, which presents SummerFest, announced today that it has received a $49,000 grant from the Lucille Little Foundation to expand its educational programs to a year-round schedule. KCTC said it will announce a lineup of workshops for  high school students through adults later this month, starting with a three-day musical theater intensive in January.

Ti Moune (Tai-Kristin Smedley) is oblvious to plans being made for her by Erzulie (Alicia Helm McCorvey), Papa Ge (Jason Thompson) and Asaka (Tamera Izlar). Photo by Rich Copley | LexGo.com.

After several summers of giving us musicals with songs we know by heart, SummerFest delivers a show with a story that will stay in our hearts.

And some of the tunes may stay with us too.

Like Hair (SummerFest 2008) and Jesus Christ Superstar (2004), writer Lynn Ahrens and composer Stephen Flaherty’s Once on This Island is a distinctly contemporary musical, and it scored a 1991 Tony Award nomination for best musical (Will Rogers Follies won). A lot of people who have seen the show love it, which means it should gain some new adherents this weekend as it closes out SummerFest at the Arboretum.

In some ways, Island seems ideally suited to the Arboretum venue. It is set on a Caribbean island and its story is intertwined with nature. The gods of earth (Tamera Izlar) and the ocean (Luther Lewis III) are co-conspirators in the story of Ti Moune (Tarynn Grundy as a girl and Tai-Kristin Smedley as an adult), a peasant girl orphaned in a flood whose love and innocence eventually conquers the cruelty and vapidity of racism.

Ti Moune is convinced she was saved in the flood for a purpose, and later comes to believe that is to save Daniel (Adam Fister), a rich boy injured in a car crash during another harrowing storm. Ti Moune’s love for Daniel is at the center of a bet between Papa Ge (Jason Thompson), the demon of death, and Erzulie (Alicia Helm McCorvey), the goddess of love, as to which one is stronger.

Death, “can stop a heart from beating, but not from loving,” Erzulie tells Papa Ge in a line you should pay attention to.

The strength in Margo Buchanan’s production is several of the performances and her often telling staging.

One of the best moments is when Daniel sings Some Girls to Ti Moune. All the while, on a platform above and behind them, Andrea (Taylor Eldred), the rich girl Daniel’s been promised to since childhood, is getting ready for the dance they will all attend. It’s visually as telling as the lyric, “Some girls you marry, and some girls you love.” Pay attention to that one, too.

Fister you’ll remember as Claude in Hair. Smedley is the first performer in the show who truly fills the Arboretum when she enters singing Waiting for Life. She provides the show with a sweet star to root for. Thompson as her nemisis, Papa Ge, is also a commanding presence in a his voice, laugh and lithe movement.

As Ti Moune’s adoptive mother, Julie-Ann Aguhob builds on her head turning performance at Grand Night for Singing in June, though she was one of several performers plagued by microphone problems Thursday night.

Despite the appropriateness of the outdoor setting, the show sometimes has trouble filling the Arboretum, in some cases due to the lightness of Flaherty’s touch. Some airy, transitional moments have trouble competing with the surroundings, such as the Arboretum’s location near two hosptials (with emergency rooms).

What does work really well in that atmosphere is Island’s format with storytellers relaying the tale in its immediacy and history of class conflict and island legend. Even if, at the back of the amphitheater, you miss some subtle moments between characters, you get the broad themes of nature and love overcoming the unnatural barriers people put between themselves.

No, not everything works in Once on This Island. But a lot does, and who doesn’t want a little island get away on a summer night?

SummerFest closes out its 2009 season with the musical Once on This Island by writer Lynn Ahrens and composer Stephen Flaherty. The musical tells the story of Ti Moune, a peasant girl in Haiti who believes the gods spared her life so she could save a rich boy, Daniel, and fall in love with him. The production is directed by Margo Buchanan. Performances are July 22-26 at the Arboretum on Alumni Drive. Photos by Rich Copley | staff.

Feature: UK Opera students spend summer exploring musical theater in Once on This Island.

Tai-Kristin Smedley is Ti Moune, Luther Lewis III is Agwe, Manuel Castillo is Armand, and Taylor Eldred is Andrea in SummerFest's production of "Once on This Island" at the Arboretum on Alumni Drive July 22-26. Photos by Rich Copley | LexGo.com.

University of Kentucky opera singers aren’t developing their musical theater skills only at It’s a Grand Night for Singing.

This week, in Once on This Island, ­SummerFest fans will see students’ increasing ­efforts to diversify their talents.

While many of their ­colleagues in the UK School of Music headed off to summer festivals, workshops and other programs across the country and overseas, four students stayed in Lexington to be part of the cast of the musical, based in part on The Little Mermaid.

For doctoral student Manuel Castillo, it is a first brush with musical theater.

“I don’t have a lot of ­experience with musicals, so I knew it would be a good ­opportunity to learn and get a little taste of it,” says Castillo, 35, from Guadalajara, Mexico.

For Taylor Eldred, the show is familiar territory. The ­Lexington native was in shows in the Arboretum when the event was the Lexington ­Shakespeare Festival, and she was in a production of Once on This Island at the School for the Creative and Performing Arts.

Margo Buchanan.

But none of those ­productions was under the ­direction of her college acting coach, Margo Buchanan.

“When Margo said she was doing Once on This Island out at the park, I said, that’s a great opportunity to be out there with the family,” says Eldred, 21, a rising senior in vocal ­performance.

Luther Lewis III, 22, and ­Tai-Kristin Smedley, 21, the other students in the cast, also got their starts in musicals, before immersing themselves in opera. All four students have sung in recent UK productions such as La Bohème and Lucia di Lammermoor.

“Vocally, it is not as hard as opera,” Castillo says of the ­musical by writer and lyricist Lynn Ahrens and composer Stephen Flaherty, whose other shows include Ragtime and Seussical.

“But there’s a lot of dancing and movement and staging, and it requires another kind of intensity in the acting.”

And there’s the point of getting opera students into musicals and on other stages.

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SummerFest presents Patti Heying’s production of Jeffrey Hatcher’s adaptation of Robert Lewis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde July 15-19, 2009, in the Arboretum on Alumni Drive. In this version, Jekyll is played by one actor (Bob Singleton) and Hyde is played by four different actors who interact with Jekyll. Photos by Rich Copley | staff.