Just in time for Tosca, Opera Tampa’s Emmy®-winning hair designer divulges trade secrets about one of the great characters in opera—the wig. Dawn Rivard’s impressive résumé of hairstyling and wigbuilding gigs spans from the ‘90s television series Animorphs to this year’s breakaway series The Handmaid’s Tale. She’s worked on the major motion reboots of Total... Continue Reading →
How the Arts Change the Lives of America’s Wounded Warriors On any given day in America, between one and 20 veterans commit suicide. However, arts experiences help military personnel and their families amid the psychological and physical consequences of time at war. This grim statistic from research by the United States Department of Veterans Affairs... Continue Reading →
When The Daily Show senior political correspondent Hasan Minhaj needed a dope illustrator to make pieces for his upcoming show Homecoming King, he called on his buddy Sam Spratt. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4DORh3n9uE A Brooklyn-based digital painter—a classic oil technique used on computer tablets—Spratt graduated from Savannah College of Art and Design in 2010 and took to the... Continue Reading →
Need a song-and-dance cabaret act for your next event? Look no further than Ovation!, the Patel Conservatory’s traveling troupe of professionally trained entertainers for hire. For a few years, a delightful idea from the Patel Conservatory’s theater department rolled around in The Straz’s creative hopper: what if ... is it possible ... could we have... Continue Reading →
Mary Shelley, the first science fiction novel and why Victor Frankenstein is not just a deadbeat dad but the worst human ever. It literally was a dark and stormy night. In 1816. Self-appointed (accurately) poetic geniuses Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley lounged in Byron’s Swiss chalet during one of the darkest, rainiest summers on... Continue Reading →
You don’t have to have a lot of money to study the performing arts. If you have a child or child in your life who has dreams, talent or just plain curiosity, we have scholarship opportunities to help them get the classes they need. The next Patel Conservatory scholarship deadline is Dec. 3, 2016. This... Continue Reading →
Carole King, one of the greatest American songwriters of the 20th century, started with a piano melody. As the song took shape, she added layers, eventually adding lyrics — first with her then-husband Gerry Goffin and eventually on her own. Tapestry, her seminal 1971 solo album, remained on the Billboard charts for six years, top... Continue Reading →
The Thursday night show during each Broadway run has a special performer, one whose acting and choreography chops never make a sound. As part of its Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) initiative, the Straz Center secures a sign language interpreter for the Thursday night show in the Broadway series, with The Illusionists being the first... Continue Reading →
“The Arts Endowment’s mission was clear – to spread this artistic prosperity throughout the land, from the dense neighborhoods of our largest cities to the vast rural spaces, so that every citizen might enjoy America’s great cultural legacy.” --from National Endowment for the Arts: A History 1965-2008 During the desultory years of the Great Depression,... Continue Reading →
The Patel Conservatory Gears Up for Another School Year There’s no such thing as summer break for the faculty and staff of the Straz Center’s Patel Conservatory. We spend the summer months steeped in a camps, classes, workshops, performances and pre-professional productions like this year’s impressive mounting of an almost full-scale Les Miserables. So, we... Continue Reading →
This week, we are pulling a little sleight-of-hand by sharing this “Behind the Persona” feature from the Straz Center’s INSIDE magazine featuring Yu Ho-Jin, The Manipulator, from The Illusionists, which returns to Tampa Sept. 23. How did you get started in the business? I got into magic at the age of nine after witnessing a... Continue Reading →
In the early 1990’s, a young professor in the Department of Modern Languages at Carnegie Mellon University happened to join a walking tour of Ybor City with renowned local history experts, Dr. Gary Mormino and E.J. Salcines, during a small gathering of peers at the University of South Florida. The tour concluded in the ornate... Continue Reading →
The Tampa-Cuba cultural connection There was a time not so long ago when Tampa belonged, in heart and mind, to Cuba. In late 19th century Ybor City and West Tampa, Cuban immigrants recreated their homeland, to the best of their ability, while they powered the burgeoning cigar-making industry. Cuban-flavored Spanish rippled through the factories as... Continue Reading →
Early childhood research reveals the critical developmental need for youngsters to participate in the arts, and many performing arts schools ensure there will be a future generation of outstanding American artists. What we sometimes forget to talk about is who, if anyone, will be in the theater seats when this next generation takes the stage.... Continue Reading →
Better Living Through Chemistry The human brain, full of its folds and electric highways and chemical conversations, brews in the skull like a micro-universe, hailed by many as the most complex organism in the known universe—the ever-expanding, macro one. When scientists and researchers began opening the doors of how music affects the brain, no one... Continue Reading →
Caught in the Act caught up with National Geographic photographer Vincent J. Musi a few weeks ago to talk about his ever-evolving career with the organization that may have invented the “dream job” category for photographers and writers. In this blog, we share excerpts from the interview, where Vince reveals the unique workaday moments on... Continue Reading →
Speak and Be Known The theater as a place of personal and social power This blog is the last in a series of five on Art as a Survival Tool, blogs that examine the crucial role art plays in the fulfillment of the human experience. When pernicious ideas overtake the rules of man, performing arts... Continue Reading →
Good Vibrations Polyrhythms, sound healing and the significance of vibration This blog is the third in a series of five on Art as a Survival Tool, blogs that examine the crucial role art plays in the fulfillment of the human experience. Famed scientist Nikola Tesla once revealed “if you want to know the secrets of... Continue Reading →
Art of Healing with Breast Cancer Survivors This blog is the second in a series of five on Art as a Survival Tool, blogs that examine the crucial role art plays in the fulfillment of the human experience. A phoenix. A lotus. A human heart. These are some of the images women chose to design... Continue Reading →
Creativity and Mental Illness Embracing a Life ‘Touched with Fire’ This blog is the first in a series of five on Art as a Survival Tool, blogs that examine the crucial role art plays in the fulfillment of the human experience. VanGogh and his ear. Marilyn Monroe and her everything. Mozart. Robin Williams. Nina Simone.... Continue Reading →