A trio of cast members from “Wicked,” the smash Broadway hit based on “Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West,” imparted the rigors of live performance upon 88 students at a TexARTS workshop Saturday morning. The national tour wrapped its stint in Austin over the weekend at Bass Concert Hall in the University of Texas Performing Arts Center.

“Wicked” tells the tale of the land of L. Frank Baum’s Oz from the perspective of the witches.

Anne Brummel, understudy for the role of Elphaba and ensemble member, told students that musicals demand an array of skills from the cast.

“You have to sing, dance, act. In some musicals, you have to play an instrument. It’s getting more and more specific as to what you have to know,” Brummel said.

She worked with students on conveying performance and emotion through vocals and said she was impressed with how children retain a lot of information in a short amount of time.

As she went over alto lines with students, she stressed the need to put energy into vocals as much as dance moves.

“The audience can hear what you’re feeling,” she explained.

Dance captain swing Jeremy Duvall said he enjoyed the students’ enthusiasm as he taught them moves from “Dancing Through Life,” the dance that sparks the friendship of Elphaba, who later becomes the Wicked Witch of the West, and Glinda, who soon becomes the Good Witch of the North.

“They were all very eager to learn, which is definitely a positive aspect,” Duvall said.

Kylah Schmidt, 10, of Lakeway said she realized the road to being a professional dancer wouldn’t be as easy as looking for yellow bricks.

“I was surprised by how much work goes into performing,” Kylah said.

Ensemble member Nathan Peck taught younger students not only choreography from “Dancing Through Life” and “One Short Day” but also how understanding the background or meaning of a scene can enhance a dancer’s presentation.

Peck said he wants to show children that they can make a living as a professional actor or dancer.

“It’s not just a silly pipe dream,” he said.

After working on vocals and dance, students had the chance to ask their teachers some questions.

A student asked what keeps the professionals inspired.

“One of the most amazing things about working in theater is that it’s always different,” Peck said, adding that the chance for a random light to go out or an instrument in the orchestra to blare off key keeps actors and dancers on their toes.

“Because you’re always aware, you’re always invested,” he said. “TV and film don’t have the immediacy that theater does.”

When Kalie Naftzger, 12, saw Wicked on Aug. 16, she wanted to try out those moves and vocals at the workshop.

“It was cool to see their positions and precise hand movements,” Kalie said. “It did inspire me. It motivated me to see these people working hard who have become somebody.”

TexARTS production of “Nunsense” is set for Sept. 25 to Oct. 11. For information on the association’s off-Broadway 2009-10 series, visit tex-ARTS.org.

The first official program of the 2009-10 season will feature Matt Wilson energizing the crowd with Rock ‘n Roll on Saturday, Sept. 12. Wilson has toured in the “Piano Man,” and with the Billy Joel musical “Movin’ Out.” This performance, like the others in the season series, will start at 7 p.m. at the Spicewood Vineyards Event Center.
Less than a month later, Donna Ingham, a Spicewood resident, storyteller and author will again delight the audience with her nearly believable, hilarious collection of stories. Don Sanders will complement the oral exploits, performing cowboy songs and stories while accompanying himself with guitar, spoons and harmonica. This “Tellabration” comes out of the chute on Oct. 9. If last year’s sellout performance is any indicator, tickets will be exhausted shortly, despite more than doubling our seating capacity at the Vineyards.
The next event will be the 7th Annual Arts Round-Up on the weekend of Oct. 24-25, starting at 10 a.m. on Saturday and Sunday. This is a fine art festival featuring Hill Country Artists, many of whom are your neighbors. There will be pottery, glass art, oil, watercolor, pastel, colored pencil on wood, photography, large metal sculpture, hand made fabrics, jewelry, fine woodwork, and paper sculpture. Each afternoon will feature live musical entertainment – Floyd Domino on Saturday afternoon and Liz Morphis on Sunday afternoon. Food will be available on site. The Society is raffling three juried pieces of art this year, by Richard Hess (a raku pottery horse), Elizabeth Sullivan (watercolor painting), and Patricia Day (a hand woven Hopi Coat). As in years past, the event is held in the rustic setting of the stable area of the old Paleface Ranch Headquarters on Texas 71 West opposite Paleface Ranch Road.
After the holidays, we celebrate the New Year on Jan. 23, 2010 with the Austin Lounge Lizards. This Austin based group composes its own satirical lyrics for folk, country and bluegrass music and along the way pokes fun at everything from songs to politics, and the general condition of mankind.
On Feb. 20, SAS will host one of the winners of the prestigious Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. Given the level of skill required to compete, much less win this award, assures us of an incredible evening of classical music.
Albert and Gage will light up the hall with their variety of folk, country, blues and bluegrass music on March 6. This popular duo is based in Austin and performs across Texas, Louisiana and more. Singly and together they have nine current CD’s. Christine Albert composes and sings a variety of music with a French flavor bestowed on her by her French maternal lineage. Chris Gage is an accomplished musician and singer, who is facile with multiple instruments. This is sure to be a favorite performance.
The Texas Gypsies close out the season on May 14 with a lively show of Swing Jazz, Western Swing and more. This group of four musicians lives up to its gypsy name by performing at multiple venues across the state. The two guitars, violin and bass promise a lively performance to send us into summer.
As stated previously, all performances, except for the Arts Round-Up Fine Art Festival, are held at the new Event Center at the Spicewood Vineyards and will begin at 7 p.m.. Further details of the performances and other Arts Society activities are available on Society’s web site, www.SpicewoodArts.org, or by calling 264-2820. Season tickets are available on the web sitie, as are tickets for individual performances. Each performance includes a “Meet the Artist” reception, during which we serve hors d’oeuvre and the wonderful wines of the Spicewood Vineyards will be available for purchase.
The Spicewood Arts Society is a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting and promoting the performing, visual and literary arts in the Spicewood community. Our generous donors and fund raising activities enable the society to provide performances at the local elementary school. The shows have become very popular with the students and allow them to experience the arts, be it pottery making, storytelling or music. In addition, for the last two years, the society has provided significant funding for the school’s annual publication of students’ creative works.

The three advanced students — who study in TexARTS’ musical theater academy, youth ballet and theater classes — are studying from some of the best directors, teachers and performers that the CCM program — and New York — have to offer while they stay in Cincinnati Conservatory dorms along with scores of other talented students from that program and others around the country.
“Todd [Dellinger, TexARTS co-founder] and I started the conversation with CCM following our hugely successful CATS summer intensive, and the folks there were excited to create this exchange program for our students and theirs,” said co-founder Robin Lewis. “Since the TexARTS mission is rooted in training young people and exposing them to the best professionals from New York, Los Angeles and top univiersity programs nation-wide, the exchange opportunity with such an esteemed program is just the beginning of fulfilling TexARTS’ potential to be among the top in the nation.”
Three Cincinnati Conservatory students lived with TexARTS families this past June as they fulfilled their end of the exchange participating in TexARTS’ “Grease” intensive and performing along with the 84 other young people enrolled in that popular program. The students, as well as their parents visiting from Cincinnati, were thrilled at the opportunity and blown away by the caliber of instruction, the guest artists such as Laura Osnes from the NBC reality series “You’re the One that I Want” and Broadway revival of “Grease” and Barry Pearl, who starred as Doody in the John Travolta film.
TexARTS planted the seeds for this terrific opportunity three years ago when founder and Broadway stage veteran Lewis invited the program’s director, Deann Brill, in to teach TexARTS youth as part of TexARTS’ Broadway and University Guest Artist/Teacher program (which that year also included the heads of Oklahoma University’s musical theater voice program, the head of Acting at UT Austin and the head of Acting at the renowned Carnegie-Mellon University, along with stars of Broadway’s CATS, Beauty & the Beast and more). Lewis guest taught for the Cincinnati Program as well, and will teach there again this month.
“I’ve learned more here at TexARTS in three weeks than I have up until this point,” said Cincinnati student Ian Gregory Hill, who played Doody in the TexARTS production in June. “It’s been such a great experience for me.”
Fellow Cincinnati exchange student Lauren Garriott reflected similar sentiments.
“I’ve made such great friends here,” Garriott said. “I’ve never worked with such a talented group of kids — it’s been amazing.”
Celebrating their newly-acquired gift of Texas gab, they were proud to say “We’re gonna miss ‘All Y’All’” which drew cheers from their Lakeway and Austin counterparts. Slota, Erxleben and Gibson will return from their experience in Cincinnati at the end of this month.
For information on this and other unique TexARTS educational programs, visit www.tex-arts.org or call TexARTS at 852-9079, extension 103.

The recently-formed “I Live Here I Give Here” institution hosted a panel discussion July 24 on the topic of Austin’s culture of creativity.
The meeting, held in front of a crowd of 70 arts patrons and donors at the Mexic-Arte Museum on Congress Street, examined issues facing institutions providing services in support of and helping to foster the Austin region’s culture of creativity.
“We’re only now really able to begin to catch up with the fundraising that is so vital to our long-term success and stability,” Dellinger said “In order for TexARTS to stay a vital contributor to the arts and culture of Austin and, more immediately, Lakeway and surrounding communities, we must now garner the support of individuals and businesses who recognize the great asset which we are creating for the community, its young people and its future.”
Dellinger was joined by directors of Austin’s Theater Action Project, Mexic-Arte Museum, Tapestry Dance and Austin Circle of Theaters for the lively discussion that occurred over lunch as part of a monthly series of panels focusing on a variety of nonprofit issues and bringing experts together with others in the field of focus as well as donors and potential other supporters and board members.
The discussion centered primarily on the challenges which these arts and cultural leaders face in this time of economic uncertainty and how each institution approaches their various situations.
Dellinger was able to report that TexARTS, unlike others represented on the panel, has demonstrated remarkable growth and expansion over the past year — mainly due to its having taken on new studios and developing a professional theater at 2300 Lohman’s Spur in Lakeway.
However, he cautioned that no arts agency can ever be certain of its economic future, noting that, while TexARTS’ business model has allowed for a much smaller percentage of contributed-to-earned income to maintain stability and grow in comparison with other larger, top-heavier institutions, it is nonetheless more vulnerable since it has not yet been able to focus on fundraising to build cash reserves that could lessen the impact of downturns in enrollment and/or attendance. Having really just begun anew with the advent of its new space despite having been founded in late 2005, TexARTS has been quite fortunate that it’s fiscally-responsible approach has kept it from falling the way so many other nonprofits have nation-wide.
The mission of the panel’s hosting institution, “I Live Here, I Give Here,” is to help educate potential donors and the broader community of the important role which philanthropic involvement in our region’s charitable, cultural and educational institutions’ plays in their ability to maintain and grow.
To learn more about how you can support TexARTS’ educational, artistic, scholarship and other programs, visit www.Tex-ARTS.org.

The three week ballet intensive culminates July 25-26 in a full performance of the piece, set to the original Stravinsky score. The event takes place in TexARTS’ Kam & James Morris Theater at TexARTS’ Keller Williams Studios at 2300 Lohman’s Spur in Lakeway.
“TexARTS strives to create a broad-view, integrated approach when teaching the various arts disciplines to young people,” said TexARTS co-founder and executive director Todd Dellinger. “While we provide the very best professional teachers and a strong technique-based training in the particular area of focus — in this case ballet — we believe that introducing and involving students in various other facets of the whole process helps create a more rounded understanding of the art and craft of performance and, ultimately, a more rounded individual. After all, this is what is needed when students progress to higher education and real-world experiences, whether in the arts or in any other aspect of their lives.”
TexARTS’ Youth Ballet Theater director Lisl Vaillant-McDonald, whose extensive performing credits include eight years in the corps d’ballet and Meg Giry understudy in the smash hit “The Phantom of the Opera” as well as with the “Stars of the New York City Ballet” and “Stars of the American Ballet Theater,” and teaching at the esteemed “The Rock” school in Pennsylvania and for Austin Ballet, is setting her original choreography on the student performers, aged seven through eighteen and teaching advanced technique to the students each day of the three-week program.
Students also learn from academy administrator and teacher Megan Bettis and Artistic Director and Broadway stage veteran Robin Lewis, as well as various elements of stage production from various guests.
Younger students will have created their own “monster” masks, unitards and various scenic elements and older students will have helped in the crafting of costumes and scenic elements to help them understand the integral other areas of making a production successful and beautiful to watch. In addition to the performance of “Firebird” students will also showcase character work learned in class and younger students will showcase some of the unique “Fosse” style learned from Robin Lewis, who performed in the hit musical of the same name on Broadway.
The Firebird is a non-ticketed event, with contributions benefitting the TexARTS Youth Ballet Program and Scholarships encouraged. RSVP by calling TexARTS at 852-9079, extension 104.
For more information on TexARTS’ ballet and other dance programs and youth performance opportunities, visit www.Tex-ARTS.org or call 852-9079, extension 103.

 “It’s a wonderful haunting,” Pearl said of the musical. “It will haunt me until my dying day, in a positive way.”
He spent last week playing improvisation and acting games with the young cast of TexARTs currently running production of the classic.
“All of the stuff I’ve gotten to do since the movie transcends the initial experience,” he said. “Meeting the people I do, seeing generation after generation get hooked.”
He said that each time a new company performs the play, it transforms, and that he has thoroughly enjoyed helping to bring it to the Lakeway stage.
“They surprise the heck out of you,” he said of the level of talent he saw out of the young cast. “Any of them that have made it this far have the sparks.”
During part of the classes, the students and Pearl played a game called, “The Department Store,” where students acting as patrons had to go up to an information booth and ask for various items, all from the 50s.
“The person playing Kenickie came up, and in the words of Grease, asked for ‘A four-speed on the floor,’” he said. The other student in the game immediately picked up and the two began into the lyrics of the song.
“They took it out of context and put it into the game, that’s what it’s all about,” he said.
Still active in the theatre, Pearl most recently performed in the tour of Happy Days, but spends much of his time teaching.
“It all works together, the teaching teaches me. The more I work, the more I put it all together,” he said.
Pearl was also known for his roll as Professor Tinkerputt on Bedtime with Barney: Imagination Island. He holds a

“He grew up on a reservation and his grandfather was a code-talker in World War II,” Chris Payne of Mountain Trails Gallery said of the artist. “His family was rounded up by Kit Carson.”
Natiya began sculpting more than ten years ago and has done several monuments that represent his people. Payne said “Legends of the Shadow,” had been in the works for more than two years.”
“The foundry process to cast it into bronze takes about six months,” he said.
The near life-size statue depicts a Native American man bound to an eagle flying out from buffalo and another Native American another wearing a bearskin. It sits near the entryway to a restaurant along with other works by Natiya and artists from Mountain Trails Gallery.

 They say golf is contagious. I don’t know if that is true — but laughter certainly is — and from the opening number you will find yourself in stitches as the gifted cast keeps the crazy metaphors flying non-stop.
While I don’t know squat about golf, I do know a good show when I see one, and this one is a sure-fire hit, With the popularity of golf in the Lake Travis area, I can’t find one good reason why every resident wouldn’t enjoy taking this musical comedy in for a great evening of entertainment.
Directed by Joel Blum, who was in the original off-Broadway cast at the John Houseman Theatre, performs triple duty by directing, acting and choreographing he show. He is joined in the cast by fellow Broadway veteran Daniel Herron (lead tenor from Mel Brooks’ “The Producers” and Austin favorite Jill Blackwood. Joe Penrod rounds out the cast. The acting is spot-on. And contrary to popular belief, it is much tougher to play comedy than drama. The musical numbers are also perfectly performed. But don’t just take my word for it — ask your neighbors — my e-mail box has been brimming with raves about the show.
The show features evening performances Thursday, Friday and Saturdays with two Sunday matinee through May 10. The performances will take place at the TexARTS Kam & James Morris Theater at Keller Williams Studios (2300 Lohman’s Spur, at RR 620, just inside Lakeway). Evening performances will be performed at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday matinees will be at 2 and 7 p.m.
Tickets are $30-$40 (cocktail seating) and can be obtained by calling TexARTS at 512-852-9079 extension 101 or on-line thru www.Tex-ARTS.org and/or NowPlayingAustin.com\Austix.