Exploring the Arts At the Open House!

Creative Arts held a Winter Open House on Saturday, January 29th from 11am to 2pm. The Open House, a free event and perfect for all ages, offered an opportunity to explore the arts with different activity stations.

 

One of the activities offered was the instrument petting zoo! Music teachers like Roald Wilson (pictured here) helped curious participants explore different musical instruments. Roald teaches traditional piano, hammer dulcimer and kalimba. His passions include collecting (and sharing) unique musical instruments.

 

Jenna Potts, pictured here helping a visitor with a guitar, teaches Suzuki & Traditional violin. In addition to teaching at Creative Arts on Mondays and Wednesdays, Jenna is also working on a Masters Degree in Violin Performance at Longy School of Music.

Mark Dante Troiano currently teaches contemporary guitar and voice in addition to writing and performing original compositions. Mark also helped curious music lovers play the guitar during the petting zoo.

 

Participants at the instrument petting zoo experiencing the piano.

Earlier, Brent Erstad, Traditional Piano Instructor, helped students investigate the piano. Brent teaches on Wednesdays and, on the weekends, is the Music Director, Choir Master and organist at Trinity Church in Newport, RI.

Suzuki & Traditional Flute Instructor Judy Braude performs a selection of repertoire before dashing to a concert in Worcester! Judy teaches on Thursdays and also performs locally with the Reading Civic Concert Band.

The Art Department created different stations to inspire visitor's creativity! Here, Lesley King, demonstrates throwing clay on the pottery wheel to a curious student. Lesley teaches adult pottery classes including hand building and wheel throwing!

Wheel throwing is definitely messy, but also very fun! Lesley is currently in the middle of a 6 week pottery class for adults. Spring semester begins in March and the pottery class will also be offered!

The Open House also featured a theatre workshop for children ages 4-6. Children learned about Pantomime, the art of acting without talking! Student teacher, Alexander Witham as part of his Internship in theatre education, created and taught the free workshop. Here's a picture of Alexander at Halloween dressed as a Wizzard (of sorts).

More to come...Stay tuned for Part 2 of the Open House...the Musical Perform-a-thon!

Supporting the Arts One Sip at a Time

On Saturday, Jan 22nd The Wine Shop of Reading and The Chocolate Truffle sponsored an evening of tastings to support Creative Arts!

Along with delicious chocolate samples and fine wine pairings, the event also featured craft beer and savory cheese tasting!

Here, volunteer Amanda Foulds samples craft wheat beer.

Nate Shaffer, piano student of Roald Wilson, provides excellent wine tasting music.

The Wine Shop cheese selections and one of the featured paintings by Visual Arts Instructor, Dennis Hart

 Over 75 guests enjoyed the evening's palate palatable pairings and music.

Enjoying the wine selections.

The chocolate samples: specialty dark, milk chocolates, peanut butter cups, Himalayan Sea Salt, blueberry and cookies and cream. They didn't last long!

Yum! Specialty dark and milk chocolate samples.

Volunteers Amanda Foulds and Laurie T. Simpson enjoyed the evening.

Creative Arts Board Co-President Virginia Wadland (L) and friends supported the arts and enjoyed the evening's entertainment.

Example of wine selections

 As the end drew near and guests slowly departed, Nate closed with a Beatles tribute.

Thank you to all who attended, and thank you to wine, cheese, beer and chocolate vendors!

Together, we raised $800 for Creative Arts!

Final Class Performance: Act I for Beginning Actors

Act I celebrated their final class by performing their play, Sleeping Beauty.

Our young actors learned stage presence, becoming different characters, pantomime and analyzing a script.

The performance was fantastic! It was a little nerve wracking for some of the actors - as this was their first stage experience - but the show must go on!

Sometimes, the most difficult thing for young actors to understand is vocal projection, especially in front of an audience!

Another hurdle is learning to say lines using emotions of the character. These are difficult concepts for any actor to master. But, you have to begin somewhere!

In Act I, students learn to express themselves through games and other exercises. Stage acting is taught and explored with a short theatrical performance.

12 novice ladies enrolled in Act I and, under the supervision and encouragement of instructor Adam Schuler, blossomed into inspiring actors ready to learn more!

Here, one of the fairies catches Maleficent after the Prince awakes Sleeping Beauty and the kingdom.

King and Queen once again on their throne!

Great performance! Thank you ladies!

The Cast of Sleeping Beauty with Instructor Adam Schuler

Festival of Trees Madness!

The Festival or Trees is an annual town fundraiser to support the Reading School Technology Fund. Businesses, families, organizations and schools donate and decorate trees for raffling. Visitors purchase raffle tickets and place them under trees they wish to win.

Creative Arts donated a tree, Creative Cravings, and decorated it with gift certificates, t-shirts and hilarious ginger-bread artists, musicians and actors.

Creative Cravings tree

 School groups also provided entertainment during the two-day event, including Creative Arts!

Jenna Pott's studio (and Suzuki Violin Group) performed a series of Suzuki and holiday selections.

 

Yes, our violin group has adults! You are never too old to learn music!

We also provided holiday face painting. Music student Taylor and her good friend helped!

Waiting patiently for a Christmas Tree!

 Taylor and her mom with matching snowflakes

 

 Close up of our tree ornaments

 

And a parting video from our string group.

Thank you to volunteers for decorating our tree, face painting and performing!

Giving Back: Helping Local Businesses During Shop the Block

Shop the Block is a 4-day event started by independent businesses in down town Reading, MA to encourage residence to shop locally for the holidays. The kick-off night, always a Thursday, is celebrated with special promotions, music, costumed carolers and retail open houses.

David, viola student of Karl Orvik, and his mom, Elena, perform Christmas Tunes at The Hitching Post

Creative Arts contributes to the evening with music. Our music students roam from shop to shop performing classical selections or favorite holiday tunes to delight shoppers.

Julia Parker, flute student of Judy Braude, performs at Simms Jewelers

Students also gain the experience of another performance opportunity, and many practice sight reading...another valuable skill.

Lailoo Perriello, violin student of Jenna Potts, plays holiday selections at Encore Consignment

Plus, students learn to adapt and improvise at each performance location.

Savannah Simpson, piano student of Tatyana Foaksman, performs classical repertoire at The Chocolate Truffle

Store performances are not formal, quiet concerts. Music students must focus on their playing and adapt to ambient music, shoppers and merchants talking and laughing.

Taylor Aspeslagh, piano student of Roald Wilson and vocal student of Andre Loretz-Frey, plays at Everything But The Dog

And, public performance opportunities allow us to give back to our community!

Amy Imrich performs a selection of fiddle tunes to get people in the mood to shop!

Thank you to performers and hosting stores: The Hitching Post, The Chocolate Truffle, Encore Consignment, Everything But the Dog, The Wine Shop of Reading, The Hot Spot, Olde Reading Butcher Shop and Simms Jewelers.

At the Reading Tree Lighting Festival

Our music students performed at Grumpy Doyle's pub and Reading Cooperative Bank as part of Reading's Tree Lighting Ceremony festivities! Our mission was to entertain folks!

 

Tim Sanford, student of Jenna Potts, performed classical violin pieces at Grumpy Doyle's. I think, for the majority of attendees, it was the first time they heard a solo student violin performance.

Amy Imrich performed fantastic fiddle pieces throughout the afternoon. That's a lot of fiddlin'!

At Reading Cooperative Bank, our piano students performed for families waiting in line to see Santa.

Lily Johnson performs a selection of pieces including an original composition. She takes piano lessons with Roald Wilson.

We also offered face painting...thanks to a generous donation by Artists & Craftsmen Supply (Saugus).

Taylor, also a piano and vocal student, carefully paints a Santa hat on a very patient boy.

He's concentrating hard on staying still!

Ta-da! Santa hat!

And Christmas trees...

Getting a pair of candy canes. For the record, the brushes kinda tickle and he was trying hard not to move!

We all had a great time! Thanks to our performing students, their families and our wonderful volunteers.

You made this a wonderful experience!