Emma Reaves appears to be the last one standing after 'The Revenger's Tragedy'. The Jacobean-era play, reinvented by Jim Wren and Joe Sturgeon, played the Kennedy Center in April.

UNCG Theatre took its edgy adaptation of “The Revenger’s Tragedy” on the road to the Washington, D.C. — at the request of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

“Tragedy,” adapted and directed by theatre professor Jim Wren, was selected to play the Kennedy Center April 15 as part of the 2009 National Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival (KCACTF). Only a handful of productions from across the country are invited to the national festival each year.

“The odds are better that you’ll make it to the finals in the NCAA than get invited to the Kennedy Center,” says theatre professor John Wolf, who coordinated the Region IV festival hosted by UNCG in February. “It’s such a validation of the hard work that’s gone on in this department for years now.”

UNCG Theatre hadn’t taken a production to the Kennedy Center since 1974.

That a national selection committee, headed by KCACTF Artistic Director Gregg Henry, chose “Tragedy” to represent Region IV was a pleasant surprise to those in the Department of Theatre. They knew their production was top-notch – exciting, original, well-written and well-acted – but it was also somewhat unwieldy, involving complex sets and a cast and crew of 70 people.

Wren and his writing partner, Joe Sturgeon, re-imagined Thomas Middleton’s Jacobean tale as a bloody homage to female action thrillers. Set in a modern underworld, it premiered in Taylor Theatre last November.

“There were such outstanding productions at the regional festival, and our students had a chance to see these productions,” Department of Theatre head Jim Fisher says. “They had a chance to see that they stood a little taller. It’s a great confidence-builder and an incredible, incredible honor.”

The Spartones

Things are just “Not the Same” for the Spartones lately.

The Spartones, UNCG’s male a cappella group, appear on singer-songwriter Ben Fold’s new CD, “Ben Folds Presents: University A Cappella!” They perform Folds’ “Not the Same” on the CD.

Folds handpicked the Spartones and 12 other college a cappella groups from a field of more than 200 hopefuls. Folds produced the CD, comprised wholly of a cappella versions of his songs, in partnership with VH1’s Save the Music Foundation. Save the Music seeks to revive music programs in our schools.

Folds, a North Carolina native who attended UNCG, is known for lilting lyrics and biting social commentary. He headed the Ben Folds Five before branching out as a solo artist.

The UNC-Chapel Hill Loreleis are the only other North Carolina group to record for the album. The Loreleis perform Folds’ “Jesusland.”

The Spartones have gotten local and national media attention since the album’s release.

Gordon Sutker, Spartones president, told the Baltimore Sun that recording the CD was a relaxed process. “A lot of it had to do with Ben putting us at ease,” Sutker says. “We recorded our track in three full takes. Ben's way of recording was to have everyone, including the soloist and vocal percussionist, sing together instead of recording each part and putting them together."

Visit http://www.benfolds.com/acappella to see videos of college a cappella groups singing Folds hits. You can also listen to the Spartones singing “Not the Same” (http://www.myspace.com/spartones) or watch them in action (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1StBVBuZue8).

One stage. Numerous groups. A musical experience like no other.

Back by popular demand, the School of Music’s Collage Concert will return to Aycock Auditorium Saturday, Sept. 12, at 7:30 p.m. The concert brings together more than a dozen faculty and student ensembles performing brief pieces of music ranging from old time folk music to opera.

Last year’s first Collage Concert celebrated the reopening of Aycock Auditorium. Like last year, proceeds from this year’s concert will support the School of Music Scholarship Fund.

Performances by student groups will include:

• Wind Ensemble
• Orchestra
• University Chorale and Chamber Singers
• Jazz Ensemble
• Old Time Folk Music Ensemble
• Percussion Ensemble
• Opera Theatre
• Casella Sinfonietta
• Composition Students

Faculty-led performances will include:

• EastWind Ensemble
• Faculty Jazz Combo
• Faculty Piano Duo
• Voice Faculty
• McIver String Quartet
• And featuring a special performance by dance faculty

For more information, visit www.uncg.edu/mus/collage.

Steve Haines

Steve Haines was on the phone with legendary drummer Jimmy Cobb, the same guy who played on Miles Davis’ “Kind of Blue.”

As they were talking, Haines noticed something wonderful. He could hear his quintet’s CD “Beginner’s Mind” playing in the background.

“I was flabbergasted,” says Haines, director of the UNCG Miles Davis Jazz Studies Program.

Cobb said he loved the CD and that maybe they should make a record together.

And so, “Stickadiboom” was born.

Stickadiboom is a term used by musicians describing the sound that jazz drummers make. Armed with original music composed by Haines (with the exception of one selection from Cobb), the group recorded the CD in Clinton Studios in New York in late 2007. In addition to having Cobb on the drums, the group had another link to music history – the piano used was the same one played by Thelonious Monk, Glen Gould and Bill Evans.

Working with Cobb was extraordinary, Haines says.

“He doesn’t imitate the jazz masters. He is a jazz master.”

From his arrival at the studio before everyone else to his careful attention to detail while listening to playbacks, he demonstrated determination and professionalism, Haines says.

“We’re constantly singing to our students – giving them the way we want the music to feel. The way he sang the tune – it knocked everybody out. It was really special.”

The CD begins with “The Freightrain,” the kind of song you should listen to with the car windows down on a sunny day. From there, the songs start winding down, growing smoother and mellower.

Reviews have been enthusiastic. “’Stickadiboom’ is strongly evocative of the days when creative jazz artists were jammin' in dark clubs everywhere,” wrote one reviewer in Blogcritics Magazine.

Jazz drummer Joe Chambers says of Haines: "Behind that retiring attitude is a fiery, imaginative bassist and composer."

The CD, which was released in March, is being distributed worldwide.

"DYBY," Magdalena Abakanowicz, 1993

The sculpture has ignited your imagination. You want to know more.

Now, with a simple phone call, you can.

Selected works at the Weatherspoon Art Museum are featured on a new cell phone audio tour. The mobile phone tours, launched last year, give patrons about 90 seconds of information about various works of art, pointing out the history and significance of the pieces.

The audio tour makes the museum experience more interactive for guests. “It’s a quick, simple thing for us to do, providing some context for our visitors,” says Ann Grimaldi, the museum’s curator of education.

Placards displayed near the works alert visitors a piece has a related audio tour.

About 30 works have been highlighted in the past year, and the service has proven to be popular: The phone number receives about 200 calls a month. Many of the voices callers hear are the artists themselves, talking about their creations. Other times, they’ll hear Grimaldi or Terri Dowell-Dennis, the museum’s assistant curator of education.

Grimaldi says the plan is to expand the tour to more artworks. “There’s a lot more we can do with it,” she says. “We’re just scratching the surface of what this can be.”

When he was a member of the Martha Graham Dance Company, Duane Cyrus would find a seat in the wings or in the audience to watch spellbound as his fellow dancers performed “Steps in the Street.”

Now, more than 15 years later, Cyrus, an assistant professor of dance, will spend the next year studying and sharing that 1936 composition with a new generation of dancers.

Supported by a $15,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts and university matching funds, the project will culminate with performances at the end of the spring semester. Venues will include local high schools, where UNCG student dancers will perform and discuss the work.

“Graham was, in many ways, the mother of all contemporary dance,” says Jan Van Dyke, head of the Department of Dance. “Since her death, we all feel a responsibility to keep her work alive and relevant to our students and the general public. This grant will enable us to do just that.”

Cyrus picked “Steps” after consulting with Katherine Crockett, a principal dancer with the Graham Company who will visit campus in the spring. A landmark work by a pioneer of modern dance, it is inspired by devastation, homelessness and exile, themes readily grasped by dancers and audiences alike. That accessibility is critical, Cyrus says.

“Maybe you’ve not seen dance before. We want you to be able to come see it and not be alienated,” he says. “Sometimes dance in its more intellectual form can be too distanced from the general populace. Graham, particularly ‘Steps in the Street,’ is accessible.”

The question is bold: “May We Have This Cyberdance?”

During the 2009 American Dance Festival, the answer is a resounding “yes,” thanks to the efforts of Cara Clark, a master’s student in Media Studies.

Clark produced “May We Have This Cyberdance?,” a daily video blog chronicling life at the annual dance festival. The project gave patrons a behind-the-scenes look at the festival, ranging from interviews with choreographers to sneak peeks into the festival’s classrooms to a 30-second dance lesson called “Dance of the Day.”

For Clark, who produces the video blogs, the opportunity to work on the project was a merger of two loves. She has a background in dance and choreography and said her first year of Media Studies coursework taught her film techniques.

“As an undergrad I got interested in film and video in a course I took called ‘Dance on Camera,’” Clark says. “The processes of choreography – looking at people moving through space and seeing an image – does parallel to film work. But rather than seeing the stage as the frame of an image, the camera lens creates the frame.”

Visit www.americandancefestival.org to view the daily video blog.

It all began with a simple letter.

Sarah Lindsay ’84 MFA had had two poems published in the Georgia Review – a wonderful thing in its own regard. And then she got a letter out of the blue from fellow poet Kay Ryan. It’s possible you’ve heard of her – she’s the current national poet laureate.

She congratulated Sarah on her work, pointing out some of her favorite lines. They were Sarah’s favorite lines, too.

Shortly thereafter, Kay contacted George Bradley of the Grove Press. She recommended Sarah to him and he contacted her and asked for a manuscript.

The result? “Primate Behavior,” a finalist for the National Book Awards.

At some point, the women began emailing. “Kay writes wonderful, funny, bright letters,” Sarah says. And her Christmas cards feature puns and original drawings that Sarah looks forward to every year.

But even with this correspondence between like minds, the women never met. Kay lives in California, and Sarah in Greensboro.

That changed this year when Kay was invited to pick three up-and-coming poets to read in New York at the 92nd Street Y. Sarah was one of the three.

Sarah relished the experience and enjoyed finally meeting Kay face-to-face. She lived up to her expectations.

“She’s very independent and wry and funny and thoroughly herself,” Sarah says. “There’s nothing put on about her.”

Since “Primate Behavior,” Sarah has written two more poetry collections – “Mount Clutter” and her latest, “Twigs and Knucklebones.” Here’s a poem from “Twigs and Knucklebones.”

• “The Prince of Fenway Park,” a novel by Julianna Baggott ’94 MFA
  (http://www.princeoffenwaypark.com/)
• “Seeds Across Snow,” a poetry collection by Kathleen Driskell ’91 MFA
  (http://www.kathleendriskell.org/default.html)
• “Invisible Scars: How to Stop, Change or End Psychological Abuse,” by Catharine Dowda ’92 MEd
  (http://www.newhorizonpressbooks.com/new/Invisible%20Scars1.php3)
• “Research, Action, and Change: Leaders Reshaping Catholic Schools” and “Faith, Finances, and the Future: The Notre Dame Study of U.S. Pastors,” co-authored by Jim Frabutt ’98 MS, ’00 PhD
  (http://ace.nd.edu/outreach/acepress)
• “Little Pockets of Alarm,” a collection of short stories by Kat Meads ’77 MFA
  (http://www.katmeads.com/)
• “Mabel, One and Only,” a children’s book by Margaret Muirhead ’95 MFA
  (http://us.penguingroup.com/nf/Book/BookDisplay/0,,9780803731981,00.html)
• “The Issues that Divide Christians,” by Christopher Phillips ’94
  (http://www2.xlibris.com/book_excerpt.asp?bookid=53626)
• “Lucky, Lucky,” a poetry chapbook by Nina Riggs ’04 MFA
  (http://everythings-jake.blogspot.com/2009/04/reading-at-spring-southeastern-literary.html)
• “After Shocks: The Poetry of Recovery for Life-Shattering Events,” an anthology which includes work by Rhett Iseman Trull ’03 MFA and Barbara Presnell ’76, ’79 MFA
  (http://www.poetryofrecovery.com/)
• “Before Wilde: Sex Between Men in Britain’s Age of Reform,” by Charles Upchurch ’91
  (http://www.ucpress.edu/books/pages/11302.php)