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Save it or Lose it
Our Save it or Lose It Laundry Building campaign has been moving along steadily. Since the launch of the campaign, we have raised around $18,500.
There are still 7 days left to contribute to the campaign! Your gift can help us reach our goal $50,000!
To save the Smokestack, click the button below.
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Upcoming Events
Next weekend, the Sitka Seafood Festival and the Sitka Fine Arts Camp brings Pamyua to the Odess Theater on August 2. Pamyua's worldly music style blends traditional native chants with modern styles. Join us a for a night of dancing!
July 25
Children of Eden
7pm, PAC
July 25
Children of Eden
2:30pm, PAC
7pm, PAC
August 2
Pamyua
7pm, Odess Theater
For more information please call the Sitka Fine Arts Camp office at 907-747-3085. Tickets are available at Old Harbor Books and at the door.
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Dee Daniels Workshop
It's no secret that Sitka is a lover of jazz. From city-wide events such as the Sitka Jazz Festival to Fine Arts Camp's Jazz on the Waterfront Fundraiser, we just can't get enough of the genre, and the sentiment is evident in our latest workshop, the Dee Daniels Vocal Jazz Workshop.
The week-long workshop, led by internationally acclaimed jazz vocalist Dee Daniels, teaches students the skills for jazz styling. There are half a dozen students attending this workshop, ranging from teenagers to mid-age participants. All participants come from vastly different backgrounds, and have a diverse range of previous experience and ability. This range of skill is no problem for the workshop - it is even celebrated, as Dee takes each unique voice and its strengths, moulds it to fit the jazz repertoire.
Aside from working on vocal ability, one of the major components of the workshop works on singers' ability to tell a story through their music. Dee guides her students through their music, teaching them the importance of intonation and physical emotion. The workshop is a collaborative atmosphere, where students and teacher alike work to improve jazz songs, jazz renditions of written work, or original songs.
Participating in the workshop, however, is hard work. Those who register for the class sign up for a week of tough training, which culminates in final solo performances. Dee improves individual abilities by taking students of out of their comfort zone. She will go through numbers with her students piece by piece, stopping them after almost every line to go over tone, pronunciation, and style.
"It is the mind that is musical, not the body," she says. One can be a gifted singer, but it takes hard work to become a great singer. In order put students in a place of mental musicality, Dee pushes her students to step outside of the norm.
Dee's effective method of teaching resulted in a phenomenal final performance by students on Wednesday. Each student improved tremendously, Dee notes at the performance, as they worked tirelessly to improve their vocal skills - including former High School Camp music faculty Jen Reid, who may have just been converted from a rock band front-woman to a jazz vocalist.
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Greetings!
To kick off the TEDxSitka event last Sunday, the cast of Children of Eden, this year's Musical Theater Camp show, gave the TEDx audience a preview of the musical. In the sneak peak, the cast performed two scenes of the first act: an intimate moment between Adam and Eve and a moment in which the Serpent tempts Eve.
Perhaps the most phenomenal aspect of the preview is the way in which Theater Director WT McRae choreographed the scenes. In what seems like a relatively simple episode between two characters, the entire cast of the musical had taken the stage. Similar to the the style of the Greek chorus, Children of Eden is visualized so that the chorus formed the homogenous entity that backed the foreground. In both Adam and Eve and the Serpent's scene, the chorus impersonated the forbidden tree, twisting and twirling to the emotions of the characters.
Aside from the performance, WT McRae and Music Director Andrew Hames spoke about the process of preparing the show. In two short weeks, the pre-professional camp works to produce a full musical. Students choose to enroll in one of two paths: Musical Theater Performance or Technical Theater Production. Of the 30 campers enrolled in the program this year, four students work in technical theater production, while the rest of the group are part of the cast and band.
In their talk, WT and Andrew stressed the fact that the musical theater kids walk into the experience with a blank slate. Students are not given the script before the start of camp, and many come not having heard of the musical in the first place. In fact, the show's reveal was made only two weeks before the camp itself started.
The cast spends the first day of camp - a Sunday - auditioning for roles in the musical. While students take a break at dinner, WT, Andrew, and accompanist Susan Reed spend the time brilliantly matching each cast member to a character. After dinner, the cast does their first blind read of the script. From the first read, time starts ticking, and the group starts to move quickly - singing, blocking, and adding layers upon layers to their character.
Yet, the intensity of Musical Theater Camp is not something to be feared. Regardless of skill and prior experience, every student comes to camp with nothing but a love for theater and a desire to learn. Our youngest student is fourteen, and our oldest students are entering their second year of college. The beauty of SFAC's musical theater program is that every student comes to camp with no knowledge of the material - not one student is more well-versed in the show Children of Eden than the other. In the production of the musical, the groups works and grows collectively.
On Raven Radio's Morning Interview on Wednesday, host Robert Woolsey asked WT what the ultimate goal of the program is. Aside from giving students the foundation and tools for success in the professional theater world, WT says, "what we really teach our students is citizenship." In accomplishing what seems like the impossible task of putting on a full musical production in two weeks, our musical theater students "learn so much, do so much, and reach so far." The goal of the program, rather, is to teach our students to push themselves, and to convey to them just how much stronger they are than they think.
The musical will be in the Sitka Performing Arts Center, and while the setting of the Odess Theater is remarkably different, the cast and crew has given us a taste of the power of their presence on opening night.
Children of Eden is on Friday, July 25 at 7:00pm and Saturday, July 26 at 2:30pm and 7:00pm in the Sitka Performing Arts Center. General tickets are $20 and tickets for students and seniors are $15 for the evening shows and $10 for the matinee. Tickets are at Old Harbor Books. For more information, please call the Sitka Fine Arts Camp office at 747-3085.
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Historic Restoration Works on Smokestack
 | | Interns Louis Wheatley and Jillian Banner enjoy a break from hammering |
The transition from Middle and High School Camp to our Musical Theater and workshop season is extraordinary. Music, which is now confined to the Odess Theater and Rasmuson, is met by the sound of another - hammers, saws, and drills. Around campus, we see hardhats, protective glasses, and dusty clothing, and the circumference of Smokestack is fenced off with ominous caution tape: all of which point to the arrival of a new group of volunteers to arrive on campus: The Historic Restoration Crew.
The Historic Restoration Crew arrived in Sitka last Sunday to begin the reconstruction of Smokestack, also known as the Laundry Building. Twenty-seven college students from around the nation will spend four weeks on the former Sheldon Jackson Campus, repairing the roof of the building. The task, which seems simple in theory, involves multiple steps and complicated work. In fact, the first day of work almost solely consisted of building scaffolding, which secures the safety of workers on the roof.
Smokestack has not been re-shingled since the building's construction over a hundred years ago. Because of this, re-shingling the roof is a tricky task. First, the original cedar shingles had to be ripped off. The rotting wood will be replaced will new panels, which are measured, cut, and hammered in on-site by the interns. Five more layers of material will be added to the roof, which include asphalt and tar to ensure durability.
The crew's job is not limited to construction, however. Hundred-year old dust that had been piling up in the corners of the building have been cleared out. The interns' time in Sitka is documented, and each valuable relic, whether it be worn newspaper clippings, or printed panels, are carefully kept aside for archival purposes.
The meticulous job is not without its perks. While the "Restoration Interns" - as they are referred to on campus - work tirelessly from 8am to 4:30pm, they work four days a week, enjoying Friday, Saturday, and Sunday to explore and play on Baranof Island. This weekend interns have planned a two day excursion to Mt. Edgecumbe, a ferry ride to Juneau, a historic window restoration workshop with the Sitka Maritime Heritage Society, and lots of canoeing.
For many, the best part about repairing the roof is the company. On a sunny day, you can hear music blasting from speakers resting on the window of Fraser. It almost looks like there's a perpetual dance party on the roof of the building, as the crew spends their day hammering to the beat of the Beach Boys, and more.
For others, the beauty of the program lies in its community outreach. "The fact that I can play a part in expanding the role of arts in Alaska is a huge honor," Adam Gerard, one of the Restoration Interns says. "When I do come back to Sitka Alaska, I'll be able to come by the building and say that I helped put that piece of wood in and I helped nailed that nail. It's a nice feeling to know that you are making a difference that will hopefully last another hundred years, as this did."
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Thank you for your ongoing support, Sitka Fine Arts Camp Staff www.fineartscamp.org 907-747-3085
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