Few audience members are aware, as they watch a performance come alive before their eyes, how much they have been saved the trouble of bringing it to life. As Chris Piner, teacher at Uintah High School and director of Uintah Theatre, puts it, “We think a lot more about the stories we tell than you will ever know. We study character and story and have thought provoking conversations about every script. We scrutinize every line and word and we make decisions on how best to proceed. That is rehearsal and you never get to see it.”

A Wideopen Door to Opportunity Some parents quail when their children announce they want a career in the theatre arts;[...]

In challenging times, art can be both a solution and a healer. At least, that’s what can be learned from arts programs like the Booker Visual & Performing Arts Center.

Producing Artistic Director Chad Cornwell’s advice for getting on top of the situation is to “realize that you are not in this boat alone."

Professional performers are used to “winging it.” So much can happen on stage – forgotten lines, misplaced props, lights going out – that improvising becomes a necessary skill.

Greenville High School had just started rehearsals for The Crucible when Michigan’s sheltering-in-place order took effect on March 23. The students and staff decided to continue with virtual rehearsals.

A story that is all too common this spring, Aspen High School theater was hours from opening, when their show was canceled and schools closed. Losing the experience for students and directors is bad enough, but the financial loss could have been devastating. Using Ludus, AHS was able to salvage at least some of that money through the generosity of an incredible community.

Every performer dreams of a state-of-the-art space that helps them achieve their best. But how many have stepped onto a stage that has served generations of artists, who felt their hopes and dreams rising with the curtain? Or had teachers who encouraged not only talent but the potential for talent? Or had peers who were there to lift them up?

To put the importance of its school band program into perspective for Westby, a rural Wisconsin community of 2,000, nearly 8% of the population – or one in every 13 residents – is enrolled in Westby’s band program.

Portage Central High School Theatre program is considered one of the finest in the country, with a history of quality[...]

Every band program should have a booster club like the Union Bands Parents Club. At a time when cash-strapped and[...]

“I was a HUGE fan of ‘The Sing Off,’” admitted Shannon Wallace, “but I never really thought I could have a group like that at the middle-school level. Then,” she added with a smile, “we started adding a capella songs into our show choir sets, and I realized that with the proper arranging our students could actually do it.”

In 1986, two high school students yearned for Holland High School to have a fully fledged theater program. “Sophomore Kurt[...]

Aviva Segall has always been passionate about music. Hearing the cello for the first time as a little girl, she remembered that “I got up and started screaming, ‘I want to play that one, mommy!’ It was love at first hear.”

Theater has always been an important part of the Hermantown High School student experience. “There has been a Drama Club at Hermantown since the school was formed in 1942,”

One characteristic of a great idea is its persistence. “My wife and I had always wanted to do ‘The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee,’” reminisced Mark Lorentzen, co-founder and artistic director of Ghostlight Productions.

Few marching bands have had a book written about them, and few of those books have been as eloquent as the one written about Elkhart, Indiana’s Concord High School Marching Minutemen.

In Texas, one community has stepped up time and again, first to launch McCallum Fine Arts Academy in Austin, TX, and then to nurture it, with epic results. Here is their story.