An audience of over 120 was on hand to hear Travis of the Cosmos and Ede perform their Halloween show.   Both the bands were in costume and prepared selections suited for the occasion.   We even had a little problem on stage causing the singer to have to be placed in a straight jacket and sing while lying on the floor!   It was fun.    Please go to the web site and check out the pictures.   I posted every person that came in costume.   The only one I missed was the winner of the costume contest!    There are 50 pictures.   My personal favorite was the family where Mom, Dad and the two little kids dressed up like the Village People.    It was nice to see everyone getting into the spirit of the evening.     Thank you to all the fans that came out for this very fun event.  

 

The Theatre will be open for Trick or Treaters on Halloween Night.   If you and your little one are walking around downtown, please stop in so that Captain Jack (or Steve as the case my be) can dole out some goodies.

 

This week saw the completion of the limestone cleaning on our facade.   Huber Bros., Inc. did a wonderful job in stripping, cleaning and sealing these wonderful facade details.   Thank you to John and his crew for a great job!     This was paid for in part by the grant the Strand received from Mainstreet Shelbyville, Inc.   Thank you Mainstreet.    While you are looking at the Halloween pictures on the web site, check out the article on the stone cleaning.   There are some good pictures of the work being accomplished.

 

The week the Strand was informed that we have been awarded a grant from the Blue River Foundation.   This grant will help us go forward with installing a lighting system in the theatre.    Before any lighting work can be done, we need to address the power issues.    We have plenty of power, just in the wrong spot in the building.   This grant (warning, tech talk ahead..) will help us consolidate our 2 single phase and 2 three phase drops into the theatre.   This is not a good situation, and we will be going from those four entrances to one.   We, with the approval of Duke Energy, would like to install a single 120/240 4 Wire Three Phase service.    This will help in several ways.   First, it is safer to have only one service entrance.   Second our lighting control system that we own runs on this type of power.   Third, will also be able to use the same service for all our single phase needs.    The sound guys will be keeping a close eye on the process so that we don’t inadvertently introduce electrical noise into our sound system.   When completed we will be able to pop our popcorn and run our stage lights at the same time!   Thank you Blue River Foundation!

 

This week brings two events to the Strand.   On Wednesday October 29, 2008 Lt. Gov. Becky Skillman will be at the Strand.   Please come out and meet our Lt. Governor.    She is scheduled to be at the theatre from 3:30 - 4:30 pm. 

 

On Thursday October 30th, the Three Sisters Bookstore will be hosting another night of Poetry Reading.    The last time they hosted this event we had over 75 people for what was an enjoyable evening of reading.   This time, we have an upgraded sound system in our Cabaret Area, so it will be even better!    These new speakers were courtesy of the Shelby County Players.   They were installed for their Divas on Broadway program.    This will be the first time we have used them for sound exclusively in the Cabaret Area.   Thank you Shelby County Players!

 

November is going to be a busy month at the theatre.   There will be something for everyone.   Details will be in the next email.  It is hard to believe, but we have hosted 41 events in the 9 short months of our new life.   Our audience total to date is 5642.   We are fast approaching the 6000th audience member!  Again, thank you for all the support.