May 19 2008
Strand Weekly Email: May 19, 2008
Hello all,
Yet another week or so has gone by… Since our last email, we have hosted five events. The Rock Bands on Friday night were quite the entertainment. The lead guitar player in one of the bands did a back flip OFF the stage while playing the guitar! He was energetic to say the least. Ron B. and Gordon H. had the sound tuned in. The theatre sounded great. We kept the volume within reasonable limits. Many bands, we have found, want to really crank the volume, but we keep it in check. The room is so live anyway, they get a boost from the hard plaster walls and concrete floor.
We changed gears on Saturday night and had Gospel Music by Terry Crites. It was equally as entertaining, but none of the gospel singers did any back flips. The program was 2 hours. It wasn’t as well attended as we had hoped, but was still successful. I had been watching, because we were very close to the 2500 mark of audience members. We just missed it on Saturday night…..we obliterated the mark on Thursday.
The Shelbyville Middle School Jazz Band and Vocal Ensemble played the Strand on Thursday. The 40 minute concert was very well attended. We had 261 people come to hear the kids strut their stuff. They were not disappointed, the musicians put on a great show. After the concert the Shelbyville Band Booster hosted a reception for retiring band director Cindy Moss. This was in the Cabaret Area. They transformed the theatre into a party room, complete with decorations (and lots of food, the meatballs were outstanding!) It was a magically evening for all who where there. Thank you to the everyone who helped make this event happen.
Saturday the 17th saw the return of the B-town Bearcats with Hopkins and Miller. They were very entertaining and put on a great show. On Sunday we had out Flag Presentation by the American Legion. Thank you to the Legion for donating and placing this very important item on our stage. Also thank you to the City of Shelbyville for allowing us to steal…I mean borrow…the lobby flag from city hall for our events. It is returned to its rightful place!
So we are now past our 2500 audience member mark. We accomplished this 2 days short of four full months of operation. I am thrilled at the success of our core mission, having a venue for live performance. We have done this with a variety of free and ticketed shows. Its been fun. Here is a quick list of things we have hosted: A musical, variety show, recitals, poetry reading, lecture, rock bands, folk bands, jazz bands, gospel groups, meetings, open house and tours. As you can see, there is a lot going on. We need to expand our volunteers to help with the operation of these events. If you are interested, please e-mail our volunteer coordinator Rhonda Schwegman. Her email is: rhonda.schwegman@strand-theatre-shelbyville.org
Do you ever go to our web site? We post lots of interesting stuff, or at least interesting to me. If you look, you will find a before and after picture of a group of us. You will read an interesting little story on the site that accompanies the picture. Our site is: www.strand-theatre-shelbyville.org (nobody has yet to test our "Donation" button on the site….any takers?)
Work will begin shortly on the exterior of the theatre. We will be having some general work sessions in the near future. We have been prohibited from starting work pending the status of a few grants. I am please to say that we received a grant from Mainstreet Shelbyville for some exterior cleaning. This will be used to clean our limestone elements on the facade. We are now starting work on the windows too. I’ll let you know how that is proceeding. We will also start work on our Marquee. While we were not successful in receiving funding for this project, we will still continue with the repainting and re-lamping. When done, its 304 light bulbs will let our community know we are "open for business" and here to help the performing arts.
Thanks for all the support,
David
