UCF Celebrates the Arts

The first annual UCF Celebrates the Arts at the new Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts in downtown Orlando was an incredible week of events that featured virtually every student in music, theatre, dance, art and digital media at the University of Central Florida.  Our Chamber Singers partnered with the Orlando REP Theatre in five performances of Civil War Voices (book by James R. Harris with music by Mark Hayes), on the 150th anniversary of Lincoln's assassination.  All choirs shared the main Disney Hall stage on Sunday night in a program that featured a collaboration with dancers from Theatre UCF, Eric Whitacre's LEONARDO DREAMS OF HIS FLYING MACHINE, and two movements of my Ecstatic Songs (DON'T GO! and ALL I WAS DOING WAS BREATHING).  Sandra Snow was the featured clinician on Tuesday for our first middle and high school choral invitational in this venue, culminating in an evening concert that featured each choir and a finale of my O MUSIC with the massed choir led by Dr. Snow.  And on Friday night we repeated the full choral concert at St. Luke's Lutheran Church.  A fantastic week!  We are all exhilarated.  And exhausted.