The 34th Cleveland International Film Festival (March 18–28 at Tower City Cinemas in Tower City Center) has grown to nearly 67,000 admissions. The festival features more than 300 films from more than 80 countries that are showcased during this annual spring film festival.

For the fifth year in a row, the CIFF will present a special evening at its original home to honor the memory of one of its founders-Rick Whitbeck. The event is a special screening of "Hipsters" on Wednesday, March 24, at the Cedar Lee Theatre in Cleveland Heights.

University Heights celebrated Black History Month in council chambers on Feb. 16 with a musical presentation by the Wiley Middle School Challenge Choir, and an address by Rev. Marvin A. McMickle, pastor of Antioch Baptist Church. Before making its trek to perform at the Capitol this spring, the choir performed for Mayor Susan Infeld, members of the University Heights city council and residents. 

More than 30 voices sang "Lift Every Voice and Sing" followed by "Total Praise" a composition by African-American composer Richard Smallwood.

This May, the choir will spend four days in the nation’s capital on a music competition tour. Last year, the choir competed in the Midwestern region and was awarded 1st and 2nd place in the categories of gospel and show choir respectively. The choir also secured a 1st place soloist ranking.

Beethoven called Luigi Cherubini "the greatest living composer" and claimed that if he himself should write a requiem, his only model would be Cherubini's"Requiem in C minor." The piece was performed at Beethoven's memorial service.

The Western Reserve Chorale will present the Cherubini's work as part of its second concert of the 2009-10 season, on March 21, at 7:00 p.m., at Grace Lutheran Church, 13001 Cedar Road. 

Ever wanted to dance in a ballroom with a live band? Perhaps you didn’t try because you didn’t know how. Well, Sunday, March 21, is your chance to take a quick lesson, then dance to the music of the 17-piece Prime Time Big Band in the ballroom of The Alcazar.

You’ll also get a chance to take a tour of The Alcazar, a Cleveland Heights landmark at 2450 Derbyshire, built in 1923 in the Spanish-Moorish style. Its Grand Ballroom will be the site of dance instruction from 1-1:45 p.m., followed by dancing to the Prime Time Big Band from 2-4:30 p.m. and refreshments including appetizers, desserts, non-alcoholic punch, coffee and tea.

“Take Nine” brings their special blend of poetry and performance to The Alcazar in Cleveland Heights on Monday, March 1, at 7 p.m., as part of the First Mondays reading series.

The March 1 program features Gail Bellamy, Kathleen Cerveny, Katie Daley, Meredith Holmes, Bonnie Jacobson, Darlene Montonaro, and Cindy Washabaugh. 

Last winter, Jeannette Sorrell, founder and director of Apollo’s Fire, the Cleveland Baroque Orchestra, conducted an all-Mozart concert at the Cleveland Institute of Music. The soloist that evening with the student orchestra was acclaimed pianist and faculty member Sergei Babayan. When Apollo’s Fire decided to return to Severance Hall for its upcoming concert titled “A Mozart Celebration” on March 13, Sorrell knew she wanted Babayan as the piano soloist.

On Tuesday, Feb. 16,  Whole Foods Market is donating 5 percent of the day’s net sales to Heights Arts, and customers can help simply by showing up to shop. 

This 5% Day will launch Fencepiration, a Heights Arts temporary public art project in partnership with Whole Foods, The Coral Company, and The City of South Euclid.  Artists Carol Hummel and Debbie Apple Presser will involve community members in transforming a utilitarian construction fence on Cedar Road into a visually interesting, inspiring, and attractive streetscape element during the multi-year construction process.  Fencepiration will use recycled materials and recycle them upon completion.  A prototype will be on view on 5% Day.

Ensemble Secundum Silentium, composed of alumni and students at the Cleveland Institute of Music and Case Western Reserve University, made its debut last February. The group, which is “dedicated to programming music that is both rarely performed and embraces devotional qualities,” celebrates its first anniversary with what it calls a “musical journey through eclectic compositions.”

"Generation gap!" The term became popular as recently as the 1960s. It describes the cultural differences between insufferably dull, judgmental parents and their hip, enlightened and often eye-rolling offspring. Yet generational schisms have always existed within families and are fascinating things to watch - from the outside, at least.

Incidentally, “HIP” is also an acronym for “historically informed performance,” and describes part of the mission of Apollo’s Fire, the Cleveland Baroque Orchestra, which further pledges “to engage widespread audiences in its joyous pursuit of artistic excellence.”

When you watch the movie “Those Lips, Those Eyes” starring Frank Langella and Tom Hulce, you’ll notice a strong resemblance to Cain Park. That is because this coming-of-age story, about a young man who works behind the scenes at a summer theater in the 1950s, was actually filmed at Cain Park in 1979.

The movie doesn’t look exactly like Cain Park does today though, because it was filmed before the amphitheater’s major renovation. The film provides not only a look at life in the 1950s in the Heights and the rest of the country, it's also a real historical documentation of the original Cain Park. Back then, Cain Park's amphitheater did not have a roof, and the show was usually over if it started raining hard. Also, the theater had stone and concrete boxes and wooden benches, rather than the seats it has today. 

It takes courage to put your high-mileage life up on the lift and give it a good, hard look.

         -- Meredith Holmes

The Grog Shop, on Coventry Road, is hosting an all-Heights concert, featuring the local talent of oldboy, Twelve 21, Max Stern and Nicky English (of Posh Army). The event begins at 8 p.m. on Jan. 14. Tickets are $10.

The concert is the first event sponsored by FutureNow, the new junior board of FutureHeights. All ticket proceeds, as well the proceeds from a 50/50 raffle, benefit FutureHeights, which publishes the Heights Observer and runs the Best of the Heights recognition program, among others.

FutureNow's goal is to engage the next generation of Heights friends and supporters, by creating and planning events, and by maintaining a social networking presence. FutureNow is always looking for new energy and talent. If interested in joining the committee, contact Mike Kinsella at kinsella1@sbcglobal.net.

Mike Kinsella is the chair of FutureNow, the junior board of FutureHeights.

 

La Cave used to be Cleveland's premier folk music venue.  That was from 1962 to 1969, when it hosted regional and national artists every week.  Most of the top names in folk music--and many rock groups, in its last few years--performed at La Cave, which was then located in the University Circle area.

This holiday season, take off on a high-flying adventure as the Beck Center for the Arts presents Peter Pan, a musical based on the classic play by J.M. Barrie, on the Mackey Main Stage, Dec. 4, 2009, through Jan. 3, 2010.

Show times are 7:30 p.m. Fridays, 2:30 and 7:30 p.m. Saturdays (no matinee performance on December 5), and 2:30 p.m. Sundays. There is a special 7:30 p.m. performance on two Sundays: Dec. 27 and Jan. 3. There will be no performances on Christmas Day and New Year’s Day.

The sounds of chorus and brass will fill the sanctuaries of Grace Lutheran Church in Cleveland Heights on Friday, Dec. 11, at 7:30 p.m., and Saint Joan of Arc Church in Chagrin Falls on Sunday, Dec. 13, at 4:00 p.m., when the Western Reserve Chorale and the Chagrin Valley Choral Union join forces.  They'll present music from the 1500s to the present day, featuring the Cleveland Brass Quintet as guest artists.

"Gutenberg! The Musical!" A musical about Johann Gutenberg, the inventor of the printing press? Or is it about the actor Steve Gutenberg? While the play does use as its inspiration the life and times of Johann Gutenberg, it does so in a most entertaining way.

Ten years ago several organizations in the Coventry neighborhood worked to bring a gateway sculpture to the P.E.A.C.E. Park. Coventry P.E.A.C.E., a grassroots group based at the elementary school, had recently built an imaginative playground at the site, and a piece of art seemed a fitting capstone to the project in this creative community.

The group that came together to select the art included the now-defunct Coventry Neighbors led by Jeffrey Dross, Coventry PTA, Friends of the Library, the city and school district, and the Coventry Special Improvement District. 

December is one of those months that is eagerly anticipated the entire year through. The joy of the holidays, the decorations, the twinkling lights, the foods, the aromas, the shopping, the traffic, the rushing around, the chaos . . . oh, wait, what happened to the joy?

Need to take a rest from the preparations? How about a moment to sit and relax? Here's an event to fit the bill.

A modern-day take on an 18th-century poem.  Christopher Smart (1722-1771) was an English poet, whose poems of intense religious feeling are admired by many contemporary poets. His “My Cat Jeoffrey,” a free-verse meditation on his cat’s connection to God, is part of a long work, Jubilate Agno(Rejoice in the Lamb).

            --- Meredith Holmes

I Will Consider All Of My Daughters’ Shoes

Heights Arts will present To the Extreme, and Back, a house concert to benefit the organization on Nov. 22.

A Cleveland Orchestra String Quartet, Miho Hashizume, Isabel Trautwein, Sonya Braaten and Tanya Ell, will perform the music of Hungarian master Gyorgi Ligeti, who wrote his first string quartet, Metamophoses Nocturnes, in 1953. This extremely demanding piece explores the limits of the players and combines Hungarian and Gypsy rhythms with the sounds of night to create a work that is irresistibly exciting. Yu Jin will join in to round off the evening with the masterful Quintet in A major by Felix Mendelssohn.

The concert takes place at the downtown penthouse of Rick Maron and Judy Eigenfeld, at 4 p.m. on Nov. 22. Tickets are $40 per person/$35 for members of Heights Arts.

The concert will be followed by a dessert reception. Call 216-371-3457 or e-mail register@heightsarts.org for more information.

 

Poem for November, 2009

This is a month of great change. Nothing is certain, the poet says; we can take nothing for granted.

            -- Meredith Holmes

Heights Arts will be celebrating its 10th anniversary next year, and it’s fascinating to look back and remember how various projects began. For example, the idea of a Holiday Store featuring local artists was brought up in a lunchtime conversation at Stone Oven Bakery in 2002. The next step was asking landlord Jon Forman if we could temporarily use an empty storefront for the shop (yes, you can!). Then we had a meeting, rounded up our husbands and friends, scraped the carpet off the floor, cleaned up and painted, contacted artists, and opened the doors.

The arty store began as a partnership among the Cedar Lee Merchant Association (Joan Costello), FutureHeights (Sarah Wean and Lita Gonzalez), Fairfax Neighborhood Network (Elaine Mosbrook), Heights Arts (Sharon Grossman, Jan Kious and Peggy Spaeth), and the cooperation of the City of Cleveland Heights (Nancy McLaughlin).

Old media like The New York Times impress everyone by reviewing books as quickly as they’re published. The Heights Observer does them one better by previewing here a book even before it’s been written. The tentative title is Yes! or else Maybe!, which experts in romance say often means the same thing.An IPO (Initial Plot Outline, below) establishes

Both performances of the First Annual Nighttown Academy of Poetry & Letters were sold out! The fictional invention of two friends, both award-winning Cleveland Heights residents: Irish actress Derdriu Ring and Regina Brett, Plain Dealer columnist. 

The event, Wise Up!!, featured a cast of local celebrities, literary greats and friends of the arts, each reading a poem or prose.  Think James Joyce meets Monty Python, this academy came alive for one night, Oct. 4, when it staged a fundraiser to benefit the Friends of the CH-UH Public Library, raising approximately $7000. 

 

Top left to right:  Marcia Mandell, Fred Sternfeld
Bottom left to right:  Marcus Dana, Mary Jane Nottage

Photo Creidt Brian Bowers

CityMusic Cleveland Chamber Orchestra debuts its 2009-10 season in Cleveland Heights Oct. 15 at 7:30 p.m. at Fairmount Presbyterian Church with a world premiere by Christos Hatzis, one of Canada’s leading composers.

Hatzis is an advocate of borderless culture. His recent works bridge the gap between classical music and today’s popular music idioms. His strongest musical and philosophical influences include early Christian spirituality and his Byzantine heritage. Through his music he is “trying to establish a conversation with everyone, not just the musically literate.”

The Western Reserve Chorale begins its 2009-10 concert season in December, but it is rehearsing now. The group meets at Grace Lutheran Church on Cedar Road in Cleveland Heights. Membership is open to all. Singers interested in joining the Western Reserve Chorale are invited to attend any Tuesday evening rehearsal or contact executive director Joanne Poderis for information: 216-791-0061 or jpoderis@msn.com.

The first concert, Chorus and Brass, a joint collaboration with the Chagrin Valley Choral Union and the Cleveland Brass Quintet, will be performed twice -- Dec. 11 in Cleveland Heights and Dec. 13 in Chagrin Falls. The combined groups will present music representative of choral literature from the 1500s to present day. The second half of the concert will feature the Cleveland Brass Quintet in works transcribed for chorus and brass.  

John Carroll University is the epicenter for service and social action in the Heights area. Two years ago, during the fall semester of 2007, a new colony of the Beta Theta Pi fraternity was born under the premise of principled living and giving back to the surrounding community.

On Oct. 2, the men of Beta will be hosting the second annual Carroll’s Got Talent – a talent show including both students, faculty and staff. The proceeds will benefit the Center for Autism at the local Cleveland Clinic Children’s Hospital in Shaker Square.

The Nighttown Academy of Poetry & Letters is the fictional invention of two friends, both award-winning Cleveland Heights residents: Irish actress Derdriu Ring and Regina Brett, Plain Dealer columnist. 

Envisioned as less Harvard or Hogwarts and more James Joyce meets Monty Python, this academy will come alive for one night only on October 4 when it stages a fundraiser benefiting the Friends of the CH-UH Public Library.

What compliments a sunny day better than bright colors? Those that visited Lee Road, Larchmere Boulevard or the parking lot behind the Cedar Lee Theatre recently had reason to smile at the colorful, striped knitting that grace the areas' parking meters. 

This unexpected element in an everyday place demonstrates how a streetscape can be unified through art.

Called Knitscape, the colorful parking meters are the result of a partnership between Heights Arts, local businesses and volunteers under the direction of artist Carol Hummel, in residence at Heights Arts Gallery in August 2009.

Cedar Fairmount festival goers can learn how the richest man in the world at the turn of the 19th century, John D. Rockefeller, and his family made their mark on Cleveland Heights.

Local historian, activist and author Sharon Gregor will give a lecture about the Rockefeller’s legacy at the festival based on the research for her first book, Forest Hill: The Rockefeller Estate.

What is now Forest Hills Park was once a sprawling, 300-acre estate with its own golf course and a 40-room Victorian mansion, a summer home to the Rockefellers during the first quarter of the 20th century.

Stepping inside the Cleveland School of Dance is like being transported to a New York dance studio, complete with live music, hard-working young dancers, and dedicated teachers.

Founding directors Gladisa Guadalupe and husband Lawrence Minadeo opened the doors in November of 2000, and the Cleveland School of Dance is now home to more than 150 students ranging in age from 4 to 18.

Guadalupe began her dance career at age 13 with Ballet de San Juan in Puerto Rico. At age 15, she moved with her family to New York City to accept a scholarship to train with the prestigious School of American Ballet. She has since toured South America, Europe and Asia, and was principal dancer with the Cleveland Ballet before retiring from the stage to become active in the Cleveland community teaching dance.

Poem for August 2009

There are lots of diseases to worry about these days, but this poem describes an illness that's done more damage than all the pandemics in human history combined.

Forty years ago this summer, I was a young singer-songwriter living in New York City and recording for a then-small (now-big) label, Sire Records. I had a ticket for the Woodstock Festival, but at the last minute I decided not to go (that’s another story) and gave my ticket to a friend. I spent that weekend listening to radio news reports of what was happening at the festival and wandering around a nearly deserted Greenwich Village, seemingly the only one my age still in town.

On Aug. 14, which is technically the 40th anniversary of the beginning of Woodstock (it’s not the same date, but it’s the same Friday in August), I’ll be performing in a “micro-festival” on the stage of Cain Park’s Evans Amphitheater, that will, in some ways, celebrate the spirit of Woodstock.

What is tall, striped and fuzzy and keeps time?

A knitscaped parking meter.

Heights Arts, in partnership with businesses and nimble-fingered helpers throughout the area, is presenting Knitscape, a temporary community public art project under the creative oversight of artist Carol Hummel in residence at Heights Arts Gallery August, 2009.

Knitscape will create a visual line of color and pattern in the Cedar Lee and Larchmere business districts with parking meter poles and selected trees being covered by colorful knitted and crocheted cozies. 

Don’t miss the chance to celebrate the Cedar Fairmount neighborhood during an afternoon of food, fun and festivities!

Cedar Fairmount’s Business District will come alive on Sunday, August 9 as artists, musicians and street vendors pack the sidewalks as part of the 8th Annual Cedar Fairmount Festival. The festival will run from noon to 4 p.m.

Without George Gershwin the hyperactive, neglected juvenile delinquent, George Gershwin the musical genius wouldn’t exist. So explained psychiatrist and concert pianist Dr. Richard Kogan to a packed house at a benefit for Cleveland Psychoanalytic Center, a Cleveland Heights-based organization that trains psychotherapists and promotes the value of psychoanalysis. Kogan's presentation of "The Mind and Music of George Gershwin" featured a unique blend of lecture and performance.

Fishing for Stillness by Kathleen Cerveny 

Sharing a common interest in animal welfare and art, the Public Animal Welfare Society of Ohio (PAWS) and two students of The Cleveland Institute of Art, Melinda Laszczynski and JenMarie Zeleznak, have combined their passions into an event to raise awareness and funding for PAWS on Saturday, June 27 from 7 to 10 p.m. at the Museum of Contemporary Art, 8501 Carnegie Avenue, Cleveland.

Artist Carol Hummel crocheted a parking meter cozy in front of Heights Arts Gallery (2173 Lee Road) and sometime late Saturday night it was removed!!!!!  Perhaps it was removed by the person who called the police when Hummel was putting it on the meter?  Hummel explained to the officer that Heights Arts does have city permission to cover the parking meter poles-this first one was a prototype-and no ticket was given. 

Is this an attack on art, or the hated parking meters???

If you find the missing pieces or know the perpetrator, please call Heights Arts:  216.371.3457.   If the pieces are returned, no questions will be asked. 

More info:

In partnership with businesses and knitters throughout the area, this summer Heights Arts is presenting Knitscape Cedar Lee and Knitscape Larchmere,

Experience night life on Lee Road Friday, June 12 with the opening of two Heights Arts photography shows. The evning will feature "drama" on the street by Cleveland Shakespeare and music by Heelsplitter.

Boom Modern Gallery will hold its grand opening in its new location, 2218 Lee, midway down the block.

And bring your own camera to join Heights Arts in exploring light on the street and in the Cedar Lee mini-park after sunset.

With great joy in their steps, Cleveland School of Dance students performed their annual Spring Performance, Simply Artistic, on May 23, celebrating the school's ninth season at Playhouse Square Center. Under the direction of the school's director, Gladisa Guadalupe, and music director, Lawrence Minadeo, the students, ages four to 18, demonstrated a variety of techniques: Pointe, Character, Jazz, Modern, Contemporary and Spanish Dance. 

Simply Artistic transported the audience into a journey of enchantment via the 10 beautiful and creative acts choreographed by Guadalupe, Libby Lubinger, Alba Topulli, Kyle Primous, Michael Medcalf and Markian Komichak. This year's Spring Concert was dedicated to two of the school's most dedicated and committed dance students, Alexandra De Leon and Alexis Spooner, both of whom are seniors and who departed the Allen Theatre stage with beautiful bouquets of flowers. 

The Cleveland area has long been known as a bastion for musical talent. Despite ever-changing musical tastes and trends, the talent that has launched (and taken root) here over the past 50 years is impressive beyond measure.

The first annual Big Cool Cats Music Festival shines the spotlight on Cleveland's venerable music scene with an all-day music showcase and festival concert Saturday, June 20, from noon - 11 p.m. at Cain Park's Evans Amphitheatre. Offering a dynamite, mainstage lineup, plus "unplugged" acoustic performances in the Colonnade, this inaugural event, created by Cleveland
Heights resident Steve Presser (owner of Big Fun Toy Store) and Lakewood residents Thomas Mulready (founder of the CoolCleveland.com online network) and Denis Devito (leader of the Cats on Holiday band), is sure to give music fans a thrill or two.

Renowned psychiatrist and concert pianist, Dr. Richard Kogan, is returning to Cleveland on Saturday, June 6, to give a lecture and concert in Mixon Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music. The program, titled "The Mind and Music of George Gershwin", will explore the stylistic period of Gershwin’s music and the psychological forces that influenced the composer’s human and artistic development. The event is being presented by the Cleveland Psychoanalytic Center, with proceeds supporting the center’s programs.

Get ready for an evening of high-octane klezmer, kvetching and comedy. The nationally renowned, Cleveland-based klezmer band, Yiddishe Cup, celebrates its 20th season and the release of its new CD, Klezmer Guy. Expect everything from mambo and Borscht Belt to, well, schmaltzy violin and clarinet solos.

The free concert is 7 p.m. Sunday, June 28, in the Evans Amphitheater. (www.cainpark.com, 216-371-3000.) No ticket required. Open seating. Gates open at 6 p.m.

The show is the Workmen's Circle 31st annual free Yiddish Concert in the Park. Cain Park/Cleveland Heights is also a producer.

Cleveland Heights residents will once again have the opportunity to buy a special block of tickets to all Cain Park events on May 30 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Cain Park Ticket Office (in person only, bring two pieces of ID).

2009 Cain Park season highlights include Judy Collins, Livingston Taylor, Arlo Guthrie & Richie Havens, John McCutcheon, Over the Rhine, The Beach Boys & Pavlo. Come for Family Fundays, exhibits in the Feinberg Art Gallery, The Doo Wops Reunion Concert in tribute to their Heights High chorus director, Bill

The artists Migiwa Orimo, Jeanne Regan and Yumiko Goto had never met before their art came together in an exhibition currently on view at Heights Arts Gallery, 2173 Lee Road. The show, titled simply Orimo Regan Goto, intersperses works by the three artists, with Regan's silk screens and Orimo's paintings and fabric installation adorning the walls, and Goto's ceramics on freestanding pedestals.

CityMusic Cleveland’s ends its 5th Anniversary Season with Heaven and Earth: Schubert and Mozart.

The program pairs Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Symphony No. 41 with Franz Schubert's Mass No.2 in G Major. At the performance, CityMusic Cleveland is collaborating with the city’s newest chorus, Quire Cleveland. Featured soloists include soprano Chabrelle Williams and tenor Roy Hage from Oberlin Conservatory, and baritone Matthew Hayward.

The concert starts at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, May 5 at Fairmount Presbyterian Church, 2747 Fairmount Blvd. The concert is free; no tickets are needed. Free childcare is offered; call the church at 216-321-5800 to reserve a spot. 

Mozart's Symphony No. 41 is ablaze with light and joyful invention, as if an antidote to the dark circumstances of the composer's life at that time. Austria was at war and cultural events had been curtailed. Don Giovanni had failed and Mozart was struggling financially with few commissions. He was also grieving the death of his 6-month-old daugther.

Poem for May 2009

Meredith Holmes

In the course of clearing out the basement, the poet witnesses an unexpected disappearance. 

Western Reserve Chorale performs the Mass in D by Antonin Dvorak (1841-1904) at Grace Lutheran Church, 13001 Cedar Road, Cleveland Heights, on Sunday, May 17 at 7:30 p.m. Guest organist Daniel Hathaway is joined by soloists Amanda-Joyce Abbott, soprano; Joanne Uniatowski, alto; Timothy Culver, tenor; and Michael Parry, bass; and choir. Other works to be performed by the chorale will be The Dove and the Maple Tree and Tu Trinitas Unitas by Dvorak and Turn Back O Man, by Gustav Holst. The concert and parking are free and wheelchair accessible. An artist’s reception follows.

Save Wednesday, June 3, 2009, 6 to 9 p.m. for the Taste of the Heights! Enjoy your favorite restaurant’s food at a fundraiser to benefit the Heights Youth Club at the club's headquarters, 2065 Lee Road. Tickets are $50 in advance or $60 at the door.

Gail Bellamy, a 20 year resident of Cleveland Heights, will be appointed the city's 4th Poet Laureate by City Council on Monday, April 20, at 7:30 at Cleveland Heights City Hall.

Bellamy's wide-ranging interests and talents are on display in her detail-rich poems, which combine a poet's startling metaphors and associative leaps with a journalist's deadly accurate, and often very funny observations. "I love all kinds of writing," Bellamy says, "poetry, journalism, fiction, and memoir, but poetry has always been my first love."  

Her  sense of history is especially vivid when she imagines her own heritage, as in "Papa's Violin:"

 

We get so many compliments, suggestions, and criticisms from our readers, and truly, we wecome them all.  We learn from every ounce of feedback, so please, tell us what you think.

One citizen thought we should have a crossword puzzle, so she made it for us.  We hope you enjoy our first crossword puzzle.  Here is the full size puzzle and of course, the solution.

Enjoy!

Dobama Theatre held a ground breaking ceremony on March 31. The new space, the former Heights YMCA pool, will open in September. From left to right: Nancy Levin, executive director of the CH-UH Public Library System; Glenn Billington, member of the library's board of trustees; lead capital campaign donors Spencer Caress, Barbara Columbi, Maurice Heller, Bill Newby (president of the Dobama Theatre board of trustees) and Barbara Hill-Newby.

This award-winning documentary is opening this Friday, March 27, at the Cedar Lee Theatre in Cleveland Heights, OH.

"Brothers At War" is an award-winning documentary about U.S. soldiers in a critical time in Iraq, told from a brother’s point of view. In “Brothers At War,” Director and Producer Jake Rademacher sets out to understand the experience, sacrifice and motivation of his two brothers serving in Iraq. The film follows Jake’s remarkable journey where he embeds with four combat units in Iraq and risks everything—including his life—to tell his brothers’ story.

Some may find it hard to imagine that 16 years ago the public schools in arty Cleveland Heights had only one art teacher at one of eight elementary schools. But during a perennial public school budget crisis, the arts had been cut from the district budget and each elementary school became a magnet for a speciality such as language, communications or art. Only one school, Roxboro Elementary, was the arty one with an art teacher.

Heights Arts presents A Flutatious Evening on Sunday, April 26 at 7 p.m. This intimate house concert is one of a series conceived by Cleveland Orchestra violinist Isabel Trautwein, who is also a trustee of Heights Arts, to perform chamber music in intimate venues where it is best appreciated.

Orchestra flutist Marisela Sager has brought together Jason Vieaux, guitar, Tanya Ell, cello, and Joanna Patterson, viola, to join her in playing Debussy, Luzuriaga, Piazzola, and Schubert in a beautiful penthouse on top of the world in Cleveland at the private home of Rick Maron and Judy Eigenfeld. Seating is limited. Reservations are $40 or $35 for Heights Arts members: 216-371-3457.

Peggy Spaeth is the executive director of Heights Arts.

Heights Arts Gallery will celebrate the opening of a group show featuring three Ohio artists on Friday, April 24, from 6 to 9 p.m. The artists' work is built on respectful attention to fine detail and great patience and skill in execution. The cumulative effect of that process is art that exudes a kind of thoughtful calm that encourages the viewer to spend some quiet time with it.

The play, Cleveland Heights, tells the story of a Jewish family who fled Europe to settle in a growing and diverse American city. They build a business and are impacted over time by financial and economic forces that are seemingly out of their control.

It’s a calculated risk to provide a broad title to any specific form of creativity, work of art or otherwise. High expectations are set that the book, song, painting, or play will reflect a wide sampling of that represented by the title as it focuses on a few dimensions.

A high bar is set, thus, for Cleveland Heights, on stage through March 15 at Cuyahoga Community College Eastern Campus Performing Arts Center in Highland Heights.

American and European 19th and 20th century prints from Vixseboxse Art Gallery will be on sale at the Heights Arts Gallery from March 7-April 18, 2009.  

Peruse engravings, etchings, color lithographs, mezzotints, Nast and Homer wood block engravings from Harper’s Weekly, and more. Subjects include botanicals, birds, civil war, hunting, lawyers, maps, Appleton, Cadart and more.