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Stories
The World's Best Board
Twice a year, the Mormon Arts Center Advisory Board gathers together for a meeting. A little over a month ago, we had a standing room only crowd to discuss developments of the Center. The Church History Museum in Salt Lake City graciously hosted it. Most arts organizations view their boards are primarily fundraisers. While they share their opinions about this or that decision made by artistic directors, they perform institutional roles to maintain governance and compliance, primarily. We see our Advisory Board a bit differently. We really seek their input. And we listen.
The Dominican Jazz Project
In 2014, Dominican artist Guillo Carias reached out to American (and Mormon) jazz pianist Stephen Anderson to perform with a group of elite musicians from the Dominican Republic at the Jazzomania Jazz Festival. They had such a great time that they decided to continue working together. Anderson, who is also a composer, traveled throughout the Caribbean to document and discover local jazz. But instead of covering their music or simply doing arrangements of the works, the group of seven musicians-- Sandy Gabriel, Guy Frómeta, Guillo Carias, Carlos Luis, Jeffry Eckels,Juan Álamo, and David Almengod--encouraged him to absorb their music and then create his own compositions that all of them could play together.
The Ghost in the Machine
I recorded a new podcast this week. The software I'm using to mix it is GarageBand on my iMac. It's all going smoothly except for one problem: I'm having a terrible time with Siri. I can't get her to leave me alone.
Saturday Morning Cartoons
In June at the Festival, one of the sessions will feature three prominent animators who will show and talk about their work. All are connected--as faculty or alumni--to the BYU Center for Animation, which has become a successful developer of student talent and a pipeline to important studios. Many of their graduates have gone to major studios including Disney, Pixar, DreamWorks, Blizzard, etc.
How Do You Get to Carnegie Hall?
That's the old joke: How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice. And if you are the concert pianist Scott Holden preparing for an exciting recital as part of the 2018 Mormon Arts Center Festival, the answers are: discover and then practice. It had long been a dream of mine to have elite Mormon performers tackle our culture's best music and put it on display in the world's best concert venues. I reached out to Scott Holden and asked whether it might appeal to him to prepare a recital of Mormon composers' works. I knew what a big ask it was. Although Scott plays quite a bit of contemporary music, this would require discovery of many composers and their best music.
The New Look
Allyson Chard, our managing director, began a conversation with the Design Lab at Brigham Young University. Each year, they take on an organization and develop a brand identity through graphic design. In October 2017, we learned that they wanted to work with us to rebrand the Mormon Arts Center. Allyson's background is in advertising, and she spearheaded the relationship, which included preparing an extensive Creative Brief on the Center. She met with the students and Doug Dearden, the class advisor on next steps.