Emmy Award-Winning Producer Donald Hancock is Named Assistant Professor of Film and Television Production at CCM

CCM Dean Stanley E. Romanstein has announced the appointment of Donald Hancock to the position of Assistant Professor of Film and Television Production in CCM’s Division of E-Media. Hancock joined CCM’s faculty as an adjunct in 2012. His new appointment will begin on Aug. 15, 2019.

Hancock is an Emmy Award-winning producer, professor and an active member of the media community. He has an MA in Film and Television from Savannah College of Art and Design and a BFA in E-Media from CCM. Hancock currently works as a producer at CET, Cincinnati’s PBS Member Station. He has produced “The Art Show,” CET’s weekly art magazine program, since 2013. He also produces content for a variety of partners with CET, including ArtsWave and the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra.

Hancock won a Regional Emmy Award for “Cincinnati’s Music Hall: The Next Movement,” a 60-minute documentary that he co-wrote, produced and shot. The documentary details the historic $150 million renovation of Cincinnati’s National Historic Landmark. Watch a promotional spot for the documentary below.

In 2013, Hancock was chosen as one of 25 producers from around the country to participate in the PBS/CPB Producer’s Academy, whose goal is to engage a talented pool of diverse producers in public broadcasting. Hancock has also partnered with WGBH and PBS to produce content around national programming including “Finding Your Roots,” “American Experience” and “Downton Abbey.”

For the past seven years, Hancock has been an adjunct professor at CCM, teaching Digital Video and Integrated Media Production courses to sophomore and junior-level students. In his spare time, he serves on the Executive Board for the UC Center for Film and Media Studies, as well as the community advisory board at Elementz Urban Arts Center. He is a member of the National Association of Black Journalists, a member of the Broadcast Education Association and volunteers as a Big Brother in the Big Brother Big Sisters Program.

Dean Romanstein thanked search committee members Kevin Burke (chair), Peter DePietro, John Hebbeler, Tondra Holt and Hagit Limor for their work on finding CCM’s new Assistant Professor of Film and Television Production.

Please join us in congratulating Donald Hancock on his new appointment!

CCM Prep Presents ‘Godspell Jr.’ on May 9-11

CCM Prep showcases its young actors with a one-act version of this cult-classic musical. Tickets available through the CCM Box Office.

CCM Preparatory and Community Engagement presents a shortened and edited version of Stephen Schwartz and John-Michael Tebelak’s popular musical Godspell Jr. on Thursday, May 9 through Saturday, May 11, 2019. The show is told as a series of parables taken from the Biblical books of Matthew, Luke and John.

This production features the students of CCM Prep’s Junior Musical Theatre Intensive program, who range from 9 and 14 years old. The student cast includes: Shannon Aitken, Hana Conte, Ben Crane, Jackson Higgason, Natalie Hillgrove, Claire Jeffreys, Noah Jeffreys, Kadyn Keeney, Lily Larsen, Ella Maisel, Esther Medlin, Rory Miller, Jack Rosen, Ceiliegh Rodway, Noelle Shiffert and Miriam Shrivastava.

In January, co-directors Becca Kloha Strand, Rebecca N. Childs and Karie-Lee Sutherland took the production to the Junior Theater Festival in Atlanta, where they presented a 15-minute excerpt of the show. Their performance received an award for Excellence in Acting, and actors Ben Crane and Esther Medlin were designated Festival All Stars. In addition to the performance, the students participated in master classes for acting, dance and music.

Numerous CCM Theatre Design and Production students make up the production crew for this show. These include Haleigh Sano, stage manager; Olivia Darling, assistant stage manager; Jacquelyn Reis, set designer; Lynae Smith, technical director; Andrew Stewart, lighting designer, Kelly Howland, sound operator; Julie Lasonczyk, scenic change artist; and Myrrh Sewell, prop master.

You can see CCM Prep’s Godspell Jr. on May 9-11, 2019 at Cohen Family Studio Theater. Tickets are $15 for general admission, $10 for non-UC students and free for UC students with a valid ID. Single tickets are on sale now and can be purchased in person at the CCM Box Office, over the telephone at 513-556-4183 or online.

Performance Times

• 7 p.m. Thursday, May 9
• 7 p.m. Friday, May 10
• 3 p.m. Saturday, May 11

Location
Cohen Family Studio Theater, CCM Village
University of Cincinnati

Purchasing Tickets
Tickets to CCM Prep’s Godspell Jr. are $15 general, $10 non-UC students and FREE for UC students with a valid ID. Tickets can be purchased in person at the CCM Box Office, over the telephone at 513-556-4183 or online now through our e-Box Office! Visit ccm.uc.edu/boxoffice for CCM Box Office hours and location.

Parking and Directions
Parking is available in the CCM Garage (located at the base of Corry Boulevard off Jefferson Avenue) and additional garages throughout the UC campus. Please visit uc.edu/parking for information on parking rates.

For detailed maps and directions, please visit uc.edu/visitors. Additional parking is available off-campus at the U Square complex on Calhoun Street and other neighboring lots.

For directions to CCM Village, visit ccm.uc.edu/about/directions.
____________________

Story by CCM Graduate Student Alexandra Doyle

CCM Prep Presents Spring Youth Ballet This Weekend

CCM Preparatory and Community Engagement presents the Spring Youth Ballet Concert at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, May 3 and Saturday, May 4, 2019. CCM Prep’s young dancers will exhibit their skills by performing excerpts from the ballet repertoire and new works, including several choreographed by CCM Prep students.

This year, six graduating high school seniors choreographed original pieces that will be presented at the concert. In addition to these student-created works, the program also features Fireborn, choreographed by CCM Prep instructor Heather Cameron Johnson, as well as Umbrella Dreams, choreographed by CCM Prep instructor Ana Bird. These two pieces will showcase CCM Prep Dance’s Mini Company, with students ages 8 to 11, and the Junior Ballet Company, ages 11 to 13.

The second half of the program consists of excerpts from Ludwig Minkus’ Don Quixote. CCM Prep instructors Thomas Bell, Isabele Elefson, Jonnie Lynn Jacobs-Percer and Tricia Sundbeck staged and choreographed these excerpts, which are based on Marius Petipa’s original choreography. The performances will include the “Bridesmaids’ Dance,” “Kitri’s Variation,” and a grand ensemble finale, plus 15 other excerpts.

You can see the CCM Prep’s Spring Youth Ballet Concert this weekend in CCM’s Patricia Corbett Theater. Tickets are $15 general admission, $10 for non-UC students and FREE for UC students with valid ID. Visit the CCM Box Office or call 513-556-4183 for more information.

Performance Times

• 7:30 p.m. Friday, May 3
• 7:30 p.m. Saturday, May 4

Location
Patricia Corbett Theater, CCM Village
University of Cincinnati

Purchasing Tickets
Tickets to CCM Prep’s Spring Youth Ballet Concert are $15 general, $10 non-UC students and FREE for UC students with a valid ID. Tickets can be purchased in person at the CCM Box Office, over the telephone at 513-556-4183 or online now through our e-Box Office! Visit ccm.uc.edu/boxoffice for CCM Box Office hours and location.

Parking and Directions
Parking is available in the CCM Garage (located at the base of Corry Boulevard off Jefferson Avenue) and additional garages throughout the UC campus. Please visit uc.edu/parking for information on parking rates.

For detailed maps and directions, please visit uc.edu/visitors. Additional parking is available off-campus at the U Square complex on Calhoun Street and other neighboring lots.

For directions to CCM Village, visit ccm.uc.edu/about/directions.
____________________

Story by CCM Graduate Student Alexandra Doyle

Shauna Steele Is Named Associate Professor of Dance and Chair of Dance Department at CCM

CCM Dean Stanley E. Romanstein has announced the appointment of arts administrator, educator, performer and choreographer Shauna Steele to the college’s dance faculty. Steele’s appointment as Associate Professor of Dance and Chair of the Dance Department begins on Aug. 15, 2019.

An administrator and educator with nearly two decades of experience, Steele most recently taught at Michigan’s Hope College where she taught dance history and criticism, jazz, modern, improvisation, assisted the historic and social dance sections, and mentored Student Dance Showcase choreographers. From 2011-18 Steele served as the Dance Program Director and Associate Professor of Dance at Anderson University in Indiana.

“I am excited by ongoing education, both that which I teach and that which I learn from my students,” Steele says. “I find challenge and reward in teaching and am inspired by my students and the movement that grows from class sessions, both academic and technique.”

She is the founder and artistic director of Mocha Dance Project – which pursues projects engaging the fusion of photography, video, dance and collaboration – and was the Associate Director for RusticGroove Dance.

Arts administrator, educator, performer and choreographer Shauna Steele.

Her research interests include dance in world culture and context, Africanized movement in the Diaspora of Western culture (specifically Afro-Cuban and Afro-Caribbean), the influences of Celtic traditions on art and movement, the function of art in restricted or repressed environments, and body movement logic. She was the artistic director of Parallel Differences youth dance and the Associate Instructor for the Indiana University African American Arts Institute’s dance company. Her choreography has appeared in Robert Hay-Smith’s Pollen: The Musical, RADfest, The Tank NYC, Midwest RADfest, the Arizona Positivity Project and the Ypsilanti Fringe Festival. She has taught master classes in Roots of Jazz Dance and served as dance faculty at Grand Valley State University, Eastern Michigan University, Anderson University and the University of Michigan’s MPulse summer dance institute. She has lead master classes and workshops in improvisational movement, African dance, modern dance, jazz, Afro-jazz and hip hop. Her professional credits include Windfall Dancers, African American Dance Company, Dancers Studio Inc., Sancocho: Musica and Dance Collage and Ann Arbor Dance Works. She has performed in Robin Wilson’s Slave Moth, in Alexandra Beller’s Reasons for Moving and in Gay Delanghe’s Motor Tango/Tangle.

Her past projects include Millstones in August 2010 and The Positivity Project in Tempe, Arizona in October 2010. Her current choreography projects include Disobedient Objects/Caged Bird Legacy (a site-specific work), Sacred Ground (an evening length concert in three parts), /ˈākər/ (which delves into compulsive behavior and the need to sort, measure and catalogue), Leyenda in Winter (a dance for camera work), Still Frame (a video dance project) and Passengers (a contemporary modern work).

A published dance scholar, Steele’s co-authored textbook Experiencing Dance: A Creative Approach to Dance Appreciation (2011) examines the ever-changing culture of dance and provides a basic historical context and appreciation of dance as an art form. Her research articles include Exploring Choreographic Responsibility through the ‘Cultural Lens’ (2013); Drawing Parallel Lines: Dance, Architecture, and Society (2009); and Drawing Parallel Lines in Dance, Architecture, and Society: African American Modern Dance, and Jewish Deconstructivist Architecture (2006), among others.

Steele received her MFA in Dance Choreography and Performance with a focus area in History and Technology from the University of Michigan in 2006, and a BGS in Arts and Humanities with a focus area in Cultural Anthropology and Dance from Indiana University in 2002. She is a member of the American College Dance Association, World Dance Alliance and the National Dance Education Organization.

Dean Romanstein thanked search committee members Diane Lala (co-chair), Denton Yockey (co-chair), Rebecca Bromels, Qi Jiang and Regina Truhart for their work on finding CCM’s new Associate Professor of Dance and Chair of the Dance Department.

Please join us in welcoming Shauna Steele to the CCM family!

CCM Voice Alumnae Named 2019 Sara Tucker Study Grant Recipients

Each year, the Richard Tucker Music Foundation awards the Sara Tucker Study Grant to singers, selected through a vocal competition, who are recently out of the university or conservatory and are considered to be at the beginning of promising careers. This year’s recipients include two recent UC College-Conservatory of Music alumnae: Kayleigh Decker (MM Voice, 2017) and Jessica Faselt (MM Voice, 2016).

Mezzo-soprano Kayleigh Decker began her 2018-19 season as an ensemble member of the Patrick G. and Shirley W. Ryan Opera Center at Lyric Opera of Chicago. Her mainstage work in the company’s season includes Dorothée in Cendrillon and Cretan Woman No. 2 in Idomeneo, both under the baton of Sir Andrew Davis. She also covers Idamante in Idomeneo and Prince Charmant in Cendrillon. The 2017-18 season included two title role debuts for Decker: La Cenerentola with Queen City Opera, and Ariodante with CCM Opera. She was also a Schwab Vocal Rising Star with Caramoor and the New York Festival of Song. Decker has been a young artist at the Glimmerglass Festival, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Utah Festival Opera and the Houston Grand Opera Young Artists Vocal Academy. At Carnegie Hall, as a part of the Weill Music Institute, she has been a participant in the Joyce DiDonato Masterclass Series, as well as in the inaugural SongStudio, under the auspices of Renée Fleming. Decker has received awards from the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, the MacDowell Society, the Three Arts Scholarship Fund and the CCM Opera Scholarship Competition. She was awarded the Faustina Hurlbutt Grant and the Louis and Marguerite Bloomberg Greenwood Grant from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music.

American soprano Jessica Faselt hails from Iowa. She is currently in her first year of the Lindemann Young Artist Program at the Metropolitan Opera, where she made her debut as the Novice in Puccini’s Suor Angelica and her Met: Live in HDdebut as Helmwige in Wagner’s Die Walküre. Opera Index recently awarded her the Tito Cappobiano Memorial Award. Faselt was a winner of the 2018 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, performing with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in the Grand Final Concert. As a Studio Artist at Florida Grand Opera, she covered the title roles of Richard Strauss’s Salome and Daniel Catán’s Florencia en el Amazonas. She was a Gerdine Young Artist at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, covering the title role of Ariadne auf Naxos. Faselt completed her masters degree at CCM where she was the recipient of the prestigious Corbett Award, and received her bachelor of music from the University of Iowa with honors.

You can learn more about current and past grant recipients here.

About the Richard Tucker Music Foundation
Founded in 1975, the Richard Tucker Music Foundation is a non-profit cultural organization that honors the artistic legacy of the great American tenor through support of talented American opera singers and by bringing opera into the community.

The Foundation seeks to heighten appreciation for opera by offering free performances in the New York Metropolitan area and by supporting music education enrichment programs.

Through an awards program that offers grants for study, performance opportunities and other career-enhancing activities the Foundation provides professional development for singers at several levels of career-readiness. Learn more by visiting https://richardtucker.org/.
____________________

Story by CCM Graduate Student Alexandra Doyle

CCM Acting Presents New Play ‘Association of Controlled Dreamers’

Admission to the play is free, but reservations are required. Tickets become available at 12:30 p.m. on Monday, April 22, 2019.

CCM concludes its 2018-19 Studio Series with MJ Kaufman’s Association of Controlled Dreamers on April 25-27, 2019, in Cohen Family Studio Theater.

In the play, a young, charismatic senator pursues policies that could have long-lasting repercussions for public education. A group of college students tries every technique available to them to change his mind, from occupying his lawn to collective lucid dreaming.

“The play is about students fighting for affordable education,” says Brant Russell, the show’s director. “The play also resonates with our current political and educational circumstances in that many college students feel as though they have little power over the institutions that rule their worlds. If students wish to be heard, they sometimes have to resort to less traditional means of communication.”

CCM commissioned Kaufman, who is a staff writer on Netflix’s The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, to write Association of Controlled Dreamers for the college’s summer Playwrights Workshop in 2017. Students presented a reading of the play as part of the workshop, but now audiences can see the fully-staged version.

While the subject matter addresses serious and modern societal concerns, Russell notes that the production doesn’t lose its humor. “The play is funny (really funny), moving, and relies on what’s best about CCM: students collaborating to create something greater than the sum of its parts.”

Performances of Association of Controlled Dreamers take place April 25-27, 2019, in CCM’s Cohen Family Studio Theater.

Admission is free, but reservations are required. Tickets become available at 12:30 p.m. on Monday, April 22. Visit the CCM Box Office or call 513-556-4183 to reserve. Limit two tickets per order.
­­­____________________

Creative Team

• Brant Russell, director
• Andrew Wright, lighting designer
• Hannah Gruneisen, master electrician
• Maya Hughes, assistant master electrician/board operator
• Will Graham, stage manager
• Cole Nevins, assistant stage manager
• Leah Berry, production assistant
• Emma Heath, production assistant
• Ryan Hurt, sound designer
• Dan DeGroh, composer/musician

Cast List

• Rin Wallace as Brittany
• Annie Jacques as Tara
• Paige Jordan as Vera
• Zoe Cotzias as Amber
• Michelle Jardine as Amaryllis
• Madison Pullman as Mary
• Amanda Nelson as Mother
• Briley Oakley as Social Media
• Sierra Coachman as Secret Girlfriend
• Cameron Nalley as Sammy
• Jason Pavlovich as Tom
• Reid Robison as Edward
• Matt Fox as Senator/Twin
• Frankie Chuter as Job Man
• Sydney Miles as Rhonda/Hope

Performance Times

• 8 p.m. Thursday, April 25
• 8 p.m. Friday, April 26
• 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, April 27

Location
Cohen Family Studio Theater, CCM Village
University of Cincinnati

Admission
Admission is free, but reservations are required. Tickets become available at 12:30 p.m. on Monday, April 22. Visit the CCM Box Office or call 513-556-4183 to reserve. Limit two tickets per order.

Parking and Directions
Parking is available in the CCM Garage (located at the base of Corry Boulevard off Jefferson Avenue) and additional garages throughout the UC campus. Please visit uc.edu/parking for more information on parking rates.

For detailed maps and directions, please visit uc.edu/visitors. Additional parking is available off-campus at the U Square complex on Calhoun Street and other neighboring lots.

For directions to CCM Village, visit ccm.uc.edu/about/directions.
____________________

Acting Studio Series Sponsor: Neil Artman and Margaret Straub

Story by CCM Graduate Student Jonathan Dellinger

Acclaimed Musician Demarre McGill Is Named Associate Professor of Flute at CCM

CCM Dean Stanley E. Romanstein has announced the appointment of Demarre McGill to the position of Associate Professor of Flute at CCM. McGill joined CCM’s faculty on a visiting basis in 2017. His new appointment will begin on Aug. 15, 2019.

Winner of the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant and Sphinx Medal of Excellence, McGill is a leading soloist, recitalist, and chamber and orchestral musician.

Photo by Denver Rispel.

At age 15, he appeared as a soloist with the Chicago Symphony and he has since appeared as soloist with the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Seattle, Pittsburgh, Dallas, San Diego and Baltimore symphony orchestras. In 2018 he performed and presented master classes in South Africa, Korea and Japan. That same year, he was soloist with the New York Youth Symphony at Carnegie Hall and he performed with the Cathedral Choral Society at the National Cathedral in Washington, DC in a May 20^thprogram entitled “Bernstein the Humanitarian.”

Now principal flute of the Seattle Symphony, McGill previously served as principal flute of the Dallas Symphony, San Diego Symphony, Florida Orchestra and Santa Fe Opera Orchestra. He recently served as acting principal flute of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and earlier with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra.

A founding member of The Myriad Trio, and former member of Chamber Music Society Two, McGill has participated in the Aspen, Santa Fe, Marlboro, Seattle and Stellenbosch chamber music festivals, to name a few. He is the co-founder of The Art of Élan and, along with clarinetist Anthony McGill and pianist Michael McHale, founded the McGill/McHale Trio in 2014. The trio’s first CD, Portraits, was released in August 2017 to rave reviews.

His media credits include appearances on PBS’s Live from Lincoln Center, A&E Network’s The Gifted Ones and NBC’s Today Show and Nightly News. McGill also appeared on Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood with his brother when they were teenagers.

A native of Chicago, McGill began studying the flute at age seven and attended the Merit School of Music. In the years that followed, he studied with Susan Levitin before leaving Chicago. He received his Bachelor’s degree from The Curtis Institute of Music and a Master’s degree at The Juilliard School.

Dean Romanstein thanked search committee members James Bunte (chair), Ron Aufmann, Mark Ostoich, Sandra Rivers and Heather Verbeck for their work on finding CCM’s new Associate Professor of Flute.

Please join us in congratulating Demarre McGill on his new appointment!