Outreach
North carolina dance theatre connects with local children for holiday magic
By Amy Dupain Vashaw
Most of us can remember the feeling we had as children when we attended our first live performance, yearning to be up on the stage with the sparkly costumes and magical lighting. No production has inspired that feeling more than the perennial holiday favorite, The Nutcracker. This past holiday season, 48 local children realized that dream when they were cast in a role in the North Carolina Dance Theatre’s version of The Nutcracker, presented by the Center for the Performing Arts on November 29, 2005.
Artistic personnel from the North Carolina Dance Theatre (NCDT) flew to State College in October 2005 to conduct auditions at Eisenhower Auditorium. Nearly 70 children (from the local communities of State College and Bellefonte, as well as Lewistown and Loretto, among others) attended the audition, and 48 were selected. They were cast in roles that included party children, mice, soldiers, angels, Babushka dolls, Georgian princesses, Anna’s attendants and Flower Fairies. Jerri Kumery, the company’s associate artistic director, made the process run smoothly, testifying to her years of experience running similar auditions in the company’s hometown of Charlotte, N.C., as well as on the road in Syracuse, N.Y.
Kumery and her associate, Kathy Diamond, spent the weekend with the children, intensively rehearsing them and sharing the choreography, which was created by Salvatore Aiello, NCDT’s former artistic director. Also on hand for these staging rehearsals was Pennsylvania Dance Theatre’s artistic director, Andre Koslowski. The Center for the Performing Arts had hired Koslowski as a rehearsal coach to conduct the weekly rehearsals with each group that would be necessary to prepare the children for their Eisenhower stage debuts.
After rehearsing without the NCDT company throughout October and November, the children were anxious to take the stage with the professional dancers, and they participated in technical and dress rehearsals with the company the day before the performance. On November 29, the groups of children (angels, mice, etc.) were separated into their own dressing rooms, and local volunteers were on hand to calm nerves, assist with costumes and prepare the children for the performance.
Marilyn Jenkins, a member of the Center for the Performing Arts Community Advisory Council, was one of the volunteers on hand. “The thing that stuck out for me was how well the children got along together, even though they did not know each other prior to this experience. They had the unifying element of dance bringing them together, and the co-ed group got along really well.”
According to Jenkins, this type of collaboration is beneficial for both the children and their parents. “I think it’s important to offer these opportunities because now these children realize that they can go anywhere with their dancing, and be just as successful as they were on the Eisenhower stage,” Jenkins notes. “It’s also a way to help people get introduced to the arts through their children.” 
Sixty-nine dancers-children and teens from the region-arrived at Eisenhower Auditorium on October 7 to audition for roles in the North Carolina Dance Theatre's production of the Nutcracker, presented by the Center for the Performing Arts on November 29.
nurturing children's musical development
By Amy Milgrub Marshall
Children from throughout the Centre Region are benefiting from the skills and experience of Penn State music education faculty and students, thanks to the efforts of program coordinator and professor Joanne Rutkowski. Since 1985, Rutkowski has been teaching music classes to children enrolled in Penn State child care facilities, first at the day care center that was located in Cedar Building, and now at the Bennett Center.
Music education undergraduates have been involved in the classes since 1991. During the first semester of their junior year, they spend 10 weeks attending the classes, where they have the opportunity to observe, interact with the kids and lead some activities. “I wanted the undergraduates to see what young children are capable of doing in a music class, what to expect from children and how to guide their musical development. I also wanted them to become comfortable in the environment,” explains Rutkowski. “Participating in the classes at the day care centers has provided them with a consistent experience with a group of children over an entire semester.”
Kelly Delaney-Klinger and her son, Matthew Klinger, participate in a Musicians All class at the Music Academy (see story below). Rutkowski teaches a preschool class at the Bennett Center once a week. Yun-Fei Hsee, a music education doctoral candidate, now also holds a weekly music class there for infants and toddlers. In addition, Hsee coordinates elective opportunities for undergraduate music education majors to teach classes prior to their official student teaching experience.
Hsee says teaching at the Bennett Center is rewarding because many of the babies learn how to respond to her via music, even though they cannot talk yet. “Most of the children are able to make some music babbling sound when they see me and sway their little bodies as a gesture of communication. At this stage of their development, music becomes their essential vocabulary.”
Both Rutkowski and Hsee’s classes at the Bennett Center take an emergent approach, exposing the kids to singing, movement and rhythms, but not expecting anything in return. “That’s what’s developmentally appropriate,” Rutkowski explains. “Recent research has observed the stages kids go through in their music development, and we’ve learned that nothing can really be expected of them at first. Often they just sit and stare at us, but we learn later that they were singing the songs and chanting the rhythms at home or in their classrooms. It is important that we provide the nurturing environment to allow their natural musical potentials to develop.”
Rutkowski instituted the classes at the Cedar and Bennett child care facilities because of her own desire to provide children on campus with a quality music experience, and to show music education students the importance of nurturing the musical development of young children. “These classes influence what the students view as important. They help them understand that music education is not just about teaching music—it’s about setting up a musically nurturing environment.”
Musicians All!
Children who do not attend the Bennett Center also have the opportunity to benefit from Joanne Rutkowski’s expertise. She teaches a weekly music class, called “Musicians All,” at the Music Academy in downtown State College. Designed for children from birth to age 5, the program is based on the philosophy that all children have musical potential but need an appropriately nurturing environment for their music development to progress normally.
Rutkowski started teaching at the Music Academy in spring 2001, and the collaboration is officially recognized by Penn State. The compensation Rutkowski and the student interns receive goes back into the music education program to help graduate students, funding travel to conferences or providing monetary assistance for their research. The music education faculty are in the process of developing a Center for the Study of Music Learning and Teaching, and the “Musicians All” program is part of that initiative.
Because Musicians All classes include toddlers and infants, some just a couple months old, you might expect to hear an unhappy baby or two. But Rutkowski says the kids are so mesmerized by the different songs, sounds and movements that even the smallest infants don’t fuss. According to several parents, their children frequently ask if that day is a music class day.
Each 45-minute class includes 15 minutes devoted to free instrument play, followed by a variety of singing, moving and chanting activities. Parents participate in the class with their children. As in the classes at the Bennett Center, Rutkowski says nothing is expected of the kids, although behaviors that indicate the children’s musical development are closely monitored. “Kids don’t have to show us their attention to learn,” she explains. “The teacher simply provides the model. I compare it to language development. We all know it’s important that we talk to children, as well as how we talk to them—it’s the same with music.”
art history department mourns henisch
Heinz K. Henisch, research professor emeritus in the history of photography in the Department of Art History, died March 28, 2006, after suffering heart problems. He was also professor emeritus of physics and Fellow emeritus of the Institute for the Arts and Humanities. Dr. Henisch taught the history of photography at Penn State from 1974 to 1993. He was the founder of the London-published journal History of Photography and served as its editor from 1977 to 1990. With his wife, Bridget A. Henisch, he wrote three books on the history of photography, all published by Penn State University Press. He wrote a number of other books on physics and additional subjects, including one chronicling his childhood memories of Europe. He was a Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain and the American Photographic Historical Society and a corresponding member of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Photographie.
