Monday at 3 on KTOO-FM on a Juneau Afternoon Joan Pardis hosts;
We’ll talk with Assistant Fire Chief Ed Quinto about volunteer firefighter recruitment;
We’ll hear from the Big Brothers Big Sisters’ Joe Clark;
And we’ll talk to the Girl Scouts’ Member Services and Program Specialist Taralee Ellis.
That, Writers’ Almanac, Bird Note, music & more on A Juneau Afternoon.
Celebration begins this evening at 6 o’clock with the Grand Entrance procession to Centennial Hall. The four-day cultural event of Southeast Alaska Natives includes 50 dance groups. Among them is All Nations Children’s Dance Group of Juneau. The group formed in 1995 and has about 80 members. I attended a recent practice and learned that singing and dancing is a foundation for much more.
It’s a Thursday evening and some 50 kids and teenagers dance their way through the Tlingit-Haida Community Center near Salmon Creek. Group founder and leader Vicki Soboleff walks up and down the line giving instructions. Soboleff says she and the group have come a long way since the first practice in 1995.
“There were 12 children here and there was a group of their parents and maybe grandparents and aunts and uncles. All those children were looking at me and I was terrified. We didn’t start off singing Tlingit songs. We actually started off singing ‘This Old Man.’ I was just trying to get them to sing and plus I was nervous.”
At this practice they sing numerous Alaska Native songs and Soboleff says they’re instruments for learning.
“Knowledge of your Native culture and involvement in Native song and dance and language really helps you with your sense of self and belonging. To your tribe, your clan. I believe it’s really important for Native children to know who they are, where they came from, what their tribal clan is.”
One of Soboleff’s early dancers is now a teacher. Barbara Dude joined the group when she was seven and now, at 26, she’s an assistant group leader. She helps 15-year-old Allison Ford with her Tlingit introduction—just like Soboleff helped her. Among other things, Dude says she gained language skills, self-esteem, and public speaking skills. But the most important lessons were about something more. She says the group’s goal to help engender identity worked.
“When I started the group when I was seven I didn’t know that I was Tlingit. The group has helped me gain a sense of pride in who I am and now I am able to share that with my children who have known they were Tlingit since they were born.”
Dude is excited for Celebration, especially the grand entrance.
“We all dance in together and ahead of us are dancers from another group, and behind us are dancers from another group and we’re dancing across stage and each person gets their chance to go across stage and dance their hardest. They feel it because everyone around them is feeling it with them.”
Dude tears up and apologizes for becoming emotional.
“How powerful it is to watch them be immersed in the culture and the language. It’s beautiful. It’s beautiful.”
The All Nations Children’s Dance Group is true to its name and is open to children of all races and ages until high school graduation. Then Soboleff and Dude hope they’ll join an adult group or stick around to help children learn language, song, dance, and especially, cultural identity and pride.
The Grand Entrance procession begins tonight at 6 p.m. at Centennial Hall. You can watch it on 360 North or 360North.org.
Planners hope to begin architectural design of the proposed Willoughby Arts Complex this summer. The multiuse performance space would include, or take the place of, the existing Juneau Arts and Culture Center. In 2012, Juneau voters approved spending $1 million from sales tax revenue to support the project. Earlier this week, interested groups heard the latest on the project.
If you’re unfamiliar with the project, here’s a summary. Both Perseverance Theatre and the Juneau Arts and Humanities Council have needed new spaces for years. About a year ago, says Perseverance Theatre’s Executive Artistic Director Art Roach, the organizations came to a realization:
“Instead of building two buildings, let’s build one. Makes sense. And let’s share in the design of it, and the operating of it, and the fundraising for it, and selling it to the community–all of those tasks are going to have to get done to make this real. Let’s do it together because if we work together we can do it more efficiently, and we can get more for the money.”
They formed a nonprofit entity called “The pARTnership” that will own and operate the building. The city, which owns the land, gave the group until 2019 to break ground. That’s where consultant Tony Forman of the international firm Theatre Projects Consultants comes in.
“We are not architects. We are a resource for architects to help them design a very unique building type, which is a performing arts space that has very specific and unique requirements to be successful,” says Forman.
That includes planning the general environment, the spaces that allow for the best interaction between actor and audience, the specialized equipment like lighting and rigging, and the question of the night: the size and number of rooms and theaters. In addition to the JACC space, a 275-seat, multiuse or community theater, a 170-seat theater for Perseverance, a smaller 30- to 45-seat performance space, a rehearsal room, a classroom, offices, a café, and more. It’s going to be bigger than the JACC is now. And speaking of the old building, will it stay or will it go? Forman says it’s tricky.
“Renovation is 95- to 115-percent of new construction. You can save a little money, and it can also be more expensive. You have things like asbestos abatement and lead paint and underground tanks that you may not even know are there when you start the project.”
While the renovation versus new construction question is not unique, Forman says that two non-profits joining forces is.
“In the past, communities have done that on a civic level where the city, town, or municipality has undertaken the project and owns and runs a building. That’s a model that has been successful for many years but it’s starting to change. I think the way Juneau is approaching this with these two organizations taking the lead is the wave of the future and very exciting.”
Juneau Arts and Humanities Council Executive Director Nancy DeCherny says there is still a lot of work to do, including fundraising.
“People are worried that we will build something that we cannot afford—we will not do that. We realize that this is a huge philanthropic stretch for this community. We have a target in mind and we are going to build what we can afford.”
DeCherny hesitates to give an estimate, but knows it will be difficult. Still, she’s enthusiastic.
“It’s been a dream in this community since I moved here in 1975 and it’s exciting to be part of seeing it though. And I think the whole community should be excited about this. We’ve got the SLAM Building being completed, we have the Walter Sobeloff Center, we’ve got this. Juneau’s going to be a hot place pretty soon.”
To raise the funds, The pARTnership has begun formation of a capital campaign committee that will be coordinated by Charlotte Fox of the Alaska State Council on the Arts.
The 28th annual Juneau Jazz and Classics festival is now in its seventh day. On Monday, I attended one of the festival’s brown bag lunches at the SOB.
The festival continues tonight with the Nikki Hill Band at the Elizabeth Peratrovich Hall. The next brown bag lunch is on Monday at noon at the SOB.
Photos by Annie Bartholomew
On the Thursday of the 40th annual Alaska Folk Festival, members of the Overby Family Band, Jason and Rachel Overby, and Telsche Mae dropped by the station and we had a fun conversation. In addition to life and music in Alaska, they spoke about their involvement with three different band configurations including the Overby Family Band, Spirit of the Red City, and Ode to the Roddes. We started by listening to their recording of Freight Train from the Ode to the Roddes CD.
The 40th annual Alaska Folk Festival is now in its fifth day. This year’s dance band, the Gallus Brothers, will play tonight at the Juneau Arts and Culture Center. Here’s an audio postcard about the band.
