The seventh annual Showcase of the Performing Arts (SOPA) kicks off with music and drama in its traditional home, the Heritage Playhouse. This year, the fundraising showcase of local talent enjoys a new experience - the theatre is finally mortgage free.
An evening program tonight (Friday) features speaker Don Chapman on the subject of Lost Canadians.
On Saturday, Fabrizio Alberico offers an evening of fingerstyle guitar instrumentals and songs, drawing from traditional Celtic tunes and North American folk styles. The local guitarist and luthier is deeply involved with the acoustic guitar. After moving to Vancouver from Toronto in 1993, he was inspired by several fingerstyle guitarists to begin performing, refining his skills and writing his own music. In 1998, Alberico took a guitar-making apprenticeship in Ontario, afterwards opening his own shop where he built steel-string and classical instruments. He views the two, his guitar building and playing, as inextricably linked parts of a lifelong journey in which he strives to find and express the pure, timeless essence of the music.
Alberico is joined on stage by Eric Norman who will provide his considerable skills on vocals, harmonica and guitar and Diana Halter, a multi-instrumentalist of Celtic heritage, on harp and vocals. Fans of Rose Kirchner will be thrilled to know she will also perform.
"She has a stunning voice and is one of the most brilliant songwriters around," said Alberico. Local actor and director Marilyn Browning appears in Snowbirds, an original script reading on Thursday, July 10. Browning's script, about seven Canadians in an RV park in Arizona, was written in short episodes to make it suitable for TV, and it was first performed at the Sechelt Seniors' Centre during their potluck evenings. It drew laughs and the audience wanted to know what happens to the characters. Though there are a few American jokes, it's more pro-Canadian than anti-American, Browning says.
Continuing the SOPA tradition, Nikki Weber presents the Now Generation on July 11. "It's a showcase; a chance for new talent to be heard," said the teacher and concert organizer. This year, the generation includes the youngest at age 12 to the oldest at age 26. The show features the vocal trio Metamorphosis: Isabell Boese, Courtney Lizee and Maddy Weber, with six guests, and MC Karlei Diening-Verge in a program that includes, pop, jazz and classical.
Some members of the Coast String Fiddlers will perform on July 12 at 8 p.m. Celtic Music School teachers Iain Fraser and Harris Playfair from Scotland will lead a talented group of young musicians from across B.C., Washington state and Scotland in a Traditional Big Band concert.
On July 17 (and tentatively, July 18) Driftwood Players offer a dramatic reading, Damnation of Vancouver, a play about development that director Sandi McGinnis said is as timely today as when it was first written by Earle Birney in 1952 as Trial of a City. Canadian poet Birney lived on Vancouver Island when it was proposed to dam an untouched glacial lake. This play is his protest. At a hearing, the opposing forces of Mr. Legion (David Hallstead) and Miss Powers (Susan Beer) call witnesses from history. Captain Vancouver is made to materialize as is a Coast Salish chief, Gassy Jack and a geology professor. The language is poetic; the message delivered in tongue-tripping rhyme or blank verse. It's an ambitious play that will stretch the intellect, plus there's a surprise ending - the audience will hear from the true voice of Vancouver. SOPA closes with the Summer Segue: Full Moon Finale, an instrumental jazz night on July 19. Vocalist Karin Bergen hosts Bill Coon and Colleen Savage along with musicians Paul Steenhuis on bass and John Rule on drums.
Ticket prices vary from $10 for the two drama productions to $15 and $18 for the music concerts. Find tickets at Gaia's Fair Trade and Hallmark Cards in Gibsons and the Sechelt Visitors Centre.
