These Things were Offered to Me as Blessings

Friday night (February 15) the Union College Department of Music presented Branches of Words a program of dance and music set to the poetry of Hafez. Siena's Mahmood Karimi-Hakak collaborated with Ellen Sinopoli in directing the program. He voiced Hafez's Persian poetry as the dancers embodied it. The effect was extraordinary. The sound echoed the movement -- not only in grace but also in physicality -- for the Farsi was as highly textured, solid and physically three-dimensional as the dancers' efforts.

The program was well-paced, varying from poetry-dance to poetry-music to pure and exhilarating percussion of Zorki Nelson. Deeply moving was "I show Myself as I Am" with single dancer Sarah Pingel and Zoe B. Zak's classical accordion that drew out every form, every tension, every pulse. Reprised from last year's program two years ago was Munir Beken's Pottery Shards, this time laid into Hafez "Those who Stood up for Tolerance"; a new title "Into Dark Moods" gave it an even greater impact.

The fine Union College Music Hall allowed all the music, all the movement, all the poetry to move cleanly about the space and into our imaginations. I can't help but feel very jealous that we at Siena cannot offer our audiences the same opportunity to realize, with Hafez, that "These Things were Offered . . . as Blessings."

REVIEWS:
http://blogs.timesunion.com/reviews/?p=351
http://www.union.edu/N/DS/edition_display.php?e=1467&s=7657

CREA's Brian Massman at Cap Rep

Brian Massman, fondly known as Mass Man, appears in the Cap Rep's production of David Henry Hwang's M. Butterfly, performances from Jan 18-Feb 10. He plays the French ambassador to China. See http://www.capitalrep.org/season/butterfly/html for tickets and information. Mass Man teaches a number of courses in CREA: Intro to Theatre, Voice and Movement, Acting for the Camera, as well as Art and Society.

Siena theatre students will see and discuss the play with the cast on February 6 and 9th.

Another Siena Premiere Make Good

Best Possible World, by Tee O'Neill has been selected to be the Australian entrant in the 7th hotINK International Play Festival in New York CIty.  It will be read at NYU (School fo TISCH) by members of the Atlantic Theatre Company at the Shop Theatre at 721 Broadway, New York, NY on Saturday, February 2, 2008 at 4:00 pm.  

For more information go to hotink.org or call for reservations at 212-998-1860.

Tee O'Neill was the winner of the International Playwrights Competition.  Best Possible World premiered at Siena College Spring Semester 2007. Tee spent several months developing the play with director Gary Maciag and a cast and crew of Siena students and staff.

Australian expatriates Bride and Orla run a former hostel in Ireland, which houses asylum seekers from all around the war torn world.  In a city where tensions run high and citizenship can be bought, sold, or snatched away, the two young women try desperately to keep their residents safe. When Bride's lover is murdered in the street, she must decide how to create a new life, even at the cost of sacrificing her own identity forever.

YATES GALLERY spring 2008 semester

FEBRUARY 13-MARCH 26

KEN RAGSDALE

How Did I Get Here? 

paintings, drawings and mixed media

APRIL 9- MAY 21

EMMA COPLEY

Nitty-Gritty

painting and drawings

SIENA COLLEGE STANDISH LIBRARY

call Liz Blum for information

BENEDICTUS LA reviews & interviews

LA City Beat's Critic's Choice.

http://www.lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=6580&IssueNum=235

AND for the buzz in Iran:

http://www.irandokht.com/TV/TVmore.php?PID=58

On Denise Massman's CREA proseminar

I just had the most moving experience of my 27 years at Siena. I attended the final session of Denise's CREA111 class and talked with the students about their work. It was incredible. They are so creative, intelligent and open, humorous and serious at the same time. They brought themselves in every way to the process of the class. They interacted with each other, drew inspiration from each other, took risks expressing themselves, experimented with media...I felt like this tremendous sense of hope while I was there and now afterwards. They are the future-our future-I am privileged that I was there to see it.

Thank you, Denise.

Greg Zoltowski

Siena Chamber Orchestra Concert

On Thurs. Nov. 29th, the Siena Chamber Orchestra, under the direction of Paul Konye, with the legendary Max Lifchitz at the piano, dedicated its performance of Oklahoma and Beethoven's Piano Concerto #1 to Fr. Kevin Mullen--Siena's 10th President.

View a video clip of that concert at www.siena.edu/konye