Events

LEXINGTON, Ky.—The Grammy Award-winning male chorus Chanticleer will perform a concert in Transylvania’s Haggin Auditorium at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 14, as part of the Dorothy J. and Fred K. Smith Endowed Concert series.  Chanticleer has developed a remarkable reputation over its 30-year history for its vivid interpretations of vocal literature, including Renaissance, classical, jazz, gospel, sacred chant, Christmas and venturesome new music. With its seamless blend of 12 male voices, ranging from countertenor to bass, Chanticleer has earned international renown as “an orchestra of voices” and New Yorker magazine called the group “the world’s reigning male chorus.” The performance at Transylvania, Wondrous Free, is an appreciation of the 250th anniversary of the earliest surviving American secular composition, “My Days Have Been So Wondrous Free,” by Francis Hopkinson, a friend of George Washington and a signer of the Declaration of Independence. The program demonstrates the diversity of song in America. Based in San Francisco, Chanticleer was name 2008 Ensemble of the Year by Musical America and was recently inducted into the American Classical Music Hall of Fame. The ensemble has 22 recordings to its credit, including Colors of Love, which won the Grammy Award for Best Small Ensemble Performance and the Contemporary A Capella Recording Award for Best Classical Album.  The most recent release, Magnificat, a disc of early music devoted to the Virgin Mary, climbed to the top four on Billboard’s Classical Chart.  In 2008-09, the ensemble will

Read “Grammy Award-winning group Chanticleer to perform at Transylvania on Friday, Nov. 14; limited tickets available to the public.”

LEXINGTON, Ky.—Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible,” a gripping drama widely recognized as one of the most important dramatic works of the 20th century, opens Thursday, Oct. 30 at 7:30 p.m. in Transylvania University’s Lucille C. Little Theater. “‘The Crucible’ serves to remind us not only of the ever-present danger of Constitutional compromises, of political power used to abuse another and of the all-too-easy threat of ambiguously-based charges, but also of the value and place of art in our lives,” said director and drama professor Tim Soulis. Miller wrote “The Crucible” in 1952, as a metaphoric response to the hysteria surrounding the fear of Soviet-style Communism in America and the resulting investigation and persecution of anyone in government organizations thought to be affiliated with the Communist Party. He saw the situation as one parallel to the Salem Witch Trials two and a half centuries earlier. In the 1692 Puritan world of Salem, Massachusetts, accusations of witchcraft flew among the disgruntled, fearful members of the community. A trial was convened to uncover and destroy the perceived power of Satan in Salem, and several Salem citizens were hanged for witchcraft. But in truth, economic expediency and personal vengeance motivated many of the accusations and the undesirables in the society—the homeless, the rebellious, the mentally challenged—could easily be eradicated with a charge of witchcraft. The mad dash to find demonic dangers in Salem and the accusatory climate of the trial led to the assessment in

Read “Transylvania University Theater opens season Oct. 30 with Miller’s masterpiece “The Crucible””

LEXINGTON, Ky.—Wendell Berry, Kentucky native, environmental activist and author of more than 40 books, will read from his recent poetry at Transylvania Thursday, Oct. 30, at 8 p.m. in the William T. Young Campus Center. The event is free and open to the public. A reception will follow the poetry reading. Berry has received numerous awards and honors, including a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, the Vachel Lindsay Prize from “Poetry” and a Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship. Berry’s essays have covered everything from agriculture to global economics, and his poetic subjects include everything from the Kentucky countryside to the Vietnam War. He lives and works with his wife, Tanya, on their farm in Port Royal. Berry was born in Henry County, Kentucky, in 1934. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Kentucky, and received a Wallace Stegner Fellowship from Stanford University. Berry taught at the University of Kentucky from 1964-77 and from 1987-93. He has also taught at Stanford University, New York University and Georgetown College. The lecture is sponsored by the Delcamp Visiting Writer series. For more information, contact the public relations office at (859) 233-8120.

LEXINGTON, KY.—Orville Schell, director of Asia Society’s Center on U.S.-China Relations and former dean of the graduate school of journalism at the University of California—Berkeley, will deliver Transylvania’s fall Kenan Lecture Wednesday, Oct. 15, at 7:30 p.m. in Haggin Auditorium. The lecture, “The U.S. and China: The Most Important Bilateral Relationship in the World,” is free and open to the public. Schell has devoted his professional life to studying, writing about and reporting on Asia, with an emphasis on China. He is director of Asia Society’s Center of U.S.-China Relations, based in New York. The society is the leading global organization working to promote understanding and strengthen relationships among the people and institutions of Asia and the United States. Schell is the author of 14 books, with 10 being on China. His undergraduate degree in Far Eastern history is from Harvard University, and he did graduate work in Chinese history at UC—Berkeley. He worked for the Ford Foundation in Indonesia and covered the war in Indochina as a journalist for “The Atlantic Monthly” and “The New Republic.” Prior to his 2007 appointment with Asia Society, Schell was dean of the graduate school of journalism at UC—Berkeley. Among his many honors is the Harvard/Stanford Shorenstein Award for Asian Journalism. He has written widely about Asia and other topics for “The New York Times Review of Books,” “Time,” “Foreign Affairs,” “The New Yorker” and “Harper’s Magazine.” The Kenan Lecture Series is made

Read “Asia expert Orville Schell to deliver Transylvania’s Kenan Lecture, Wednesday, Oct. 15, at 7:30 p.m.; free and open to the public”