Events

LEXINGTON, Ky.—Planning a special Valentine’s weekend with your significant other? Don’t miss this opportunity to share the joy of a local performance by international music star and Lexington native Ben Sollee on Feb. 15 at Transylvania University’s Haggin Auditorium, sponsored by the Student Activities Board. Tickets are $15 for general admission and $5 for Transylvania students, faculty and staff. They can be purchased online at www.tinyurl.com/TUBenSollee. The doors will open at 8 p.m. and the concert will begin at 8:30 with a performance by the Dreamin’ Rovers, a Transylvania student band that includes Ryan Anderson, Luke Gnadinger, Dan Marnatti, Alex Schmitt and Mason Williams. Ben Sollee—cellist, singer-songwriter and composer—will then offer his rare mix of genre-bending music, which moves easily from personal ballads to environmental protest songs. NPR’s “All Things Considered” called “Learning to Bend,” Sollee’s debut album, “an inspired collection of acoustic, folk and jazz-flavored songs, filled with hope and the earnest belief that the world is good.” Sollee regularly collaborates with a number of recognized artists, including Bela Fleck, Daniel Martin Moore and Jim James of My Morning Jacket. Writing about Sollee’s latest album, “Half-Made Man,” noted Kentucky author Silas House says, “The songs give us the many facets of a human being who is acutely aware of the world around him and his own faults. The album is novelistic in its scope and theme as we travel with the narrator who reveals everything about himself as a

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LEXINGTON, Ky.―Costumes, actors and sets are multiplied by three this fall as Transylvania University’s theater program ambitiously mounts its first repertory theater season, packing nine performances into 11 days. “Repertory implies the same cast in all the shows,” explains Sullivan Canaday White, assistant professor of theater and the theater program director. “However, we are rotating all the student actors and the directors for each show. That means we can have first-year students in major roles and no overlap among the actors and technicians. “There is one exception: Sophomore theater major Olivia Luken will stage manage two shows.” A total of 30 students will present three plays that range from drama to comedy. All performances will be in Transylvania’s Lucille C. Little Theater. Kevin Kling’s “Lloyd’s Prayer” opens the trilogy of productions. Directed by White, the comedy is a parable about Bob the raccoon boy and what happens to him when he is “rescued” from his raccoon family. Kling, a playwright and storyteller known for his popular commentaries on National Public Radio’s “All Things Considered,” will visit Transylvania in February to deliver a one-man performance. Sheila Callahan’s “Crumble (Lay Me Down Justin Timberlake)” confronts themes of loss, aging and adolescent hardship. Directed by senior classics and history major Tori Lantrip, the hilarious although disturbing production finds young Janice and her mother in a dilapidated apartment without much hope—except for visitations from their celebrity crushes, Justin Timberlake and Harrison Ford. Meanwhile, the

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