The Rowan County Big Band All Stars will be performing at the F&M Trolley Barn on the corner of Liberty and Lee Streets this Friday night during a fundraiser for Communities in Schools. The All Stars consists of a band of 19 musicians directed by Dr. Ron Turbyfill.
A social hour begins at 6 p.m., and music starts at 7, lasting until around 10 p.m.
There will be no admission charge, but donations to Communities in Schools are welcome.
Sponsors include Cheerwine, Apple Baking and Silver Eagle Distributors.
Photography show
ROCKWELL ó Rockwell Museum presents the photography exhibit “Out with the Film, in With the New” for Rowan County middle and high schoolers.
The photos must be taken in Rockwell or the surrounding area, and people in the photos must not be recognizable. Two entries are allowed per student: one 8 by 10 print of each image, film or digital.
Photographs need to be matted for 10 by 13 framing and available for sale for $50 each (20 percent goes to the museum, and 80 percent to the artist).
Entry deadline is May 8. A reception and announcement of winners takes place 2 p.m. on May 17. The exhibition runs Sundays, May-July. Entry forms available at Rockwell Town Hall and Rowan Public Libraries.
For more information, call 704-279-9664.
Call For Poets
The Rowan Arts Council invites local poets to apply to participate in Jazzy Art and Poetry Nights on May 14, June 11 and July 9 from 5 to 7 p.m. Poets are invited to read their own original poems.
Poets will read in addition to jazz music performed by Jimmy and Lesley Alston at the Rail Walk Studios & Gallery, 413 N. Lee St. in downtown Salisbury. The performance will be free and open to the public.
Contact Rowan Arts Council at 704-638-9887 or rac@rowanarts.org to submit your poems.
Monument observance
The Robert F. Hoke Chapter No. 78 of the United Daughters of the Confederacy will conduct a special service May 9 recognizing the 100th anniversary of the Rowan County Confederate Monument.
The free program will take place at 10 a.m. in the Stanback Auditorium of the Rowan Public Library. The event will include a slide presentation on the history of the monument as a tribute to the 2,500 soldiers from Rowan County who served in the Civil War.
Funds for the local monument were raised by the Hoke Chapter, which dedicated it on May 10, 1909; the chapter had it restored in 1991. The bronze statue was sculpted by artist Frederic W. Ruckstuhl and cast in Brussels, Belgium.
The Hoke Chapter invites individuals with early photos or articles about the monument to bring them to the program to share.
For more information contact President Sue Curtis at 704-637-6411 or southpaws@salisbury.net.
Paolino performance
Salisbury blues man Bob Paolino will be playing at the Rocky River Coffee Company in Harrisburg May 9 from 7 to 9 p.m.
Paolino won the 2009 Charlotte Blues Society’s competition for solo/duo acts, and subsequently represented them at the International Blues Challenge in Memphis Tenn.
For more information, visit www.myspace.com/blazin39 bluesbob.
School residency
LENOIR ó The Caldwell Arts Council is seeking artists in all disciplines for the Mountain Arts Program (MAP), which arranges residencies in the public schools in western North Carolina counties, ranging from single day visits up to week-long residencies . The deadline to apply has been extended to May 22.
The residencies are administered in each county by the participating arts council and supported by locally raised funds, allocations from public school budgets, as well as grants from the North Carolina Arts Council. The artists receive a stipend for each residency from $200 to $650, depending on the number of days contracted.
Artists are selected through an application and interview process. Final selections will be conducted through auditions held on June 10. For more information, visit www.waanc.org. or call 828-682-7215.
Night on stage
Piedmont Players Theatre is hosting its 6th annual “Night on the Stage” fundraiser on May 29 and 30 from 6-9:30 p.m..
The evening includes a reception, dinner catered by Chef Santos on the Meroney stage, silent auction and raffle, and entertainment by the Ocracoke folk-fusion band Molasses Creek. The band has toured throughout the United States, released nine CDs, and has received worldwide radio airplay.
The fundraiser helps underwrite the annual operating budget in order to maintain current ticket prices even as our operating expenses for utilities, set materials, costumes, printing and advertising increase.
Event sponsors receive special recognition night of the event and recognition on all invitations, press releases, event posters and a special thank you in the playbill.
Sponsorship levels are: Event Sponsors ($800), priority seating at a private table with eight seats; Participating Sponsors ($500), receive four seats; Sponsor ($250), receive two seats.
Individual seats are $125.
For information call 704-633-5471 or visit www.piedmontplayers.com.
Steimel accepted
RALEIGH ó Salisbury’s Phyllis Steimel has had her painting “One Hundred Percent Cotton” accepted into the juried show, “Scope: The North Carolina Landscape” June 5-25, 2009, at the Visual Art Exchange in Raleigh.
For more information, visit www.visualartexchange.org/june2009.php.
Picturing America
ALBEMARLE ó The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) awarded Picturing America grants to 29,086 schools and public libraries, including the Stanly County Public Library, as the result of the program’s second national application period.
NEH’s Picturing America is an education initiative that brings significant works of American art directly to classrooms and libraries.
Awardees receive 40 large, high-quality reproductions of great American art and a teachers resource book that can be used in core subject areas such as social studies, civics, language arts, and American history. The Picturing America web site provides additional resources for educators, including over 150 links to lesson plans and external online resources.
Groups interested in checking out the materials can contact Melanie Holles at 704-986-3761.
Student art winners
The winners of the recent Student Art Expo sponsored by Carolina Artists are:
K-1: Liza Simmerson, first; Ezra Nance, second; Maximus Qrdonez, third; Crystal Diehl, honorable mention.
Grades 2-3: Kendra Sharpe, first; Kay Leah Scarbrough, second; Drew Shelby, third; Trexler Cloninger, honorable mention.
Grades 4-5: Isabell Alvarez, first; Savanna Alligood, second; Julie Abbey, third; Rebecca Barnhardt, honorable mention.
Grades 6-8: Edward Conner, first; Chandler Smith, second; Allie Brendle, third; Mattie Lowe, Matt Sullivan, honorable mentions.
Grades 9-12: Ivan Sotelo, first; Karen Presnell, second; Ginny Weant, third; Adriana Garduno, honorable mention.
In photography: Corbin Smith, first; Seth Nance, second; Brendon Smith, third; Victoria Scheve, honorable mention.
South Rowan Play
The Young Order of Dramatic Actors at South Rowan High School will perform the play “John Lennon and Me” at 7 p.m. May 13-15 at South Rowan High School.
Admission is $3.