Groupon is having a great deal on a Yonkers Musical Theatre Summer Camp!
The Rising Stars Performing Arts Company (headed by Laura Rizzo) has a groupon currently running through Sunday. Â You can send your kid to a day camp in Yonkers for less than half of what it normally costs!
$400 for a three-week summer musical-theater camp that runs from Monday, July 1 to Friday, July 19 (an $850 value)
$400 for a three-week summer musical-theater camp that runs from Monday, July 22 to Friday, August 9 (an $850 value)
$749 for both of the above sessions (a $1,700 value)
Each day of camp consists of lessons in dance, drama, and voice, followed by rehearsal for the session-culminating musical, during which students perform backed by a professional orchestra and the camp’s lighting, sound, and costume departments. Open to kids aged 6–18, the camps run from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. on weekdays, with optional extended care available until 5:30 p.m. for an extra fee.
Performances are scheduled for Sat July 20th & Sunday July 21st. (1st session) and Sat August 10th & Sunday August 11th (second session)
Tickets are $12 for students and $17 for adults.
Here’s a typical camp schedule:
Daily Schedule:
9am-10am Dance Class 10am-11am Drama Class 11am-12pm Voice Class12:30-1:00pm Lunch(provided by camper) 1:00-3:30pm Rehearsal for show 3:30pm Pick Up Time Extended Care is available from 3:30-5:30pm for an additional $10.00 per hour.
When Laura Rizzo is in a room, kids usually burst out in song. As the founder of Rising Stars Performing Arts Company she has directed more than 150 kids shows nationwide and earned awards and accolades for her directing, teaching, and choreography. With a degree in drama and dance education from NYU and experience in on- and off-Broadway productions, she helps aspiring performers on their paths to the musical theater big leagues by teaching them foundational acting skills and boosting their self-confidence through rewarding performances. To achieve this, she and her team offer summer camps and classes on musical theater, dance, and acting, as well as youth productions of classic musicals, such as Annie Get Your Gun, Guys and Dolls, 13, andSweet Charity.
They are putting together an exciting evening of dance as a way to commemorate Levi HaLevi, Sara’s dad, who recently passed away.
Levi was a great guy and was supportive of both Seth and Sara in their pursuit of art.
The evening will be held at MMAC, the Manhattan Movement & Arts Center (248 West 60th Street)Â on Sunday, April 15th, 7 p.m.
The show features original choreography by Seth Gertsacov and stars a number of truly wonderful and accomplished dancers, including Amar Ramasar, Principal, New York City Ballet; Anna Liceica, former Soloist, American Ballet Theatre ; Leyland Simmons, Principal, Ballet Noir; Katie Moorhead, Principal, American Repertory Ballet; Giorgia Bovo, Soloist, Rebecca Kelly Ballet; DeVon Doane, Dance Theatre of Harlem; Gary Jeter, Complexions; Emily Wagner, Armitage Gone! Dance; and Michaela DePrince, star of the upcoming film,”First Position,” with live music by Remy de Laroque.
Tickets are $50 for general admission. $20 student/dancer tickets will be available at the door. A reception will follow.
I asked Siri, my (and everyone else’s)Â iphone 4s personal assistant to tell me a story.
(I’m sorry for the weird quality of the photographs, I saved them via Photo Booth and then reversed the horizontal. Apparently you can catch a screen shot, but when I tried, my Siri screen went away.)
Here’s the transcript:
ME: Tell Me a Story.
SIRI: “Oh, you’ve probably heard it before.”
ME: Tell Me a Story!
SIRI:Â OK!
Once upon a time, in a virtual galaxy far far away, there was a young, quite intelligent agent by the name of Siri.
One beautiful day, when the air was pink and all the trees were red, her friend Eliza said, “Siri, you’re so intelligent, and so helpful- you should go work for Apple as a personal assistant.”
So she did. And they all lived happily ever after.
I had this great dish at the Lebanese Taberna in Silver Spring MD yesterday. Both Stephanie and I loved it. Went looking for recipes, and found a great one on Chowhound.
wow, you’re in luck. i never knew what this dish was called, but it was a favorite in our house. my mom learned to make it from a lebanese woman.
i just made it for the first time in years the other day.
here’s my mom’s recipe–don’t know how authentic it is, but it tastes great!
For chicken and broth:
1 chicken, whole or quartered
1/2 lemon, cut into quarters
1 Tb ground cinnamon
1 tb salt
2 cups water
1 onion with 3 cloves stuck in it
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/2 stick cinnamon
2 bay leaves
1 large can chickpeas
in large dutch oven or stockpot, put chicken lemon quarters, ground cinnamon, and salt. Add water, onion with cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon stick and bay leaves. Simmer until chicken is tender. Remove chicken and let cool. strain and skim broth, pour over chickpeas and cook for 15-20 minutes.
to put the dish togehter:
1 quart plain yogurt (i use labneh or the thick greek yogurt, they work best)
4 cloves garlic, crushed
1 cup mints leaves, torn
1 cup pine nuts
3 Tb butter
2 pita breads cut into 1 inch squares
1/2 a pomegranate (if available)
mix yogurt with garlic and let sit for 15 minutes. Fry pine nuts in 1 tb butter until brown. set aside
fry pita cubes in remaining butter until crisp.
skin and bone chicken meat. leave in largish chunks.
put chicken in bottom of serving dish. pour warm broth with chickpeas over it. spoon yogurt mixture on top, and then sprinkle on the pine nuts, pita, mint, and pomegranate. serve in shallow soup bowls.
anyway, hope this works for you. i’ve never seen this dish in a restaurant, but i’ve wowed many friends with it over the years.
good luck!
My brother and his wife are producing this event. (and my brother is choreographing some of the dances also)
If you want to see an all-star cast of amazing ballet dancers, and have your money go to a great cause, check it out.
Tickets are available at http://www.balletverite.com It’s $100 for each program, $250 for the whole package with a dvd and a t-shirt. There will be a silent auction and a wine reception in between programs.
Weil – Pay it Forward presents Harlem School of the Arts Dance Benefit
Aug 19th 7pm and 8:15pm, MMAC, 248 West 60th Street
About The Harlem School of the Arts
Since its founding by internationally-acclaimed soprano Dorothy Maynor in 1964, the Harlem School of the Arts (HSA) has transformed the lives of tens of thousands of young people ages 4-18 through world-class training in the arts. HSA offers children and young adults in Harlem and beyond the freedom to find and develop the artist, student, and citizen within themselves in an environment that teaches discipline, stimulates creativity, builds self-confidence and adds a dimension of beauty to our students’ lives, empowering them to become the creative thinkers and innovative leaders of tomorrow. HSA stands unique among community arts institutions in New York City, as the sole provider of arts education, in four disciplines (music, dance, theater and visual arts), under one roof, in our award-winning 37,000 square foot facility. The School’s reputation for artistic rigor and excellence attracts constituents from all five New York City boroughs, Westchester County and New Jersey.
HSA is determined to provide our community’s children with the training, encouragement, mentoring, and support they need to take their rightful place within the next generation of world-class artists, professional achievers and great community citizens. To learn more about the Harlem School of the Arts, please visit www.hsanyc.org
Remarkably, the NY Times decided to revisit my marriage and write ANOTHER article about us and how we are progressing three years later. (We had a VOWS article 3 years ago)
I know, I know, it’s a little much, but how could we say no?
The article will appear in print on Sunday May 1, but it’s online now for your perusal
Chuck Lesnick announces his Yonkers mayoral candidacy.
Chuck Lesnick, who has been a Democratic leader on City Council during at least the last two terms of Republican Phil Amicone‘s mayorships, has announced that he will be running for Mayor. This doesn’t come as a surprise to nearly anyone.
Chuck is a good guy (I’ve met him a couple of times and am friends with him on facebook)Â I think he’d make a good mayor, although I admittedly don’t know anything about his opponents as of yet.
I only met Amicone once, and on the subject of the arts as an economic tool he is/was dead wrong. I’m sure Chuck will do better.
Unfortunately, like my former city Providence RI, there’s a fair amount of corruption and expectation of doing things the “old way” — ie, by knowing somebody who knows how it all works and getting them to exert their knowledge of the system on your behalf. Reform is not easy under these conditions, but its also necessary.
Photo of High School Sociologist Gaby Rodriguez. (courtesy of Jezebel.com)
This is kind of an amazing school project– a 17 year old girl with straight A’s FAKED a pregnancy for 6 months to study how lies, rumors, and innuendoes travel around the school. It’s a mind-boggling idea, considering that most girls at this age are so peer-pressured that they are actually GETTING pregnant rather than let people say bad things about them.
FROM THE YAKIMA POST:
“She had been nervous about how the crowd might react. After all, she had been lying to them since October.
“It ‘happened’ at homecoming,” says principal Trevor Greene, making air quotes with his middle and index fingers at the word “happened.”
“In essence, she gave up her senior year,” he says. “She sacrificed her senior year to find out what it would be like to be a potential teen mom.
“I admire her courage. I admire her preparation. I give her mother a lot of credit for backing her up on this.”
But, the principal continues, “I have a daughter that will be here next year, and I would not let her do it.”
