seabury hall performing arts

seabury hall performing arts
2011 • 2012

Contents
This Magic Moment ..................... 3
The New
Creative Arts Center . .................. 7
Drama: Out of the P.A.S.t ........... 11
Season Calendar ..................... 14 -15
Dance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Music ........................................... 21
Allie Powell .................................. 21
Performing Arts Faculty ............. 25
Advertisers.................................. 28
Gift of Performance
Miles Kelsey . .............................. 30

Aloha & Welcome
I hope that you thoroughly enjoy these outstanding plays, musical performances,
dance productions and art shows that continue to be a hallmark of our school. Our
commitment to the arts continues to enhance our program, and developing the new
Creative Arts Center will serve our community for years to come.
Research shows that students who participate in the arts improve
their ability to think critically, creatively problem-solve, and
develop skills that go far beyond performance.
Thank you for your continued support of the Seabury Hall
Arts program.
Aloha,
Joseph J. Schmidt, H eadmaster
2 ••• encore! 11 • 12 seabury hall performing arts
encore! 2011 - 2012
encore! brochure director
André Morissette
graphic design
joan selix berman
writer
Todd Van Amburgh
advertising coordinators
Joan Selix Berman • Erin Diaz
André Morissette
contributor
Miles Kelsey
photographers
John Andrick | grins2go
Joan Selix Berman • Angelina Hills
Jim Langford • Zachary Pezzillo
Eric Rolph • Michael Sugimura
encore! is the season program of
Seabury Hall Performing Arts,
published annually by
Seabury Hall, 480 Olinda Road,
Makawao, HI 96768 • 808.573.1257
Printed by Ace Printing with Soy-Based Inks
support for the PAS
got photos
performing
arts
PAS studio
The Performing Arts Studio
is available (on a limited basis)
as a cost-effective rental
for workshops, seminars,
lectures, and performances.
For rental information, call
Lynn Matayoshi at 572.7235.
To learn more about how you can
support Seabury Hall in general or
the Performing Arts program,
please call Kathleen Buenger,
Director of Institutional Advancement,
at 442.6112.
Please feel free to share your candid
photos. Contact André at 573.1257.
Remember the use of flash
photography is prohibited during
performances.

S
this
magic
moment
chool is about
moments of transformation.
School is the place we build
spaces for children to unfold.
For over 40 years, Seabury Hall
has transformed itself by building spaces for the children of Maui to
stretch, risk and expand. Teachers, in partnership with administrators
and trustees, have built programs, classrooms, playing fields —
stages where children perform the magical act of transforming
themselves into young adults.
— Continued on page 5
3 •••

••• moments Continued from page 3
Now
Seabury Hall
is poised to
transform itself
again.
this
magic
moment
With a performing and fine arts program bursting at the
seams — and audiences for concerts, plays and assemblies
overflowing beyond capacity — the school has envisioned a
Creative Arts Center to give a home to student artists who are
bursting at their own seams with song, dance, drama, paint
and clay.
We invite you to help us make those magic moments
happen in the lives of Maui’s children. Together we can build
a beautiful arts facility that is as creative, relevant and futurethinking
as the students of Seabury Hall. •••
5 •••

The New
Creative Arts Center:
Why Here
Why Now
…because
we like to be
where it’s at:
In our wired, connected world, more and
more we stay in touch without leaving our
homes. Though that’s convenient, we still like
to convene: to emerge from our houses and
come together as a community for discussion,
entertainment, ceremony, celebration. The
Creative Arts Center is a gathering place for
sharing our gifts and stories.
…because
it feels good
to make
something:
— Continued on page 9
Making art is a basic human
impulse that fuses mind, body,
and spirit. Making things by
hand, touching materials,
feeling rhythms, using our
bodies — though many of
these skills can be replaced
by computer skills, these
primitive, tactile, kinesthetic
skills feed the soul, ground us in nature,
draw us together, and make us a family.
7 •••

••• the new creative arts center continued from page 7
…because
we are all
just people
in a room:
21st Century teaching is about creating positive
environments and jumping inside them to work
alongside kids as they wrestle with problems and
invent solutions. Both teachers and students are
just people in a room: each brings a richly varied
experience and expertise to the shared work of
exploring issues and creating solutions. In this
process, we create ourselves.
…because
art is the soul
in action:
In Hawaiian culture, the
creative act is a spiritual act.
In the artistic process we delve
deep inside where our personal
psyche connects with our shared
culture as well as our earth,
sea, and sky. What surfaces
is personal and universal,
individual and shared.
…because learning is messy
In education we struggle with where
to put the emphasis — on the process
or the product. But if we think back
on our own school experience,
we realize that process IS the
product. Our job is to produce
confident people who trust the
messy process of working
with others toward a
solution. That is the
product. That’s what the
Creative Arts Center
produces: it’s a factory
of Being. •••
9 •••

drama
at seabury
k Did
you realize...
this might be the
last time you sit
in this building
With the new Creative
Arts Center on the
way, this year we bid
farewell to our dear
old tin box, the PAS.
Ou t o f t h e P. A.S. t
Did you know…The Performing Arts
Studio (PAS) used to be the school’s gym And
the “Green Room” (which doubles as the
dressing room) was the Weight Room There
are still a few clues to the PAS’s past life as
a gym. If you walk behind the “cyc” (that
big light blue cloth at the back of the stage)
you’ll see the steel column that held the big
basketball hoop — still padded to protect
players sailing down from flying lay-ups.
Did you know…That before it became
the costume facility, the upstairs was the Band
Room Trumpets blared upstairs while whistles
and slapped volleyballs downstairs made
the old tin gym into a huge tin drum.
“You couldn’t hear yourself think in
there,” remembers Director Sally Sefton-
Johnston. The acoustics were a nightmare. “I
thought, will we ever be able to hear anyone
with all this echoing”
But in came carpet and heavy drapes on
the walls (and ceiling!), out went the hoops
and bags of volleyballs . The real sound test
was when Assembly moved in and that first
6 th grader stood up to squeak out a Happy
Birthday wish to her friend — and finally
everyone could hear it!
“It was a miracle,” remembers
Sefton-Johnston, who has come to love
working in the PAS for its intimacy. “It’s the
most intimate theater on Maui — where the
audience is closest to the actors. It’s great for
drawing people into the emotional lives of
the characters on stage.”
And it almost didn’t happen: the present
gym, in its planning stages, had a theater
attached to the front. Why didn’t we build
that Because a performing arts program is not
just in what you see (a nice stage and comfortable
seats) it’s in what you don’t see: rehearsal
rooms, changing rooms, costume-making,
prop-making, set-building, painting, etc. A
theater isn’t just a showroom, it’s a factory.
In April of 1995, we opened the PAS
with the musical Anything Goes. The last
few days running up to the opening were
pretty frantic. The seating platforms weren’t
— Continued on page 13
11 •••

••• drama at Seabury continued from page 11
finished, so John Plunkett and a team of
dads worked out front right into opening
day. There was no Scene Shop and Dance
Studio at that time, so the girls got the
only dressing room and the boys changed
under a tent back where the Shop is now.
Back in those days there was a peculiar
aroma when the wind changed that
reminded us that Upcountry was the
country. Often, when you were trying on
a costume upstairs, you’d turn to a window
and be eye to eye with a cow. Then
that changed to a horse. Now it’s a guy in
a hard hat on a bulldozer.
Out of the PAS
And this year, we literally get “out” of
the PAS for our first show, Shakespeare’s A
Midsummer Night’s Dream.
“The success of Romeo and Juliet two
years ago in the Cooper House Courtyard
inspired us to try it again,” says the
show’s director, Sally Sefton-Johnston.
“Midsummer outside on the grass seems
the perfect choice.”
It’s hard to say how many times
Shakespeare’s words have been heard
on the Seabury campus. There were the
Studio H’Poko Summer Shakespeare productions
of Hamlet, The Tempest, Twelfth
Night, and Comedy of Errors (produced
by Marsha Kelly, who then became
our Middle School Drama Teacher).
The school did productions of Comedy
and Midsummer — and six installments
of Seabury’s signature pastiche
of Shakespeare scenes, Live! Tonight!
At the Globe! That was followed by the
Sophomore English classes’ Shakespeare
Day project, where every sophomore
acted in scenes performed around campus
on the day before Thanksgiving.
Maybe it’s easier to ask, “Who hath
NOT heard Shakespeare spoken on the
Seabury campus”•••

The 2011-2012 Season Schedule •
A Midsummer
Night’s Dream
Shakespeare’s comedy — under the stars
Directed by Sally Sefton
Fridays, Saturdays & Sundays
October 7-9, 14-16 • 7:00 PM
•
byline: Amanda Danger
By Robert Lawson
Our Middle-Schoolers in
“a noir/Comedic Action-Adventure”
Directed by Marsha Kelly
Friday & Saturday
November 18-19 • 7:00 PM
Sunday, November 20 • 3:00 PM
Christmas Party/
Performing Arts Concert
The Seabury Hall Dance Program with
Drama and Music Guests
Directed by David Ward
Friday & Saturday, December 2-3 • 7:00 PM
Sunday, Dec. 4 (upper levels only) • 3:00 PM
•
Music Department
Fall Concert
Directed by
Richard Franco and Stephen Haines
Upper School Band and Chorus
Thursday, December 8 • 7:00 PM
Middle School Band and Chorus
Friday, December 9 • 7:00 PM
•
14 •••

Seabury Hall Performing Arts
The Cherry Orchard
Anton Chekhov’s Classic Comedy
Directed by Todd Van Amburgh
Fridays & Saturdays
February 24-25, March 2-3 • 7:00 PM
Sunday, March 4 • 3:00 PM
•
Dance Showcase 2012
The Seabury Hall Dance Program
Directed by David Ward
Fridays & Saturdays
April 20-21, 27-28 • 7:00 PM
Sunday, April 29 • 3:00 PM
•
The Sixth Grade Play
Our Sixth Grade actors in a comedy
Directed by Marsha Kelly
Saturday, May 5 • 7:00 PM
Sunday, May 6 • 3:00 PM
Music Department
Spring Concert
Directed by
Richard Franco and Stephen Haines
Upper School Band & Chorus
Monday, May 14 • 7:00 PM
Middle School Band & Chorus
Tuesday, May 15 • 7:00 PM
•
Side Shows
Our 15th annual wild array
of one-act plays with adult and student
actors and directors.
This one is crazy!
Friday & Saturday
May 18 & 19 • 7:00 PM
•
Ticket prices
vary by event.
Dates/times
subject to change.
Reservations &
Information
573-1257.
15 •••

dance
at seabury
PAS: Birth of a
Legend
Q: gWhere did you go to see a show at Seabury before the PAS
A: The Dining Hall had a raised stage in
the back third of the room. Actors had
to exit through the windows, down ladders,
and run over to change costumes in
what’s now the Engineering lab.
“We were bursting at the seams
on that little stage,” says David Ward,
Director of Dance. “We just outgrew it.”
The first solution was to tack a
theater onto the front of the Erdman
Athletic Center (which was not yet built);
but we had our eyes on (what was at that
time) the gym.
“We were just as excited to be in
this old tin box,” remembers Ward. “For
us, coming from doing shows in the
Dining Hall, it was great.”
“Turning this space into a black box
theater was a lot of work. Mostly because
we were putting on a musical and trying
to finish the building by the same date.”
“Oops!” adds Dance teacher André
Morissette. “And of course right during
‘Hell Week’ our cat gave birth — with
complications that caused her to not be
able to nurse the kittens. So we had to go
home at intervals and feed the babies with
a dropper. The whole thing was wild.”
When the Dance Studio and Scene
Shop came a year later, we inaugurated
a guest choreographer program. Since
that time, Portland Oregon’s Julane
Stites, director of the Beaverton Arts and
Magnet Academy has returned every
True ease in
writing comes
from art, not
chance, as those
who move easiest
have learned
to dance.
year to bring a week-long
intensive training to our
dancers.
Outside activities
expanded. Two
Dancequake concerts
brought Hawaiian,
Korean, Filipino,
Japanese cultural dance
masters to our campus for
richly varied concerts that
rivaled much of what can
be seen at The Castle.
Favorite memory Oh
yeah: packed house, middle
of the second act, the power goes out.
“The audience got quiet. No one
moved. Meanwhile,” remembers Ward,
“75 students backstage were in the
middle of changing costumes. Crazily,
we had done a dance with flashlights,
so we handed them out to the audience,
brought out a boom box, found some
batteries, and got our cassette tape
— Continued on page 19
Alexander Pope
17 •••

••• dance at
Seabury
continued from page 17
going again. We asked, but the audience wouldn’t go. They wanted to see the rest
of the show, so they turned their flashlights on the dancers — shadows going
everywhere across the back like an Indonesian shadow puppet show — and
created an amazing experience that anyone there that night is sure to remember.”
“This has been a magic box. 17 years in this glorious sweat-soaked gym,
we’ve truly been able to make magic happen down here.”
On the Move
Ballet on Saturday
mornings has grown so
popular, our Ballet teacher,
Vanessa Cerrito, has been able to
add a third level. “Now students can
be placed more appropriately,” says
Cerrito. “It makes everyone more
comfortable with where they are.”
The Movement class (a P.E.
option for 7 th & 8 th Graders) will
now have one quarter dedicated to
Line Dancing. “We’ll go through
the history — from The Mash
Potato of the 50s to The Electric
Slide and The Hustle of the 70s
to the Western line dancing of
today,” says Ward. “Then we’ll
encourage them to build their own.”
And during
Spring Break,
the Seabury Hall Dance
Ensemble will make
its 5 th journey to the
National High School Dance
Conference, this year in
Philadelphia. Students often
say the trip, which includes a
day in New York to see Broadway
shows, is “one of the best experiences
of my high school career!” •••
He who would learn to fly one day
must first learn to stand and walk
and run and climb and dance;
one cannot fly into flying.
Friedrich Nietzsche
19 •••

music
at seabury
You
Perform
in There
t“You perform in there.”
“That’s what they told me when
I first got to Maui,” recalls Band
teacher Richie Franco. “And they
pointed to this old corrugated tin
shack.”
“I thought, OK, I’m from
Chicago, I’ve been in ghettoes before
… “ Like most first-time audience
members, Franco was a bit put off
by the Performing Arts Studio’s
(beige green grey) exterior.
“But then you go inside — on
an opening night — and all of a sudden
it looks palatial. Nothing like it
does from the outside. I love how it
transforms!”
Fond Memories
“I loved singing in our Busby
Berkeley rendition of ‘Beauty
School Dropout’ in Grease. But
seriously … Being able to perform
with Lucas Nelson ’08 and his
brother Micah at the Performing
Arts Christmas Concert. I think
the world of him as a musician.”
And Lucas’ also-famous
dad played in our first Local
Licks concert — with Doobie
Bros. members Pat Simmons and
Michael McDonald joining in, too.
Since the P.A.S. was where
we held all-school assemblies
— Continued on page 23
Music
is the
shorthand
of
emotion.
Leo Tolstoy
21 •••

••• music at Seabury
continued from page 21
for nearly a decade, other famous visitors have included Frank De Lima, Jake
Shimabukuro, Senator Inouye, Governor Lingle, U.S. Poet Laureate W.S.
Merwin, and actor Hal Holbrook.
“Assemblies in the PAS were intimate,” remembers Chorus teacher
Stephen Haines.
“You performed with people swarmed around you — practically on top
of you — since the whole Middle School sat on big old carpets on the floor.
We called them the rugrats. Seniors had their exalted chairs on the side of
the stage, just for them, to be envied by the lower classes that had to sit in the
stands. Alan Hodara, up in the tech booth, played exit music as we filed out.”
New Arrangements
“This year,” says Franco, “I
want more students to use Sibelius
[the computer software] for writing
music and doing orchestral arrangements.
I’m already using it to transfer
parts written, say, for bassoon, to
the trumpet and sax for our band.
Now I want to have students listen
to a song and learn how to write out
their own parts — what they’ll play
on their instrument. Since my Music
theory students are already doing
this, I thought, why shouldn’t Band
students do the same”
Band students might be too
busy: Twenty of them will perform
with the Hawai‘i All State Marching
Band in the Macy’s Thanksgiving
Day Parade in New York City.
Meanwhile, the Chorus will travel
this year, and the Middle School
Marching Band will strut its stuff
again in the Pacific Whale Foundation
Parade and Craft Fair. •••
If music be the food of love, play on.
William Shakespeare
23 •••

A llison Powell ’00
1982-2011
I n this tribute to our beloved friend, Allie
Powell, her close friends and classmates reminisce on
their days together at Seabury Hall.
Allison Lanier Powell, age 28,
beloved daughter of Dayle and
William Spencer and Donald W.
and Bonny Powell, died Sunday,
January 2, 2011, in Boston.
Allison was an accomplished
theater producer, director,
playwright and performer. For
more than 22 years she had been
in stage performances. Her most
recent play was Choose Thine
Own Adventure, which she cowrote
with William Shakespeare.
It ran for six weeks of sold-out
performances in Chicago in
September and October. B
Allison Powell
Memorial Fund
Now, the family and friends
have established a fund for the
Performing Arts in Allie’s name. To
join them in participating, contact
Seabury’s Office of Advancement.
Phone: 442-6112, or email:
advancement@seaburyhall.org
One day before class, outside the upper-school
building, I got a hug from a friend that changed
my life. I was soon introduced to the life of Allison
Powell, a passionate dreamer,
and a go-getter. Spiritual in her
quest and diligent in her pursuit
of what matters. An old soul on a
new adventure, unstoppable. …
Singing and dancing in a musical,
performing as a grandmother
or a swing dancer, her greatest
show happened every morning
at 7:45 a.m. where Allison Powell
led the school in assembly with
dignified yet accessible grace.
Respectable, relatable, lovable,
Allie. Doug Carney
“My name is Allie. But most people call me
unpredictable”. With a whip of the head she turned
and strutted off, leaving me without an introduction
of my own. Although it was our locker assignments
that put me next to her, it was that charisma, attitude,
and most definitely her unpredictable nature that
kept me at her side for the 15 years that followed.
Anthony Pristyak
Allie and I were orphans. Kind of. We had loving
parents, but since we were always in some Seabury
show, we were
the “We’re from
Lahaina, so where
do we go when
we have rehearsal
until 11 p.m. and
need to be back
at 7:20 a.m.”
orphans. …Her
fierce friendship
transformed us
from orphans to always being at home.
Danielle Allaire
25 •••

••• dance faculty
David Ward,
23 years at Seabury,
director/choreographer
of the Dance Program,
musical theater, Seabury
Hall Dance Ensemble,
and teaches dance and
MS P.E.•••
••• drama faculty
André Morissette,
23 years at Seabury, is
director of Encore!,
choreographer, dance
teacher, resident costume
designer, and publicist
for all our shows.•••
Vanessa Cerrito,
10 years at Seabury,
is a ballet and
middle school
movement teacher,
and costume
designer.•••
Performing Arts Faculty
Todd
Van Amburgh,
21 years at Seabury, writes
and directs plays, designs
sets and lights, tech
directs, teaches Acting and
English, and chairs the
Arts department.•••
Sally
Sefton-Johnston,
23 years at Seabury,
teaches speech and
English and directs
plays in the Upper
School.•••
Marsha Kelly,
8 years at Seabury,
teaches Middle School
Drama electives, directs
the Middle School and
Sixth Grade plays, and
often costumes Upper
School plays.•••
••• music faculty
Richie Franco,
6 years at Seabury,
directs the Upper and
Middle School Bands
and teaches 6th Grade
General Music.•••
Stephen Haines,
14 years at Seabury,
teaches 6th, 7th, 8th and
Upper School Chorus,
Music Appreciation,
and serves as musical
director for each
Seabury musical.•••
a
The art of
teaching
is the art
of assisting
discovery.
Mark Van Doren
27 •••

The Gift of
Performance
BY
MILES kelsey ‘11
’m sure if I claimed that theater changed my life forever and made me
into who I am today, at least one person would tell me I’m being overly
dramatic. To that I would reply,
“Perhaps, but I wouldn’t be so dramatic if it weren’t
for theater.”
But that’s not entirely accurate. Though I’ve been a
dramatic extrovert for as long as I can remember (at three I
was reenacting scenes from The Lion King with my brother),
theater has changed my life because of what it has given me.
One of those gifts is passion. Since I was cast as a
coffee-junkie jingle singer in my first play, my fervor for the
performing arts appears to be caffeinated. In all seven years,
there has not been a period longer than a month in which
I am not cast or involved in some theatrical production.
I devote so much time and energy to plays and musicals
because I love telling stories, becoming characters, and
entertaining others. It’s hard to describe, but I’d say passion
is like an activity or interest that intensifies your life—
every moment spent committed to the passion is special or
memorable, and the energy put into the passion is repaid in
double through the sense of accomplishment when progress
is made. Theater has given me that feeling.
Another gift the performing arts gave to me is a
home—a place where all of my oddest idiosyncrasies are
normal and welcome, and a voice keeps saying “This is
where I’m meant to be.” Casts
... a place where all of my
oddest idiosyncrasies are
normal and welcome...
“This is where I’m to be.”
and crews become temporary
families and life-long friends.
Even the Performing Arts Center
felt more like home than the
bedroom I rarely saw thanks
to Seabury’s gracious amounts
of homework. I can honestly
say that I am not at all worried
about my future because theater has taught me that I will
always have a community where I belong no matter where
life takes me.•••
miles
kelsey,
the hardest
working kid
in (Maui)
showbiz,
won the Pat
Green Music
Award and
the Paul Wood
Performing
Arts Award.
He now
attends MIT,
in Cambridge,
Mass.