by Mckenzi Harris | Jul 6, 2019 | Arts and Entertainment, News Slider
“Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” written by Ernie Nolan, is this season’s Nashville Children’s Theatre “Snuggery” show and is being performed at Lipscomb University in the black box theater. This is not the first year Lipscomb has hosted the NCT, but it is the first time the university have hosted the Snuggery, as well as the first time NCT has done a Snuggery show. The performance is geared toward kids 5-and-under, but is most certainly enjoyable for the parents as well. The show is comprised of two characters: Glimmer and Sparkle. The two are star-catchers and spend the entirety of the show searching for “Little Star.” The cast starts the show by inviting the young audience members as well as the adults to become star-catchers with them by giving them star-catcher kits and taking them through an interactive training that includes: dancing, singing, searching for stars and learning to be star-catchers. An interactive theater is a new concept and a fun way to get away from a screen for 45 minutes, said Eric D. Pasto-Crosby (who portrays Glimmer). “I personally love how different it can be,” he said. “I thoroughly enjoy that (children’s reactions0 part, having to loop that in as we go through. You could easily go on autopilot, but they don’t allow you to.” The dynamic between the two-person cast creates a new energy in the theater, according to Pasto-Crosby: “We go through all the ranges. We get sad, happy and it’s a full art, they experience with you…. It’s the same energy each time, but different dynamic” The actors are wonderful at including the whole audience in the...
by Cavin Jacobson | Jul 3, 2019 | Arts and Entertainment, News Slider
“Spider-Man: Far From Home” returns to the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s roots and delivers a story that feels straight from the pages of a comic. Coming fresh on the heels of “Avengers: Endgame,” “Far From Home” makes for the perfect coda to the story that Marvel wrapped up with “Endgame.” It is important to note that this review will have slight spoilers for “Far From Home,” references to past MCU movies, and spoilers for “Avengers: Endgame.” If you have not seen “Endgame,” a new version was released in theaters last Friday. “Spider-Man: Far From Home” immediately answers the questions that bothered so many after “Endgame.” While the film does not answer them perfectly, “Far From Home” reminds the audience just why the MCU formula is a winning one. After the comedic exposition of how life was for non-superpowered people during “Endgame,” we find Peter Parker (Tom Holland) wanting to return to normal high-school life and work up the courage to ask out MJ (Zendaya). The world has different plans for Spider-Man though, as the burden of being the next Iron Man falls on his shoulders. Peter Parker flees the burden of Spider-Man and goes on a class trip across Europe. The traveling montages hark back to the style of National Lampoon movies and clearly shows director Jon Watts’ love for ’80s teen comedies. While on the trip, Peter is forced to be Spider-Man when creatures known as Elementals start attacking cities that Peter and his class are visiting. A new superhuman called Mysterio (Jake Gyllenhaal) arrives on the scene to help stop the Elementals’ threat. He is joined by Nick...
by Mckenzi Harris and Kathryn Farris | Jul 1, 2019 | Arts and Entertainment, Galleries, News Slider
Lipscomb closed out the Summer Celebration conference with the music and fireworks of the 15th annual Bison Block Party. Summer Celebration, previously known as the “Lipscomb Lectures,” is when Lipscomb opens the campus for guest speakers and hundreds of visitors from the community. The celebration started over 90 years ago and is one of Lipscomb’s oldest traditions. Each year since about 2003 Lipscomb has celebrated Independence Day by hosting the free, grand finale Bison Block Party in the Allen Arena Mall. This year’s big finale was June 28. The block party kicks off the Independence Week celebrations by offering the community an evening of food vendors, live music and fun. Lipscomb alumni bands Arcadian Wild, Dave’s Highway, and S. Grant Parker performed as did the Faculty Brass Quintet with Ben Blasko. The full evening was hosted by retired long-time WSMV-TV sports anchor and Christian inspirational speaker Rudy Kalis. The night ended with a free fireworks show set to music from the Faculty Brass Quintet. Check out the following photo gallery from Mckenzi Harris and video from Kathryn Farris. ...
by Cavin Jacobson | Jun 28, 2019 | Arts and Entertainment, News Slider
Tradition, tradition. Bartlett Sher’s rendition of ‘Fiddler on the Roof’ is the 21st-century update for a tale about tradition. Sher’s 2015 reboot is currently on its national tour and is at the TPAC June 25-30. This classic musical brings the difficulties of facing changes to long-standing traditions to a younger audience with a story that still resonates despite moving away from its historical period. ‘Fiddler on the Roof’ is a musical comedy set during the beginning of the Russian Revolution of 1905. The story follows a poor Jewish dairyman named Tevye (played by Yehezkel Lazarov in this production) as he confronts defiance of Jewish tradition among his three eldest daughters. Tevye’s story begins with him, as the patriarch of his family and having the most control in his household. He immediately starts losing control when his horse suffers an injury and he is forced to pull his milk-wagon himself. The play takes us through his life as he deals with the loss of control among his family — and how his love for his family helps him overcome his ties to tradition — or almost overcome it, as Tevye says, “Some things do not change for us. Some things will never change.” The original play was first performed on Broadway in 1964 and amass critical success it found many fans. This 2015 rendition of the 60’s hit, however, makes some noticeable changes to original Broadway hit. Some of these include turning Tevye into more of comedic relief and lessens the stage time for the younger two daughters’ stories. These changes, as well as others, had some waxing nostalgia for...
by Cavin Jacobson | Jun 24, 2019 | Arts and Entertainment, News Slider, Radio
BisonBot is in its 13th year of teaching engineering and robotics skills to students from elementary through high schools. The four-week camp, put on by Lipscomb Engineering, features four different groups that each spend a week learning engineering skills while building and operating robots. The robots range from simple moving gears to fully-functioning arms that can move objects off of a conveyor belt. The campers’ experience levels range from the first time with electronics, all the way up to advanced students who have been building robotics and engineering for years. “We don’t require that [the students] have any previous robotics knowledge before they come in, although a lot of the kids do,” said Ginger Reasonover, the coordinator of BisonBot camp. She is also a Science teacher at Lipscomb Academy. The four groups are the wee bots, who are between kindergarten and first grade, the juniors, who are between second and third grade, the fundamentals camp includes fourth through seventh graders and the advanced camp is for children that have had robotics experience. The advanced camp, for students in seventh through 12th grade, is mostly for students who have done the camp in the past. Every other year is the Robotics Academy where students learn how to program as well as build a robot. That will take place in next summer. The students get to take approximately five different robot projects that they built home with them. The youngest age group only builds their robots for a show-and-tell with the group and with their parents. The two older groups are split into teams of two and compete in a game...
by Mckenzi Harris | Jun 11, 2019 | Arts and Entertainment, Galleries, News Slider
Lipscomb alums Thomas Rhett and Kelsea Ballerini were the hosts for CMA Fest’s biggest stage: Nissan Stadium, where country music’s biggest stars performed to four nights to fans from all over the world. Their hosting chores will be showcased again when the highlights of the performances on CMA’s biggest stage will be broadcast by ABC later this summer. While Carrie Underwood, Tim McGraw, Martina McBride, Dierks Bentley and Brantley Gilbert loaded on the star power, it was rapper Lil Nas X who captured the stage and perhaps the festival itself when he and Billy Ray Cyrus teamed up for their “Old Town Road,” the surprise hit that has topped the charts for more than two months. Lending his able hands to the duo was Keith Urban. Other special guests included rock legend Joan Jett, HARDY, Midland and many others. This was “CMA Fest’s 48th year of connecting fans with Country Music artists” according to the website. The festival fell on a temperamental weekend for weather, and caused delays in both the daytime and nightly shows. Despite the rain coming down multiple evenings. CMA Fest 2019 sold out four straight nightly shows and met capacity crowds throughout the weekend. “Attendees were more engaged than ever before with users of The Official CMA Fest App up 15 percent year-over-year, spending an average of 15 minutes per session during the four days of the festival and scheduling nearly 700,000 events,” according to the CMA. This year’s three-hour primetime television special will air at 7 p.m. August 4 on ABC, Channel 2 in Nashville. In addition to Rhett and Ballerini, that broadcast will include Bobby Bones, host...
