by Chris Shappley | Jun 7, 2010 | Opinion
Tennessee has always had a reputation as a place to hear great music. I know this well: I grew up in Memphis. In Memphis, it was common to see Elvis impersonators around the city. In fact, Presley’s home, Graceland, is the second-most visited house in the country behind The White House. And if you are looking for he real flavor of the city, stroll down Beale Street and listen to classic blues music no matter what time of day. Going to school at Lipscomb in Nashville has provided me with yet another type of music experience. And it’s not just the difference between Memphis blues and Nashville’s country music scene. While Memphis is a city known for its musical heritage, Nashville is known for its musical present, a place where where people from all over the world come to break into the music business. And it’s not just country music; it’s also rock, pop and more. However, in the last nine years Tennessee has garnered a reputation for another kind of musical experience: the music festival. Oh sure, there’s the big CMA festival here in Nashville, but that is an outgrowth of the long-time Fan Fair country music festival. The type of music festival I’m talking about here is one word that has come to describe an experience: “Bonnaroo.” That modern — rock, hip-hop, country and more — music festival takes place only 50 minutes away in Manchester, Tenn. What began as sort of a jam-band celebration in 2002 has evolved. In its ninth year has become one of the biggest and most diverse music festivals in the world....
by Chris Shappley | Jun 7, 2010 | Opinion
Lipscomb had a unique opportunity last week to host the Christian Scholars Conference, during which scholars from all over the country descended upon the campus to hear panel discussions and speeches on theology, art, racism and many other topics. But what may have been the highlight of the conference was not a panel or speech, but a play. John Patrick Shanley’s Doubt has been performed on stages all over the country, and has even been turned into a major motion picture starring such masters as Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman. But last week, it was Lipscomb’s Mike Fernandez, chair of the Theater Department, who took the director’s role. Directing such a renowned play is probably trying, but when you add the fact that Shanley himself was in attendance for the opener, it’s obvious that it was a taxing — if rewarding — time for Fernandez. I’m happy to report that Doubt was performed without a hitch. And while the play was well directed and acted, the best part of the evening came after the curtain closed that first night. That’s when the talk-back began. Shanley and the cast and designers, including Fernandez, talked openly to audience about what the experience of putting on Doubt meant to them. The audience was able to ask questions, and most of them were directed towards Shanley. It was great to hear from Shanley how he took experiences from his childhood to help him write the play. In a moment of bluntness, Shanley tried to describe what it was like seeing his play being performed at Lipscomb. He said, in so many words,...
by Jake Morgan | Jun 6, 2010 | Uncategorized
A brief segment of an interview with award-winning American playwright, John Patrick Shanley on the set of Lipscomb University’s production of “Doubt.” This interview was conducted during the 2010 Christian Scholars Conference. Check back for additional...
by Tim Ghianni | Jun 4, 2010 | News Slider
Little Jimmy Dickens will escort Lipscomb University into the history books at 7 p.m. Saturday when he takes the stage and officially makes Allen Arena one of the homes of the Grand Ole Opry. The short-in-stature, rhinestone-and-smiles showman, who had a country song on the charts in every decade from the 1940s through the 1970s, is host of the Dollar General segment, the first half-hour of the legendary country variety and radio show. Allen Arena is stepping in to serve as host of the Opry both this Saturday and on June 15, as the world’s longest continuously running radio show lives out something of a gypsy existence in the wake of the May 1-May 2 floods. Those floods, which ravaged much of Nashville, severely damaged the Grand Ole Opry House as well as adjacent Opryland Hotel and Opry Mills mall. The Opry House will be repaired and is scheduled to reopen in the autumn, and the show can return to its home. But for now the Opry wanders around Nashville and demonstrates that the music – not the structure — is the heart of the iconic broadcast. While waiting for the repairs to be completed at the Grand Ole Opry House, the broadcast is setting up shop in such sites as Two Rivers Baptist Church, War Memorial Auditorium, the Ryman Auditorium (which regularly houses the show during the winter months), TPAC’s Jackson Hall and the Allen Arena. “The Grand Ole Opry is looking forward to presenting ‘The Show That Made Country Music Famous’ at Allen Arena,” said Pete Fisher, Grand Ole Opry vice president and general manager. ”We are...
by Allison Woods | May 30, 2010 | News Slider
Beauty in the Academy: Faith, Scholarship and The Arts will be the central theme Thursday-through-Saturday when experts gather at Lipscomb for the 30st annual Christian Scholars’ Conference. The conference boasts a diverse group of plenary speakers, all scholars in their own right, weighing in on subject areas of art, literature, theater and music. Conference attendees also will have opportunities to share their thoughts in paper-and-panel sessions. The conference’s goal annually is to create and nurture an intellectual and Christian community that brings individuals and institutions together to stimulate networks of scholarly dialogue and collaboration. The conference was created by Dr. Thomas H. Olbricht of Pepperdine University and has been hosted by Church of Christ schools across the country. But now, the CSC calls Lipscomb University home most of the time. The conference attracts Christian scholars, from a wide variety of disciplines in the liberal arts and sciences, who wish to develop their own academic research. Professor David Fleer, advisory board chairman of the conference, coordinates the event for Lipscomb. “It’s as deep as scholarship as exists,” he said. Plenary Addresses–The Beauty The conference is structured around four plenary addresses, each featuring a scholar of focus in a later panel session. The Lipscomb Art Department supported the first speaker to lead the Colloquium for the Fine Arts. James Elkins is E.C. Chadbourne Professor in the Department of Art History, Theory and Criticism, School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He has written many books of art criticism, with a focus on the history and theory of images in art. His address, titled “Ongoing Issues between Religious Art and the Art World,” will open the conference in Alumni Auditorium at 9:30 a.m. Second in...
