Weekend performances to celebrate Festival Hall
Published 8:00 am Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Members of the Greensboro and Lake Oconee community have an opportunity to enjoy an array of entertainment options this weekend, as the community celebrates the opening and rededication of Festival Hall in downtown Greensboro as a community cultural center.
Festival Hall, which was recently renovated for use as a cultural center in Greensboro, has a longstanding history in the local community, as the building served as the auditorium for Greensboro High School through 1967 and a county office building as recently as 2005.
A series of performances this weekend will celebrate the completion of the renovation to the 576-seat cultural center and welcome the community to discover and experience the new facility first-hand.
The weekend’s first event will feature a dinner theater performance highlighted by a 100-mile dinner, a meal made of fresh ingredients that have been grown within 100 miles of Greene County and catered by Siloam’s Washington Grass Inn, and a musical performance of “An American Portrait Songbook” starring pianist Mac Frampton, tenor Sam Hogan and mezzo-soprano Dawn Marie.
Tickets for the 100-Mile Dinner and American Portrait Songbook can be purchased in advance, by the table or individually for $100 each.
On Saturday, Aug. 21, a full lineup of entertainment is scheduled throughout the afternoon including music, theater and dance performances.
Known as Festival Hall Afternoon, performances start at 1 p.m. and continue through 4 p.m. in the Carolyn Reynolds Parker Auditorium at Festival Hall. The afternoon will feature a performance by Atlanta’s Piccadilly Puppets, a performance by the University of Georgia Ballroom Performance Group showcasing smooth and Latin ballroom dances, a performance by area entertainers who will showcase music and dance and a performance by a bluegrass string band known as the Georgia Mudcats.
Admission to the Saturday afternoon entertainment is $1 and tickets will be sold at the door.
Saturday night, Festival Hall will be hosting “An Evening with John Berry,” a Georgia musician who has recorded more than 15 studio albums and charted 19 songs on Billboard Magazine’s Hot Country Songs including the number one single, “Your Love Amazes Me.”
The concert begins at 8 p.m., and the event is separate from the afternoon festivities.
Tickets are available in advance for $25, $15, or $10.
The weekend’s festivities will then finish up on Sunday, Aug. 22 with a 3 p.m. performance of traditional Southern and gospel music by Greene County’s own choirs titled “A Joyful Noise.”
The event is free to the public as a complimentary concert.
Festival Hall, on Main Street in Greensboro, is the result of a community-wide partnership to renovate the building originally constructed in 1939 as the Greensboro Auditorium.
The rededication of the building to the performing arts has long been a vision of area citizens and this weekend’s events are meant to usher in the building’s new mission as a cultural center.
For more information on the weekend events at Festival Hall or to inquire about tickets, please call (706) 453-1006 or visit http://www.visitlakeoconee.com/whats-going-on.da