Rockefeller Arts Center presents 2015-2016 series of events

Fredonia’s talented vocal and musical theatre students will be featured twice as part of Rockefeller Arts Center’s signature series during the 2015-16 Lake Shore Savings Season.

The DFT Communications Pops opens the season on Saturday, Sept. 26 with “An Evening of Ella and Ellington with the Cleveland Jazz Orchestra” at 7:30 p.m. in King Concert Hall. Nia Drummond, a Voice Performance major who starred in the 2012 “Big Band Christmas Spectacular,” will be the featured vocalist. Sharing the spotlight will be The Fredonia Voices, an eight-member vocal jazz group featuring seven current students and one graduate. Paul Ferguson leads the Cleveland Jazz Orchestra, which has been northeast Ohio’s “premiere jazz voice” for more than 30 years. The Fredonia Voices will also perform with the group in Cleveland on Sept. 12.

Students will also be featured, per tradition, in the Commencement eve pops concert. This season’s production will be the concert version of Meredith Willson’s “The Music Man,” on Friday, May 13 at 7:30 p.m. in King Concert Hall.

The Western New York Chamber Orchestra, under the direction of Glen Cortese, will back the student performers and Tom Loughlin, chairman of the Department of Theatre and Dance, will be the stage director.

Rounding out the 2015-16 Pops Series will be the traditional Christmas concert on Saturday, Dec. 12 at 7:30 p.m. in King Concert Hall. This season’s show brings in M-Pact, an all-male a cappella group hailed by the San Francisco Chronicle as “one of the best pop-jazz vocal groups in the world.” The holiday concert will feature favorites like “Do You Hear What I Hear,” “Away in a Manger,” “O Come, O Come Emmanuel” and many more.

Rockefeller’s Lake Shore Savings Season will also feature events in the Kaleidoscope Family Series and the World Travel Series.

The Kaleidoscope Family Series, sponsored by The Observer, opens Nov. 20 with a return performance by the ever-popular DuffleBag Theatre. The Canadian company performs its interactive, comedic take on the classic fairy tale “Snow White” at 7 p.m. in Marvel Theatre.

Due to the ongoing building project at Rockefeller, the second Kaleidoscope event will be held in Rosch Recital Hall in Mason Hall. Trout Fishing in America, an eclectic folk/rock band specializing in family music and children’s songs, performs on March 11 at 7 p.m.

The World Travel Series, sponsored by Fredonia Place, will offer three travel-adventure films this season, opening Oct. 17 with “Cuba’s Secret Side” with filmmaker Karen Muller at 7:30 p.m. in King Concert Hall. The film is particularly timely with recent efforts to re-establish formal relations between the United States and Cuba. In November, the series looks at one of the great wonders of North America with “The Great Rocky Mountain RV Adventure, Part Two” with John Holod. The film will be presented on Saturday, Nov. 14 at 7:30 p.m. in King Concert Hall. Part one was presented as part of the 2011-12 World Travel Series. Award-winning filmmaker Rick Ray returns to Fredonia to close out the series on Saturday, April 9 with “The Promised Land: Adventures in the Middle East” at 7:30 p.m. in King Concert Hall. Ray’s work highlights the paradoxes of the Middle East on a journey through Israel, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey.

Tickets to all events in the above series are available through the Campus Ticket Office in the Williams Center, by phone at 716-673-3501 and online at www.fredonia.edu/tickets. The events are also part of Rockefeller Arts Center’s “Mix & Match” season ticket plan in which discounts are available with the purchase of at least three different events. Call the Ticket Office at 716-673-3501 for more details.