i know i've and for those of you that don't know i had my second need revision it's like a second time to have my whole need done i had a wonderful surgeon dr dingle and the people at sarasota memorial hospital in the sarasota big club were so wonderful to me so but anyway we have a really exciting march and let's get right to what we have first up the beloved celtic woman and this is called the ancient land tour what do they mean by that i think they mean that their traditions go back a long ways and they're into telling their stories to song and dance yes and this is one of those types of things and i've seen celtic woman i don't know three or four times it's stunning it's beautiful these women are just you know the voices are theory i sunday march third and then we've got a whole nother favorite of mine rain right now and this is the abbey road version because it's fifty three and a verse three can you believe i can and you know i was on vacation once and i is on march the fifth and they still are going to do all the beatles all the catalog that they're going to go note by note through a lot of this iconic album and you know there is nothing better than the beetle i mean you get there there will never be another multigenerational might is love it well of course the very biggest show of the whole year cited the lion king is coming and i've been working for five years to bring this here and it's finally coming and i'm praying it all loads in i'm sure people will see some of this on the news we're loading like twenty five scenery trucks normal show is for and i'm going to show is a plus and it is one of the most educational director but it is here for three weeks and it's going to be here let's see what is the exact date march the fourteenth to the thirty first and we still have tickets available because it's a three week run and you can't miss this women's parts as well let's look at them april the fourth is th next up is rent that's right no data like today that's right two decades they've been i know i thought i wanted open it's april ninth and ten here and i will say i saw the live television or it wasn't really like the vision version and it was kind of it didn't quite meet the mark but i mean they had a real problem on television where the an actor broke a foot like that but this show reaches out to all generations and the music you know i can remember seeing on broadway and it was just like we all our chins just dropped yeah i did and there's nothing like a live performance as good as television is or even the movie's life performance beats it all let's see some of the live show time now here's a new one we've never had at the van ways well it's the music of cream and you know i'm a little bit older than you but i remember this when i was like twelve and thirteen the music of cream and they were a supergroup the sunshine of my love and oh in my white room and yeah and crossroads strange group oh yeah one thousand nine hundred and these are these are kids or are sons and nephews of the original band and they say they've also in april we have a bunch of other shows coming up which next month we'll talk a little bit more about but the second city from chicago that in front of troops will be here on the sixteenth menopause the musical which i'm sure you know not really about my wife told me but i said i sorts of shows he started a couple of t v series and he's from scotland where i went last that's right and i really love his voice and he is just an amazing performer and that's on the twentieth and then we have rose in cash in our band here on the twenty fifth the temps of the tops who are always a sell out there's still a few tickets available to that and then we have whoopi goldberg here to make us laugh out of the twenty seven league greenwood crystal gayle on april twenty eighth and the illusionist on april thirtieth right great from broadway so that is one heck of a march right role is that a lot of things going on and so if you want to buy tickets you could come by the box office which we have a really wonderful we have a brand new box office manager right now  see tim and we you can also call in the phone nine five three three three six eight and charge in your pajamas in the middle of the night and then you could also do it by mail or you could go to  is not and you look for the word official website because what people have done is what our tickets are not even bought them yet you know and then they jack up the price significantly and you don't want to do that so either call us if you can't remember what the website is call us on the phone come over and visit us who are friendly you know take care of you we'll take care of you but do not go on one of these third party websites it's bad but we're going to be back in just a minute with kelly maldonado our director of education every day forty four people in the us die from drug overdose but they don't have to do in florida if you're trying to save the life of another person you're protected from prosecution by the good samaritan one welcome back to at the band weasel i'm kaleem all the not owed director of education and community engagement for the van weasel performing arts hall and we're thrilled to have our guest with us today john amis senior vice president of collaboration an impact from the charles and marjorie branson foundation welcome john stewart thank you kelly it's a thrill to be here yes we're thrilled to have you were able to talk about a project that we have coming up tied to our upcoming production of the lying and we will be partnering with girls inc to work with those students for a week before they come and see the show exploring themes of the show and then having them share artwork that they've been working on with their parents this is a really exciting project for us because it allows us to expand on our education program bringing it into the main stage production can you tell us a little bit about what excites you about this project from the first time you presented the idea to me i was really excited about the possibility of working with girls inc and the lion king production and particularly the parent piece that you've added to it were now the parents going to get to come and see the production at the end and i can imagine the rich conversations are going to have acros inking them with the girls and then the girls are going to have with their families just really excited about the entire production professionally because of the branson grant but also personally to come to see  that's we're really looking to that to gender approach which i know you're familiar with a lot of the work we've done with family literacy nights and family science nights tying it to the school curriculum but this will really allow the girls to explore the curriculum that girls inc use is looking at who they are who they were and who they where will be how we can sort of rewrite the narratives of women making them strong young women and so we're really excited to share that piece with the parents i'm glad you're looking forward to that i know rose inc is also i say angie  stringer the c e o of girls inc yesterday and she was so excited about the getting ready to start the production and about the work that's going to be accomplished there so it's so much more than seeing the lying it's all the messaging that you've done and and the learning that's going to take place with the girls again but with their families and with  the staff of girls inc is excited about doing the project with the two yes in fact we actually will be doing the training with the staff of girls inc before we're able to do the project so that they know the strategies we're using they're going to be able to support them so is that something that you tend to look as every project we've done with you with the families i've been very happy with and i way that it turns out so the way that you've already thought through what we want to get to and we always do we learn new things and i'm excited about that too but part of my excitement is how excited you are about the project and girls inc in particular the girls that you know we've talked to about the possibility of being part of this is is there anything special that you hope the girls will learn about this project i think what i'm going to learn i'm most excited about what their reaction is going to be to the conversations and what they learned projects we've done with girls inc in the past on sustainability we're putting solar panels on girls thinking to see how they've really got into conservation in the environment and how excited they get about learning and how it carries through in the rest of their lives talking to their families and talking to the board members of the girls inc about what they do for sustainability i can only imagine what it's going to lead to with this lion king project and this is really a wonderful chance to us to partner with a social service organization an organization serving young women and so we're really excited about this is not just a family as a project but sort of jointly to work we've worked a lot with their staff to help plan this project can you tell us a little bit about i know the branch that foundation does a lot with doing partnerships and cooperation it's process and how we get there and what we learn together and i was at a conference last week there for a philanthropic network and they were talking about the work you have done a visible man academy center comedian they're talking about some of the work and breaking the chains and other projects that you've done and for me this will be the first time i've really watched the work this closely with just girls at that age on a big main stage production so this is a real big deal and what's what we're excited about with girls inc when you think of the lion king you think of characters like simba the leader of the production that lead role but what this broadway production has done is sort of strengthened the female characters of nala and refeed is now played by a female so it's really an exciting chance for the girls to see how we can strengthen female roles and how that can be empowering for them to take charge of their own narratives as we're sort of looking at that with that project the we've talked a little bit about the families coming but i as someone who has really done a lot of two gen work i'm so excited about including the families yes giving them opportunity to enjoy this all together and really going together so and as we spoke with the teaching artist they will be creating poetry that they'll be sharing with their with their parents they'll be creating self portraits that use those words of who they are who they were who they were who they will be and sort of create that self portrait of their future and this is something that they'll be able to share with their parents on that final night i'm so looking forward to it i can hardly wait and then we are really looking forward to bringing them to the production and sort of seeing this large scale probably production i'm know many of them through their schools have attended our school time performances but i know for many of these girls this will be their first sort of professional level broadway production and they get to bring their families yes when they have a meal right they're going to get they're going to have dinner ye they're going to come that's an important part of the project that time to sit down with the family and talk is something that busy working families sometimes don't have so that's a very important piece of that's private the excitement enthusiasm leading up to it's be fun to watch how you work with the girls to contain some of th make it to you know that night the big night yeah i'm really looking forward to it and i look forward to sharing with you about this project the success and i know we'll be sharing with our community about what this project has done for those girls and hopefully be able to expand it to other afterschool activities as well thrice want to thank you again for the chance to do this project i'm talking about with thank you for the opportunity and my family i'm going with my boys and my wife to see what i'm going to do so we're excited as a family and i'm excited professionally have you seen it before i have seen it once before but opportunity for local governments to engage their citizens in the process of crafting policies and tackling issues the city of serious so to has over twenty five advisory boards and committees with numerous opportunities for our citizens to volunteer their time and expertise from parks and recreation to public art to the historic preservation board just to name a few many advisory boards require some experience in particular fields or professions and some only require residency in the city of sarasota for more information on the city of syria so this advisory boards visit sarasota f l dot gov and click on the government tab there you can find a list of all city advisory boards and vacancies and comes out of that lady you know yeah she's all in when it comes to education is and that's only one tiny program we do talkbacks we do kids not on broadway we do total access and military access we have special programs with the kennedy center we do so much in education we have a fund there's a about a half a million dollars i wish i had about five million dollars budget but we reach so many kids and it's great when we have some of the local foundations that are willing to support projects like this and you can really see the impact of these our programs like the kids in the teachers the teachers they get behind it all the way they just love it but anyway we're here to announce it's like christmas  broadway shows a and it's the biggest we've ever had you know and of course i'm scared because every time you know you've got to you've got to top yourself we have ten new broadway shows coming seven of which are premier's correct to the sarasota area so let's go through a few ok the talk i mean we start out with a fun one that's perfect for florida it's xscape to margaritaville from no one other than  entertainment weekly says it'll knock your flip flops off there you go there you know what with my knee right now i'm not we're going to flip flop but anyway it is on december second it's just a party on stage now here's a show i've been trying to get for three years and i had it i had it booked and someone stole it away from us and i can remember sitting in new york city crying because they took the show away from us and so we finally ha beautiful coming the carole king story and i have wanted to show for our audiences ever since i saw it it's the story of carole king her life how she became an artist working with her husband and other songwriters to write songs of our generation really i mean one fine day i feel the earth move you've got a friend you make me feel you know it's just it's just every song i know is so classic and the shuffle on all these tony yeah but i really want to see this year you're going to see it yeah yeah i saw it four or five years ago and it's a great show well the next show up is a big favorite we've had this show before it's by popular demand the book of mormon  coming back and it's coming for eight shows and it's about some misguided missionaries that are sent to the other part of the world right has some explicit language but it is like the it was the big mega hit it won i think have only seen bits of it and i've heard the music it's great and it look forward to seeing that it's january seventh as twelve's now another one of our new shows this is one that i really love to one of my favorite new artists and she's not a all that right and in the in the play play in the musical they bake pies during the whole time and they sing about butter flour everybody in the audience by intermission has got to have a cell you know and we're going to have a special a subscription party here and we're going to have to give we will you know we have a little well there's five shows it's january twenty fourth to twenty six it is fantastic it's been a huge hit on broadway another woman that i've worked with i went actually to budapest with last year katherine mcphee she's doing it right now and ollie so yeah so it's a great it's a great show but the next show i have i sadly did not have a chance to see when i was in new york  it's bandstand and it's again music of another generate us correct tell us a little bit about well it's a little bit of the american servicemen marching home from world war two and they start a band and they find out this is really what they want to do and they have a second home by traveling together and learning about you know the country and playing all this and it's a great music generation and so many of the people and so many of our veterans what dates is that years it'll be here february fourth and fifth ok so that'll be a fun time my dad played in the band so this is really go you're going to go for me hit home for you and then another huge huge favor coming back it is my favorite musical of all time nothingness knocked it out of les miserables is coming back and the door that show it's the bluebells schoenberg's show and it's eight shows february twenty sixth to march one it's cameron mackintosh this new production some of the hit songs are bringing more you know the dream i dreamed a dream of create my own yeah and let's see a clip it's here february twenty sixth of march one and then color purple another right bible and this revival won the tony in two thousand and sixteen for the best musical revival i saw they do these things it's like a wall of chairs and they do these things and the piece comes to life for you and it is just fabulous and it's here on march tenth and we have a little  gershwin and you've got to come see it and then this is a show i loved another premiere i mean all these premieres it's a bronx tale and there ketch line is where jersey boys meets west side story i saw it i've met cha palminteri who had sort of his on his life story but it's about these young kids hanging out on the stoop and whether they go to the life of a gangster you know and great music it was directed by jerry robert de niro well yeah quite a team quite a team and it's here for several performances here april twenty one twenty two you will be amazed at how much you love bronx tale and then i will say the last show is and i hate to have favorite favorites and les mis is my favorite musical but for of the new ones we are bringing a show that will rock your world it's called come from away and it is a show that a musical that is based on what happened in nine eleven it said you know they said on nine eleven the world stopped on nine twelve their stories got told there were seven thousand people in the air that day and those people had to go somewhere and they took them to newfoundland and this little tiny town the new film opened their hearts to all people from all over the world different languages every home my gosh and well laid by a very small cast  these rules are played it is so inspiring it is so moving and i was so excited that i could bring this to sarasota and that's here april twenty eighth to march third and then we have