Where should you go for a little winter time fun with your sweetie? Mark and Sandy Auburn have the answer!

Photo credit: Michael Chirtton

A guest blog post written by art patrons, Drs. Mark and Sandy Auburn.

Live performances still gets us out at night. Having met as actors in “The Wonderful Tang” at The University of Akron’s Children’s Theatre Workshop more than fifty years ago, we still delight in community and professional theatre. Ballet and large ensemble music also attracts us. We buy more season tickets for Summit County companies than we can use and regret when the travels of our retirement years mean we will miss performances.

In the last couple of decades, we’ve found great joy in the extensive array of free or low-cost performances by the School of Music and the School of Dance, Theatre, and Arts Administration at The University of Akron. Performances by aspiring professionals and young dedicated amateurs bring unexpected moments of the sublime. At this stage in their careers, every appearance carries personal risk. Ensemble synchronicity rarely marks rehearsal, but in the cauldron of live performance, gold sometimes precipitates to everyone’s happy surprise.

We can’t have our great Akron Symphony Orchestra or our enthusiastic Weathervane Community Playhouse or the Magical Theatre or Coach House or Groundworks or NEOS or Ballet Excel Ohio or BLU Jazz without The University of Akron to provide not just training, but the conditions to bring employers and audiences to live and work in our community. Go to them and to Broadway in Akron and the great lectures at E.J. Thomas Performing Arts Hall, but don’t miss the student performances there or next door in Guzzetta Hall.

Drs. Mark and Sandy Auburn