Imagine dressing up to the nines and going with your date to the theatre to see the national Broadway touring group of Wicked, the ‘other’ version of the Wizard of Oz.
The theatre is lit up in vibrant colors and the crowd filters into the cool, dark hall as the opening bars of the musical fade in. It’s hard to believe that you’re not in the Majestic in San Antonio. Yet, you never left San Angelo.
Imagine the electric atmosphere, the crowd, the noise, and the lights you would see at Blake Shelton, Katy Perry, Beyoncé, Taylor Swift, Muse, Chicago or Mumford and Sons.
Imagine you could take your little girl who dreams of being a ballerina to a performance of Swan Lake by the National Russian Ballet.
None of this is possible in San Angelo. At least not yet. But there is a movement afoot by civic leaders to attract nationally-renowned music artists, Broadway plays, and even nationally touring ballet companies.
The challenge is that San Angelo doesn’t have a ready facility for large touring acts. The limiting factor is that while San Angelo conveniently sits on the path of many national tours of musicians and theater groups, none of the facilities have the ability to offer quick, on-and-off loading and unloading of the stage equipment.
For two years the San Angelo Performing Arts Coalition (SAPAC) have been raising funds for the Performance Arts Center, which will have seven ballet studios, a Black Box Theatre, a 300 seat Theatre, dressing rooms, backstage areas, loading docks and offices for SAPAC.
Renovation for the City Auditorium will develop the basement areas for the Symphony to practice in, as well as host offices and storage for the Symphony, along with updating the sound and lighting systems.
A parking lot of 60,000 square feet will lend itself to the ease of sold out shows.
As of right now SAPAC is about $2 million short of the $13.5 necessary to begin construction.
The center, that is proposed to be the renovated Coca-Cola Warehouse just off N. Chadbourne, already has the most important feature: A loading dock.
Actually it has two, and the location allows for large groups with semi-trucks hauling equipment to load and unload quickly and easily, something that the Angelo Civic Theatre on Sherwood Way, for example, can’t provide.
“They can’t unload 18-wheelers here,” said Gus Clemens, Theatre appointed Director of SAPAC.
Clemens said that the lack of backstage area and no loading dock is the only reason why national acts like Chicago and Broadway touring groups never stop in San Angelo.
The center will satisfy infrastructure feasibility issues, as well as introduce a central ticketing office for the Cultural Affairs Council, which services all local arts programs.
Angelo Civic Theatre, San Angelo Symphony, Angelo Civic Ballet, and the San Angelo Cultural Affairs Council will all set up shop in the new center and the newly renovated City Auditorium.
Lindsay Boynton, Education and Public Relations Assistant for the San Angelo Symphony expressed her delight at the auditorium’s renovation.
“The City Auditorium is our [the symphony’s] home so it will be nice to be back,” she said.
The San Angelo Performing Arts Center sounds like a dream come true for all art lovers, but will a new venue really bring in big acts?
If Wagner Noel Performing Arts Center in Midland is any example, then yes.
Just in the next few days, ZZ Top, Weird Al Yankovic, The Charlie Daniels Band and comedians Jerry Seinfeld and Anjelah Johnson will be stopping in Midland to perform at the Wagner Noel.
Gus Clemens spoke about the citizens of the Midland/Odessa area suddenly changing their tune to “All of a sudden we’re a happening place.”
Clemens’ reasoning is that all mid-sized west Texas cities sit almost directly in the path from the I-35 corridor, Houston and Dallas to all points west. Their trucks are driving through the region, why not make it profitable and feasible for them to stop and give San Angelo a show too?
SAPAC is on the final stretch of its fundraising drive, and just $2 million short. SAPAC offers naming rights available for a number of the venues, seats and pavers planned in and around this ambitious project to help them get there.
For more information visit www.sa-pac.com
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