Events

LEXINGTON, Ky.—Transylvania University’s Theatre Guild offers up a Shakespearean action-adventure-fantasy with “Rough Magic,” in the Lucille C. Little Theater May 17-19 at 7:30 p.m. and May 20 at 2 p.m.   Transylvania senior Heather Porter directs the regional premiere of this play, written by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa. Transplanting characters from “The Tempest” to present-day New York, “Rough Magic” conjures a mythical, magical meta-universe in which the evil sorcerer Prospero is willing to do anything to recover his stolen book of magic, even if it means Manhattan’s destruction. Luckily, Manhattan’s defenders include a quartet of unlikely heroes: a plucky, raven-haired dramaturg named Melanie Porter, who has the ability to free characters from plays; Prospero’s hunky, though not-to-bright son, Caliban; a revenge-seeking Fury from ancient Greece named Tisiphone and Chet Baxter, a 17-year-old lifeguard from Coney Island. General admission tickets are $10 and may be reserved by calling the box office at (859) 281-3621, weekdays from 1-4 p.m. For more information, contact Sully White at swhite@transy.edu.

LEXINGTON, Ky.—On Wednesday, May 16, from 11 a.m.-1 p.m., Transylvania University will host a garden party to unveil new signage for Transylvania’s rain garden, one of the first in Lexington. A traditional sign has been created by Kayla Kidwell-Snider ’12 and Barbara Grinnell, Transylvania’s graphic designer. Kidwell-Snider has also created hand-painted interactive signage for the garden. These signs are blocks mounted on a threaded rod. Each side of the block has different information, such as a picture of the plant with the name, a picture of an animal that uses the plant, a fun fact about the plant and information on when the plant blooms or where to plant it. The party is free and open to the public and representatives from the Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government will attend. The garden signage is the final component of Transylvania’s nearly $4,900 Stormwater Quality Grant that the university received in December 2010 from the LFUCG. The grant was to fund education initiatives related to water quality, specifically, how people’s actions can impact water quality. With the grant money, which Transylvania matched at 50 percent, the sustainability office has held workshops on rain barrel making, rain gardens and environmentally friendly lawncare for faculty, staff and students. Last May term, the office also hosted Town Branch Tuesdays to increase stormwater quality awareness, including a progressive lunch garden party, a scavenger hunt, a water festival and storm drain painting. For more information, contact the public

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Tim Polashek LEXINGTON, Ky.—Contemporary music composed by Transylvania University music professor Timothy Polashek will be performed Saturday, April 28, at 7:30 p.m. at Land of Tomorrow Gallery, 527 East Third St., Lexington. Admission is free, but donations will be accepted. The concert will feature Polashek’s “Engravings for Prepared Snare Drum, iPad, and Computer” and “Echoes of Steel: Electro-Acoustic Music for Drum Set”—both performed by percussionist Brad Meyer—and “Micro-Coastings: Electro-Acoustic Music and Video.” Polashek and Meyer are founders of the gEARbox Ensemble, which performs contemporary acoustic, electro-acoustic and electronic music and commissions and premieres works by established and emerging composers. Micro-Coastings is Polashek’s first extensive use of video in a composition. “The video camera, like the microphone during the recording of my sound sources, was positioned to frame objects more closely in order to capture things expressively,” he said. “All the sounds and video were taken from in and around my family’s home in Lexington.” Polashek writes in a variety of media and styles including vocal, instrumental and electro-acoustic music, text/sound compositions and interactive performance. His work has been performed all over the world, and he directed the Studio 300 Digital Art and Music Festival at Transylvania, which was held in September 2011 and featured more than 60 works and exhibitions by artists and musicians from eight countries. Land of Tomorrow Gallery facilitates the making and showing of experimental works of art, design, and music. For more information, visit www.landoftomorrow.org.