Presenter Profile:
Alysa VandenHeuvel
Position: Performing Arts Manager
Organization: Gunnison Arts Center

What does your job entail?
I manage all programming for our music concerts. We hold a free summer concert series for the community, with concerts in Legion Park on Sunday nights. I book all the bands for that series as well as for a First Friday Art Walk that involves up to 10 galleries. I also book a few concerts and workshops here at the Arts Center. In all, I book music for about 20 events per year.

In addition, I run the programming for our dance studio—all ages of dancing starting at 2 years old and all the way up seniors. And I do the producing for our 8-10 theatre productions every year featuring all local actors and local directors.

When hiring live music acts, how do you find talent that fits your organization's needs?  
A lot of people contact me. I have not had to reach out very often to find bands to play here. We have quite a few local bands that I really enjoy featuring first, before hiring out-of-town bands, but maybe one-quarter of the groups we present are from Denver, Boulder, or Paonia. Paonia, which is just half an hour from us, has a huge music scene. (Photo: Sundays @ 6 free concert series held in Legion Park, Gunnison. Photo by Matt Burt.)

What is your greatest challenge as a booker?  
Finding people to attend our events. Also our calendar—we have so much going on that there’s often an event every night of the week; it can be stressful on the community as well. I do find some local sponsors around town to help with certain events, and I do extra promotion for the events that aren’t free to the public. Another challenge is price; I try to negotiate with the band or the workshop instructor to show them our not very large budget and explain what would happen if we raised or lowered the ticket price.

What is the biggest red flag or turnoff in considering an act?  
For music, it would probably be price. If the group wants an amount that’s out of our budget, and they aren’t able to negotiate due to their own legitimate needs, sometimes we just can’t match up on a price. As far as dance productions go, we don’t have a big theatre and some groups just can’t perform here. We work closely with the Crested Butte Center for the Arts; they have a larger theatre.

What do you find most rewarding about your job?  
I love experiencing an event or a class going well, where the students or audience members walk out feeling refreshed and inspired, like they’ve learned something.

What is a local act that you booked recently that was especially successful, and why was it a success?
We recently presented an event called “Singer Songwriters in the Round.” A local singer songwriter, Chris Coady, approached us; he had done a similar performance here before and he had some singers who had just moved back into town. The other performers that night were Evelyn Roper, Kevin Walter, Alan Wartes, and Issa Forrest. I loved how they were able to talk about each song and give some background about it before they played it, rather than a regular concert, where you just go from one tune to the next. This event took the experience to another level and got the audience thinking more about the art of songwriting. I think it got the musicians even more inspired about the songwriting process, too.

Presenter Profile - Rhonda Welch

Name: Rhonda Welch

Position: Festival Coordinator,

Culture, Parks, and Recreation Department, City of Greeley, CO

How did you get into presenting in the first place?

Before my husband and I moved to Greeley from Sterling, we used to come to concerts at UNC. We were anxious to get to the big city. When we moved here, the Arts Picnic was already underway, so I volunteered my time with the Arts Picnic while I was getting to know people in Greeley. I was a volunteer for the Cultural Affairs Department (now combined with the Parks and Recreation Department).

When the bond finally passed to build our new Performing Arts Center, which would be umbrella-ed under the Cultural Affairs Department, I applied for and got the position of Volunteer Coordinator and Special Events Coordinator from 1988-1991.

I helped with the opening of the Union Colony Civic Center (UCCC) in September 1988. We celebrated our 25^th year last September. As the Special Events Coordinator for the new performing arts center, I had the pleasure of presenting and producing Tony Bennett, Flash Cadillac with the Greeley Philharmonic Orchestra, and A Tribute to Gershwin show. It was unbelievably exciting to be a part of something so wonderful for Greeley.

The City’s Festival Coordinator position came up the next year and I accepted that position. My job with the UCCC, although incredibly rewarding, was very time-consuming and I had two young boys at home. As Mike and Dave grew older, I “volunteered” them (as well as my husband Tom, who also works for the City) to help with the festivals. Some jobs they liked and some . . . not so much! When I started my new position, I was coordinating the annual Arts Picnic and Festival of Trees in addition to Greeley’s Cinco de Mayo Celebration (the latter has now been turned over to the Latino Chamber of Northern Colorado).

What events do you produce now?

I’m responsible for creating the schedule for Greeley’s Neighborhood Nights, a free program on five evenings throughout the summer. We present movies on a large, inflatable screen in Greeley’s beautiful parks, and I hire performers to entertain the crowd before the movie begins. Often 500 or more people show up in the park, arriving early with their picnics, blankets and lawn chairs.

Then there’s the Arts Picnic, which takes place in beautiful, historic Lincoln Park with a kickoff concert on the 9th Street Plaza. This weekend festival draws more than 25,000 participants to downtown Greeley and includes some 150 arts and crafts vendors. For this festival I book 24 or more stage performances as well as roving performers. The festival has grown from one stage to two stages, and now there’s a third stage in the kids’ area. 

The Festival of Trees is a weeklong gala that includes elaborately decorated tree displays designed and assembled by local businesses, individuals, and organizations along with musical events, children’s activities, horse and carriage rides, and much more. Hundreds of performers donate their time for the festival as lobby entertainment amidst the beautiful trees as well as on two stages, one in the Hensel Phelps Theatre that accommodates 200 patrons and the other in the Monfort Concert Hall that seats 1600. People come from all over northern Colorado for the festival not only to stroll through the trees but to also take part in the festival’s special events: The Whoville Holiday, with a Whoville Hair Salon, photos with the Grinch, and much more; a Silver Bells Social for seniors; a Sip & Shop Ladies’ Night Out, and a Teddy Bear Bash for little preschoolers--all of which usually sell out each year.

I’m also on the steering committee for Greeley’s annual Blues Jam, now in its 10^th year.

It’s a wonderful job giving me the privilege to get to know so many incredible Colorado artists and performers.

How have you seen the arts change since you've been presenting?

Greeley tends to be a rather conservative community, but the people who now live here are so diverse. A part of Greeley is made up of East African immigrants employed by JBS Swift & Company, and then there is our large Hispanic community, many of whom came to northern Colorado from Mexico to work in the fields and stayed to raise their families. We are working very hard to immerse those cultures into our community, supporting and celebrating their artistic talents. 

We are also in the process of applying to join one of seven communities in Colorado to be designated a Creative District, which encompasses the adjoining areas of Greeley Downtown and the neighborhoods including and surrounding the University of Northern Colorado. It is a dynamic, diverse, active and arts-rich area where people live, work, create, innovate, learn, shop, dine, gather and play. I am so lucky to sit on the board of this organization.  www.greeleycreativedistrict.org

As far as I’m concerned, I was also so lucky to begin working for the City as one of the Union Colony Center’s original staff. Opening the UCCC was instrumental in spotlighting arts and entertainment in Greeley at that time. Then the economy did what it did, and we felt it as much as everyone else, especially in the arts. Now that the country seems to be in recovering mode, I’m seeing an emergence of new performers and a re-focus on the arts. Hopefully we are once again realizing  how extremely important they are to our communities!

Why have these events been so successful?

One factor is that Greeley has wonderful  volunteers who are committed to the arts. We absolutely could not do these events without all the help of civic-minded folks who live here and generously give their time.

As a presenter, you always have to challenge yourself to create new events. You have to constantly tweak to keep them fresh.

Do you attend the Colorado Performing Arts Jamboree?

Yes, I have attended for years. I have never left the Jamboree without also booking so many performers and entertainers from that program. People are crazy not to go there every year. It’s the best resource for performing art and entertainment.

Presenter Profile: Rich Harris

Name:   Rich Harris
Position:  Theater Manager, The Rialto Theater, Loveland, CO

Rich Harris has been managing the Rialto Theater just since November 2013, but he’s no newcomer to presenting. Over the past 30 years he’s worked at such venues as Town Hall Arts Center (Littleton), Dairy Center for the Arts (Boulder), Lone Tree Arts Center, and Swallow Hill, including 15 years at Teikyo Loretto Heights University in Denver. He also put in seven years as a booking agent.

What do you do as Theater Manager? I run the facility in all aspects, but with two major areas of focus. The Rialto is a wonderful resource for the community and many community groups come and rent the theatre for their productions. The majority of our business is rentals, but we do produce a fair number of shows ourselves. I’m in charge of selecting and booking those shows.

How many events do you book talent for annually? About 25. It depends on whether I want to do fewer acts with large talent fees or more acts--I will probably lean toward more rather than fewer because there are just so many good things to present. I also book for a summer outdoor series at Loveland’s Foote Lagoon--six concerts that are free to the public. We get an average attendance of 2000 people. Also, we have a small arts and education program that I am excited about developing.

How do you find local talent that fits your organization's needs? For me personally, I like to sit down with the Web. I have a long history booking  the performing arts, and of course there are many artists looking for opportunities to perform; two-thirds of our phone calls are people calling me to offer acts. I’ll also be attending a couple of major booking conferences--APAP Arts Presenters Conference, New York, and the Western Arts Alliance on the West Coast.

I’ll certainly be at the Colorado Performing Arts Jamboree this January, which I’ve attended a half dozen times or more. All those people are potential acts. Many of them have played at the Rialto and almost all of them offer arts and education programming. I try to stop by every booth and see what they have to offer.

What is your greatest challenge as a booker? Finding the right act for the situation and then making a deal that is fair to everybody, that everybody feels good about when it’s over. People have their egos and their livelihood and their artistic lives--you can’t always equate that to dollars. I respect the artist immensely and don’t always have the dollars to make it work financially. It’s one big balancing act. But it’s wonderful experience when you get the right artist in front of the right audience.

What is a local act that you worked with recently that was especially successful, and why was it a success? Hazel Miller. She is just a dream to work with. It is wonderful to present her act and music in the best light in a nice theater with professional production staff. I feel really motivated to get her the biggest audience.

Who Cares About the Arts? Loveland Does.

As we witness arts budgets being ripped to pieces like gift wrapping on Christmas morning--only without any present inside--it’s gratifying to hear about a community that is doing bold and visionary work to support the arts.

Like Loveland’s 2012 creation of the Rialto Theater Center.

Photo: Michelle Standiford

The original Rialto Theater in downtown Loveland opened as a vaudeville house in 1920 and thrived as a movie theater for decades before its eventual decline into a mini shopping mall in the 1970s. In the 1980s the City of Loveland began restoration of the building and secured its designation as a National Historic Place. With the help of major fundraising and volunteer labor, the Rialto opened in 1996 as a 446-seat, Art Deco gem with modern sound and lighting equipment. Since then the Rialto has maintained a busy schedule ranging from local theater groups and choruses to national touring musicians, independent and silent films, meetings, and school functions.

“The theater was wonderful, but it didn’t have support spaces,” says Rich Harris, Rialto Theater Manager, explaining that the dressing room was a cramped space with low headroom under the stage and there was no room for offices or classrooms.

“I’ve worked at the Boulder Theatre and the Fox, and they they all have this same challenge,” Harris says. “It is a great credit to the City of Loveland that they decided to fix that problem. They took the building adjoining the Rialto, demolished it, and built a three-story building designed for beautiful support services for the theater.”

The new building, dubbed the Rialto Theater Center, is a joint venture between the City of Loveland; the Rialto Bridge, LLC; and the Community Foundation of Northern Colorado.

The bottom floor is leased to a restaurant in partnership with the city. “The 1919 building and the 2012 building interconnect,” Harris says. “When we want to serve alcohol, we just open up the window between the two.”

The middle floor contains beautiful, modern dressing rooms; meeting rooms; and workshop rooms for arts and education and children’s programs.  The rooms are equipped with slide-down projection screens and all-new audio systems. The top floor is being leased to a communications company.

“It’s very sophisticated,” Harris says. “The Rialto has gone from being a stand-alone theater to a small arts complex. This whole project was visionary.”