A Reprieve from Your Cabin Fever! World Music for the Cooped Up!
Venture out this Friday, March 7th, at 6:30pm and hear the renowned NIU Steel Band play a benefit show for Neighbor’ House! You might even get up & dance! The event will take place at the Evangelical Free Church of Sycamore-DeKalb, 150 Bethany Rd in DeKalb (corner of N. 1st St. and Bethany Rd.) from 6:30-8:30pm. Tickets are $15 and benefit Neighbors’ House. Purchase tickets here. Follow the Facebook event page here.
Neighbors’ House is a not-for-profit, faith-based, community development organization partnering with DeKalb County students, and families, to help them fulfill their God-given potential for academic and relational success.
They do this through no-cost programs like: Summer Reading Vacation, Summer Art Vacation, and Reading & Homework Clubs. Their year-round programs take place in income-eligible apartment complexes throughout DeKalb County. Events like this help them serve about 200 kids per year.
The NIU Steel Band is directed by Liam Teague (Head of Steelpan Studies/Associate Professor of Music) and Clifford Alexis (composer, arranger, tuner and builder). Created in 1973 by G. Allan O’Connor, it was the first active steel band formed in an American university and has performed throughout the United States and around the world. NIU is one of the few institutions in the world at which students may pursue music degrees (undergraduate and graduate) with the steelpan as the major instrument of choice.
Over the years, the NIU Steel Band has broadened the repertoire and performance for the steelpan; highlights include a performance for 18,000 soccer fans in Yankee Stadium, two successful tours of Taiwan in 1992 and 1998, concerts with symphony orchestras (including the St. Louis Symphony and the Chicago Sinfonietta), and performances at several Percussive Arts Society International Conventions (PASIC). In 2000 the NIU Steelband had the distinction of placing 2nd in the World Steelband Festival in Trinidad, and in 2002 performed several concerts (including the opening) at the Seoul Drum Festival in South Korea.
NIU Steel Band is a 35-member group and mainly comprises steelpan and percussion majors. The band performs regularly at public schools, colleges and universities, as well as conventions and arts series. The band has three recordings to its credit; including the most recent, “Festival of Voices”, a live concert featuring an eclectic blend of styles.
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