Strathmore Performing Arts Festival preparing for spring

By Christine Foshaug Times Contributor

Mark your calendars … the dates for the 2020 Strathmore Performing Arts Festival (SPAF) have been announced – the festival will run from Mar. 27 to Apr. 4, winding up with the Showcase Concert on Apr. 7.
SPAF gives local singers and musicians the opportunity to perform in front of an audience and get valuable feedback from an adjudicator. Anyone can register and there is no age limit. The registration deadline is Feb. 1.
Classes will include musical theatre, voice, concert band, jazz band, percussion ensemble, instrumental, choir, piano and classroom music, which is new to the 2020 schedule. They will be held at École Brentwood Elementary School, Strathmore High School, Holy Cross Collegiate and Strathmore United Church. The Showcase Concert will take place at Hope Community Covenant Church.
SPAF hopes to build on last year’s inaugural festival, which saw 210 entries and more than 600 participants from Strathmore and surrounding areas.
“Our first festival was very successful,” said Carolyn Steeves, SPAF president. “Because of generous donations from members of our community, we were able to offer $4,250 in scholarship money to 68 festival participants, as well as provide each participant with excellent education from high-level musicians and performers from all over Alberta.”
On Oct. 26, SPAF became part of the Alberta Music Festival Association (AMFA), and it was an emotional moment for Steeves.
“I had tears in my eyes,” she said. “There were so many things to be thankful for. So many thoughts went through my head. But I kept coming back to all the amazing people of Strathmore and area who believed in us, our vision and most of all our Strathmore Performing Arts Festival.”
Joining AMFA allows SPAF the privilege of being part of an organization that oversees 36 member festivals. It also means that adjudicators will be able to nominate outstanding SPAF performers to represent Strathmore at the provincial festival in late May in Edmonton.
Steeves stressed the importance of sponsorship to the success of the inaugural festival. “Our SPAF board started with no funds at all and by the time the festival had started, we had fundraised over $20,000. This enabled us to rent performance space, pay our adjudicators, print everything we needed and provide over $4,000 in scholarships.”
Sponsors can choose from a variety of seed money donation levels and scholarship donation levels, within the corporate sponsorship package or the patron donation package. The deadline for donations is Mar. 1, 2020.
Students in schools and private music studios are already preparing for the festival.
“We are hoping that developing musicians will look forward to the first week in April every year as their time to shine, their time to be in the spotlight and to let their hard work, creativity and talents shine through,” said Steeves.
For more information, please visit strathmorepaf.com or email strathmorepaf@gmail.com.