The Sunday performance will be the culminating event in a week-long exploration of these themes at Grandview Heights High School sponsored by the Ohio Humanities Council. The orchestra and band classes of Jennifer Olis and Thomas Stanley will work with Early Interval musicians on pieces that will be included in the Sunday event. 11th and 12th grade English students of Joseph Hecker and Kevin McCarthy will participate in an interactive game created by Terry Hermsen which centers on historical material related to this 500-year exploration. The students will then create poems and other writings in response, to be read as a prelude to Sunday’s program.
Jim Bates, co-director of Early Interval, writes, “The 15th century in Europe saw a great awakening of sorts, a burgeoning curiosity and an interest in intellectual matters. This Renaissance of learning and the subsequent flourishing of the arts began in northern Italy and spread across Europe. Concurrent to these developments and a further outgrowth of that ‘curiosity’ was the Age of Discovery. Trade routes were established that produced an exchange of goods – goods that included the transfer of animals, plants, insects, humans (often in the form of slaves) and communicable diseases, putting into motion forces with consequences that would not fully reveal themselves for 500 years.”
Co-designer of the event, poet Terry Hermsen from Otterbein University, has edited a book to go along with the performance. He reflects, “Where these two arts and time periods meet, ‘Tempest’ invites audiences to explore contact zones of common ground and wonder.”