SCAI News

SUNRISE COUNTY ARTS INSTITUTE IN MILBRIDGE, ME, ANNOUNCES “SUNRISE VOICES,”

A PAIR OF SUMMER MUSIC AND DRAMA VIRTUAL PRODUCTIONS FOR YOUTH,

IN COLLABORATION WITH HEALTHY ACADIA’S “PARTNERSHIPS FOR SUCCESS”

Milbridge, ME, June-July 2021 – SUNRISE COUNTY ARTS INSTITUTE, INC. (SCAI) in Milbridge

will be creating two virtual productions with Downeast-Acadia youth this summer: a short choral

concert, and an original play with music. The project, called “Sunrise Voices”, is funded by a minigrant

from Healthy Acadia’s Downeast Maine Partnerships for Success initiative. Participation is

free, and open to people ages 9-20 from Washington and Hancock Counties who like to sing, act,

and/or play instruments.

Recruitment and casting are starting immediately. The goal is to create two videos during

July through early August, and post the finished productions online by August 31:

- a 15-20-minute program of choral music, and

- a play with incidental music, “The Lobsterman and His Wife: A Downeast Fairy

Tale,” which Woerner and the members of the Narraguagus JrSrHS Drama Club created in

2018-19, through a workshopping and performance process.

The Lobsterman script was based on the Grimm’s fairy tale, “The Fisherman and His

Wife”—but as Woerner describes it, “with songs, several additional characters, and a much more

redemptive ending for all of them” than the original Grimm’s story. “We had a short run at the high

school, just one weekend in spring 2019, and also took it out to UMM’s ‘Thou Art Faire’ and the

residents at Narraguagus Bay Health Care. All our audiences loved it.” The script was selected by

The Grand’s Fringe Festival for inclusion in its fall 2019 season in Ellsworth, though the early-

September festival timing proved too soon to reassemble the cast for performances.

“We made a good little show, and I’ve always wanted more people to have a chance to see

it,” says Woerner. “A virtual production now seems made to order.”

On a practical; note, she says, “We waited to kick off the active signup and

rehearsal/production phase till kids were out of school, as they’ve been under enormous pressure

with so many changes and so much virtual learning during the past academic year. A lot of them

couldn’t think past getting through finals.”

Now, she adds: “Doing most of the recording one-on-one and virtually will enable everyone

to work around their summer job schedules and vacations.” Some portions of the shows will be

recorded outdoors at SCAI’s bayside headquarters in Milbridge—“barring too much wind in the

microphones,” she quips.

Says PFS Coordinator Sara McConnell, “Healthy Acadia's Downeast Partnerships for

Success is thrilled to partner with groups like SCAI to provide opportunities for area youth to

increase protective factors and decrease risk factors of substance use. We can't wait to see this

project evolve."

SCAI’s $5,400 mini-grant for “Sunrise Voices” was originally announced before the Covid

pandemic struck in March 2020, and planned as an in-person young women’s Downeast-Area

chorus. Since then, the project has been reconfigured to accommodate the current performing-arts

reality: even though some activities are making a longed-for reappearance, there’s a slower return

to safe singing together in person. Through June, SCAI was busy laying the groundwork: learning

how to create virtual productions, obtaining needed software and equipment, and working with a

college-student intern who assists with recruitment and social media, and will help participants

prepare their vocal recordings.

For those interested in joining or volunteering to help the Sunrise Voices program, contact

Woerner through SCAI’s website: www.sunrisecountyarts.org; its Facebook page,

facebook.com/sunrisecountyarts; Instagram @sunrisecountyarts; or call 207-546-2272.

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