Arts Can Teach: May 9th,10th & 11th, May 16th, 17th & 18th, May 23rd, 24th & 25th, May 31st, June 1st & 2nd, June 6th, 7th & 8th, June 13th, 14th & 15th

Saturday, June 29th: Greek Revival Theatre Festival, Jordan Muschler’s ‘Calypso

Jordan Muschler (he/him) is a playwright and director who hails from Minneapolis. He has written two other full-length plays, Grisling Hall and Parasocial Play, as well as various short plays and screenplays. He has also acted since the age of 10, works in film, and most importantly, loves doing the crossword! He recently graduated from Oberlin College with a B.A. in Theater and English.  His play, Calypso, will be presented as the first show of the 2024 season.  Trapped alone on an island for what feels like eternity, Calypso’s life flips upside down when a man named Odysseus washes ashore and enters her life.

Sunday, July 14th: Windsor Classic Chorale, Sheniz Janmohammed

Windsor Classic Chorale:

Founded in 1977, the Windsor Classic Chorale has become a core component of the local arts community by presenting its annual concert season and singing at a variety of other events throughout the Windsor area. The Chorale considers it a privilege to perform in this community and enjoys collaborating with other organizations and solo artists. The Chorale has performed in a wide range of venues including Heritage Auditorium at the University of Windsor, All Saints’ Church, and on Pelee Island at the Stone & Sky Music & Art Series.  The Chorale hosts the Windsor Choral Festival, providing opportunities for musical growth and development to choral singers of all ages. This event brings a wealth of knowledge and expertise to our community and provide local singers with a fresh perspective on their musical interpretation, vocal technique, and overall performance.

Sheniz Janmohamed is an author, artist educator, and spoken word artist. A graduate of the MFA in Creative Writing program at the University of Guelph, Sheniz has been mentored by authors Dionne Brand, Kuldip Gill, and Janice Kulyk Keefer. She has performed nationally and internationally for over 10 years, including features at the TedXYouth Conference, the Jaipur Literature Festival, and the Aga Khan Museum. Her work has been published in various print and online journals and anthologies including West Coast Line, SUFI, and Descant.

Sunday, July 28th: Teajai Travis, Amrita Choudhury & Jada Malik Larkin *Louise Paquette will be filling in for Amrita Choudhury due to illness*

Teajai Travis is a descendent of Afro-Indigenous West Indians who were unsettled on the magical island of Bermuda. He is also descended from a family of Foundational Black travelers and conductors of the Underground Railroad.
Teajai is passionate about the celebrations and preservation of storytelling. He finds joy and purpose in guiding learners of all ages to discover their story through fun and thought-provoking exercises.
As part of Teajai’s practice, he incorporates percussion instruments and spoken word poetry, to facilitate classroom drumming and storytelling circles. Teajai is the inaugural multicultural community storyteller for the City of Windsor, the former Executive Director of Artcite Inc., and the founder of Sacred Story Studio, the home of A Blaze of Story.

Louise Paquette, a native of Windsor, ON, received her BFA as a dance major from York University in Toronto in 1995, after graduating from Walkersville’s WCCA program.  Paquette was a principle dancer with HNM Dance Company from 1997- 2011. Paquette was also a principle dancer with Gina Lori Riley Dance Enterprises 1997-2009 and currently sits on the board of directors. Paquette had the pleasure of dancing and training with Denise Szykula, as a member of Dance Nonce for the 1998 and 1999 seasons and Dance Nonce the Sequel 2010- 2018. Louise taught creative movement, ballet, jazz, and modern disciplines at the Acedemie Ste. Cecile Dance Studio School 1996-2014. Louise opened her own dance school Dare2Dance in 2014 and enjoyed five successful seasons.  Paquette has been a mentor artist educator in the classroom with the Learning Through the Arts program 2000-2018 and continues this work with Arts Can Teach currently.

Jada Malik Larkin, born and raised in Windsor, he is an accompaniment of the area. Raised in the heart of Windsor history, he strives to present this area’s heritage.  Always keeping in mind (centering) roots (land), rich – wealth of (knowledge) and revitalization (people).  At 29 and back home from his 3 Bachelor’s completion; University of British Columbia Okanagan, he is eagerly painting, creating and originating with a vigorous rhythm to present who he is.  A huge thank you and hug to everyone who comes across his work, with much love and great appreciation.

Sunday, August 4th: Mike Karloff & Friends, Tina Newlove, Karl Jirgens

Mike Karloff is a multi-talented pianist, composer, arranger, conductor and musical director based in Windsor. He performs regularly as both a collaborative pianist and jazz pianist. Michael frequently performs with The Windsor Symphony Orchestra, Windsor Light Music Theatre, 4th Wall Music and Jazz at Mackenzie Hall. Michael’s original compositions and arrangements have been performed by The Windsor Symphony Orchestra, at The Detroit Jazz Festival and in various concert settings in Windsor.

Tina Newlove continues to be recognized by curators and jurors as an artist who is making a significant contribution to the cultural life of Canada. The Arts & Letters Club of Toronto founded by members of the Group of Seven commissioned Tina to create the annual 1998/99 Executive List. Her abstract oil painting titled Organizing my Mind is in the City of Toronto’s permanent collection. In 2011, Newlove received a First Place Award for her bronze sculpture A Song Grew Through My Rib Cage from Lakeshore Arts and in 2010 an Award of Merit for her painting Step Lightly at the Art Gallery of Hamilton.

Karl Jirgens has four critically acclaimed books in print including Strappado (Coach House), and A Measure of Time (Mercury Press). He has edited two books including one on Canadian Poet Christopher Dewdney, and painter Jack Bush. Jirgens is the former Head of the English Department at the University of Windsor. He served on the steering committee for BookFest Windsor for 10 years, and is the founder and long-standing editor of the international literary journal, Rampike.

Violinist Velda Kelly has been teaching and performing in metropolitan Detroit since 1983. As the recipient of a Music Assistance Fund fellowship, Ms. Kelly played with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra for three years. She holds music degrees from Boston University and the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music where her violin teachers included Henry Meyer, Joseph Silverstein and Denes Zsigmondy. Ms. Kelly is a member of the Detroit Opera Orchestra and has an active chamber music career. She and cellist Nadine Deleury co-founded Chamber Music at the Scarab Club, a small series based in Detroit. Velda performs as an extra musician with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, has a large class of private violin students, is an adjunct faculty member at Madonna University and serves as the advisor for Tuesday Musicale of Detroit’s Student League.

Laura Roelofs recently completed her final season as Assistant Concertmaster of the Detroit Opera Orchestra, a position she has held since 2004. She holds the title of Associate Professor Emeritus at Wayne State University, where she was on the music faculty for seventeen years. Earlier in her career, she was Assistant Concertmaster of the Richmond Symphony Orchestra and performed as a member of the Oberon String Quartet, artists-in-residence at St. Catherine’s and St. Christopher’s Schools. Ms. Roelofs has served on the faculty of Virginia Commonwealth University and as Artist-Teacher of Violin at Georgia State University in Atlanta, where she was a member of the Atlanta Chamber Players. She was a founding member of the Eakins String Quartet and performed for several years with Currents, a Richmond-based contemporary music ensemble. She holds performance degrees from Boston University’s School of Fine Arts and the Catholic University of America.

Gord Gristenthwaite is nłeʔkepmx, a member of the Lytton First Nation, and has earned an MA in English Literature & Creative Writing at the University of Windsor (2020). His second book, Tales for Late Night Bonfires was released September, 2023 and his first, Home Waltz, was a finalist for the 2021 Governor General’s Award for fiction.
His work has appeared in Prairie Fire, FreeFall, Exile Quarterly, The Antigonish Review, Our Stories Literary Journal, Prism International, ndnCountry, Offset 17, Bawaajigan: Stories of Power, and Food of My People. His work has earned a number of prizes, including the 2013 John Kenneth Galbraith Literary Award.

Sunday, September 1st: Marshall Drägun & Zhaoyi Cai

Marshall Drägun & Zhaoyi Cai:

Destinature is a contemplative manifestation of sonic aural being conceived and brought forth into existence through the collective hearts and minds of Zhaoyi Cai and Marshall Drägun. Paying homage to earthly and intergalactic elements that weave the very fabric of existence; creating the vibrational conditions that hold space and temporal form to life itself; flora, fauna and an array of cosmic agents. The project is traveling journey spanning across generations, regions, and solar systems leading to an eternally unraveling state of Now; A destined path that no matter which road is chosen, a conglomeration of possibilities will always lead us to our present moment in the natural world. These are the very pathways that brought us here. An ancestral language of peoples and places; of existence and non-existence. A blossoming improvisational force that bridges past, present and future together in a symphony of morphing totality.

Arts Can Teach: September 5th – 7th, & Sept 13th – 15th Maryam Safarzadeh

Maryam Safarzadeh is a visual artist, poet, educator, founder and managing director of Windsor Persian Arts & Cultural Centre, and a member of the education committee Art Gallery of Windsor-Essex.  She began painting at the age of 10 and went on to study many different art techniques from Masters of painting in Iran. She studied Graphic Design at the University of Science and Culture of Tehran and has been painting since. Maryam’s favourite technique is oil painting on canvas. She also has experience creating large scale tile mosaics, murals, works of calligraphy, and illustrations. She writes poetry as well. Maryam has been teaching art and creation for 20 years in art schools, institutes and colleges across Iran as well as in her own studio at SHO Art, Spirit & Performance in Windsor.

Sunday, September 15th: Flutter Fest – ‘Magiquecal’; Patricia Fell, Ray Manzerolle, Pamela Cole, Mary Jo Mullins, Allison Ware, Collette Broeders

Mary Jo Mullins Mary Jo Mullins is an award winning Canadian dance artist, photographer and visual artist. Her expertise in the arts is grounded in the forms of contemporary dance. A self-taught photographer and visual artist, she is also an avid facilitator and practitioner of Conscious Bodies Methodology by Dreamwalker Dance. This sensory awakening artistic practice has become the heart of all her creations, inspiring empowering embodiment and consciously connecting inner and outer worlds.

Pamela Cole Pamela was intrigued with classical sacred music and vocal performance when she was a young member of the St. Alphonsus Choir downtown Windsor.  She began studying classical voice has a hobby at 14 years old and continued training intermittently and performing until her early 30’s.  Pelee Island is one of her favourite places in the world and therefore she feels honoured and blessed to create and perform in The Quarry. 

Ray Manzerolle: The soulful alto saxophonist had a decade long association with multi Grammy Award winning acoustic guitarist Earl Klugh. He went on to perform and record alongside many Jazz, R&B & Urbane Music icons, including Patti LaBelle, George Benson, Oleta Adams, Patrice Rushen, Keith Washington, George Duke, Gene Dunlap, Dennis Coffey as well as the late Teena Marie. World renowned Jazz author and critic Scott Yanow describes Ray’s playing as “has his own conception…, plays melodically, and makes every note count!”

Patricia Fell’s career as a professional artist for more than 30 years has embraced award winning design for the theatre, education, and the promotion of social injustice issues.  Her extensive background in community based arts initiatives place her in an educated position from which to project a unique and achievable production outcome.  Her body of work includes experience in design for the theatre, installation art, performance art, production management, and all levels of theatre production & administration.  She is delighted to work with the brilliant artists of Magiquecal to give this production its glittering wings!

Allison Ware is a third year BFA student at the School of Creative Arts, University of Windsor. She is creating the Island’s newest mural at the Pelee Island Co-op Association on the north shore. The mural celebrates Monarch Migration aligning with Flutter Fest: A Community Migration Celebration.

Create your own unique and animated butterfly that flutters with artist, Collette Broeders.

Broeders is a multi-media artist merging traditional processes with new media and performance.  As a print artist and paper maker, she connects to the ‘handmade’ and sensory experience of the natural world.  She has exhibited nationally and internationally in galleries throughout North America, France and Bulgaria.