ANACONDA— Get your vocal cords warmed up because the Young People’s Open Theatre Project in Anaconda is back with its summer musical theater workshop.
"I was doing a lot of theater in Butte and then I moved to Anaconda where there wasn’t a lot of theater going on back then, so I started the Open Theatre Project to fill that gap," said Sue Konicek.
Konicek, the artistic director for the Young People’s Open Theatre Project, started the group in 2013 for elementary to junior high students. There are touring productions, community shows, and a summer musical theater workshop.
"The kids learn all about being in a musical theater production. They learn the music, and they learn about vocal production, and they learn all the choreography and they learn about performance techniques," said Konicek.
The summer musical theater workshop is a half-day camp that runs for two weeks on the second floor of the Copper Village Museum and Arts Center.
The second floor is part of the historic Anaconda City Hall. The three-story brick building was built in 1895. The first and second floors had a courtroom, clerk's office and attorney's office. The second floor was the courtroom and plans are being made to renovate it into a performing arts and events space.
"We’ve been working on a grant that we were awarded to have an architectural preliminary report so that we could get heating up there and that’s our next goal ‘cause once you have heat then you can work on your drywall, your painting, your floors," said Shannon Warner, Director of the Copper Village museum and arts center.
Konicek says there isn’t a practical space for performances in Anaconda and hopes the soon-to-be renovated room can be used for more than just theater.
"We want to have a space that the different dance groups can use, that different music groups can use, we’ll have concerts. We can bring in any kind of performance," said Konicek.
The summer musical theater workshop will begin on July 11. The camp is open for students entering 3rd grade and over. Workshops will be held from 9 am to 1 pm with a performance on July 22 at 12 p.m.
