Mary D'Angelo Performing Arts Center facts for kids

The Mary D'Angelo Performing Arts Center is a special place at Mercyhurst University in Erie, Pennsylvania. It's where people can enjoy many different kinds of shows, like music, dance, and movies. This center is a big part of the arts scene in Erie.

Cool Facts About the Center

• The Mary D'Angelo Performing Arts Center is in Erie, Pennsylvania, at Mercyhurst University.
• It has a lot of seats! There are 792 regular seats and 24 special box seats, making a total of 816 places for people to watch shows.
• This center was the first theater in the whole U.S. to use geothermal energy. This means it uses heat from the Earth to warm and cool the building!
• The beautiful chandeliers hanging over the opera boxes are the same ones found in the famous Metropolitan Opera House in New York City. They were made in Austria from pure Crystal.

History of the Arts Center

The Mary D'Angelo Performing Arts Center first opened its doors in February 1996. The very first show featured a famous piano player named André Watts. It was a snowy day, but nearly 800 people came to watch him play. During his performance, something funny happened! The piano keys froze, and the piano kept playing by itself for a moment. They had to bring out a different piano for him to finish the show. After that, André Watts joked that he was "cursed" and would never play at a grand opening again!

When the center first opened in 1996, it had a small team and hosted about six or seven shows a year. These shows mostly featured classical music artists like Kathleen Battle and the Juilliard String Quartet. Over the years, the center grew a lot! Now, it has more staff and hosts over one hundred events each year. These events include jazz, dance, classical music, and world music.

The center is also the only active movie theater in Erie. It shows special film series, live broadcasts of operas from the Metropolitan Opera, and lecture series. The entire D'Angelo Arts Complex, which includes the center, is very large, covering over 50,000 square feet.

Other Arts Spaces

The arts complex also includes other important spaces:

• The Taylor Little Theatre, which is a "black-box" theater.
• The Walker Recital Hall.
• The Cummings Art Gallery, which has recently been made bigger.

Right next to the Mary D'Angelo Performing Arts Center are the dance department, with two dance studios called danceSpace, and the D'Angelo music department.

Different Performance Spaces

The D'Angelo Arts Complex has several different areas for performances and art.

Mary D'Angelo Performing Arts Center

• This is the main theater.
• It seats 792 people, plus 24 special box seats.

Walker Recital Hall

• This hall seats 250 people.
• It opened on October 27, 2002. The first performance was a two-hour piano recital by Lorin Hollander.

Taylor Little Theatre

• This theater seats 251 people.
• It was named in 1994 to honor Sister M. Eustace Taylor. She loved Mercyhurst College and the arts very much.

Cummings Art Gallery

• This gallery can hold about 150 people standing.
• It was named after Sister Angelica Cummings, who started the Mercyhurst Art department. It opened in January 1984.

Amazing Performances

The Mary D'Angelo Performing Arts Center has hosted many famous artists and groups.

Grammy Award Winners

Some artists who have won Grammy Awards have performed here, including:

• Maria Schneider
• Paquito D’Rivera
• Eric Bibb

World-Renowned Dance and Music

Famous dance groups like the Paul Taylor Dance Company and Pilobolus have performed on the D'Angelo Center stage. World music artists such as Pink Martini and Jesse Cook have also visited.

One of the most popular shows in the center's history is the Japanese drumming group called Yamato. Yamato has visited Erie four times in the past seven years. They have performed five sold-out shows, with over 5,000 people coming to see them!

Educational Programs

The center also has special programs to help young people learn about the arts. Through these programs, over 6,300 students have had the chance to see exciting performances. These include the African Drummers, Ba Cissoko, the Latin dance group Ballet Hispanico, and Yamato. These programs help introduce students to different cultures and art forms.

Cool Facts About the Center

• The Mary D'Angelo Performing Arts Center is found at Mercyhurst University in Erie, Pennsylvania.
• It has lots of seats! There are 792 regular seats, plus 24 special box seats, making a total of 816 spots for people to watch shows.
• This center was the very first theater in the United States to use geothermal energy. This means it uses heat from deep inside the Earth to keep the building warm in winter and cool in summer!
• The beautiful lights, called chandeliers, hanging above the opera boxes are super special. They are exactly like the ones in the famous Metropolitan Opera House in New York City. They were made in Austria from pure Crystal.