Join us as we bring the holiday classic ballet and magical tale of the Nutcracker to life at Tecumseh Center for the Arts (TCA), December 12-14, 2019. The TCA Nutcracker Ballet has become a biennial tradition at the theater and is a collaboration between The Ballet School, Dance Steps Studio, Inc., Encore Dance Studio, Dance with Heart Studios, MST Dance Center and The Tecumseh Players.

Leads for this year’s production include:

• Maggie McCutchan as Clara – Thursday Evening & Saturday Matinee. She dances with Dance with Heart Studios.
• Mackenzie Terrazas as Clara – Friday & Saturday Evenings. Mackenzie is a member of Dance With Heart Studios.
• Landin Fisher as Fritz – Thursday Evening & Saturday Matinee. Landin attends Encore Dance Studio.
• Ethan Anderson as Fritz – Friday & Saturday Evenings. Ethan dances with Dance with Heart Studios.
• Will Fowle as Drosselmeyer for all four performances.  Will has performed on television, movies and in theater productions in New York City and Michigan.
• Dylan Cunningham as Nutcracker Prince for all four performances. Dylan Cunningham is a member of Dance With Heart Studios.
• Emily Willett as Snow Queen – Thursday Evening & Saturday Matinee. Emily dances with Dance with Heart Studio.
• Caitlin Taft as Snow Queen – Friday & Saturday Evenings. Caitlin dances at Dance Steps Studio.
• Olivia Torres as Sugar Plum Fairy - Thursday Evening & Saturday Matinee.  Olivia dances with Encore Dance Studio.
• Isabelle Luppo as Sugar Plum Fairy – Friday & Saturday Evenings.  Isabel dances with Encore Dance Studio.
• Morgan Manchester as Spanish Lead for all four performances. Morgan dances with Encore Dance Studio.
• Brynn Ruhl as Arabian Lead – Thursday Evening & Saturday Matinee. Brynn dances with Dancing With Heart Studios.
• Riley Short as Arabian Lead – Friday & Saturday Evenings. Riley dances with Encore Dance Studio.
• Sydney Cunningham as Chinese Lead – Thursday Evening & Saturday Matinee. Sydney dances with Dance With Heart Studios.
• Isabelle Brooks as Chinese Lead – Friday & Saturday Evenings. Isabelle attends Encore Dance Studio.
• Sophia Watson as Candy Cane Lead – Thursday Evening & Saturday Matinee. Sophia dances at Dance with Heart Studios.
• Catherine Welter as Candy Cane Lead – Friday & Saturday Evenings. Catherine dance with Dance With Heart Studios.
• Melisa Deneweth as Dew Drop – Thursday Evening & Saturday Matinee. Melisa dances at Encore Dance Studio. 
• Peyton Benjamin as Dew Drop – – Friday & Saturday Evenings. Peyton dances with Dance Steps Studio.
• Derek Lewis Hileman as Cavalier for all four performances. Derek dances with River Raisin Academy in Monroe and Toledo School for the Arts.

 
Make the Nutcracker Ballet part of your holiday tradition. Tickets are available for Thursday, December 12 at 7:30 pm, Friday, December 13 at 7:30 pm and Saturday, December 14 at 2:00 pm and 7:30 pm. Tickets are $16 for adults and $12 for seniors and youth. Tickets can be purchased by phone at 517-423-6617, at the box office located at 400 N. Maumee Street, Tecumseh, Michigan, or on-line at www.thetca.org.

​The 2019 Nutcracker Ballet is supported in part by an award from the MICHIGAN COUNCIL FOR ARTS AND CULTURAL AFFAIRS, show sponsor Suburban Chevrolet of Clinton and this year’s 39th season sponsor 3 Dudes & Dinner.

Tecumseh Center for the Arts (TCA) is celebrating Veterans Day by holding a free concert for the community in honor of local veterans and their families. The event is sponsored by the Elizabeth Ruthruff Wilson Foundation (ERWF) and will take place Sunday, November 10 at 4:00 pm. The event is free and open to the public.

Music will be provided by the Peace Jubilee Brass Band. In the spirit of the great American Peace Jubilee of 1869 comes the Peace Jubilee Brass Band. This group presents the latest and most popular tunes of the late 19th and early 20th century while using historic brass instruments that were commonly used by bands across America after the Civil War. To spruce up the event, they appear in period attire to add to the authenticity of their show! Don’t miss their fun afternoon at the TCA filled with polkas, quick steps, schottisches, marches, and even waltzes, where couples are allowed to embrace each other— how scandalous!

Guest Speakers include Tecumseh Mayor Jack Baker, Local Historian Bob Elliott, and Elizabeth Ruthruff Wilson Foundation President Theresa Powers.
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To learn more about our free Veterans Day Concert, please call the TCA at 517.423.6617.

Tecumseh Center for the Arts (TCA) kicks off its National Touring Season with John Latini and the Latini Flying Brothers on Saturday, November 2 at 7:30 pm.
 
Award-winning musician and three-time Detroit Blues Champ, John Latini personifies the best that Michigan’s rock history has to offer: an honest, no-nonsense commitment to real songs about real people. Whether he’s tearing it up at a blues fest or captivating a room with original songs, folk and blues go arm in arm in his music like the blood brothers they are.

John Latini may have grown up in Queens, New York, but he’s as truly a son of Michigan as if he’d been issued a passport. It’s not just that this singing, songwriting, guitar-slinging, uber-performing bluesman seems to be a perennial nominee for every Southeast Michigan music award, and winner of many, including the Metro Detroit Songwriting Grand Prize in 2004 and the Detroit Blues Challenge winner in both 2008 and 2009, and songwriting honors in North Carolina and Texas.
 
It’s more that, whether he’s fronting his band the Flying Latini Brothers, working in duos with longtime sidekicks Whit Hill or Jamie-Sue Seal, or, most often, commanding the stage alone, John Latini personifies the best that the heartland, and especially Michigan’s righteous rock history, have to offer: an honest, straight-ahead, no-nonsense commitment to real songs about real people. Latini also knows that all the best American music flowers from blues roots. In addition to being a serious crafter of clever, literate songs, Latini is the purveyor of a slick, blues-soaked, economically hard-driving guitar style— but more than anything he’s an intense, incandescent performer, with an emotional, testosterone-charged voice that the Ann Arbor Observer called “alternately celebratory, remorseful, seductive and dangerous.” A popular, well-established voice in Michigan, he’s begun to build an enthusiastic fan base throughout the Midwest and beyond to Colorado and New York.

Don’t miss John Latini at the TCA when he showcases his talent on November 2 with his band The Latini Flying Brothers. Tickets are $25 for adults and $23 for seniors, youth and military members. Tickets can be purchased by phone at 517-423-6617, at the box office located at 400 N. Maumee Street, Tecumseh, Michigan, or on-line at www.thetca.org.

Tecumseh Center for the Arts’ 39th season is sponsored by Three Dudes and Dinner. The National Touring Season is sponsored in part by Tuckey’s Big Boy and Carpet on Wheels. The John Latini Show Sponsor is Bob Fox from Howard Hanna Realty. 
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Tecumseh Center for the Arts (TCA) is once again preparing to raise the curtain on this year’s season featuring music, comedy, youth productions and so much more!
 
Patrons, business sponsors and the public are invited to the TCA on Saturday, September 21 for a sneak peek at this year’s line-up. The TCA lobby opens its doors at 6 pm with dinner provided by Three Dudes and Dinner, the TCA Cash Bar featuring Flying Otter Winery and a meet & greet session with some of this year’s partners including Tecumseh Pops Orchestra and Community Chorus, The TCA Big Band & VocalAires, Neighbors of Hope, National Home School Music Ensemble and  more.
 
A meal by 3 Dudes and Dinner will take place in the TCA lobby beginning at 6 pm and include poached pear salad, lemon thyme chicken, whole roasted beef tenderloin with whisky peppercorn sauce, garlic smashed herb potatoes, oven roasted autumn vegetables and spiced baked apples!
 
At 7 pm, Ear Candy will perform live on the TCA stage to help kick off this year’s season. TCA staff will take time to recognize this year’s business sponsorships, volunteer ushers and show the new sizzler reel highlighting this year’s National Touring Season. The community is invited to come out and enjoy this free event as we share the exciting things happening at Tecumseh Center for the Arts.
 
Those in attendance will have a chance to win a set of complimentary tickets to one of our Touring shows including John Latini and the Flying Latini Brothers, The Legends of Michigan Comedy Show, New York, NY Dueling Pianos, Le Cirque Esprit and Phase 5 Motown Tribute Band. Stop in for your chance to win!   
 
This event is free and open to the public so join us as we kick off the 39th season at the TCA. You may even walk away the winner of a set of complimentary tickets to a TCA show!
 
To RSVP, go to www.TheTCA.org and get your free Season Preview ticket. You can also stop by the Box Office Tuesday-Friday between noon and 5 pm or call 517-423-6617.
 
The Season Preview event is sponsored by Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs and our 39th season sponsor 3 Dudes and Dinner.
 

Tecumseh Center for the Arts is actively seeking business sponsors for this year's season. With a goal to raise $20,000 in business sponsors this year,  we are thrilled to say we are nearly half way there! 

Business sponsors offset the cost of our National Touring Season by helping us cover the cost of shows including stipends, marketing and promotional materials, hotels and hospitality, playbills and concessions. Simply stated, we could not bring such high caliber talent to the TCA without the support of the community. 

We still have some amazing sponsorship levels remaining and are looking for businesses to partner with us by September 15. 

Producer's Chair = $3,000 ($3,000 Total)

• One sponsorship is still available

Director's Circle = $2,000 ($4,000 Total)

• Sold Out!

Leading Player = $1,000 ($10,000 Total)

• Six sponsors are still available

Supporting Player = $600 ($6,000 Total)

• Five sponsors are still available

Ensemble Player = $350 ($3,500)

• Eight sponsors are still available

Cast Member = $200 ($1,000)

• Four sponsors are still available

Friends of the TCA = $100 ($500)

• Nine sponsors are still available

A business sponsorship with Tecumseh Center for the Arts is an amazing return on your investment. A sponsorship includes your ad in our playbills, your logo on our website and social media sites, your name in press releases, print ads in newspapers and magazines, radio ads, television ads, on posters and in email newsletters. Sponsors also get recognized at our free, Season Preview event on September 21, and are displayed on our lobby TV throughout the season and announced before each our show. 

For more information on this year's sponsorship levels, click here. You can also contact TCA Director  Kelly Jo Gilmore to find out more. 

​Tecumseh Center for the Arts (TCA) will be conducting Nutcracker Ballet Auditions on Sunday, September 8, 2019. This year’s production marks the 15th production of the timeless tale at the TCA. All dancers must enter through the Green Room located in the back of the theater from the south parking lot. No parents are allowed beyond the check in point. After the audition process is complete, dancers can be picked up at the front entrance. Parents are welcome to wait in the lobby, but will not be permitted beyond that point.
 
Audition times are broken down into the following age groups:

• Ages 8-10 … 1:00 pm (arrive at 12:00 pm)
• Ages 11-13 … 2:15 pm (arrive at 1:15 pm)
• Ages 14+… 3:30 pm (arrive at 2:30 pm)

Dancers must be the minimum age of 8-years-old by November 15, 2019.  The maximum age of the dancer is a senior in high school. All dancers must report 1 hour prior to audition time for fitting and cast photo. All dancers must wear pink tights, black or blue leotard, ballet shoes or pointe shoes, hair in a bun and absolutely no jewelry.
 
The following items are mandatory requirements for all dancers.

• Mandatory Parent Meeting on Thursday, September 26 at 7 PM
• Attendance at all Sunday rehearsals in October
• Must be currently enrolled in a ballet or pointe class at any studio
• Only one absence allowed during November and December

New this year! Dancers can pre-register for auditions through the TCA’s website at www.TheTCA.org. Simply click on the “Buy Tickets” tab and click on “Register Now” next to Nutcracker Ballet Auditions.

This year’s Nutcracker Ballet will take place December 12 – 14, 2019. There will be two casts this year. All casting decisions are determined by the Nutcracker Ballet Production Team. Each dancer is reviewed by a panel of five area dance studio owners, choreographers, and the producer. Cast members are chosen by how they perform at the time of auditions, based on ability, stage presence, and skill level. The panel reviews individual scores and jointly decides casting.
 
For more information, call Tecumseh Center for the Arts at 517-423-6617.