Allen County-Scottsville Arts Council, First Bank Announce Partnership

By Chris Cole,
Staff Writer

Saturday, Feb. 28 was a big night for the Allen County-Scottsville Arts Council. Not only were Van Winkle & The Spirits in the house recording their first live album (see additional article in this week’s edition) and not only was it the first time The Lyric hosted an album recording session, it was the night that a new partnership between them and FirstBank was announced with a $10,000 donation.

“One of the musicians that played here, Norm Stannard, went to college with me. He’s an old hippie and it turns out he’s good friends with Dan Harbison (of First Bank),” said John Buchanon, Executive Director of The Allen County-Scottsville Arts Council. “Norm lived on The Flying Frog Farm which was the commune back in the day but anyway, he goes, ‘You gotta show Dan what you’re doing.’ So I brought him (Harbison) down here in the middle of the week and gave him the tour and I showed him the videos we’ve been doing.”

FirstBank, which also sponsors the FirstBank Amphitheater in Franklin, Ky., was happy to come on board in support of what the Allen County-Scottsville Arts Council and The Lyric are doing here.

Buchanon believes that the partnership with FirstBank will just add to the legitimacy of what they’ve been building going into their third year at The Lyric.

FirstBank is just the latest to come on in support of The Allen County-Scottsville Arts Council. The Laura Goad Turner Charitable Foundation and The Fund for Allen County have been longtime supporters that former President of the Allen County-Scottsville Arts Council Terri Holder says “Every dime we get from sponsors loosens up money to go to these other things.”

The “other things” are things like Kentucky Shakespeare, which will be going to the high school later this month; Summer Soundz youth choir; the Arts day camp at The CORE and NorroFest which they’re looking to move to September this year.

“I’m open to whatever sells more tickets,” said Buchanon, noting that sometimes, the weather in October can be tricky. “The first year, the weather really spoiled us. We had a couple really good years of weather. And then we had a couple of cold and rain.”

It’s also hoped that moving NorroFest to September will help alleviate how dark the park gets as the sun sets a little bit later.

An announcement on the acts appearing at NorroFest will be made soon.

It’s not just the big events either. The sponsorships that The Allen County-Scottsville Arts Council have helped allow The Lyric, as a venue, to be improved as well.

“You probably noticed this, we had a new guy on the light board,” said Buchanon. It’s always been Barry (Richards) and I. That was one big part I never got to see the way I wanted it until tonight. He figured out how to do it on the fly, changing those lights. So I sat back there and watched him most of the night.”

Other recent improvements to The Lyric were tables that allowed for their first dinner theater/murder mystery “The Monster Among Us” to be the hit that it was.

“I was caught off guard with the murder mystery. I had no idea that genre was a thing and there were fans who traveled to come and see it,” said Buchanon. “I was pleasantly surprised and I stand corrected on that.”

It was seeing that The Lyric could be configured to host more than just concerts and more than just meetings that has them wanting to have the next act coming in, Nanseera on March 28, do more of a coffee house/theater in the round set up.

Nanseera played NorroFest last year and has a sound reminiscent of Erykah Badu and Jewel with a world music influence as she was born in London but mostly grew up in Uganda and Ethiopia and now resides in Nashville.

Going into the third year of having The Lyric, the bar that the Allen County-Scottsville Arts Council has set for itself is being raised even more thanks in large part to the support they’ve received.

Buchanon admitted that Scottsville is a “tough nut to crack” in getting people to see we’re more than capable in terms of bringing in quality entertainment but so far they’ve sold out the dinner theater/murder mystery each night that ran and had a near capacity crowd for Van Winkle & The Spirits.

Webb Wilder was going to be a sold out show until it was rescheduled due to the freezing cold temperatures of January 31. Those who had tickets to that show will be able to use them for the rescheduled performance to be held on April 11. Plus, an additional 30 tickets (according to the flyer on the ACSAS Facebook page) are being released.

Other upcoming acts include Kentucky Just Us on April 25.

For additional shows and tickets, visit the Allen County-Scottsville Arts Council website at www.acsarts.org.