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The Mary D'Angelo Perfomring Arts Center is located at Mercyhurst College Erie, Pennsylvania. Mercyhurst's D'Angelo Arts Complex in Zurn Hall exceeds 50,000 square feet. With the completion of the Mary D'Angelo Performing Arts Center, students and community members enjoy world-class performances in this $3.7 million complex. The arts complex also includes the black-box Taylor Little Theatre, the intimate and acoustic Walker Recital Hall, and the recently expanded Cummings Art Gallery. Adjacent to the Mary D'Angelo Performing Arts Center are the department of dance with two state-of-the-art dance studios called danceSpace, and the D'Angelo department of music. It holds 792 along with the box seats which hold 24, totaling 816 seats. The Mary D’Angelo Performing Arts Center was the first theater in the U.S. to use geothermal energy to heat and cool its facility. The chandeliers that hang over the opera boxes are the exact same chandeliers that hang in the Metropolitan Opera House in NYC. They were made in Austria from pure Crystal.

History The Mary D’Angelo Performing Arts Center opened its doors to the public in February 1996. The first concert featured acclaimed pianist André Watts. During a blizzard, Watts took the stage to perform in front of nearly 800 people on a piano that was shipped up from Pittsburgh. In the middle of his performance, Watts stood up and the audience starred in confusion as the piano continued to play. Turns out the piano keys were frozen and an untuned piano from backstage was wheeled out for Watts to play. After that performance Watts swore that he would never again agree to play a grand opening because of his self proclaimed “curse.” Apparently Watts opened two other facilities that year and a fire alarm and sprinklers interrupted his performances.

When the [Mary D’Angelo Performing Arts Center] opened in 1996, the center was comprised of two full time and two part time staff members. In its infancy, the center brought in nearly 4,000 people a year and offered between six and seven programs, which consisted of the finest in Classical music featuring artists such as Kathleen Battle and the[ Juilliard String Quartet]. Fourteen years later, the center has a staff of six full time employees and offers over a 100 events each year featuring the best in jazz, cutting edge dance, award winning classical, contemporary and world music. Serving as the only active movie house in the city of Erie, the center is also home to the Guelcher Film Series, The Metropolitan Opera: HD Live series and the Live from NY's 92nd Street Y broadcast lecture series. Last year, the Mary D’Angelo Performing Arts Center saw more than 27, 000 people from tri state-region and can be seen arguably as Erie’s version of the Kennedy Center. The Center has helped shape, please, and educate the community over the years. “Any city that dreams of being great, must have as a prerequisite a vibrant cultural environment,” Michael Fuhrman

Notable Performances The center has hosted several Grammy Award winning artists such as Maria Schneider, Paquito D’Rivera and Eric Bibb. World-renowned dance troupes such as the Paul Taylor Dance Company and Pilobolus have graced the stage of the D’Angelo Center, along with world music artists such as Pink Martini and Jesse Cook. The most successful show and quite possibly the most well known in the center’s history are the Japanese drummers, known as Yamato. Yamato has visited Erie fours times over the last seven years and has performed five sold out performances to over 5,000 people.

Other notable performances include those that comprise the center’s educational outreach program. Through the program, the D’Angelo Center has had the opportunity to expose the young people in our community to the arts. Since the start of the program the center has been able to provide over 6,300 students with the opportunity to see performances such as the African Drummers, Ba Cissoko, renowed Latin dance troupe Ballet Hispanico and of course Yamato!

Performance Facilities - Mary D'Angelo Performing Arts Center, Walker Recital Hall, Taylor Little Theatre, Cummings Art Gallery

Staff Box Office D'Angelo Performing Arts Center The Mary D'Angelo Performing Arts Center has six full time employees - Director: Michael Fuhrman, Assistant Director: Bruce Parkhurst, Box Office Manager: Annette Gardner, Assistant Marketing Manager: Michelle Ellia, Production Manager: Greg Clepper, Production technician: Randy Stankey

Cummings Art Gallery -Gallery Director: Robert Hagle

Performances -Regular Performances: Guelcher Film Series, Live from NY's 92nd Street Y broadcast series, MetropolitanOpera: HD Live series -Other Events: The Jazz Mandolin Project, Bad Boys Of Dance, Igudesman & Joo, Robin Mckelle, Leahy: A Celtic Christmas, CityMusic Cleveland, Quartet New Generation, Ballet Hispanico, The Dirty Dozen Brass Band & Trombone Shorty