Our Setting
Nestled between Chicago, Indianapolis, and St. Louis, Krannert Center serves as both a crossroads and a dynamic destination for the global arts scene. We’re able to draw artists at their peak as well as emerging stars from around the world in part because of the reputation of our colleagues at the University of Illinois on the Urbana-Champaign campus. Consistently ranked as one of the top universities in the nation, it is perhaps best known for its outstanding library science, engineering, business, and education departments—and it’s been singled out for its accessibility, diversity, high-tech access, faculty satisfaction, and number of international students. Along with dozens of Nobel laureates, a couple of Pulitzer Prize winners, and several MacArthur fellows on the faculty, the campus can boast about 158 Guggenheim fellows, alumnus Roger Ebert, HAL, and the more than 53 million annual users of the online catalog to the enormous library system.
We’re lucky to work with the Department of Theatre, which is the home to world-class directors of film and Broadway productions, technical directors, stage managers who excel, artists in costume design, Shakespeare masters, stage actors, highly skilled prop and scenery crafters, renowned lighting directors, and everyone else you’ve seen (or haven’t seen) involved with the dramas, comedies, and musical theatre pieces performed each year. Students in the acting, design, directing, production, and stage management programs go on to win Emmys, start their own theatre companies, create lighting designs for Fortune 500 companies, act in regional theatres, appear with Shakespeare in the Park, and continue to live, work, eat, and breathe the arts.
The School of Music Opera Program typically mounts three full operas per season, and these have ranged from immortal works like Madama Butterfly and Aida to American pieces like The Mikado and Leonard Bernstein’s Mass to innovative productions by living composers, like The Scarecrow in 2007 and both Rappaccini’s Daughter and alumni Neely Bruce’s Hansel and Gretel in 2009. Jerry Hadley and Nathan Gunn are the shining stars from a distinguished group of alumni, and in addition to a focus on mastering the repertoire, the rigors of staging and choreography, and the intricacies of singing in a foreign language, students take opera into K-12 schools as part of their training.
Gamelan, marching band, Latin jazz ensemble, black chorus, wind ensemble, jazz trombone ensemble, big band—these vast categories don’t even begin to cover the musical ground of this campus. Literally hundreds—really!—of recitals and concerts are performed each year. In addition to exacting players who will go on to grace the concert stages—or hide in orchestra pits—in nearly every country as soloists, conductors, and ensemble members, the School of Music welcomes players who take up the oboe or sing tenor just for the love of it. Many ensembles are available to anyone, and the open studies program allows students who yearn to design their own music studios, play the pipa, introduce music into therapeutic approaches to autism, or have any other forward-thinking idea to join in.
Around our immediate neighborhood, we’ve joined business owners to establish a destination for rising artists to shine. The Krannert Center District was launched to encourage people to visit our area for dining, shopping, communing, and experiencing culture in the broadest sense. All businesses in the area support one another, and sometimes we extend special discounts or exclusive offers. We’ve also established the KCD Friday event as a way to draw attention to local artists, who can display their visual arts, perform, and otherwise let everyone see what they have to offer.
If all of that weren’t enough to make us feel rich, our supercharged community boasts a thriving farmers’ market, neighborhood block parties and luminaria-lined streets, world-renowned software companies, proximity to Allerton Park’s gardens and sculptural richness, an extensive health-care system, boutiques and sprawling big-box stores, access to Crystal Lake Park, architecture ranging from midcentury classic ramblers to Victorian filigreed beauties and Prairie style dwellings, frozen custard, and citizens of the world.
We’re lucky to work with the Department of Theatre, which is the home to world-class directors of film and Broadway productions, technical directors, stage managers who excel, artists in costume design, Shakespeare masters, stage actors, highly skilled prop and scenery crafters, renowned lighting directors, and everyone else you’ve seen (or haven’t seen) involved with the dramas, comedies, and musical theatre pieces performed each year. Students in the acting, design, directing, production, and stage management programs go on to win Emmys, start their own theatre companies, create lighting designs for Fortune 500 companies, act in regional theatres, appear with Shakespeare in the Park, and continue to live, work, eat, and breathe the arts.
The School of Music Opera Program typically mounts three full operas per season, and these have ranged from immortal works like Madama Butterfly and Aida to American pieces like The Mikado and Leonard Bernstein’s Mass to innovative productions by living composers, like The Scarecrow in 2007 and both Rappaccini’s Daughter and alumni Neely Bruce’s Hansel and Gretel in 2009. Jerry Hadley and Nathan Gunn are the shining stars from a distinguished group of alumni, and in addition to a focus on mastering the repertoire, the rigors of staging and choreography, and the intricacies of singing in a foreign language, students take opera into K-12 schools as part of their training.
Gamelan, marching band, Latin jazz ensemble, black chorus, wind ensemble, jazz trombone ensemble, big band—these vast categories don’t even begin to cover the musical ground of this campus. Literally hundreds—really!—of recitals and concerts are performed each year. In addition to exacting players who will go on to grace the concert stages—or hide in orchestra pits—in nearly every country as soloists, conductors, and ensemble members, the School of Music welcomes players who take up the oboe or sing tenor just for the love of it. Many ensembles are available to anyone, and the open studies program allows students who yearn to design their own music studios, play the pipa, introduce music into therapeutic approaches to autism, or have any other forward-thinking idea to join in.
Around our immediate neighborhood, we’ve joined business owners to establish a destination for rising artists to shine. The Krannert Center District was launched to encourage people to visit our area for dining, shopping, communing, and experiencing culture in the broadest sense. All businesses in the area support one another, and sometimes we extend special discounts or exclusive offers. We’ve also established the KCD Friday event as a way to draw attention to local artists, who can display their visual arts, perform, and otherwise let everyone see what they have to offer.
If all of that weren’t enough to make us feel rich, our supercharged community boasts a thriving farmers’ market, neighborhood block parties and luminaria-lined streets, world-renowned software companies, proximity to Allerton Park’s gardens and sculptural richness, an extensive health-care system, boutiques and sprawling big-box stores, access to Crystal Lake Park, architecture ranging from midcentury classic ramblers to Victorian filigreed beauties and Prairie style dwellings, frozen custard, and citizens of the world.