Regional and National Arts Specials

Dina Sophie Zaret is a winner of WHYY’s "Moved By the Bell."

The defining experiences of the WHYY Arts and Culture Service in FY’04 included: Bringing history to life; watching the reinvention of a classic art form; and getting first-class tickets to a spectacular concert.

WHYY continued its statewide effort to share the remarkable stories behind the distinctive blue-and-gold roadside historical markers throughout Pennsylvania. These signs commemorate significant people, places and events in the Commonwealth's history. WHYY, with sister station WITF, created new awareness of the region’s past with weekly reports on 91FM ranging from the importance of Fort Mifflin to the Mario Lanza Museum. The Internet played a key role, too, allowing audiences outside WHYY's signal area to hear the reports online.

At the historic moving of the Liberty Bell last fall to its new home on Independence Mall, WHYY invited folks throughout the region and beyond to write about what the Liberty Bell meant to them. Winners, who met for the first time during a WHYY Civic Space event, ranged from a 9-year-old who believes that "all together we are equal," to a grandmother who said that the "Liberty Bell is the visible symbol of an invisible pride." Their experiences, part of our region's living history, appeared on a special TV feature and are archived on whyy.org.

Principal Pennsylvania Ballet dancer Arantxa Ochoa is in a WHYY-TV Experience feature.
	Go behind the scenes with Swan Lake director Christopher Wheeldon.

To deepen our audiences' exposure to and understanding of the arts, WHYY is producing behind-the-scenes stories about local arts and cultural organizations. Aptly named Experience, these short TV features -- which are accompanied by Web components -- provide fresh insight into how the arts are created, ranging from the adaptation of Swan Lake by the Pennsylvania Ballet to the music that inspired Benjamin Franklin by Philomel.

This past year saw the local and national premieres of WHYY's own Denyce Graves: Breaking the Rules. The experience of this spectacular jazz, gospel and classical music concert was broadened through an extensive Web site and Web-based teacher's guide designed to be compatible with a high school curriculum, and a VHS, DVD and CD based on the concert.

WHYY continues its commitment to providing audiences with meaningful arts and cultural experiences on TV, FM and whyy.org, and in Civic Space events. Education and entertainment are part of that experience, as is providing a new and deeper understanding of the artistic excellence in our midst.