- [Narrator] This program is made possible in part by, Michigan Department of Education, the state of Michigan, and by viewers like you.

(upbeat music) - Welcome to Extra Credit, where we meet interesting people, explore new ideas, and discover fun places together.

I'm your host, Brooke.

During today's show, we're focusing on creative arts!

First up, with the help of Mosaic Youth Theater, people from around Detroit, take an intense Broadway workshop with a professional team.

(techno music) - Musical theater is huge nowadays, and a lot of kids are drawn to it, but not many people get a chance to study and train with Broadway professionals.

Thanks to a little help from Mosaic Youth Theater, a group of young Detroit singers and dancers are learning the ropes in an intensive week long Broadway workshop.

♪ First rule of singing ♪ ♪ Get the rafters ringing ♪ ♪ Toss everything in, deep down deep inside ♪ - I'm Marc Tumminelli.

I'm the owner and director of Broadway workshop.

I started Broadway workshop about six years ago.

And our goal is to create opportunities for kids with an elevated interest in the performing arts to give them opportunities to work on musical material, to work with the highest level of people in the industry.

And over the last six years, we started taking our programs on tour.

So, this summer we are in Kentucky, we're in Vermont, and then we're also here in Detroit.

And the Mosaic Youth Theater has brought us in to present our camp here.

So, we have 50 students.

They're broken up into two age groups.

We have 9 to 13 year olds and then 14 to 18 year olds.

And these students are unlike every other group that I've ever worked with, to be honest.

Their training level is at such a high, such a high level.

They are so well-educated in their vocal performance, their movement, their presence on stage.

They're really at a level that we can continue to add things and build on the program because we're only here for five days.

So, what you can normally accomplish in five days is, you know, a limited amount.

But with these kids, we have gone above and beyond.

They want to be here so badly and they're working so hard for, you know, seven hours a day.

Hello!

I'm not going to talk until everyone is quiet.

(crown talking) You guys have to stay focused when we're doing these put togethers.

This goes for every rehearsal you will ever be in for the rest of your life that is a tech rehearsal.

It's not about you.

It's about making sure everything happens safely, okay?

So sometimes we're working on lights, sometimes we're working on transition.

So, you just have to be mindful of where you are and that everything around you is safe, okay?

We want to give them a professional experience and all my years as a professional actor, and my team and their years on Broadway, and what they know coming in, you can't give half of a job.

You have to go 100% all the time because there's someone else who will do that.

And so if these kids want to do this, and many of them do, and a lot of our kids in the older groups here, they're ready.

They're like 17 and 18.

They're going to college, or next year, they're going to start auditioning for college programs.

We need to give them the skills that to basically open up the door for them to understand that this is how you have to work 100% of the time.

♪ Oh oh oh ♪ ♪ Calling me out to the smiles in the streets ♪ ♪ That I love, ♪ ♪ Good morning Baltimore, ♪ ♪ Every day is like an open door ♪ ♪ Every night is like a fantasy ♪ ♪ Every sound is like a symphony ♪ ♪ Good morning, Baltimore ♪ - The people here, they're not mean to us.

They will be certain like, oh no, do that again.

Or you guys need to practice that, take this home, go over this.

It's cause we all want the same goal of having a great show.

- [Instructor] Hey guys!

I'm just not hearing you enough or seeing enough energy in your body.

It's very collapsed down, it's very strange.

I need you to use your raise your voice energy.

- I've learned how to make my voice louder.

I've learned the songs and new dance moves.

When they're giving me strong directions, I listen so I can make sure that I'm doing the best for the group.

♪ Your heart starts beating like a big brass band ♪ ♪ The daffy dills who entertain ♪ ♪ At Angelo's and Maxie's ♪ ♪ When a Broadway baby says goodnight ♪ ♪ It's early in the morning ♪ - [Marc] My advice for parents is you have to take it from where your kid is.

A lot of parents want to push their kids to do something when they're not quite ready.

And some parents sort of let their kids take the lead.

And that's how it really should go.

So if you have a kid that is 24/7 listening to musicals, working really hard, like re-doing a lot of research on their own.

You have to open doors for them and get them into the right schools, make sure that they have good teachers, find opportunities for them.

And then the kids that are maybe not quite there, you know, a class here and there is fine.

You know, you don't have to push it too hard.

So when you see your kid doing the work on their own, then just try to do everything you can to make it happen and then stay out of the way.

(Marc laughs) That was like a hundred songs.

(crowd laughs) In five days.

All right?

Yeah, give it up one more time.

(crowd cheering) So good.

The kids in Detroit are more talented than anywhere else in the universe.

And I, I mean, it.

♪ Raise some ruckus ♪ ♪ Raise the devil ♪ ♪ Raise it up another level ♪ ♪ Raise your voice ♪ ♪ Lift it up to Heaven ♪ (crowd cheering) ♪ Raise your voice ♪ ♪ Spread it across the sky ♪ - The biggest thing that I will take from here is I know I can do it.

♪ Raise your voice ♪ (crowd cheering) ♪ Raise your voice ♪ ♪ Raise your voice ♪ ♪ Raise it, raise it, raise it up ♪ ♪ Raise ♪ ♪ Your voice ♪ (crowd cheering) - To find out more about the Mosaic Youth Theater and the Broadway workshop, head to Detroitperforms.org (techno music) - [Narrator] Living Minute.

A look at the latest medical innovations, changing our lives, brought to you by, Thermo Fisher Scientific's Coronavirus testing program for schools and the health channel.

- [Narrator] Music can soothe the soul.

It can also help build bonds between people.

- And he's now like my best friend, now.

- I just couldn't ask for more.

- [Narrator] Marco's been battling leukemia since 2016 and Aiden was diagnosed with rhabdomyosarcoma, last year.

It didn't take long before they were hanging out and playing guitar together.

- I definitely feel like it helps me feel less alone.

It's good to have other people that you can relate to because it's not something a lot of kids can relate to.

- I just think, you know, music is something that we can use no matter what.

And it's been fun to see these two really take hold of how music helps them and just really share it too.

- [Narrator] Aiden is now in remission, and Marco is undergoing maintenance therapy.

Both of them plan to go to college and start their own band.

(techno music) (upbeat music) (techno music) (techno music) (acoustic guitar playing) - I've met a guy that I thought, yeah, I want to be like him.

Who was a great rock and roll guitar player.

And I had no money.

This guy that I met loaned me a book.

And then at the end of the book, there was a chapter that was about eight pages long that professed to tell you everything you needed to know to build two different kinds of guitars.

So, I took the book and started looking it over and decided, yeah, I could probably do that.

It was enough to get me started.

So, that was how I built my first guitar.

At the time, it was the greatest guitar that had ever been built.

I couldn't believe I had done it.

My father was so proud.

He was walking around the neighborhood with it, showing all of his friends what I had done.

I am completely self-taught.

I've never had anyone show me anything.

When I got into it, when I built the first guitar or even the first two or three guitars, I had no idea that it would lead to this being a full-time job.

I mean, I've built almost 300 guitars now.

And when you add in mandolins and ukuleles and all that, my total is well over 300.

So, I've done enough that I know if I change one thing, how it's going to affect the ultimate sound of the guitar.

It's still very difficult to know exactly the qualities of the materials I'm working with.

Even if you have successive cuts of wood off of the same log, they're each a little different physically.

And so you have to really just tweak everything right to that specific instrument.

I remember seeing sets of Brazilian Rosewood that the back and sides being advertised for $100.

And now it's nothing to spend $3,000 for the same piece of wood.

There are a lot of stories in the media about all of the abandoned buildings in Detroit.

My son and a friend of mine gave me an idea, what if we could take some of the wood from these old buildings and make new musical instruments?

I heard about a place called Reclaim Detroit, which is a part of Focus Hope, which is a local charitable organization.

Homeowners donate their abandoned homes to this organization and they dismantle them and sell all of the materials that they can salvage.

So, I went to the Reclaim Detroit warehouse and they showed me all of the building materials that they had taken out of a house that was well over 100 years old.

I wound up with a couple of big bundles of maple floorboards and also some sections of 2x10 Douglas first ceiling joist.

So when I get the wood from Reclaim Detroit, this is pretty much how the floorboards look.

They're covered with decades of grime and dirt.

A lot of the floorboards have nail holes in them.

And so before I can actually use any of this in an instrument, I have to clean up the wood, generally starting with a chisel to get off some of the surface grime.

And then I'll slice the wood up on my bandsaw to reveal the clean wood that's inside.

And then I can select what I'm going to use.

So, I built a ukulele, really didn't have very high hopes for it because I've played maple ukuleles before, maple backed ukeleles, and they have a real dead kind of sound.

But I built this one and it sounded great.

It sounded at least as good as any traditional ukulele with a koa backside and top set.

And I'm almost finished building a guitar, now.

I invited my friend, Rob, a local studio musician, over to test out the sound of one of the Reclaim Detroit maple ukuleles.

(man playing ukelele) - Oh, this is beautiful.

This is a very old sounding.

And it's very resonant for maple.

It doesn't have too bright of a sound, which is often the case.

Sounds like an old, you know, it sounds like an old koa or mahogany, sort of ukulele.

It doesn't have a maple sound.

I don't know why.

That's a very interesting top on there too.

So, beautiful, excellent.

Nice action, great sustain.

(man strumming ukelele) Good plunky tune.

Very loud.

- On all of the instruments that I'm building from the Reclaim Detroit materials, there's a small mother of pearl inlay of a house.

This is a reproduction of the house that the materials came from.

It was built in 1910 and is located about two blocks away from the Motown studios.

Right now, I'm really enjoying building instruments out of this reclaimed wood.

Not only because the wood is so old and well-seasoned, but also because I think the projects pay tribute to the craftsmen who built these fine homes 100 years ago.

I like to say that I'm building instruments not made in Detroit, but made of Detroit.

(techno music) - [Atisha] I love art.

I never thought I would be painting on faces.

I'm so used to doing it with acrylic, used to pencil, but never did I ever think this would be what I would be doing for a living.

Right now, I'm just doing the base of the skull.

I like painting calaveras because it's part of a tradition.

It's a beautiful form of art that actually brings in the spirit to the life.

And it's more of a beautiful elegant than it is to be scary and evil.

It's something to represent our ancestors.

The day of the dead actually originated from Mexico and it's to celebrate the life of our loved ones that had passed.

I started, actually going to be seven years on October 31st, I had a Halloween party, and never thought in my wildest dreams that I would be a face painter.

The skulls are very colorful and not scary at all.

They're not dark, a lot of colors are added in here.

The yellow represents the marigold.

The marigolds are flowers of big representation of the butterflies I painted where monarchs and monarchs migrate to Mexico.

And they're believed to be our spirits of our ancestors.

And they actually migrate around that timeframe.

This is my grandma and my grandfather and they are the biggest piece of my life.

They been there since day one.

I lost my grandfather six years ago.

Nana, we lost her, my grandmother, micorazon, this year to COVID and that's been a hard one.

And so I like wearing them because it feels like they're here with me.

And it's a piece of them.

Today when I painted this beautiful calavera, it was more of a representation of my grandma.

And the orange I placed in there, she had a little thing for orange, and like orange lipsticks, and it just, I just felt her.

I felt like she was with me.

So, this piece really was a good piece that was a representation of her.

After I'm done with the face painting, I absolutely love having to show the piece to them.

(Angelica gasps) - It's so pretty!

(Atisha laughs) Oh, I'm going to cry.

Wow!

- [Atisha] Like the excitement and joy it brings somebody, it just lightens me up inside.

Like, I get this really good feeling, and I love making people smile.

- [Angelica] I want people to realize that Dia Los Muertos is a celebration of life.

It is not scary, it's not spooky.

It's not a costume, it's more than that.

Don't be afraid to learn about other cultures and to see how other people in the world celebrate and honor their loved ones who have passed.

There's still so much more to learn.

The indigenous roots of it, and the roots from other cultures.

(techno music) - Hi!

My name is Olivia, and I'm a dance student at Central Michigan University.

And one of my favorite things to do in dance class is jump.

A jump is when two feet leave the floor and two feet land on the floor.

An important thing to remember when jumping is to bend your knees when you jump and when you land in order to protect all your bones and muscles.

Let's try it together.

Let's do four in a row.

1, 2, 3, 4.

Awesome job!

Let's do that one more time.

And remember to bend those knees so you can jump as high as you want to.

Ready?

1, 2, 3, 4.

Awesome job, everyone.

I'm going to change it up.

Let's go forward and back.

1, 2, 3, 4.

Great job!

Going to change it up one more time.

Let's go side to side.

1, 2, 3, 4.

Awesome job, everyone.

Wasn't that fun?

Thank you for jumping with me today.

(upbeat music) (techno music) - [Instructor] Today, we'll be making a spiral snake with materials you may have at home.

You will need either a paper plate, piece of paper or a folder, scissors, string, such as fishing line, ribbon, or yarn.

Tape, and ways to decorate, such as markers and crayons.

Optionally, you can use paint.

Start by choosing your background material.

If you choose paper or a folder, trace it and cut it out.

I'll be using a paper plate.

Decide if you want to decorate before or after you cut out your snake.

If you are using paint, it can be easier to paint the plates before you cut it out.

This is a great choice if you're not worried about creating a detailed pattern.

For this example, I'll use paint on the bottom and I'll draw on the top.

Next, draw your snake on the plate.

If you start by drawing the head in the middle, and work your way outwards.

When you're all done, the head will be at the top and the tail will hang downwards.

If you draw the head of the snake on the outside, it will hang downwards, suspended by the tail.

It's up to you.

Now, it's time to decorate.

You can draw a pattern, pictures, words, a message, whatever you like.

For this snake, I'll draw a pattern using the letter S because the word snake starts with an S. After that, color it in, and don't forget the back.

Next, follow the guidelines and cut it out.

Now, let's add a tongue.

You can cut out a tongue with a separate piece of paper, or you can cut off the end of the tail, and cut it into the shape of a snake's tongue.

And then decorate it, and tape it onto the back.

Now, let's add the string.

I'll be using a piece of fishing line, but you can use whatever type of string you like.

Take your string, add some tape, and then tape it to the back of the snake's head so that the string comes out right between the head and the body.

Congratulations, you have a spiral snake.

- I had so much fun creating art with you today.

What was your favorite activity?

Be sure to visit our website for more content.

See you next time!

- [Narrator] This program is made possible in part by, Michigan Department of Education, the state of Michigan, and by viewers like you.

(upbeat music)