- Kansas City is a town steeped in creativity and innovation, with loyal audiences who support the arts, even at a time when live performances are not possible.

This dedication to nurturing a vibrant art scene is one of many reasons why Kansas City PBS is lucky to have a home here.

This year, the focus on distancing to keep ourselves healthy has left many audiences without the ability to enjoy their favorite performances, and has left many local arts organizations without a platform on which to entertain and inspire.

Kansas City PBS is proud to present KC Performs.

We are thrilled to be able to bring this new series into thousands of homes in the Kansas City community.

I hope you enjoy this labor of love, and encourage you to visit KansasCityPBS.org/KCPerforms to learn more about our partnerships with local arts organizations.

Thank you for helping us make this big stage available to our friends in the arts.

(orchestral music) - Musical Theater Heritage is in Crown Center.

It's been around since 1997.

It was founded by George Harder, who founded it to kind of syndicate his nationally syndicated radio show called, "A Night on the Town."

Lots of people in Kansas City know George of course, and so for a local mission started producing shows at the Belger Art Center, on the loading dock in 2003, and got successful, and people love seeing musicals, and moved to Crown Center in 2008, and we do the greatest musicals of all time in a theater with about 250 seats, and it's awesome.

We're really lucky that we've got a lot of talented, versatile people, so, you know, we're very nimble.

We've always been nimble in how we produce shows.

You know, if you're gonna produce big musicals in a small space, you've gotta be very creative, and innovative, and nimble, and so we were used to drawing on that toolkit to begin with, so when we had to figure out a different way to give our product to our audience, our ticket holders, and to keep our local artists employed, but in the COVID climate, we really wanted to be cognizant of doing it as small as we could, you know, to have as few people in the room as possible, and fortunately we've been successful, and people seem to like what we've been doing.

♪ Isn't it rich?

♪ ♪ Are we a pair?

♪ ♪ Me here at last on the ground ♪ ♪ You in midair ♪ ♪ Send in the clowns ♪ ♪ Isn't it bliss?

♪ ♪ Don't you approve?

♪ ♪ One who keeps tearing around ♪ ♪ One who can't move ♪ ♪ Where are the clowns?

♪ ♪ Send in the clowns ♪ ♪ Just when I stopped ♪ ♪ Opening doors ♪ ♪ Finally knowing the one that I wanted was yours ♪ ♪ Making my entrance again with my usual flair ♪ ♪ Sure of my lines ♪ ♪ No one is there ♪ ♪ Don't you love farce?

♪ ♪ My fault, I fear ♪ ♪ I thought that you'd want what I want ♪ ♪ Sorry my dear ♪ ♪ But where are the clowns?

♪ ♪ Quick, send in the clowns ♪ ♪ Don't bother, they're here ♪ ♪ Isn't it rich?

♪ ♪ Isn't it queer?

♪ ♪ Losing my timing this late in my career?

♪ ♪ And where are the clowns?

♪ ♪ There ought to be clowns ♪ ♪ Well, maybe next year... ♪ - There I was in Boston Ballet.

It was the night before my premiere, on March 11th.

We got through the dress rehearsal, and then we were all called in on the day of May 12th, sorry, March 12th, we were all called in on March 12th to the theater, and the director let us know, Mikko Nissinen, that everything was shut down.

So I rented a car, and packed all my stuff up, and drove back to Philadelphia.

And I got to say, you know, up until that point, I'm an independent choreographer, I work with people in sweaty ballet studios all the time, and it is my work, it is what I love, I love the whole comradery, community, but I'm with people all the time.

So after about a month, I'll call it of wondering, actually it was a lot of TV watching in my bed, I was having a hard time reconciling with this, I woke up one day and I decided, right, so this is, you know, this is not me.

I don't take things literally lying down, I don't.

I have to figure out a way.

So I thought, right, so I would like in this time to support, and give back to my community, and I want to learn something new, so I thought about dance films, and I love the art of filmmaking anyhow.

I just, I've always found it, editing, all of that.

So I started contacting dancers I'd worked with, directors I'd worked with, and I said, "Listen, I have a new endeavor."

Not, not new of course, dance films have been happening a long time, but something new for me, and man, people were amazing, in how they were like, "Yeah, right.

"Let's let's do, let's do this."

(gentle dramatic music) (wind and waves) (light music) - Park ICM actually started in 2003, by Stanislav Ioudenitch, who is our piano master.

He had the dream of creating what is really a very boutique and very unusual program, a conservatory in the United States that trains soloists.

It was developed on the European master-apprentice relationship.

Very much a one-on-one relationship between their professor and the student, so that they can learn and craft their music to a whole new level.

We have 30 incredible musicians from all over the world, right here in Kansas City, to train with these world-class musicians.

If you want to learn more about Park International Center for Music, you can go to icm.park.edu.

(violin and piano) This year has been extremely challenging for not only Quixotic, but other performing arts communities and companies, and we can all use your support.

There's a lot of, you know, people behind the scenes that also are impacted by this, and all of our wishes right now is just to move forward, stay positive, and just continue to create in the best of our abilities in these challenging times.

(dramatic music)