Passion in a Pandemic: Local Film by Nora Jacobson Makes It to PBS
Local screening on October 12 at Briggs
“Passion in a Pandemic: Making Opera at Hanover High School” is back, with an upcoming local screening of the work by award-winning Upper Valley independent filmmaker Nora Jacobson that has made its way to PBS. (Click here for the original film review on Artful).
Heroes throughout the pandemic years came in many forms, including artists. Jennifer Chambers, then the school’s Choral Director, music teacher, and herself an opera singer, teamed up with Dartmouth conductor Filippo Ciabatti to teach and stage a program of operatic music featuring Hanover High School students. Filmmaker Nora Jacobson captured the process from beginning to end. It’s a satisfying film. Here’s a snippet:
What’s new is that New Hampshire PBS has picked up the hour-long documentary for broadcast (check local listings). When asked what goes into having your film selected and broadcast on PBS, Jacobson described a lengthy application process that in this case was ultimately successful. Then the work began. In addition to a “few tweaks here and there” to the film itself, she added:
“There are many elements that go into preparing a film for broadcast, which involve creating a 30 second promotional piece, proofing the film very carefully for any typos in the credits, sending the donor list to NETA [a distributing arm of PBS] and NH PBS, securing all the rights, but also exporting the film from my editing system in a way that they can broadcast, rather than, say, project the film theatrically. What else? Well, sending the photos to use for promotion, log lines, close captioning all of the dialogue in the film--and more. So it's a rather labor intensive process.”
With a grant from New Hampshire Humanities and help from other generous donors, Jacobson also created a study guide that PBS can put on their PBS LearningMedia platform for teachers to use along with the film.
See “Passion in a Pandemic” at Briggs Opera House in White River Junction, VT on October 12 at 7:00 pm, courtesy of JAM – Junction Arts & Media, along with a live musical performance with some of the young people in the film. For more info, check JAM’s website.
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And in case you are wondering . . . Susan B. Apel shuttered a lifelong career as a law professor to continue an interest (since kindergarten) in writing. Her freelance business, The Next Word, includes literary and feature writing; her work has appeared in a variety of lit mags and other publications including Art New England, The Woven Tale Press, The Arts Fuse, and Persimmon Tree. She connects with her neighbors through Artful, her blog about arts and culture in the Upper Valley. She’s in love with the written word.