Valhalla Art, Music & Theatre Festival opening June 22 in South Lake Tahoe

Summer on the sublime shores of South Lake Tahoe can reawaken youth’s creative bliss, no matter your age. The 37th season of the Valhalla Arts, Music & Theatre Festival, which runs from opening night June 22 through the finale on August 31, is ambitious and free rolling this year. From high quality Americana & New Orleans roots music, to a Tony Award-winning wickedly pathological play to a jazz orchestra to immersive outdoor art camps for kids to an uplifting gospel send-off, the creative arts offerings are plentiful and appealing to all ages. A very special event this year is the “Boathouse Theatre 20th Anniversary” fête.

Opening night for the 2016 Valhalla Art Music & Theatre Festival is on June 22 with a concert featuring The Earles of Newtown — Dixie swing with an Americana punch! They’re swinging it like nobody ever did before. Earle’s original tunes mix Harlem and New Orleans jazz traditions with Nevada City roots. A hard-driving horn section. Dueling vocals. Over-the-top talent on banjo, guitar and piano. Put it all together. You’ve got the new jazz sensation where hot sass meets cool class. Showtime is 7:30 p.m.

The historic Valhalla Boathouse Theatre is celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2016. Valhalla Tahoe (www.valhallatahoe.com), manager of the “Valhalla Estate” and producer of the Valhalla Art, Music & Theatre Festival, is planning a unique community event and fundraiser for the Boathouse to mark the occasion.

The Valhalla Boathouse Theatre is a unique cultural resource in the Tahoe basin, indeed in all of northern California and northern Nevada. No other arts venue showcases Tahoe heritage and the stunning beauty of the lake like the Boathouse Theatre. Patrons sitting in the theatre are treated to a view of the lake like no other, through the floor to ceiling window behind the stage. The interior, preserved with exposed beams and wonderful natural acoustics, is both intimate and grand creating an experience unrivaled in performing arts venues.

The Valhalla Boathouse Theatre 20th Anniversary Fundraiser — Lucky Baldwin Poker Promenade and piano concert featuring Radoslav Lorkovic. The event, to be held on June 25, 2016 at 6 p.m., is a rare opportunity for guests to explore Valhalla Tahoe’s heritage through a leisurely poker stroll around the Estate and experience a remarkable night of history and entertainment – right on the shores of beautiful Lake Tahoe.

The Lucky Baldwin Poker Promenade will feature various stations around the Tallac Historic Site, each offering food and drinks, interpretive history and historic figures along with playing cards for event participants. Prizes will be given to the winners with various poker hands. Presentations and piano concert will follow the promenade in the Boathouse Theatre featuring Radoslav Lorkovic.

Radoslav Lorkovic – Born in Zagreb, Croatia, Radoslav Lorkovic was just three when he began putting on floor shows for his grandfather and friends. When he was six, the family moved to the U.S. — and by his teens, classically trained in piano, he was heading toward a life in classical music when the blues sidetracked him and he began to turn his distinctive piano style into a career that has led him to the Canary Islands, Yup’ik villages, the Kennedy Center, and Carnegie Hall.

Valhalla Grand Raffle — This is a fundraiser for much needed upgrades to the Boathouse Theatre. Tickets are $10 each and the prizes are a collection of high end items and experiences donated by our supporters, some of Lake Tahoe’s premier companies and organizations. Tickets are available at our office in the twin cabins at Valhalla, at the anniversary event and via our staff and Board members. You need not be present to win.

Valhalla Boathouse History

The Valhalla Boathouse was built in the late 1800s by William Tevis as part of his 75 acre estate. Due to a bad financial investment and bankruptcy, the then Tevis Estate was purchased by George Pope, Sr. of the Pope & Talbot Lumber and Shipping Company. George’s pride and joy was his motorboat, The Sheik, which he named after his friend and frequent guest Rudolph Valentino. The Sheik was the biggest and fastest boat of its time on Lake Tahoe, and was housed in the Valhalla Boathouse during that period.

In 1924 George Pope, Sr. sold 3.3 acres of his property to Walter Heller, a San Francisco financial broker. The contract and sale of the property was conducted in winter, however the official survey of the property was not conducted until the following summer. To Mr. Pope’s distress it was discovered that his boathouse had been included in the sale of the property to the Heller’s in error!

The boathouse originally had four bedrooms and a bathroom on the second level that today contain the restrooms, tech room and small storage rooms. Over the years it became dilapidated, used primarily for storage until the late 1980s when the Tahoe Tallac Association (now Valhalla Tahoe), with the support and vision of Dr. Leo Buscaglia, turned it into a thriving and unique theater.

The Valhalla Boathouse Theatre is Born

In the late 1980s, Carol Spain, the founding Executive Director of the Tahoe Tallac Association (now Valhalla Tahoe) was pouring wine at one of the organization’s arts events when she was introduced to Leo Buscaglia who was attending. Carol shared her dream with Leo to transform the Valhalla boathouse into a community theatre and Leo loved the idea. He committed half of the proceeds from his next book and, along with Carol Spain, committed to developing the project and raising the funds.

This effort was truly a community one, with countless individuals and organizations investing in the project with Spain and Buscaglia and the Tahoe Tallac Association Board of Directors leading the charge. Many bureaucratic, financial and design and engineering hurdles had to be cleared that involved complex negotiations with the Forest Service and funding appropriations from congress.

Carol Spain and David Kurtzman made three lobbying trips to Washington DC in the early 1990s, but it wasn’t until Kurtzman heard that Senator Harry Reid would be speaking at a Stateline, NV Rotary Club meeting that they were able to get past the staff line and meet with Reid face to face. The Nevada senator was then on the Senate Appropriations Committee. From that meeting Spain and Kurtzman secured $250,000 to transform the boathouse into a theatre.

Tremendous community outreach locally in the Tahoe Basin as well as Northern Nevada and California was undertaken to cement support for the project and raise funds. In 1996, twenty years ago, the project was complete and Valhalla open the theatre for its first summer season.

Today the Boathouse Theatre is home to the Valhalla Art, Music, and Theatre Festival, hosting productions that range from world-class musicians to dramatic and comedic theatre. Located on the shores of beautiful Lake Tahoe, this performance space offers a special experience to all who visit.

The 2016 Valhalla Art, Music & Theatre Festival

The 2016 Festival’s focus is to highlight the deep and rich well of talent in Northern California and Nevada to highlight the value of the Boathouse Theatre to the local and regional community. Valhalla will produce two critically acclaimed dramatic plays featuring local directors and actors. Concerts will feature music from almost every genre featuring award winning acts from across California and Northern Nevada. The Tahoe Improv Players will be back for another season; a beloved tradition of the festival. There will be Vaudeville, free concerts on the lawn and fine art shows from regional artists as part of the Artists in Residence Program and more. The festival opens on June 22!

Valhalla is located next door to Camp Richardson on Emerald Bay Road/Highway 89 on the southwest shore of beautiful Lake Tahoe.

Anniversary event and festival tickets and information are available at: https://valhallatahoe.showare.com/.

Valhalla Tahoe on the web: http://valhallatahoe.com/ and https://www.facebook.com/tahoetallac/.