Allegheny RiverStone Center for the Arts
For more information on concert schedules and ARCA membership, please contact ARCA Executive Director, John Soroka, at (724) 659-3153 or info@alleghenyriverstone.org.
Glorious Music and Art in the Beautiful Allegheny River Valley
Allegheny RiverStone Center for the Arts is a 501 (c) (3) nonprofit arts organization founded in 2005 and located in Foxburg, Pennsylvania. ARCA’s mission is to provide stimulating and enriching professional arts and education programs, touching the lives of thousands of people living in the six county, Allegheny Valley Region – Clarion, Venango, Armstrong, Butler, Mercer and Crawford counties – and thereby contributing to the economic growth and vitality of the region.
ARCA provides an annual series of concerts and events in various idioms, including classical music recitals, chamber music, jazz, popular and Celtic music; Wurlitzer Theatre Organ concerts; cabaret; dance; drama; literature; film and visual arts. Fine arts exhibits are presented in The Red Brick Gallery and Gift Shop on Main Street in downtown Foxburg. Concerts are presented in Foxburg at Lincoln Hall – ARCA’s home; The Episcopal Memorial Church of Our Father; the Allegheny-Clarion Valley High School Auditorium; on the Foxburg Green and on the grounds of RIverStone Farm. The Pittsburgh Symphony Brass at Christmas is a perennial favorite in the Church of our Father and the Pittsburgh Youth Symphony Orchestra has performed at A-C Valley. Since 2014 ARCA has presented concerts in Emlenton – Pittsburgh’s Three Rivers Ringers hand bell choir at the United Methodist Church and River City Brass and a Beatle Tribute Band at The Crawford Center.
ARCA’s first performance season was inaugurated in 2006 in its home, the recently restored Lincoln Hall performance space located atop the Foxburg Free Library. Built in 1909, Lincoln Hall has retained its nineteenth and early twentieth century charm with many authentic design features, as well as an original hand painted stage curtain that now serves as the stage backdrop. Lincoln Hall houses the McKissick Mighty Wurlitzer Theatre Organ, and a seven foot Steinway grand piano graces its stage.
Internationally renowned performers have included the Alexander String Quartet, organist David Wickerham, Chatham Baroque, Pittsburgh Symphony Chamber Players, Mezzo Soprano Emily Righter and Pianists David Allen Wehr and Gayle Martin Henry. Other musical attractions include jazz trombonist Hal Betters, C Street Brass, cabaret artist Dane Vannatter, and Tom Roberts and the Allegheny City Ragtime Orchestra.
Outdoors at picturesque RiverStone Farm, ARCA presented the Scottish Festival for five years, featuring Scottish athletic competitions, soccer clinics, sheep dog demonstrations, and Scottish dogs agility and obedience shows – with Celtic music concerts abounding in Lincoln Hall and outdoors on the Foxburg Green and at RiverStone Farm. In 2013 ARCA presented the Scottish rock band, Big Country in the RiverStone outdoor arena. Since then, ARCA has shifted its summer events at RiverStone Farm to outdoor concerts, bringing nationally acclaimed popular artists to perform in RiverStone’s scenic beauty. In 2014 ARCA presented the DePue Brothers Band, acclaimed “grassical” recording artists; and in 2015 the funk, rhythm and blues recording artists, WaterSeed; as well as international thumb picking guitar virtuosos and recording artists, Loren and Mark.
Since 2009, ARCA has presented a sequential arts education program in the Allegheny Clarion Valley Schools, funded by the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. In 2013, the cross over music group, Cello Fury, presented workshops in the elementary schools, offering a ‘cello petting zoo’, followed by assembly concerts in the elementary and high schools. A family concert in the AC Valley High School auditorium in the evening drew a large audience to experience the musical magic of Cello Fury.
In 2014-15, ARCA built on this success, presenting a partnership program with the Allegheny Clarion Valley Schools entitled The Music That Makes Us Dance. ARCA brought in professional dancers, musicians and teaching artists to present movement and music workshops and assembly concerts, as well as community concerts designed for families in the Allegheny-Clarion Valley High School Auditorium – all on the theme of music and the dance. On November 15, 2015 the Pittsburgh Youth Symphony Orchestra performed a concert in the A-C Valley High School Auditorium, including ballet music from Appalachian Spring and Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony. Dancing Off the Canvas in the spring of 2015 exhibited A-C Valley students’ art at the Red Brick Gallery and in Foxburg businesses during the summer. Attack Theatre (dance) performed workshops and an assembly concert for A-C Valley students and a consortium of Gifted and Talented students from area school districts.
Lincoln Hall is home to a 1929 Wurlizter Theater Organ – The McKissick Mighty Wurlitzer – which was originally installed in Cleveland’s Uptown Theater. It is one of twenty-four built in this style and size. The instrument retains its ornate French console and was painstakingly rebuilt by Paul McKissick. Lincoln Hall’s Mighty Wurlitzer contains seventeen ranks of pipes and is characterized by a balanced blend of unmistakable Wurlitzer ‘sounds’. It was purchased by Patricia and Dr. Arthur Steffee, ARCA’s Founders, to enhance the newly restored Lincoln Hall.
Since the series was inaugurated, ARCA has presented concerts featuring nationally acclaimed organists, including David Wickerham, Martin Ellis, Walt Strony, Scott Foppiano, Donna Parker, Jelani Eddington and Ken Double.
The Red Brick Gallery and Gift Shop, founded in 2011, is Allegheny RiverStone Center for the Arts’ boutique fine art gallery and gift shop located in historic Foxburg. The Red Brick Gallery exhibits in a charming and historic, 136 year old building at 17 Main Street in downtown Foxburg. The building, once the business office of the Fox Family from Philadelphia, was restored recently and has reopened as both a Gift Shop and Gallery and with an inspired use – as an Artist Cooperative. With the help of local artist volunteers, The Red Brick displays and has for sale on consignment on the first floor, works of local painters, photographers, and artisans. Their work also is featured in a special holiday exhibit annually. The Red Brick Gallery strives to nurture artistic creativity by providing a venue for viewing works by local artisans and other emerging art talent from the surrounding region and to provide a sales outlet for their works.
Art works are displayed in the shop space on the first floor and the second floor is used as a gallery space for various exhibitions. In 2013 and 2014, the Red Brick Gallery presented a broad range of exhibits featuring Jason Floyd Lewis, Daniel Stainer, Dennis Keyes, Sigrid Piroche. Fritz Keck, Doug Elder, Debra Pruskowski and sculptor Bill Smith; Rhoda Taylor and Barbara Frohne; and Donna Edmonds and Angela Hardwick. 2015 Exhibits featured artists Carolyn Schiffhouer, Seth McClaine, Carol Modery-Kilkeary, Stacie Johnson-Leske, Sally Heston and Chris DeNapoli Michael and a holiday exhibit featuring Cooperative artists Donna Edmonds, Blanche Hall, Angela Taylor Hardwick, Nick J. Karellas, Dennis Keyes, Jason Floyd Lewis, Paul O’Neil, Ray Rossi, Glenn and Linda Thompson, and Cathy and Jack Trzeciak. Cooperative Membership is open and interested artists may apply.
