About the Norton Center

Centre College's Norton Center for the Arts is an 85,000 square-foot facility that hosts a major performing arts series each year. Unusual for a town of 18,000 and a campus of 1,054 students, the series is routinely a sellout and the Norton Center operates with a balanced budget. Last year's series featured 24 major events including the Boston Pops Orchestra and the Moscow Symphony Orchestra, touring productions of King Lear and The Barber of Seville, as well as performances by Tap Dogs, the Beaux Arts Trio, and the Waverly Consort. Special events brought the Beach Boys and the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band to the stage. The Norton Center also hosts an annual series of children's plays, with recent guest productions of Charlotte's Web and Island of the Blue Dolphins. Centre College students benefit from the Norton Center by having access to complimentary tickets and by producing their own shows in the state-of-the-art Weisiger Theatre.

The Norton Center building, constructed in 1973, was designed by architect William Wesley Peters of the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation. The arts center is named for Jane Morton Norton, a Centre trustee and patron of the arts from Louisville. Newlin Hall is named for Chauncey Newlin, a Centre trustee and attorney from New York City.

The Norton Center includes a mixture of performance and academic space. The performance spaces include Newlin Hall (the official "debate hall" where the Vice Presidential candidates will meet); Weisiger, an intimate theater with seating for about 300; a black-box theater for small drama productions, and the Audrey Gillespie Recital Hall for musical performances. Classrooms for drama and music are scattered throughout the Grant Hall portion of the building, as are practice studios and faculty offices.

The debate hall

Newlin Hall has a maximum seating capacity of 1,500. The capacity will be greatly reduced for the debate due to television production equipment. All tickets are controlled by the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD).

On-line resources

• Centre Web site: www.centre.edu
• Norton Center home page: www.centre.edu/web/nortonctr/nortoncenter.html

Contacts in Centre College's Norton Center for the Arts

• George Foreman, managing director • 859-236-4692
• Debra Hoskins, publicity • (toll free) 1-877-HIT-SHOW

Contacts in Centre College Communications Office

• Patsi Trollinger • 859-238-5719 • trllngrp@centre.edu
• Mike Norris • 859-238-5718 • norris@centre.edu

• Diane Johnson -- 859-238-5717 • johnsond@centre.edu

Centre College, 600 W. Walnut Street, Danville, KY 40422