Laughs and fun abound at the annual Halloween Orchestra Concert. Read more about this favorite, costumed tradition in this feature article by Blake Sebring for PFW News.

Surack-Sweetwater Music Industry Building Construction Picks Up the Tempo

Construction of the Surack-Sweetwater Music Industry Building in the heart of Purdue University Fort Wayne's campus is on track, with work now focused on the interior of the building. With less than a year until opening day, the entire College of Visual and Performing Arts community is thrilled with its progress and what it represents for the future of the College. Read the latest here.

PFW Department of Theatre Hits the Ice

A small group of PFW Theatre majors, minors, alumni and faculty came together to sing the national anthem at the Fort Wayne Komets versus the Kalamazoo Wings hockey game on November 22, 2025 at the Allen County War Memorial Coliseum. 

The Student Theatre Organization (STO) was able to offer discounted tickets to the game, with purchases benefitting the STO to provide future scholarships, events, and opportunities for PFW’s student theatre community.

Bringing Early Music to the Fort Wayne Community

The fascinating work of Dr. John Romey, assistant professor of musicology, and the story of how his latest early music concert, Mestizo Baroque: Music at the Edges of the Empire, came together, are explored in this Whatzup feature story by Wheat Williams and this story by Blake Sebring for PFW News.

On November 16, at the downtown Allen County Public Library, the Kekionga Early Music Collective, led by Romey, performed songs and instrumental music from the 1700s from Peru, Bolivia, and Mexico, sung in the languages of native peoples: Quecha, Guarani, and Nahuatl.

The concert also featured PFW professors Dr. Julie Lyn Barber and Dr. William Sauerland, plus special guest artist Brian Kay on Baroque guitar. Kay won a Grammy in 2018 with the renowned early music group Apollo’s Fire, plays on Netflix’s The Witcher soundtrack, and arranged Russian folk songs for Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein, recently released on Netflix.

Seth Green, associate professor of ceramics, has been awarded a $25,000 grant from the Windgate Foundation. He will use these funds to purchase a smaller gas kiln for test batches and smaller firings, which will help save in both energy and efficiency for the University.

Dr. Suining Ding, professor of interior design, published her new book Photoshop for Interior Designers: A Nonverbal Communication, Second Edition with Bloomsbury Publishing on October 16, 2025. This book combines Dr. Ding’s scholarly inquiries and creative endeavors. This second edition features new case studies and examples using updated techniques and tools to illustrate different types of design projects. Additionally, the book highlights the importance of storytelling through design, showcasing how designers can effectively communicate their concepts and ideas in a quick and easy way through a visual thinking process. Furthermore, this book introduces techniques to create drawings which have the characteristics of both freehand and digital drawings. Lastly, explanations of how evidence-based and research-informed design solutions should be visually communicated are provided. This book aims to serve as a valuable resource for design students, interior designers, architects, and allied design professionals looking to convey their design concepts and design solutions in a quick and easy way.

Dr. Julie Lyn Barber, assistant professor and head of musical theatre, appeared as Frau Blucher in the Actors Theatre of Indiana’s production of Young Frankenstein in Carmel, Indiana from October 24 through November 9, 2025. Photo credit: Indy Ghost Light

Dr. Julie Lyn Barber, assistant professor and head of musical theatre, has also been chosen as the 2nd place winner of the The American Prize in Directing - The Charles Nelson Reilly Prize for Hot ’n Cole: A Cole Porter Celebration, a musical that she directed at PFW in spring 2024. 

Dr. Hamilton Tescarollo, professor of music and director of keyboard studies, presented a masterclass and solo piano concert titled “Dances, Brazil and St. Francis" on September 29 and 30 at Cameron University in Lawton, Oklahoma.

Dr. Tescarollo also presented a lecture and recital on Brazilian piano music for the Ohio Music Teachers Association, Central East District in Columbus, Ohio on October 17, 2025.

John Hrehov, professor of drawing and painting, recently received the Helen V. Surovek Memorial Award at the 82nd Annual Salon Show at the South Shore Arts in Munster, Indiana, for his painting, “Tangent” (right). 

The juror was Victor Armendariz, owner of Gallery Victor in Chicago.

Assistant Professor of Musicology Dr. John Romey's article, "The pieces that are in the hands of everyone belong to the public’: Philippe-Emmanuel de Coulanges, Song Games and Operatic Artefacts in Seventeenth-Century Paris", published in the Cambridge Opera Journal in December 2024 has recently received the Nancy Lyman Roelker Prize by the Sixteenth Century Society. The Prize is awarded annually for the best article published in English on the history of France and its empire in the Early Modern Era (1450 - 1750).

Earlier in November, Dr. Romey also presented his paper titled "Singing Subjugation: Ursuline Nuns and Opera Airs in Colonial Nouvelle-Orléans” at the annual meeting of the American Musicological Society in Minneapolis. It is part of a session he organized called "Operatic Echoes in the Global Francophone World."

Dressed for the occasion, senior music therapy student Emma Keeling was among the participants at Purdue Fort Wayne's 2025 Constitution Day observance, a national event marking the original document's ratification. Other activities in the Classic Ballroom at Walb Student Union included a choir performance, a reading of the Constitution, a trivia contest, a panel of political science faculty, and a costume contest.

A rising star known for her colorful, bakery-inspired pottery, Ceramics student Teagan Koble was interviewed by 89.1 WBOI in celebration of her acceptance into the 47th Annual Elkhart Juried Regional Exhibition at the Midwest Museum of American Art, on display now through December 31, 2025. 

Follow Koble on Instagram @teagan.a.art

If you’d like to own one of Koble’s charming works of art, make sure to drop by the upcoming PFW Ceramics Club pottery sale on Thursday, December 4 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Friday, December 5 from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. in the Helmke Library IDEASpace.

Proceeds from the event will help support student travel to Detroit, Michigan for the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts (NCECA) conference in March, 2026.

Art student Cody White's photograph, "The Embosom" (left) was selected for an international exhibition titled Conceptual by Blank Wall Gallery in Athens, Greece. The exhibition can currently be viewed online, and features pieces from artists around the world. White's winning photograph was created as part of Jim Gabbard's Introduction to Photography course.

School of Music student Andrew Danielson shares his love of early music and ancient instruments with Dr. John Romey. A keyboardist and now harpsicord player, Danielson performed with Romey as part of the Kekionga Early Music Collective at the Allen County Public Library earlier this month. 

Asked why he values early music in this feature article by Blake Sebring for PFW News, Danielson said: “It indicates to me that humanity since the beginning of its history has always been a creature of curiosity and skill. Even though this music was written hundreds of years ago, I can see the thought, intent, and beautiful craftsmanship a person made to write the notes I play in 2025.”

Carissa DeLong, who is pursuing a B.A. degree in Art and Design, was recently accepted to a prestigious study abroad program in Milan, Italy.

Recent School of Music alumnus Tim McDonough has accepted a position as a recording engineer and instructor at prestigious recording studio Round Table Recording Company in Indianapolis, Indiana. Round Table is known for offering a wide range of services to help artists realize their creative potential, including recording, mixing, and mastering, as well as music production, education, and licensing opportunities.

This Halloween season, Northrop High School theatre students guided audiences through the winding paths of Lindenwood Nature Preserve and Cemetery in their original production, The Haunted Forest. Read all about this immersive, inclusive theatre project led by Gabriel Walburn, an IPFW Theatre alumna and student of Jeff Casazza, in this delightfully spooky feature for Input Fort Wayne.

Art and Design alumna Julie Wall gave PBS Fort Wayne a look inside her studio and artistic process in this special video for their "arts IN focus" series. Wall is the artistic force behind the HEDGE, a Fort Wayne-founded print studio and creative hub established in 2013. She blends linoleum printmaking, letterpress, metalwork, jewelry design, and mural-making into everyday art.

Her work reflects a deep love for nature, insects, texture, pattern, and women’s stories, and her creations have reached audiences from boutique weddings to Architectural Digest and Forbes.

Alicia Pyle, a graduate of the School of Music, performed a special dueling pianos concert at The Fairfield in downtown Fort Wayne on November 21, 2025.