About the Event

Local storytellers interpret and celebrate the energy, vitality, and radiant color of both spring and Impressionism. Featuring Cooper Braun, Rachel Ann Harding and Kathleen Santopietro and hosted by poet Laura Soto. Inspired by our Enduring Impressions exhibit, the evening will also feature Impressionist music performed by pianist John Boggs. 

About Thursday Nights @ the (Virtual) Museum

Spend your Thursday evenings at the (virtual) Longmont Museum for panels, lectures, conversations, and readings presented live from our Stewart Auditorium for FREE.

Every Thursday at 7:30 pm, January 28 – April 29

Watch Monet’s Longmont:

About the Artists

John Boggs is a composer, pianist, and vocalist based out of Lafayette, CO. He attended Bard College where he studied piano with German Diez. He then went on to the University of Michigan for his Masters and just completed his DMA in Composition from the University of Colorado Boulder. He is an active performer of his own music and loves exploring genre-blending. He sings and composes for experimental rock band Fifth Veil, as well as for the Renaissance / new music specialists Solis Singers (an a capella group). He plays with Orquesta Tipica NaturalTango in Denver, and teaches piano and voice at Dana V Music in Louisville.

Cooper Braun was raised by granola eating coyotes in Boulder Colorado. He started his performance career as an actor (what do you do with a BA in Theater?) and in 2013 rekindled his childhood love for live storytelling. In October 2017, he performed at the Exchange Place at the National Storytelling Festival. He was awarded the 2018 JJ Reneaux Emerging Artist Award by the National Storytelling Network. Cooper’s stories remind adults that fairy tales are not just for children.

Rachel Ann Harding is a traditional storyteller and musician who is passionate about telling beautiful folk, myth, and traditional tales. In 2018 she was a featured storyteller in the Exchange Place at the National Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough, TN. Most recently, she was a new voice at the Sone Soup storytelling Festival in Woodruff, SC. She is the creator and producer of the Story Story Podcast, which has been showcasing voices of traditional storytelling from around the world since 2016. Rachel Ann weaves story and song together to create unique and entertaining storytelling events that display the relevance of storytelling in our lives. She believes that fairytales are for all ages.

Storytelling happened to Kathleen Santopietro during her career as an adult educator and has stuck around for the last 26+ years. She tells only a few “selfies” (personal stories) and prefers sharing folk tales, classics and literary stories with adult/teen audiences in a variety of venues. Kathy has crafted programs for businesses, conferences, libraries, museums, churches as well as senior facilities and has developed an introduction to storytelling course that can be customized for a variety of purposes. She is a member of and has performed for the National Storytelling Network, Rocky Mountain Storytellers, and Northern Colorado Storytellers.

Laura Soto brings 20 years experience working in advocacy for underrepresented groups. Born in Chihuahua, Mexico, and raised bicultural in the U.S., Laura has engaged in community activism for community. Laura has worked with art centers, schools, public officials, local news media, public libraries, at-risk youth advocacy centers, alternative healing centers, homeless shelters, women centers, disability centers and legal offices. She has held leadership roles facilitating dialog with Colorado State Representatives, the Boulder County Sheriff, District Attorney and other policy makers to defend equal protections for undocumented immigrants under Colorado law and continues to be a fierce advocate for Spanish-speaking communities serving as a bilingual/bicultural translator, interpreter, facilitator, panelist, speaker and spoken word performer. Laura is a DACA recipient currently working at the Philanthropiece Foundation as their Operations Manager, she is co-founder of Voces Unidas of Boulder County, Colectivo Cultura; is an active member of the SVVSD Parents Involved in Education (PIE) Taskforce, the Colorado Immigrants Rights Coalition (CIRC), and the Latinx Advisory Committee to Congressman Joe Neguse.

:Camille Pissarro and William Thornley, The Battery in Montfoucault. Photography courtesy of Denver Art Museum.