One last bow for IMAC founder Michael Rothbard
Other Columnists
If there's any comfort to be found in the sudden death of Michael Rothbard, it's knowing that the Inter-Media Arts Center co-founder had some idea of how much people valued him for his work in the community.
Rothbard and his partner, Kathie Bodily, decided in June to close IMAC in Huntington and move on to the next phase in their lifelong careers of promoting the arts on Long Island. They had big new plans - of uniting the area's many arts groups with a single information source, of sharing their knowledge of building community-based arts centers with groups around the country. And, luckily, it turns out their friends and fans got a chance to thank them and wish them well for the many years of keeping interesting music and arts programs coming to Huntington.
Rothbard, who died of a sudden illness on Oct. 30, also got a chance to see how hard it would be to replace him while he was still alive. The Town of Huntington even created a task force to determine what it could do to fill the hole left by IMAC's closing. Hopefully, that gave Rothbard a small sense of his successes.
His legacy lives on in the numerous community theaters now providing IMAC-ish programming around Long Island and in the careers of countless musicians he supported. The Michael Rothbard Young Musicians Scholarship at imactheater.org will help continue that work.
'BLUZMAN' HONORED. The career of another Long Island legend, Sam "The Bluzman" Taylor, who died in January, will be celebrated Saturday by A Band Called Sam - featuring the Long Island Music Hall of Famer's daughter, Sandra Taylor, and grandson, LAW, as well as many of his longtime bandmates - at Berkner Auditorium in Upton, N.Y. Tickets are $15 through ticketweb.com.
