A Cascades church and its performing arts community are celebrating the opening of a new theater, Dreamscapes Performing Arts. The space can seat around 400 people and will begin hosting shows in October.
Planning for the theater began in January when a grant covering some of the construction costs was received, according to Community Lutheran Church Music Director Jennifer Quinones. From there, an Eagle Scout designed the stage’s curtain and a variety of members of the community helped with other areas of the process.
“It’s definitely a community effort,” Quinones said. “I’ve had a lot of partners. A lot of companies have wanted to support it because they think it’s a worthy cause.”
Quinones also serves as director of The Creative Dreamers, a group of neurodivergent adults that is based at the new theater. Last Saturday the group presented the inaugural show at the new venue, which was the space’s “soft opening.” The show was a selection of songs from a musical that the group is currently putting together and will be presenting in October.
The Creative Dreamers were founded in 2021 by Quinones and her son, Gabe, who is neurodivergent, and now has 30 members. The group has members from across the area and sings both religious and non-religious songs.
“They’re very much like a family,” said Quinones. “They check in with each other every week. They’re extremely supportive of each other, they know each other’s repertoire.”
She added that performing has many positive effects for the members, many of whom, including her son Gabe, stopped having access to creative outlets when they graduated from school.
“It’s great to see the individuals rise to the occasion,” she said. “Some of them took it upon themselves to add, before they performed, like they wanted to dedicate it to something… it was a form of expression, and that is really important.”
“In the end, it’s about the music, which brings me happiness,” Quinones said.
The group was renting space in schools and other facilities to perform, which was too expensive, and that led to discussions about building a theater at Community Lutheran. Quinones said she has talked to many other musical groups in Loudoun about performing at Dreamscapes once it is fully open this Fall and has 10-20 interested parties already.
“I think that there’s some interest there [for] performing here because there really is a lack of spaces for musicians and actors and everyone who is in the arts,” she said.
Quinones is also part of the group advocating for an eastern Loudoun arts center, the initial designing of which was approved by the Board of Supervisors in January but is still several years away.
Performances ranging from plays to operas and children’s events are all in the works for this Fall and beyond. Quinones said the community is prepared to offer events every week if the interest is there.
“I think the timing for us to do this is a great thing because we have a revitalization that’s happening over at Cascades right now, they’re doing a lot of improvements, and so this would be a nice addition to that, I think,” Quinones said.
The full grand opening of Dreamscapes Performing Arts will be October 4-5. Groups interested in touring the space or inquiring about scheduling shows can contact Quinones by emailing [email protected].