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    Madill Performing Arts Center

    2.3 (3 reviews)
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    2 years ago

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    5 years ago

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    5 years ago

    Best dance studio in the area! Professional staff who make dance fun and engaging for all ages and abilities.

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    Magic Smelt Puppet Troupe - I really shoulda worn more silver

    Magic Smelt Puppet Troupe

    5.0(1 review)
    2.2 mi

    I've never waited a full six years between experiencing what a business has to offer and writing a…read morereview before but Magic Smelt Puppet Troupe breaks the mold in more ways than one. I'm not sure what else they do besides putting on the Run, Smelt, Run! parade on the shore of Lake Superior in May but that's more than enough. I've been meaning to go back but it's a ways off from Detroit and finances are always a challenge so who knows if that will happen especially since ... gasp! This year might have been the final smelt parade. Jim Ouray, the founder of the smelt parade is stepping down as head honcho, citing the headaches of securing funding and doing all the clerical work which he's pretty tired of at his age. Hell, it sounds exhausting to me and I'm a good deal younger than him. He still wants to do the fun stuff, like play King Neptune, but unless someone steps up and takes the reins, which nobody has yet, it's curtains for the smelt parade. As grandpa would say "Well, that's too damn bad!" The smelt parade is a riot! It's kind of a northern bastardization of Mardi Gras. We have something similar in Detroit called the Marche du Nain Rouge. Ours is bigger and we wear red and dress like demons sometimes while in Duluth they wear silver and usually rock some sort of smelt themed costume. Theirs is more fun and soulful and flipped out if you ask me though. There's all manner of wacky smelt themed costumes- Smelt Lumberjack, Smelt Pope, Smeltbot 3000, Smelt Mayor and the fabulous Smelt Queen among dozens of others. There's a second line jazz band playing as the merrymakers dance down the Duluth boardwalk. There's a smelt fry and more music at the parade's conclusion at the Zeitgeist Theater. There's stilt walkers and a whole Rite of Spring type ceremony. Bye bye winter, let's party! Of course they're farther north than the Motor City so it's in May and not March. That's also the height of smelting time here - the reason for the season. Sorry it took me so long to write this. Hell, I had to create the listing, too. None of the normies here on Yelp are messing with this bizarre wonderfulness. Lots of details have slipped through my memory banks in the over half a decade that's elapsed, even if I have lots of photos and even created a travel comic about my pilgrimage here. Suffice it say I give the weirdos at Magic Smelt Puppet Troupe the highest possible recommendation and hope the Smelt Parade somehow endures.

    Photos
    Magic Smelt Puppet Troupe - Queen Smelt

    Queen Smelt

    Magic Smelt Puppet Troupe - Eli usually plays too much but the smelt people played more than Ely!!

    Eli usually plays too much but the smelt people played more than Ely!!

    Magic Smelt Puppet Troupe - That's Smeltvolution

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    That's Smeltvolution

    Madill Performing Arts Center - theater - Updated May 2026

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