As a child of the ‘90s, David Miller grew up listening to country music while surrounded by family in his Ashland, Kentucky, home. However, when he heard Weezer’s 1994 “Blue Album,” everything changed.
At that moment, a love for pop-punk, a genre combining elements of punk rock and pop music, and a new career aspiration developed for Miller. Now, as the new executive director of the Keith-Albee Performing Arts Center, the power to book acts like Weezer lies in Miller’s hands, and if he had his say, Paul Simon would be the first to take the stage under his administration.
“I know that’s a long shot,” Miller said. “He can pick anywhere, but still, he is very top of mind.”
“I guess Weezer does arenas, but I’m still going to hold out hope that they’ll do an underplay,” he added with a laugh.
Aside from booking the artists of his childhood, Miller, who was appointed July 1, has plans to bring a variety of talent to the theater, including comedians, local musicians and dance recitals. In September, some attainable acts on his radar, he said, include Tyler Childers and John Mulaney. As of Oct. 28, the theater announced Miller had indeed booked the latter.
The 37-year-old brings several years of experience in the performing arts industry to the Keith-Albee, from volunteering to book the bands at his hometown’s summer concert series as a young adult to most recently serving as the director of marketing and sales at the Marshall Health Network Arena.
After graduating with a bachelor’s of communication and convergent media from Morehead State University in 2013, Miller served as the director of marketing and community engagement at the Paramount Arts Center in Ashland, where his marketing skills frequently helped to sell-out the 1,400-seat theater.
As the Paramount’s marketing director, Miller said his goal was to bring new faces to the theater he’d grown up seeing educational programs and musical theater performances in.
All the while, the Ashland native discovered what he loved most about working in a performing arts venue: the community that filled its seats. This community mindset is exactly what will take principal under his administration in the Keith-Albee’s new era.
“If you’re going to be the home theater for someone, we don’t want people to just have it be their home theater because they’re sitting in the seats,” Miller said.
“We have names like Taylor Swift that have played here, or you have comedians that are coming through, bands in general. People see that, and they might want to aspire to do that, but if they can’t also be on the stage side, it’s hard to get to that next level or to have a local scene,” he added.
While Miller will not often be on the stage side of things, he looks forward to immersing himself in the Huntington community in this new role.
Anna Adkins, director of sales & marketing at the Huntington Area Convention and Visitors Bureau, said Miller has already proven to be a “great partner for the community” in the early stages of his leadership at the Keith-Albee.
After meeting Miller during his stint at the Marshall Health Network Arena, Adkins said she’s grateful Huntington will get to keep such a knowledgeable individual in its performing arts business.
“I think the Keith has a very strong, bright future ahead of it with David at the helm,” she said.
Since moving to Huntington, Miller said a “quiet dream” of his has been to lead the Keith-Albee in its new era. As an Ashland native, though, he also dreams of bridging the river’s gap and fostering a more inclusive mindset among all members of the Tri-State area.
“Ashland and Ironton still kind of feel separated because of, I guess, the river, so I felt like it was going to be this whole new world coming over here and working, and it’s not,” Miller said.
Looking at Ashland’s Paramount and Ironton’s Ro-Na Theater alongside Huntington’s Keith-Albee, Miller believes the separation between the three states could finally be closed by the arts.
“As the arts scene continues to grow over there and we do our thing here, I think the arts in the Tri-State can be a really cool driver of getting people across the river,” he said.
Although Huntington once felt like the “big city” for the Ashland native, it’s now the place he hopes to stay and make a positive impact in the years to come.
Baylee Parsons can be contacted at [email protected].
