MuseFlashes

Compiled by BONNIE WELLS

Published on May 15, 2009

Dickinson Poetry Walk Saturday in Amherst

The annual Emily Dickinson Poetry Walk marks the anniversary of the poet's death Saturday with readings of her works at six historic Amherst sites, ending at her grave site in West Cemetery on Triangle Street.

Walkers are invited to gather at the Dickinson Homestead at 280 Main St. at 1 p.m. This year's walk features five area poets - Deborah Gorlin, Daniel Hall, Lisa Olstein, Pat Schneider and Ellen Watson - who will read and comment on their favorite Dickinson poems. In case of rain, the readings will be held indoors at First Congregational Church, 165 Main St., across from the museum.

An open house at the Homestead and The Evergreens and booksignings with the poets follows the walk from 3 to 4 p.m. The event is free and open to the public.

For more information on the Emily Dickinson Museum and its schedule of events, visit the Web site www.emilydickinsonmuseum.org, or call (413) 542-8161.

Music educators feted at PVS concert Saturday

An Amherst woman is among three local music teachers and violinists who will be honored by the Pioneer Valley Symphony at its final concert of the season Saturday night.

Diana Peelle of Amherst joins Verna Nash of South Hadley and Rose Lander of Northampton as recipients of the seventh annual Nathan Gottschalk Memorial Award for their outstanding contributions to music performance and education in the Pioneer Valley. The award was established in memory of Nathan Gottschalk, who was music director and conductor of the PVS for 37 years.

The trio of honorees, longtime teachers of the Suzuki method of violin education, are co-founders of the Western Massachusetts Suzuki Association, which sponsors performances, workshops and a summer institute, where local students work with nationally recognized Suzuki teachers.

The concert Saturday night at 7:30 p.m. at the Fine Arts Center Concert Hall at the University of Massachusetts brings the 70th season of the Pioneer Valley Symphony and Chorus to a close with "Music of Love and War."

The first half of the program includes selections from Berlioz' "The Trojans" and the Massachusetts premiere of PVS Music Director Paul Phillips' suite "War Music," which sets to music Christopher Logue's selected translations from the "Iliad."

The Bennington Children's Chorus joins the symphony and chorus in the featured work of the evening, Carl Orff's "Carmina Burana."

The doors will open at 6:30, with students of the Western Massachusetts Suzuki Association performing in the lobby of the Fine Arts Center at 6:45. There will be a pre-concert talk by Zeke Hecker at 7 p.m.

Tickets are $18; $16 seniors; $12 students; $6 youth under 18, available at (413) 773-3664.

Stark Raving Madrigals at Renaissance center

Springtime in the Renaissance comes to Amherst Saturday afternoon when the Stark Raving Madrigals perform at 2 p.m. at the Massachusetts Center for Renaissance Studies. The concert is free and open to the public at the center at 650 East Pleasant St.

Members of the the local group - Elizabeth Chilton, Kathy Blaisdell, Sara Metcalf, Ted Blaisdell and Brit Albritton - have been singing together in various Valley groups, like Valley Light Opera and Valley Capella, for years but only came together as the Stark Raving Madrigals last fall. Chilton said that the inspiration for the group is the late 16th-, early 17th-century Italian composer Carlo Gesualdo.

"He wrote a series of Italian madrigals that are expressive, heart-wrenchingly beautiful and quite modern for their age," she wrote in a recent email. "He uses dissonance and chord progressions that just were not typical of the day, and that still evoke great emotion, especially love and pain."

Audiences can hear what she means by that Saturday. For their debut performance the group will sing madrigals by Gesualdo, as well as a selection by Morley, Gibbons, Monteverdi, and others.

GirlsEyeView marks milestone with exhibit

An exhibit of photography at the Nacul Center in Amherst offers a many-sided view of the world through the eyes of local young women.

The photographers are 7th- and 8th-grade girls from Amherst Regional Middle School, who are members of GirlsEyeView, a program of the Amherst nonprofit community organization Youth Action Coalition. The group, which aims to promote leadership, creativity and youth activism through photography and creative writing, celebrates its 10th anniversary with the exhibit "Girls Eye (Re) View: A Decade Through Our Eyes."

The show opens with a reception May 15, from 5 to 8 p.m., at the center at 592 Main St. and will be on view through May 25.

Porter-Phelps opens for season Saturday

Along with the robins, lilacs and the Amherst Farmers Market, spring brings the annual seasonal peek into the lives of six generations of an 18th-century Hadley family.

The Porter-Phelps-Huntington Museum, an historic house museum dating to 1752, opens Saturday for its 60th season. The house known as Forty Acres, on the banks of the Connecticut River at 130 River Drive, tells the stories of the extended farming family through their words, spaces and possessions, spanning 250 years of American history.

In addition to guided tours, available Saturday through Wednesday, from 1 to 4:30 p.m., the house hosts its popular outdoor Wednesday Folk Traditions concert series starting June 17 with Heshima Moja y Ofriecimiento Ensemble. Think Luther Vandross meets Tito Puente and John Coltrane. The series continues Wednesdays at 6:30 p.m. through July 19.

The museum's "Perfect Spot of Tea" series series kicks in July 4, with music and pastries on the breezy back veranda, continuing every Saturday through Aug. 29 with seatings at 2:30 and 3:30 p.m.

For more information visit the Web site www.pphmuseum.org, or call (413) 584-4699.

Roger Salloom at the Iron Horse

Living in the Pioneer Valley for 29 years, musician Roger Salloom can lay claim to being one of the area's most well-known musicians. Since the early '80s, he's produced an annual free concert at Look Park's Pines Theatre in Northampton, which moved to the Academy of Music two years ago. Along with gigs across the country, he's headlined at just about every local venue over the years. But its been close to three decades since he stepped onstage at the Iron Horse Music Hall in Northampton.

That's where he'll be Saturday, when he's likely to perform songs from his lated album "La Te Da."

The CD has been getting its share of national attention, reaching Top 40 status on the Americana Music Association's chart, among others.

Salloom's songs deal with life's ups and downs and the strange, sad and funny situations we all encounter every day.

In his song "I'm in Trouble Again,: for example, Salloom writes, "Woke up busted in my bed/ at the head was my feet/ the foot was my head."

His songs have been nominated for Grammy Music Awards and he also was the subject of a 2004 documentary, "So Glad I Made It: the Saga of Roger Salloom, America's Best Unknown Songwriter," which was shown at festivals and theaters nationwide.

The Iron Horse concert starts at 7 p.m., with Unit 7. For tickets and information, visit www.iheg.com.

A musical afternoon with the poetry of Robert Frost

The poetry of Robert Frost takes center stage next week at South Congregational Church in Amherst, when the church presents "Something There is That Doesn't Love a Wall," an evening of dramatic and musical performances of his work.

The program title comes from Frost's poem "Mending Wall," which will be presented as a miniplay, along with other selections from Frost's 1914 collection "North of Boston." Performing the works will be Doug Albertson, Julio Giarusso, Harrison Gregg, Norma McKenna, Bruce Penniman, Daphne Reed and Tina Swift.

The program also includes Willis Bridegam's settings of four poems from the 1913 collection "A Boy's Will," sung by soprano Anita Cooper. Selections include "Mowing," "A Late Walk," "Stars" and "Storm Fear."

The event May 20 at 7 p.m. is free and open to the public at the church at 1066 South East St. on the South Amherst Common. For more information call 253-2669.