Muse Flashes

Compiled by BONNIE WELLS

Published on December 22, 2006

UMass professor to sing at Carnegie Hall

Tenor William Hite, professor of voice in the department of music and dance at the University of Massachusetts, knows the way to Carnegie Hall featured in the old joke - practice!

This week he sings solos at the famed New York concert hall in Musica Sacra's annual performance of Handel's "Messiah" on Dec. 20 and 22.

New York's Musica Sacra, led by Richard Westenburg, is the country's longest-running, regularly performing all-professional choral ensemble, as it sings its way through its fourth decade.

Hite has received critical acclaim for his performances with groups such as the American Symphony Orchestra, the Washington Bach Consort and the Handel and Haydn Society, working with conductors such as Seiji Ozawa, Christopher Hogwood and Leon Botstein.

Hite has recorded on the Koch, Denon and Centaur labels and is featured on award-winning CDs with the Boston Camerata as well as the medieval ensemble Sequentia.

The Yiddish Book Center looks back at Goldbergs

The National Yiddish Book Center in Amherst takes an audience back to the golden age of television Sunday afternoon, with a screening of the 1950 film "Molly: The Goldbergs," based on the long-running radio and TV serial of the 1930s through the '50s.

The film will be introduced by Donald Weber, professor of English at Mount Holyoke College and author of "Haunted in the World: Jewish American Culture from Cahan to 'The Goldbergs.' " He will lead a discussion of the film following the screening.

"The Goldbergs" began its 25-year run on radio, airing from 1930 to 1946, before moving to television from 1949 to 1953. The warm-hearted series about the trials and tribulations of a working-class Jewish family from the Bronx starred Gertrude Berg as the indomitable Molly Goldberg. The show captured the hopes and aspirations of second-generation immigrants who strove for respectability, and of middle-class Americans who identified with its values.

The fim to be shown Sunday at 2 p.m. at the center at 1021 West Street on the Hampshire College campus, is based on the television series. In the 83-minute film, an old flame of Molly's pays a call.

Tickets are $5. More information is available at the center at (413) 256-4900, or at the Web site at www.yiddishbookcenter.org.

David Foster wins wildflower society's highest award

A local man was honored by the New England Wildflower Society last month with its Massachusetts State Award, which recognizes great works in the field of botany or horticulture, benefiting Massachusetts.

In a press release the society announced the award given to David Foster of Shutesbury "for guiding the development of Harvard Forest from a small academic outpost to a major research site, and for changing the way biologists interpret landscape patterns and ecological processes."

Foster is director of the Harvard Forest, a 3,000-acre ecological laboratory and classroom in Petersham, and has been a member of the Harvard University facult in the department of organismic and evolutionary biology since 1983.

The society invites applications and nominations for a new entry to its annual awards roster, landscape design using native plants. The 2007 award will honor a New England-based firm or individual specializing in landscape architecture or design with a longterm commitment to the use of native plants in distinctive landscape compositions.

For more information, or to nominate a group or individual for any of the society's awards, contact Karen Pierce at (508) 877-7630 or TTY (508) 877-6553, or by e-mail at kpierce@newfs.org.

Amherst Chamber calls for artists

The Amherst Area Chamber of Commerce invites artists to apply for monthlong exhibitions at its office at 28 Amity St. Applications are available at the office Monday through Friday, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. The deadline for submissions is Jan. 26. Rotating exhibitions begin in April, 2007.

For more information call Jacques Graton at 256-0326, or Jule Dupre at 256-0562.

Multi-Arts adds a Web Art Gallery

Multi-Arts, the Hadley organization offering art classes, workshops and summer camps for children, has added another venue for displaying the fruits of the kids' artistic labors.

In addition to an exhibit this month at the Cushman Cafe in North Amherst, and a permanent display at the Northampton Community Music Center, Multi-Arts has added a Web site where rotating displays of children's art will be shown.

Exhibition in the online gallery at www.multi-arts.org is open to any child. For more information or to submit work, contact Multi-Arts director Catalina Arrubla at (413) 584-7951.

Amherst native's story in 2006 best-of list

Amherst native Jessamyn Smyth's short story "A More Perfect Union" is listed as one of the "100 Distinguished Stories of 2005" in the Best American Short Stories 2006 anthology.

Published by Houghton Mifflin, the anthology also lists stories by Allegra Goodman, Alice Hoffman, Alice Monro, Joyce Carol Oates, Paul Theroux and James Updike, among others. The book is edited by Katrina Kenison and guest editor author Ann Patchett.

Smyth splits her time between the Valley, southern Vermont and New Hampshire, where she teaches writing at Keene State College. She also teaches writing at the University of Pennsylvania's Writer's Conference and produces and directs local theater. Smyth has taught composition, creative writing and literature at Greenfield Community College and has served as director of community education at Everywoman's Center at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

- PHOEBE MITCHELL