...intervening dates to be announced soon...
pop. 1,000 • pop. rank #3 • gig #
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CAMBRIDGE write-up coming soon
However, Bob told me that the equally historic Brownington Congregational Church, just across the street, had a Steinway baby grand, and immediately volunteered to put me in touch with its music director, Mark Violette. Mark turned out to be more than a generous host and presenter. He offered the church choir as colloborators, and suggested I contact composer Sara Doncaster, music teacher at the nearby Lake Region Union High School to find a student participant as well. Sara, in addition to helping with publicity, asked Matthew Faust, a Brownington student, to perform, while Mark reached out to Darryl Kubian, a Brownington violinist also eager to play. It was enormously heartening to have so much enthusiasm and so much community support and participation for our very first away game, and a great augury for the project as a whole. (click images to embiggen)
Welcome stone
Concert poster, bookended by handyman ad and majestic reflected white pine
The program
...Brownington Congregational Church, host of Concert #2
Mark Violette, impresario for this concert, did the honors filling in the town of Brownington on our map
The enthusiastic audience of 40 was well fitted to the small church.
Scarlatti Sonata in G Major, K.2 (preceded by 2 ii-V-I’s)
Darryl Kubian joins me for the Meditation from Massenet’s Thaïs
The closer, “Stride Rite”, with a nice panning shot of the audience at the end
That’s me in front of the Samuel Read Hall House
A warm audience of 70 was present to see the project off. The first concert in this 251 252-concert series featured a number of firsts:
Beethoven’s first sonata, Bach’s first published keyboard suite, and Scarlatti’s first and also 251st keyboard sonatas, plus various ragtime and stride pieces.
My self-assessment of the performance is in this blog post.
Images and video follow—as well as the first installment of the about the piano feature. Every piano has a story, and for each venue, I will tell some of it here.
The program
Bert Crosby set up the lighting to cast UVM’s Recital Hall organ in full green-and-gold splendor
A brief selection from the second half featuring the evening’s birthday boys, Tchaikovsky and Brahms
Post-concert, I address a coterie of young fans, who collectively brought the audience average age from over 60 down to the mid-40s
Reception goodies featuring Vermonty cookies! (on left), courtesy of Annelies McVoy
Poster
Pianists who play the UVM Recital Hall traditionally sign the frame. This snapshot highlights the signature of William Bolcom, composer of the Graceful Ghost Rag, which I played on this inaugural Play Every Town concert. (I was unable to locate signatures of other composers on the program such as Bach, Beethoven, or Scarlatti.)
Leah also arranged for me to play with her vocal music colleague, Mavis MacNeil, who sang Brahms and also her own setting of Robert Frost’s “The Oven Bird”. Mavis’s music was beautifully suited to the poem: at once vernacular and modernist, natural and artful, just like Frost’s phraseology. It is taken from Mavis’ set “Early Frost”, which is one of the best song-set names ever. Mavis, in turn, put me together with Hazen student Sam Avery, who sang Ned Rorem’s “I Never Knew”.
Hazen Union auditorium. How do all 1970s U.S. school buildings look the same?
The program
Soprano, composer, and Hazen vocal music teacher Mavis MacNeil
Hazen student soprano Sam Avery
Scarlatti Sonata in G minor, no. 4 (preceded by 4 ii-V-I’s)
“The Oven Bird” (Frost) composed and sung by Hazen Union vocal music teacher Mavis MacNeil
Poulenc, Sonata for Flute and piano, performed by Hazen Union instrumental music teacher Leah Gagnon
Her master’s voice. Stella was a respectful listener, kept happy by her new buddy Connor
Leah fills in Hardwick. Schoolteachers are good at coloring inside the lines
Post-concert chilling at the Lamoille River, which runs through Hardwick
Did I pre-empt ice cream?
The church, with OG Superfan Katherine Kjelleren on the right
Fortunately the kind folks at United Church of Underhill not only agreed to host the concert on just over a week’s notice, the sponsoring group United for Justice managed to scramble an appreciative crowd of 35, an impressive turnout for such a quick turnaround.
I talk as well as play. The beautiful organ is a Mason & Hamlin—I didn’t know they made organs
The program
Sandy Wilmot, member of United for Justice and point person for this concert, fills in Underhill
Scarlatti Sonata in A minor, no. 3 (preceded by 3 ii-V-I’s)
Beethoven Sonata no. 1 in F minor, mvts. 1 & 2. I talk about playing “grand” repertoire on a small piano in this blog post
Joplin, Gladiolus Rag
Of Homer Rockwood, Gary writes, “He signed on November 17, 1878, the oldest dated signature there. He lived across the street, and was a druggist in the Underhill Drug Store. He also was a musician who played in the Underhill Citizens Band, and who played a concert in the church in February, 1889.” How about that?
After the concert, Gary invited me to sign. I signed just to the right of one of the largest inscriptions, which marks the end of World War I. Over a century later, you can sense the writer’s joyous relief in the script’s exuberant curvature and extravagant proportions, so unlike the frugal, tight hands of most of the old autographs. There was a catch in my throat as I signed. Our current situation is daunting and dire, its magnitude unprecedented in human history. But it is not the first time people have faced seeming doom.
The oldest dated graffito
The newest, as of this writing
My signature in context
Incidentally, the gorgeous Mason and Hamlin reed organ to the left of the altar was purchased in 1894 by the Women’s Fellowship of the church, each member having earned one dollar toward the cost.