The Kopkind Colony kicks off its 20th anniversary summer sessions on July 14 with an eye to two other birthdays: Stonewall 50 and the 95th of one of America's greatest writers.
James Baldwin: The Price of the Ticket will be the featured film at Kopkind's annual Potluck and Movie Night at the Organ Barn in Guilford, followed by discussion with special guest, writer, and activist Kenyon Farrow.
“Kopkind has always been about convergences. How can you think about politics without culture, freedom without art, class without race, labor without sex, death without life?” JoAnn Wypijewski, president of Kopkind's board, said in a news release about the project, which since 1999 has brought together writers, activists, and filmmakers for weeklong seminar/retreats.
“Andy Kopkind contained multitudes, as Walt Whitman said (his 200th birthday is this year, too), and across 20 years, in discussions, workshops and public forums, we have strived to do the same,” she said. “For this summer's opening free public event, we honor those multitudes in the figure of James Baldwin, a gay man, a black man, an artist, a passionate voice for personal, political, and historical honesty. A genius who spoke to the deepest questions of humanity, which necessarily involve love.”...
We are writing to the voters of Brookline, Jamaica, Newfane, and Townshend to ask: please vote yes on Tuesday, July 16 to allow Windham to leave the Leland and Gray Union Middle/High School District. Why are we asking to be released after 50 years of membership? We appreciate the...
Photographer Dona Ann McAdams will discuss her life and work with Marlboro College Professor of American Studies Kate Ratcliff on Tuesday, July 16, at 7:30 p.m. at the Brattleboro Museum & Art Center. The talk is free and open to the public. This event is presented in conjunction with...
Jeff Battaglini has painted his hives with different motifs like Punisher skulls, large honeybees, and orange honeycombs. The colorful subjects are whimsical - but the beekeeper says they also help the bees identify the hives they live in. In a hive, the queen is the egg factory. “She's not this royalty,” he said. “She is an egg-laying machine, laying between 800 to 1,200 eggs a day for two or three years.” A queen is identified by her pheromones, Battaglini said.
Twilight Music continues its 17th annual Twilight On The Tavern Lawn series of folk, world beat, zydeco, Celtic, jazz, blues, and bluegrass summer concerts on Sunday, July 14, with high energy Scottish music bagpipes/fiddle/guitar trio Cantrip. The concert begins at 6 p.m. in downtown Putney on the Putney Tavern lawn (bring a lawn chair or blanket) or at Next Stage at 15 Kimball Hill in case of rain. The concerts are free to the public (donations are accepted) and food...
The Brattleboro Music Center and Retreat Farm “Music Under the Stars” concert series features the BMC Brass Quintet on Saturday, July 13. Gates open at 6:30 p.m., with the free concert starting at 7:30 p.m. at Retreat Farm, located at 45 Farmhouse Square (next to Grafton Village Cheese). The BMC Brass Quintet includes Rob Freeberg and Melissa Griffin, both on trumpet and flugelhorn; Karen Horton on French horn; Riley Goodemote on trombone; and Susan Lemei on the tuba. The group...
Violinist and conductor Moby Pearson invites music lovers into his home this summer for a series of evening Summer Salons. The sessions will explore music and musical perspectives and will be held from 7 to 9 p.m. The cost is $25 per session or $60 for three sessions. Call the Brattleboro Music Center at 802-257-4523 to sign up and get directions. A graduate of Oberlin Conservatory, Pearson has performed with chamber ensembles and orchestras for over 45 years. He has...
Wildflower walk on Hogback Mountain MARLBORO - On Saturday, July 13, from 10 a.m. to noon, medicinal plant expert Allison Turner will lead a wildflower walk at the Hogback Mountain Conservation Area on Route 9. Turner will take hikers on a tour of the glorious mid-summer flowers and share her deep knowledge of how these plants were used by early settlers and how they can still be used today for medicinal and other purposes. This is an easy ramble, with...
Brattleboro Area Hospice presents its second annual garden party event on Friday, July 26, from 4:30 to 7:30 p.m., in the gardens of Cyndy Fine of Genius Loci, Ecological Landscape Design, at 3293 Route 5, Westminster Village. Organizers say the event “will feature the opportunity to explore one of the region's most spectacular summer gardens in full, July bloom, to learn about Brattleboro Area Hospice in its 40th year, and to visit with great company, all while enjoying light refreshments...
College news • The following local students graduated from Vermont Technical College's Practical Nursing program in the spring 2019 semester: Mariah Barnett of Saxtons River; Ivy Bingham of Brattleboro; Tana Cutting of Brattleboro; Sage Hall of Newfane; Erin Hammond of Williamsville; Iyla MacArthur of Brattleboro; Emily Mleczko of Putney; Abigail Molina of Westminster; Megan Peters of Landgrove; Lauren Punger of Bellows Falls; Christina Quinn of Brattleboro; Rebecca Snow of Brattleboro; Alexus Vergobbe of Vernon; and Matthew Wright of Brattleboro. •
Colby Nixon, 29, of Northampton, Mass., and Delaney Bullock, 19, of Newfane were the overall winners at the 42nd Bill Powers Memorial Firecracker 4-Miler on July 4 in Brattleboro. Nixon finished 22 minutes, 44 seconds, nearly a minute ahead of defending champion Colin Costa-Walsh, 20, of Putney (23:40). Soren Pelz-Walsh, 25, of Dummerston, was third in 24:16, while Nate Antaya, 39, of West Chesterfield, N.H., was fourth in 24:53. Bullock placed fifth overall in 25:18, with Paige Warren-Shriner, 27, of...
Hello and good day to you, southeastern Vermonters! Summer is building now, and by mid to late next week we could be looking at high temperatures in the low 90s as a southeast U.S. ridge may start to assume its classic position and pump some heat and humidity our way. As for the upcoming week, we will be seeing increased humidity by Thursday, and especially so by Thursday night and Friday when the best chance for showers, downpours, and thunderstorms...
Traversing the sleepy, winding roads of Southern Vermont, one might never guess the richness of art and craft hidden in this bucolic landscape. Among a few, noble, open fine art and craft studio tours in the region, the Rock River Artists holds its own again July 20-21 in the villages of Williamsville, Newfane, and South Newfane, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily. Joining tour regulars - Ellen Darrow, pottery; Dan DeWalt, custom furniture; Chris Ericson, furniture and jewelry; Georgie,
Yellow Barn continues its 50th-anniversary season with concerts Thursday and Friday evenings and a violin master class, pre-concert discussion, and performance on Saturday. The programming for Thursday, July 11, takes listeners back to the 1940s with works evoking the style and the sentiment of that era. The concert opens with Ró (Calm) an octet for winds, piano, percussion, and strings by Icelandic composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir. Simon Brainbridge's Four Primo Levi Settings (Lucy Shelton, soprano) follows, based on texts by the...
Jeff Battaglini is from the tough-love school of beekeeping. “I had a tough-love meeting with a beekeeper when I started,” said the former plumber and skydiver. “It was really good honest tough love.” “He said, 'It's going to be the most expensive honey you get,'” he added. Battaglini's experience has proved the old beekeeper right. Several years, several steep learning curves, and several emotional roller coasters later, he is now the president of the fledgling Windham County Beekeepers Association and...
Beginning this season, Jonathan Biss joins Mitsuko Uchida as co-artistic director of Marlboro Music. Biss says it feels “wonderful” to pick up the reins at Marlboro. “This is a very special place which, unlike the rest of the world these days, takes things slowly and gradually,” says Biss. “Marlboro is an ideal environment for musicians to learn as much as they can about music. The life of a musician may be terrific, but it can also be frantic, as he...
Gallery North Star, 151 Townshend Rd., presents a solo show of new oil paintings by nationally acclaimed artist Paul Stone. The exhibition will run from July 13 through Aug. 11. The public is invited to an opening reception for the artist on Saturday, July 13, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. A lifelong dedication to documenting the artist's fascination with the rural landscape and its structures is demonstrated in these new works. Employing a bold palette, Stone renders the ordinary in...
Becca Balint, one of two state senators from Windham County, serves on the Senate Committee on Economic Development, Housing, and General Affairs as well as a slew of other Senate committees: Finance, Rules, and the Sexual Harassment Panel. She also serves on the Joint Committee on Judicial Rules, the Joint Rules Committee, and the Adverse Childhood Experiences Working Group, as well as the PEG (Public, Educational, and Government Access) TV Working Group, to which she was recently elected chair. Balint,
I recently had the opportunity to counsel a young couple who are considering getting married. I was tickled to be asked for feedback, as so often brides and grooms are more focused on the wedding celebration than on contemplating what it's like to be in a day-in/day-out, committed relationship that they hope will last for many decades. Like the relationship of a couple who were both nearing end of life in their 90s, having been married at a very young...
In the year 2025, Marlboro, Vermont will be different. The swamp on Sunset Lake Road will be drained and have apartment buildings built on top of it. A shopping plaza could be built on the field across from the Muller's Golden Eagle Motel, which by then would be five stories high and hold 550 people. There will be about one drug store, three supermarkets, two hardware stores, a toy and candy store, two clothing department stores, and an art shop...
Uncertainty still hangs over the heads of community access television stations, as a change at the federal level could significantly lower the stream of funding from the primary source that has kept stations like Brattleboro Community Television (BCTV) and Falls Area Cable Television (FACT) solvent for decades. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is nearing the conclusion of a process expected to reduce franchise fees that public, education, governmental stations (PEGs) receive from cable companies. These community television stations are proactively...