Performing arts
• Capitol Steps at the Latchis: The sassy, musical, political satire of the Capitol Steps will return to the Latchis Theatre in downtown Brattleboro at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 16. Armed with new songs and numbers, the Capitol Steps performers will bring their timely and irreverent spoofs of the headlines to the stage, and promise to bring down the entire house - and Senate.
A free pre-Capitol Steps event “Heart of the Home” at 6 p.m. will focus on the work of the Windham Housing Trust with photographs in the main theater, a silent auction focusing on the home. Comfort food, beer and wine will be sold.
All proceeds will support the affordable housing and community development work of Windham Housing Trust.
The Capitol Steps began as a group of Senate staffers who set out to satirize the very people and places that employed them. Altogether, the performers have worked in 18 Congressional offices and represent 62 years of collective House and Senate staff experience.
Since they began, the Capitol Steps have recorded 30 albums and have been featured on NBC, CBS, ABC, and PBS, and can be heard four times a year on National Public Radio stations nationwide.
The Capitol Steps will perform songs from their new album, Liberal Shop of Horrors, although the material is subject to changes in the headlines and the scandals of the day. Current songs include both political and non-political stories, including Secret Kenyan Man, Battle Hymn of the Tea Public, Return to Spenders, Under BP, What Kind of Fuel am I, and many more.
For more information or to purchase tickets by check or credit card, contact Development Assistant Betsy Hall at 802-246-2114 or [email protected]; or purchase your ticket at www.brattleborotix.com.
The Windham Housing Trust is a nonprofit organization that creates a wide variety of affordable housing opportunities, and fosters vibrant, diverse, and attractive communities throughout Windham County. For more information, visit www.windhamhousingtrust.org.
Visual arts
• Woodland landscape painting: The Saxtons River Art Guild will host a workshop, “The Woodland Landscape Painting in Pastel,” with Robert Carsten on Saturday, Oct. 23, from 9:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., at the United Church in Bellows Falls.
This workshop will explore various ways to correspond the subject of landscape with contemporary and historical artistic concerns. Working from photographs, concepts of color, design, and techniques will be presented and demonstrated. Critique, at-easel assistance, and lots of painting time will make this an educational and enjoyable painting experience. All levels are welcome from beginner through advanced.
For registration, call Kathy at 802-463-9456 or Donna at 603-835-2387.
• Potters aid Our Place Empty Bowl event: Area potters are working on their wheels to create bowls for the thirteenth annual Empty Bowl soup supper and auctions Sunday, Nov. 7, at Alyson's Orchard in Walpole, N.H. to benefit Our Place Drop-in Center.
The bowls are a highlight of the event, as each attendee selects one to take home as a reminder of those who struggle to put food on the family table. “Gather and Share” is the theme of this year's event, which begins at 5 p.m. with an auction preview and social time.
Proceeds go towards supporting the food programs of Our Place, which serves families in the greater Rockingham area and Walpole and North Walpole in New Hampshire, serving breakfast and lunch four days a week and providing groceries and fresh produce to approximately 160 families per month, including 52 homebound seniors.
Fiddler Jill Newton and Friends will be playing traditional tunes for the event. Bob Sprague is auctioneer. The Empty Bowl is part of an international effort that began in 1990 to raise money for food programs.
Tickets ($30) will be available at Village Square Booksellers in Bellows Falls, Real to Reel Video in Walpole or by calling Our Place at 463-2217. Anyone wishing to contribute bowls or auction items may call the same number or e-mail [email protected].
• FACT TV hosts camera, editing classes: Falls Area Community Television (FACT) hosts camera and editing classes every Tuesday this fall at 6:30 p.m. Those interested should call the station at 802-463-1613 to enroll.
FACT needs new producers to be trained so that they can bring their talents to the station and create new shows. Students will have the choice between two classes, Studio Production or Digital Production.
Studio Production will require the student to participate in the complete production of a news-style studio program. Each student will explore the individual roles involved with studio production, including director, camera operator, on-camera talent, audio mixer, technical director, lighting director and graphics. After learning all aspects of the studio and studio control room, each student will be required to submit a news story and accompanying photograph or video footage, select a particular role, and produce a 10-minute news-related program.
Digital Production will teach the students the basics of video production concentrating on the tool and methods used in making video programs. Students will participate in hands-on enviroment, learning proper camera operation, audio recording, basic lighting and most importantly the fine art of post-production editing. This course will give you all the tools you need to go out and shoot and edit your story for air on FACT 8.
Music
• BMC announces new classes in choral arts: Are you a singer who wants to read music, but never learned how? Read a little bit, but want to improve your confidence and skills? Read pretty well, but seek more insight and musicality?
Beginning on Thursday, Oct. 21, the Brattleboro Music Center offers two classes for singers who are looking to increase their enjoyment and skill in the area of music reading, comprehension, and interpretation.
“Musicianship Skills for Singers: The Fundamentals” is for people who love to sing who want to expand their ability to read music at the basic level, while “Musicianship for the Experienced Singer” is aimed at the more advanced singer who seeks to deepen their level of skill, musicality, and insight. Both classes are taught by choral director Susan Dedell.
Both classes place a huge emphasis on rhythm skills, and aim to connect the intellectual ability to read musical notation with the body's instinctive rhythms. Both classes also seek to integrate the ear's natural ability to hear melody and harmony into sight reading and interpretation. While the first class is aimed at covering the fundamental basics of musicianship, the second class in this series is geared toward the experienced singer who seeks to deepen their level of skill, musicality, and insight.
“Musicianship Skills for Singers: The Fundamentals” will be held on Thursdays, 5:45 - 6:45 pm. “Musicianship for the Experienced Singer” will be held on Thursdays, 7-8 p.m. The cost per class is $140 for eight weeks beginning on Oct. 21. To register for Choral Arts classes, contact the Brattleboro Music Center at 802-257-4523 or visit www.bmcvt.org for more information.
• House Blend performs in BF: On Saturday, Oct. 23, at 7:30 p.m. at the Immanuel Episcopal Church in Bellows Falls, a concert will feature the a cappella group House Blend.
Formed in 2006, House Blend is an assembly of 20 veteran singers from Vermont and New Hampshire, devoted to the collective exploration of the many styles of mostly a cappella songs from around the world and throughout musical history. A democratically-governed party of self-professed singing addicts, the “Blenders” look to the artistic direction of all of its members to guide the group, creating a harmonious brew that reflects their diverse musical backgrounds.
Their repertoire includes precisely blended early music, contemporary arrangements by local composers, songs from American folk traditions such as spirituals, soulful gospel numbers, hill songs of Appalachia and jazz, as well as lush Italian and Spanish ballads, South African freedom songs, village music of Italy, France, Québec and the Republic of Georgia, Renaissance madrigals, songs from the Jewish choral tradition, contemporary Latin chant and Bach, along with anything else the singers choose to add to the mix.
Concert tickets are $17 in advance, $20 at the door. For seniors, students, and children under 12, tickets are $13 in advance, $15 at the door. They are available at Village Square Booksellers in Bellows Falls, Brattleboro Books, Toadstool Bookshop in Keene, N.H., Misty Valley Books in Chester and online at www.brattleborotix.com.
• Music for organs and piano at Estey museum: In celebration of electronic music pioneer Harald Bode's 100th birthday, the Estey Organ Museum will present a special concert at the Engine House on Birge Street in Brattleboro on Oct. 23 at 5 p.m.
Organist George Matthew Jr. will be performing pieces on a variety of instruments made by the Estey Organ Co. One of those instruments is the Walk Through Pipe Organ, a one-of-a-kind Estey pneumatic pipe organ rebuilt so that visitors can stand inside of it while it is being played. There will also be pieces played on Estey reed organs, electronic organ, and piano.
Bode was an innovative inventor who worked at the company developing ways to produce sounds using electricity and circuits. His work formed a core of knowledgelater used by people such as Robert Moog to create modern synthesizers, and the museum is featuring an exhibit of his contributions to the world of electronic music.
The $15 suggested donation supports the museum. Information: www.esteyorganmuseum.org.
Dance
• Andy Toepfer at Evening Star Grange: An evening of community contra and square dances will take place at the Evening Star Grange in Dummerston Center on Saturday, Oct. 16, from 6:30-9:30 p.m.
Live music on two fiddles will be provided by Laurie Indenbaum and Jill Newton. Andy Toepfer will be playing guitar and calling the dance. Chandra Bossard will tell a traditional folk tale midway through the evening. The dance will be preceded by a community potluck supper at 5:30 p.m. Bring a dish and your own plates and silverware.
The program will include traditional New England contra dances, square dances, circle mixers, and couple dances. Admission is $4 for children, $7 for adults and $20 for a family. For more information and directions to the Evening Star Grange, contact Robin or Andy Davis at 802-257-1819, or [email protected].
Books
• Deep sea fishing in New England: On Friday, Oct. 15, at 7 p.m. in the main room of the Brooks Memorial Library in downtown Brattleboro, Sandy Macfarlane, author, will lead a free discussion about topics presented in her book, Tiggie: The Lure and Lore of Commercial Fishing in New England. She will also comment on her personal experience with oil in the marine environment and the effects of oil in New England waters.
Tiggie was named the 2009 Best Regional Non-fiction and received the Independent Publishing Awards Bronze Medal. The book focuses on Charles “Tiggie” Peluso, one of the Cape's crustiest, crankiest commercial fishermen, who shares his harrowing stories of fishing New England's waters in one of the world's deadliest occupations.
Macfarlane spent her childhood summers around the waters of Cape Cod. After graduating from the University of Massachusetts, she settled in the Cape town of Orleans where she began her professional career as shellfish biologist for the Town of Orleans. Later, she was appointed as the town's first conservation administrator. Sandy retired from town government in 1998, was awarded a master's degree in resource management from Antioch New England Graduate School and founded Coastal Resource Specialists, a consulting company devoted to shellfish, coastal and watershed issues.
• Local cookbook author Deborah Krasner will talk about and autograph copies of her newest book, Good Meat, The Complete Guide to Sourcing and Cooking Sustainable Meat, from 4 to 5:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 16, at Kitchen Sync, next to Vermont Artisan Designs on Main Street.
In Good Meat, Krasner, a James Beard cookbook award winner from Westminster, shows concerned consumers how to find, order, and prepare sustainably raised meat, thus making the vital connections among responsible agriculture, delicious food, good health, the environment, and every American dinner table.
Krasner's Good Meat provides detailed guidance to enable people to become truly responsible meat eaters. Instead of supporting industrial farming that advances global warming, drives family farmers off the land, abuses animals, pollutes watersheds and produces high-cholesterol meat, consumers can choose a healthful, sustainable alternative.
Sustainable agriculture allows animals to eat a natural diet, without the need for antibiotics and growth hormones. Instead, these animals live in balance with the land and produce naturally lean meat the provides plentiful antioxidants, which can actually lower cholesterol. Because such meats are naturally so lean, they must be cooked differently from conventionally-raised grain-fed meats. Krasner provides consumers with more than 200 delicious recipes for cooking this leaner meat, and she facilitates direct purchasing from local farmers.
Owner Susan Worden, whose grandparents, Georges and Suzanne Lainé, owned Le Chanticleer restaurant in Brattleboro in the 1950s, said they certainly would have enjoyed the return to locally produced meats and Krasner's presentation that promotes community supported agriculture.