Posted in Uncategorized, tagged band, communities, concord, cotton candy, emerson field, July 4, massachusetts, picnic in the park, southern rail on July 5, 2012| Leave a Comment »
I haven’t been to Concord’s homey celebration in years, and yesterday was a good day to see it at its best. Please note the “burning building” with fake flames, which the fire department repeatedly doused, cooling off the children watching at a safe distance.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged art, concord, massachusetts, rainbow on July 3, 2012| 2 Comments »
First there were ghost leaves embedded in the sidewalks. And then … mystery messages.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged burlington, concord, environment, forest, h mart, hapgood wright, korean, nature, pond lily, town forest, woods on June 17, 2012| 2 Comments »
A sunny day for outings. First to the fabled Korean grocery, where salmon and pickled radish were cheap — if you don’t count the gas for the trip.
Then to the town forest for a walk with the Father in Chief.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged author, children's books, concord, farmer, farmers market, farmstand, Gertrude Crampton, hydroponic, illustrator, library sale, new england, peonies, polka-dot tie, rain, scuffy the tugboat, Tibor Gergely on June 3, 2012| 5 Comments »
Looking at streams swollen by yesterday’s rain, I began thinking about Scuffy the Tugboat.
“The water moved in a hurry, as all things move in a hurry when it is Spring. Scuffy was in a hurry, too. ‘Come back little tugboat, come back,’ cried the little boy.”
A farmers market in Providence was undaunted by the rain. The farmer at the farmstand here joked that the puddle was just a matter of hydroponic gardening. In other photos, I show peonies and a sign buffeted by the storm — and a rabbit too busy foraging to worry about cameras.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged ban on bottled water, concord, concord town meeting, earth day, emerson umbrella, environment, Musketaquid, sale of bottled water, sustainable, water on April 28, 2012| Leave a Comment »
For some years now, Concord has had a fun and funky Earth Day that involves a parade with giant animal and bird puppets and a festival at the Emerson Umbrella Center for the Arts afterward.
The photos: The Blue Person is one of the event’s costumed organizers. Note also the glassblowing demonstration. The faucet made of plastic bottles is meant to remind you that drinking tap water is better for the environment. (Concord Town Meeting just passed a ban on the sale of bottled water — the second attempt to get the legal language right.)
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged april 19, Caesar Robbins, concord, fife, free man, lexington, north bridge, patriots day, paul revere, slave, underground railway on April 16, 2012| 2 Comments »
When I first wrote about the Concord home of former slave Caesar Robbins, a group of concerned citizens had just raised enough money to save it from demolition and move it near the North Bridge (in the Minute Man National Historical Park). See that post here.
Quite a lot has happened since then, and it looks like the refurbished house should be open to the public soon, if not in time for Patriots Day 2012, celebrated today.
Concord was once a stop on the Underground Railway, so saving the first Concord home owned by a freed slave is in keeping with that history.
By the way, if you are my reader in Australia or South Korea, you may not know about Patriots Day, which is a big deal in most of New England. People here consider April 19, 1775, the start of the American Revolution, although there are other worthy claimants for that honor. Paul Revere and Samuel Prescott rode to warn colonists that the British were coming, and shots were fired in Concord and Lexington.
Nowadays the day is commemorated on the closest Monday. Schools and libraries close. The Boston Marathon is run. Parades and reenactments sprout all over the region. One of my colleagues gets up at crack of dawn to march between towns in costume, playing the fife. In spite of all the hoopla, there is something about it that touches people.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Betsy Levinson, concord, cooking, culinary arts, food, food service, homeless, job training, katie johnston, pine street inn, prisoner, social skills on March 31, 2012| 2 Comments »
I liked a story in the January 25 Boston Globe. It’s about a gourmet chef taking a job at a homeless shelter and helping to train residents with the marketable skills he knows best.
“Frank Van Overbeeke used to prepare foie gras and filet mignon for the French brasserie crowd as executive chef at Bouchee on Newbury Street,” writes Katie Johnston. “Now he makes cheeseburger meatloaf for the residents at the Pine Street Inn.
“In the shelter’s kitchen, he also oversees the preparation of jerk chicken with pineapple rice pilaf for the Boston Foundation, chicken tikka masala for Simmons College, and baked ziti for doctors at Boston Medical Center.
“Van Overbeeke’s move two years ago from haute cuisine to homeless shelter was a key step in Pine Street Inn’s efforts to develop a corporate catering business to increase revenues to support its food service job-training program.” Read more.
Another job-training program in the culinary arts has been going since 1983 at a prisoner pre-release facility in Concord.
Betsy Levinson writes in a March 29 Globe article, “Four days a week, diners pay $3.21 to enter one of the drab gray buildings at the Concord rotary, drop off their licenses at security, and line up for a seat at one of nine tables in the cafe known as the Fife and Drum.
“Inmates serve as waiters, cooks, and busboys, all trained by chef Kim Luketich. Those who complete the 10-month culinary arts program get a Serve Safe food-handler certificate, making them eligible for work in restaurants.
“ ‘I love it,’ said Jacqueline Friedman, an Acton resident arriving for lunch. ‘It’s an experience. The guys are so nice and are trying so hard.’ …
“ ‘This is a premier program,’ said the superintendent. ‘No other facility has this kind of program that allows the community to come in and eat. We have some elderly who have come daily for years. It’s a great setting, a great atmosphere.’
“ ‘They learn quality skills,’ said Luketich. … “‘They learn social skills. The whole idea is that they will go back into society. That is what we focus on.’ ’’
Read more. As the article says, food service is one of the areas where there actually are jobs today, and it can be a way to get acclimated to dealing with the public.
Photograph: Bill Greene/Globe Staff
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged after magritte, amy, beth, concord, concord passion play, concord players, drama, jo, jon chase, kate clarke, literature, little women, louisa may alcott, marmee, meg, nancy shohet west, orchard house, pat kane, photograph, play, production, stoppard, theater on March 8, 2012| Leave a Comment »
Twenty years ago I helped out on what local people jokingly refer to as the Concord Passion Play: Little Women. It’s performed every 10 years by the Concord Players because (a) author Louisa May Alcott lived at Orchard House in Concord and (b) she was a founder of the theater group that became the Concord Players.
Kate Clarke is directing the show this year, and she just got some great publicity in the Boston Globe.
“ ‘Preparing to direct the play, I started to do some research and was fascinated to discover just how meaningful the book is to so many people,’ Clarke said.
“ ‘Even the rock star Patti Smith wrote in her recent memoir that “Little Women” was what made her feel as a young high school student that she could be an artist. It motivated her to go to New York and become a performer. I started thinking, “Good Lord, Jo March is everywhere! Why do people find her so compelling?”
“ ‘That’s the question I’ve been tackling with this group of actors. Yes, it’s about the Civil War era, and the societal restrictions that females were under at that time. But the fact that the book’s popularity has endured reflects what compelling characters these young women were.
“ ‘This story is so uniquely Concord and yet reaches far beyond the boundaries of Concord, just as it is a story about the 1860s that also brings up a lot of contemporary issues,’ Clarke said.” Read more.
Here’s photo by Jon Chase for the Boston Globe. Pat Kane, an incredible costume designer, is in the middle. (I don’t think she remembers, but the first time she worked for the Concord Players was when I sought her help on a one-act I directed, Stoppard’s After Magritte.)
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Alan Yost, amahl, amahl and the night visitors, Brad Amidon, christmas music, coloratura, concord, FOPAC, friends of the perfoming arts, gian carlo menotti, Julia Shneyderman, lunastellablog, menotti, Michael Prichard, music, oboe, opera, operetta, Ray Bauwens, robin farnsley, runck, soprano, Thomas Dawkins, xmas music on December 18, 2011| Leave a Comment »
Gian Carlo Menotti composed Amahl and the Night Visitors for an NBC Christmas show in 1951. He was under deadline and drawing a blank when the painting “The Adoration of the Magi” at the Metropolitan Museum of Art sparked his childhood memories of three kings who visit Italian children with gifts.
I have seen the operetta and listened to the recording many times. It takes only the first few bars and the lovely oboe representing the shepherd boy’s pipe for me to bring out the tissues and start crying and smiling all the way through.
A production today at the Friends of the Performing Arts in Concord was excellent. Kim Lamoureux took the role of Amahl. Robert Runck was stage director. Robin Farnsley was music director. Farnsley also was a breathtaking Mother of Amahl. Her anguish in the scene where her fear for her son overcomes her is heartbreaking as she inches toward the gold of the sleeping kings.
“All that gold! All that gold!
I wonder if rich people know what to do with their gold?
Do they know how a child could be fed? Do rich people know?”
You may read the whole script of this short operetta here. And there are lots of snippets on YouTube.
Update: December 22, 2013 at 2:00 p.m. and 4:00 p.m.
Amahl and the Night Visitors, with soloists Julia Shneyderman, Robin Farnsley, Ray Bauwens, Brad Amidon, Thomas Dawkins, and Michael Prichard. Chorus and orchestra conducted by Alan Yost, Tickets $20 adults/$10 students. Call 978 369-7911 or buy on-line.
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Posted in Uncategorized, tagged baking, concord, concord indies, cookies, decorations, frame shop, holiday, main streets cafe, massachusetts, recipe, sugar cookies, toy shop on December 10, 2011| Leave a Comment »
Still the best sugar cookie recipe comes from the cookbook John made in nursery school, age three.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cchs, concord, crafts, danish, fair, finnish, norumbega lodge, norwegian, scandinavian fair, swedish on November 12, 2011| 4 Comments »
I’ve been attending the annual Scandinavian Fair ever since Erik came into our lives. Although he has yet to be in town when it has taken place, it’s OK. He may not feel a need to be more Scandinavian than he already is.
The Scandinavian Fair is a real happening — “sui generis to a fault,” as the humorist S.J. Perelman might have said. Definitely the place to go if you have inadvertently run out of glögg.
Update 11/13/14: This year’s fair is Saturday, November 15, at Concord Carlisle High School, Walden Street, Concord, MA, starting at 10 a.m.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged autumn, band, beacon hill, bee, block party, boston, concord, fall, h.d., hd, honey, leaves, Luna & Stella, music, neighborhood, new england, orchard, poem, poet, poetry, walnut on September 25, 2011| Leave a Comment »
This is the time of year for walnut trees to bear fruit, for bees to bring in the last of the wine, and for block parties. Beacon Hill’s party is way more elaborate than any block party in Concord and is considered a time to raise funds for a cause. See if you can guess which party is which.
Orchard
by H. D.
I saw the first pear
as it fell—
the honey-seeking, golden-banded,
the yellow swarm
was not more fleet than I,
(spare us from loveliness)
and I fell prostrate
crying:
you have flayed us
with your blossoms,
spare us the beauty
of fruit-trees.
The honey-seeking
paused not,
the air thundered their song,
and I alone was prostrate.
O rough-hewn
god of the orchard,
I bring you an offering—
do you, alone unbeautiful,
son of the god,
spare us from loveliness:
these fallen hazel-nuts,
stripped late of their green sheaths,
grapes, red-purple,
their berries
dripping with wine,
pomegranates already broken,
and shrunken figs
and quinces untouched,
I bring you as offering.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged backyard birds, berries, concord, flowers, food, Frank Scimone Farm, fruit, hutchins farm, massachusetts, milldam, pete & jen's, produce, vegetables, verrill farm, yellow watermelon on September 10, 2011| 2 Comments »
Concord’s main business street, sometimes called the Milldam because it was built over a dam, got blocked to traffic this morning, and farmers set up booths. Concord doesn’t do this often because most farmers around town have their own stands. I bought a small yellow watermelon, corn, lettuce, green beans, and a tomato. Because I was on foot I resisted buying more, but the raspberries looked wonderful as did some seasoned salt, pots of flowers, dried hydrangeas, and homemade soaps.
Among the farms represented were Verrill Farm (where we went for Mothers Day brunch this year), Pete & Jen’s Backyard Birds, Frank Scimone Farm, and Hutchins Farm (pictured).
Last year we attended the Concord farms’ annual Stone Soup dinner, a benefit organized by the town’s Agricultural Committee — quite elaborate and delicious. A scholarship was awarded that night to a young local farmer as part of the campaign to encourage the next generation to pursue or stay in agriculture. I was surprised to learn that there are 18 farms in Concord. Read more here.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged activities, Bsrefoot Books, children's books, concord, landscaping, music, plants, play, pottery, publisher, puppets, storytelling, storytime on August 22, 2011| 2 Comments »
Barefoot Books, the children’s book publisher, opened its retail store in Concord this past spring.
In addition to selling books, the shop offers storytelling and pottery every day and numerous other activities, like music, dance, and yoga for children. There is a puppet theater play area, a kitchen for food events, and toys. Note the list of August activities in the photo.
The neighbors, by and large, loved the way the company decorated this long-empty building. And they especially loved the new landscaping.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged bookbinding, bookmaking, concord, craft, dabblers, handcraft, handmade books, hobby, jeannine stein, la times, los angeles times, quarry books on August 16, 2011| 3 Comments »
My friend and former colleague Mary Ann acquires, edits, and designs lovely craft books for Quarry. Today on Facebook, she linked to this article by one of her authors, Los Angeles Times writer Jeannine Stein.
Jeannine has published two craft books on making your own books: Re-Bound: Creating Handmade Books from Recycled and Repurposed Materials and, this year, Adventures in Bookbinding: Handcrafting Mixed-Media Books. This quote from Stein’s LA Times article gives you an idea of how she thinks about these projects.
“As I learned more complicated traditional bindings, I also gravitated toward unorthodox materials such as 19th century photographs, old quilts, cereal boxes and vintage record albums. My fascination with these materials was really born from books. Reading Laura Ingalls Wilder books made me crazy for worn, faded quilts, calico fabric and rough, unbleached cotton and linen that to this day inform my work. I cannot go to a flea market or thrift store without pawing through every basket of vintage linens, and I have a vast collection of 19th century tin types, carte de visite photographs and cabinet cards that inevitably become book covers or embellishments.”
By chance, my friend Kristina, who is an artist and teaches after-school art classes in her studio, is deep into planning student projects for the coming school year, with a focus on the art of books and bookmaking. I like making connections in general, and in particular, I have been passing leads to Kristina from Mary Ann. And while I was at it, I also promoted Quarry Books to the owner of Dabblers, a craft shop in Concord.
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