As soon as the Thanksgiving table is cleared, I feel liberated to start singing along to Handel’s epic oratorio, “The Messiah,” and to practice for the annual sing-alongs in Great Barrington, Mass., and Kent, Conn.
It seems unlikely that this year’s public sing-alongs will be held. To fill the void, there will be an online “sing-along Messiah” hosted by the Bardavon Opera House in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., on Saturday, Dec. 19, at 2 p.m.
It features excerpts from the 2019 performance of the Hudson Valley Philharmonic and Cappella Festiva. Lyrics will be streamed on the screen.
I’m not sure how all this will work, and I don’t know which sections of “The Messiah” will be included. It should be fun, however, and it’s free so there’s nothing to lose.
Sing-along essentials
Even though I will not actually be inflicting my voice on other people for this sing-along, this is the year I decided to reach out to several area singing pros to ask for tips. If you want to sound great (at least to yourself) try these out.
My first and favorite tip came from my friend Mary Sullivan, who has suffered through several sing-alongs with my friend Jody and I. Mary is an experienced and lovely choral singer and an active participant in the region’s extraordinary Crescendo program.
At a Messiah sing-along a year or two ago, Mary politely but firmly suggested that Jody and I cleanly break off our syllables instead of letting them trail along and deflate like pricked balloons. It’s a wonderful tip and definitely made us sound better.
These kinds of simple but essential tips, such as the ones that follow, should make your sing-along experience more fun — for yourself, and for anyone else in the room while you sing (and of course these tips can be applied when you’re singing by yourself in the kitchen while you cook).
Alice Maggio is a board member with the Berkshire Children’s Chorus. Her beginner-to-pro suggestions:
First, she said, “Find a comfortable room in your house where you don’t feel self conscious making a lot of noise.
“Set up your computer so that the screen is at a comfortable height for you to look at while standing.
“Wear shoes, not slippers — and make sure you don’t lock your knees when you’re singing.”
Following the score
Randy Orzano (who lives in Sharon, Conn., and bakes wonderful pastries at Sweet William’s in Salisbury, Conn.) is also a sometime singer with Crescendo. When asked for sing-along advice, he said, “I find that the prepared I am, the more fun choral singing can be.”
There are three steps to preparation that he recommends. First, get a copy of the score (which is the lyrics and the music). He suggested this one: scores.ccarh.org/handel/messiah/messiah-fullscore.pdf.
For those of us who can’t read music (and Handel’s music is very layered and complicated), there is a midi file you can download that will help you learn how to put the music and the words together.
“This website that has Midi files for all the choral parts: www.cyberbass.com/Major_Works/Handel_GF/Handel_Messiah.htm,” Orzano said.
Listen to it first, if you like, but, “Before you start singing, warm up your voice. Here’s a warm up I found on YouTube that I liked with a conductor named Katherine FitzGibbon: youtu.be/Narti8eO7Ho.
“Once your voice is warmed up, go to the CyberBass website and choose your vocal part for one of the Messiah movements.”
The CyberBass website is the one with the midi files.
“Sing along while reading the score. If the midi file is too fast, the website allows you to slow it down.
“Once your part is learned, try singing your part against a different part. For instance, if you’re a soprano, play the midi file for, say, the bass part and try singing your soprano line.
“You’ll find that there are sections that need more practice. Mark these sections and go back to practicing while listening to the soprano part.
“If you have a keyboard, go over your part, especially the challenging sections.
“If you want another challenge, find a YouTube video of a performance conducted by John Elliot Gardner (one of Christine’s favorites). Practice your part with their tempos and always check your intonation, phrasing, pronunciation (English is challenging).”
Above all, enjoy yourself
The Christine of whom Randy speaks is Christine Gevert, founder and artistic director of Crescendo, which makes its home at Trinity Church in Lime Rock, Conn. She had some tips of her own to share, although she modestly said she felt that Randy hit the high notes, so to speak.
She agreed that, “Listening to recordings beforehand is really important.”
For those of us who have sung along before but are flummoxed by trying to follow the sheet music, Christine suggests that, “A big part of being able to follow the score is highlighting your lines! It seems so obvious, but a big part of ‘reading’ the score is knowing where to read!
“If you are not a trained musician,” she added, “even looking at notes going up or down, and following with your voice is a big part of being able to sing.”
Here’s a pro tip: “A very helpful general rule: The more black you see, the faster the music goes (note heads and beams). White notes generally are slower.”
Above all, she counseled, have fun.
“Most of all: Go with your heart, your feelings! It is just wonderful to be part of a Messiah performance, and the music will lead you to a happy place — and your voice will follow that.”
The free live stream sing-along Messiah performed by Hudson Valley Philharmonic and Cappella Festiva (and you!) will be on Saturday, Dec. 19, at 2 p.m. For more information on this and other Bardavon Opera House streamed performances, go to www.bardavon.org.
Abstract art display in Wassaic for Upstate Art Weekend, July 18-21.
WASSAIC — Art enthusiasts from all over the country flocked to the Catskill Mountains and Hudson Valley to participate in Upstate Art Weekend, which ran from July 18 to July 21.
The event, which “celebrates the cultural vibrancy of Upstate New York”, included 145 different locations where visitors could enjoy and interact with art.
On Saturday, July 20, The Wassaic Project hosted numerous community events. Will Hutnick, the director of artistic programming, said “We’ve been a part of it since the beginning, this is the fifth year of UPAW.”
Most of the action was based at Maxon Mills, the seven-floor grain mill located in the heart of Wassaic. On exhibit was work from 30 artists, 18 of whom were past residents of The Wassaic Project. “Artists can come and do a residency here, meaning they live and work with one another for a couple months at a time,” Hutnick stated.
The first floor held work by Petra Szilagyi, who uses dirt and linseed oil to construct images of paranormal concepts, most of which include bats. They reflected that a recent trip to a fifth sense competition in Vietnam was the influence behind the exhibit.
Across the floor was Tiffany Smith’s interactive installation which incorporated plants and wicker chairs, all of which were objects associated with her Carribean upbringing. “The room being filled with plants is symbolic of hurricane prep which often included bringing the plants from outside into the house,” Smith said.
As visitors made their way up the narrow wooden stairs, music could be heard from behind the walls. The echoing music was Daniel Shieh’s installation, entitled Mother’s Anthem, which played a recording of the American Anthem in 30 languages. The languages ranged from Spanish and Italian to Navajo and Bengali.
Each floor was filled with artwork of all mediums, including painting, fibers, collage and photography. Rachel Bussières, who switched her concentration after watching the 2017 solar eclipse, uses varying light sources to produce lumen prints. During the wildfires, she recounted that she “made a new exposure each day to capture the changing air quality”.
Luciana Abait also incorporates the natural world into her pieces, instead using maps. An environmental activist originally from Argentina, Abait’s work highlights “environmental fragility, specifically the impacts it has on immigrants.” Her installation that is currently on display at Maxon Mills, takes the form of a mountain range built solely from maps of the US and Argentina.
Throughout the day, visitors could “Arm Wrestle 4 A Popsicle”. Winners had the choice of 3 playfully flavored trout-inspired popsicles - Nightcrawler, Power Bait, and Salmon Roe. Artist Katie Peck, who spent the day in costume as a rainbow trout, encouraged guests to step up and try their hand at an arm wrestle.
Shibori Indigo dyeing, group meditation, and dance workshops were open for community members of all ages as well.
While the daytime activities fostered appreciation of fixed art, a dance party until midnight at The Lantern Inn offered guests a space for performative art.
When describing the environment of The Wassaic Project, Smith emphasized, “It’s all community, it’s all love.”
A serene scene from the Amenia garden tour.
AMENIA — The much-anticipated annual Amenia Garden Tour drew a steady stream of visitors to admire five local gardens on Saturday, July 13, each one demonstrative of what a green thumb can do. An added advantage was the sense of community as neighbors and friends met along the way.
Each garden selected for the tour presented a different garden vibe. Phantom’s Rock, the garden of Wendy Goidel, offered a rocky terrain and a deep rock pool offering peaceful seclusion and anytime swims. Goidel graciously welcomed visitors and answered questions about the breathtaking setting.
Amenia Finance Director Charlie Miller welcomed visitors to his Bog Hollow Road garden in Wassaic, a manicured expansive yard with well-placed garden beds framing a far-reaching view. He said he plans carefully each winter for the next spring’s improvement.
The organic, environmentally responsible Maitri Farm was next, a lesson in coordinating agriculture with natural balance. The farm stand and a walk among the greenhouses brought visitors together.
Near the center of Amenia was the garden of Polly Pitts-Garvin, offering a chance to visit a robust vegetable garden with raised beds to be envious of and a remarkable absence of any insects or usual vegetable garden problems.
At Chez Cheese, the vast garden acreage surrounding the 1850s historic home of Joan Feeney and Bruce Phillips in Millerton, visitors could begin at refreshment stations where walking tour maps of the 15-acre property were available. There were streams and ponds with docks, and a dozen bridges arranged around the landscape. In the 19th-century, the property had been the home of the Wilson Cheese Factory, inspiring the name of the estate.
The Amenia Garden Tour was supported this year by Paley’s Garden Center in Sharon.
Gary Dodson working a tricky pool on the Schoharie Creek, hoping to lure something other than a rock bass from the depths.
PRATTSVILLE, N.Y. — The Schoharie Creek, a fabled Catskill trout stream, has suffered mightily in recent decades.
Between pressure from human development around the busy and popular Hunter Mountain ski area, serious flooding, and the fact that the stream’s east-west configuration means it gets the maximum amount of sunlight, the cool water required for trout habitat is simply not as available as in the old days.
This is not a new phenomenon. It does seem to be getting worse, though.
Gary Dodson and I convened where the creek makes its final run into the Schoharie reservoir, part of the New York City water supply system, on a semi-broiling Thursday afternoon, July 11.
The goal was simple. Catch smallmouth bass, which abound in the lower section of the river.
This was hot stuff — as in an 80-degree water temperature.
The air temperature was actually slightly less at 77.
After negotiating the intensely slippery rocks, festooned with treacherous algae, the first major pool presented several difficulties, with a back eddy competing with a main flow and several large trees draped about the whole thing.
I hit on the simplest strategy, which was to flip a weighted attractor fly called a Tequilley into the start of the eddy so it would proceed slowly but steadily into the maelstrom, sinking all the while.
This worked. A proper adult smallmouth, with bronze coloring and vertical stripes, took the thing.
The point-and-shoot camera finally died, however, and I was not going to try to fumble my phone out for a nice but routine fish photo.
Why not?
Because I guarantee the fish would have made a sudden, last-moment bolt for freedom, causing me to drop the device into the drink.
Gary moved downstream while I continued trying to annoy the residents of the pool, succeeding a couple of times with different colored Wooly Buggers.
Then we all got bored and I moved off, where Gary was catching rock bass and cussing them out for not being something else.
I have to admit, they are not the most compelling critters. Something about the red eyes.
This latest trip was dominated by extremely tedious and distasteful Harry Homeowner activities, but on both Wednesday and Thursday mornings I prowled Woodland Valley Creek. By “morning” I mean “dawn,” because that was when the water temps were down to a barely acceptable 64.
I made the acquaintance of several stocked browns and of a handful of their wild cousins. The wild fish are smaller and nimbler.
The successful ploy was an Adams wet fly, size 16, drifted behind something big, like a Parachute Adams or Stimulator.
