Notes on the Arts

Young @ Heart

Young @ Heart is a chorus in Northampton, Massachusetts, as well as a movie about the chorus, its challenges and successes. Two things make this chorus different from any other: the average age of the participants is 80, and they sing songs you wouldn’t expect them to want to listen to, let alone sing, with enthusiasm and good spirits, songs like “Fix You” by Cold Play, “Schizophrenia” by Sonic Youth, the Clash, “I Want to Be Sedated,” by the Ramones, and more.

When the movie starts, many of the senior singers express a preference for classical music and opera. You have to wonder whether they are being forced to sing crazy rock music so people will laugh at them. In many of the early rehearsals, directed by the chorus leader, Bob Cilman, singers are expressing their dismay at music like “Schizophrenia,” and you start to feel a little uncomfortable about the whole thing. Maybe if they could sing opera and songs from the 30s and 40s, they would be happier. They would be just another old folks chorus (not that there are that many of them), though; they wouldn’t be going on world tours or be the subject of a movie.

Watching the rehearsals is a little painful. Singers are not in tune, or in time, and some are asleep. They do not learn quickly. You want Bob to give their solo to someone else who can handle it. You want them to sing something easier. You want them to drop this facade and sing the songs they know and love.

But as the move continues, you realize that singing and being in this group of singers, is vitally important to each and every singer. While they may plug their ears with cotton when loud rock music is played, they seem genuinely interested in broadening their musical horizons and giving their own expression to classic and contemporary rock music. Yes, it is still funny to see and hear old people sing “I Feel Good!,” but you are also convinced that they do feel good, and that music is why they feel so good. As one chorus member says, “music does a lot for your whole body. All the chorus members share a love of music with their good friends in the chorus, and they enjoy the thrill of making their audiences feel good too.

As the movie progresses, you get to know some of the individual singers, and some turn out to be very good singers. You mourn the loss of two members along with them, members who die while the group is preparing for a big concert. Members are united in their feeling that if (or when) they were to die, they would want the others to continue. The show must go on, and it does.

The movie contains several excerpts from Young@Heart performances, as well as three very well-done music videos. It is all lots of fun to watch, and the concert and video singing is very impressive. The members do finally remember their words, and they come in when they are supposed to, even though they couldn’t do it the day before.

Bob Cilman, who has led this group for 25 years, can be a stern taskmaster, though he is also quite sensitive to the frailty of his singers. He has witnessed deaths of many chorus members over the years, and, thanks to him, the show does go on, and it is a great inspiration.

Young@Heart is currently playing at the Regal Nickelodeon 5, 742 Nathan Ellis Highway (Route 151), in North Falmouth.

Growing an Orchestra

A small group of musicians at a recent gathering of the Falmouth Chamber Players, left to right, Hilde Maingay (violin), Laura Tutino (violin), Joyce Gindra (oboe), Fritz Sonnichsen (violin), Grant Mallett (violin), and behind him: Kate Housman (French horn), Jonathan Neufeld (viola). In front are Wendy Gabriel, Mary Sholkovitz (her arm only), and me (out of camera range) all on cello.

Ever since I took up the cello nine years ago, I have joined in discussions about what fun it would be to have an amateur orchestra in Falmouth, and those discussions no doubt precede my awareness of them. I was a member, for a semester, of a string ensemble at the Cape Cod Conservatory in West Barnstable. That was fun, but it was a long trip, and work tended to interfere with my attendance at rehearsals. And the end-of-semester concert was in Chatham. I also played flute in Falmouth Town Band for nine years, an energetic group of 100 or more musicians of all ages, under the direction of Lin Whitehead. I enjoyed that too, but I began to worry that my hearing was being compromised by sitting directly in front of a dozen trumpets every week.

Besides, I couldn’t play cello in Town Band. Clearly, we needed an orchestra. It seemed like a lot of work, to get an orchestra going, despite the plenitude of instrumentalists in and around town. There didn’t seem to be an available rehearsal space, a conductor, or available sheet music. Then, one day, pianist-oboist-singer Joyce Gindra and her neighbor Carol Knox, cellist-organist, got together for some piano/cello duets. In the course of their practicing, they thought, “wouldn’t it be nice to have more people, an ensemble, or maybe an orchestra?”

They both knew several musicians, and those musicians knew other musicians, and, in no time at all, there were about three dozen people (about nine of whom are cellists) interested in playing in the orchestra. Hilde Maingay found a place for the group to practice at Alchemy Farm in Hatchville, others located sheet music, and Joyce talked to John Yankee (who leads the Falmouth Chorale and the Greater Falmouth Mostly All-Male Chorus) about conducting the group.

The group, which calls itself the Falmouth Chamber Players, will meet three times in July (the last three Mondays of the month) to try out music and get to know each other better, before starting the season in the fall. Members value the group not only for the opportunity to play together in a chamber orchestra, but also for the chance to meet up with musicians with similar interests to play together on a continuing basis or for special occasions.

We met recently at Hilde’s house and played through some string quartets and quintets, doubling and tripling parts, as necessary. We had a wonderful time, and I was impressed by how good the individual players are and how musical they sound as a group. I am looking forward to the July sessions.

Amateur or professional musicians, young and old, who are interested in playing with the group should contact Joyce Gindra at jgindra at att dot net.

It’s Drawing Day

June 7 is international Drawing Day, so pick up a pencil and draw! There is a website to coordinate the Internet aspect of this event at DrawingDay. According to the site, Drawing Day is “a worldwide drawing event encouraging everyone to drop everything and draw for the sake of art.” The goal is to “create 1 million drawings online this day and boost online art communities.” The site provides links to online drawing communities and instructions for how to get your art online.

Whether you draw on the back of an envelope, online, or with traditional drawing media, it’s a great idea to express your creativity with a drawing, today, or any day.

Bluegrass on the Bogs

I‘m heading off-Cape this weekend to go to the Bluegrass on the Bogs festival about 30 miles away in South Carver. There will be a lot of local and regional bluegrass bands playing over the 2-day event: No Spare Parts, Lisa Bastoni and Chris Boucher, Bluegrass Invitation Review, Bradford Bog People, Crossfire, James Delnero & Lost Mountain, Falmouth Fiddlers, Harvest, Hickory Strings, Dawn Kenney Band, Matt Miklus, Oomph, Patmos Brothers Revival, Pine Hill Ramblers, Mike and Mary.

It promises to be a fun event; bluegrass music is energetic and exciting, without being overpowering. Most bluegrass bands have guitars, mandolins, violins, banjos, and a string bass, in one combination or another, plus singers. A couple of big-name bluegrass bands have cellos, notably Crooked Still and Abigail Washburn’s Sparrow Quartet, both of whom I enjoy. They are kind of alternative bluegrass/folk rock bands, both with female lead singers with delicate voices, more ethereal than hard-driving, and the cello adds a nice touch, supporting, rhythmic and deep. I have seen both bands perform at the Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival in upstate New York.

There won’t be any cellists at Bluegrass on the Bogs, though, so far as I know. Except me. I will be playing cello with the Falmouth Fiddlers. Nothing fancy; I’m an amateur player, like most of the other members of the group, and I started the cello fairly late in life. Mostly I will just try to keep up with the others. We (the Falmouth Fiddlers) will play old-time fiddle tunes, which aren’t as high-energy as standard bluegrass music, but are still quite fast-paced, and it is challenging to play these tunes quickly on a cello.

It’s fun though, even exhilarating, to play with other musicians, and to listen to the other bands. I enjoy it immensely, and I highly recommend it.