Muse Flashes
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Please send arts news items to MuseFlashes, in care of Kathleen Mellen, Box 299, Northampton, MA 01061, or email them to kmellen@gazettenet.com.
Compiled by Kathleen Mellen
Art cooperative
ART Works! ETTA Studio & Gallery (formerly known as Empowerment Through The Arts Art Studio, Amherst Community Art Center and Mudpie Arts and Crafts), located at 534 Main St. in Amherst, invites those interested in discussing the development of a community-run collaborative space for art to attend a brainstorming session Dec. 16 at 6 p.m.
ETTA has been teaching, showing and making art in the space for 15 years. Currently the studio is available for rent to artists for studio space and exhibits, and to community groups for meetings.
The conversation, dubbed "Occupy Art," will address the viability of ETTA becoming a cooperative, collaborative guild. Additional meetings are scheduled for Jan. 11 and 12 at 6 p.m.
For information, call 230-3272 or visit www.yippeeskippy.com/etta-arts-studio or www.etta-international.org.
Old classic, good as new
Frank Capra's 1947 holiday classic "It's a Wonderful Life" will be shown Dec. 17 and 18 at 11 a.m. at Amherst Cinema, located at 27 Pleasant St. in Amherst.
James Stewart stars at George Bailey, a compassionate but despairingly frustrated businessman who has a chance to see what life would have been like if he had never been born.
Bailey has spent his life giving of himself to the people of Bedford Falls. He has longed to travel but never dared leave for fear that, in his absence, rich skinflint Mr. Potter would take over the entire town.
The movie also stars Donna Reed as Bailey's wife, Mary, and Lionel Barrymore as the heartless slumlord Henry Potter.
Tickets are available at the Amherst Cinema box office or online at www.amherstcinema.org.
Holiday concert
The Pioneer Valley Symphony Chorus will celebrate its 50th season as it joins the Pioneer Valley Symphony Orchestra in a Holiday Family Concert Dec. 17 at 7 p.m. at Greenfield High School.
Music director Paul Phillips has selected a varied program of holiday favorites, popular arrangements and classical selections to celebrate the season.
The concert opens with the familiar Prelude to Englebert Humperdinck's children's opera "Hansel and Gretel." Selections from Anatoly Liadov's "Eight Russian Folk Songs" include a Russian Christmas carol and a religious chant.
Under the baton of director Jonathan Harvey, the chorus will perform the Latin setting of the Christmas story the "Magnificat" by Franz Schubert, with local soloists Carol Coan, Kathleen Galluzzo, Matthew Howell and Alan Harris. The first half of the concert closes with Howard Shore's symphonic suite "The Fellowship of the Ring" from "The Lord of the Rings."
In the second half of the program: "Trepak" the Russian dance from Tchaikovsky's "The Nutcracker Suite"; Alan Silvestri's score from the film adaptation of Chris Van Allsburg's book "The Polar Express"; "Christmas Memories" arranged by Bruce Chase revives old favorites like "Frosty the Snowman" and "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus"; Robert Kyr's "Voices for Peace."
For the grand finale, the 48 members of the Greenfield High School chorus will join the PVS Orchestra and Chorus to perform "The Many Moods of Christmas, Suite 1," a medley of Christmas carols by Robert Shaw and Robert Russell Bennett.
Tickets cost $20; $17 for seniors and students; $6 for children under 18. Tickets can also be purchased at Amherst Books in Amherst, Broadside Books in Northampton, World Eye Books in Greenfield and Boswell's Books in Shelburne Falls. Also available online at www.pvso.org or by calling 773-3664.
In their own backyard
East Street Dance Center will present "The Bluebird" Dec. 17, at 7:30 p.m. and Dec. 18 at 2:30 p.m., at Bowker Auditorium at the University of Massachusetts Amherst,
In addition to performers from the ballet school, based in Hadley, guest performer Marlen Alimanov from the Manassas Ballet in Virginia, will perform. Choreographed by Irina Vakhromeeva with music by Glazunov Katchaturian, "The Bluebird," a popular fairy tale written by Maurice Maeterlinck, follows the story of brother and sister Tyltyl and Mytyl who are sent by a fairy on Christmas Eve to find the Bluebird of Happiness. Guess where they finally find it?
Tickets cost $20; $15 for students and seniors. For more information visit www.eaststreetballet.com or call 584-5525.
Solstice concert
Guitarist and songwriter John Sheldon of Amherst will perform a solo concert Dec. 17 at 7:30 p.m. at the Echo Lake Coffeehouse in the Town Hall in Leverett. His theme: the winter solstice.
Sheldon, a professional guitarist since the age of 14, was Van Morrison's guitar player by 17 and at 21, was an accomplished studio musician. Since then, he has written hundreds of songs, including "September Grass," which appeared on a platinum album by James Taylor. Sheldon has composed for film and theater, conducted workshops in songwriting and composition and taught privately for 30 years. Over the years, he has continued to play gigs throughout New England.
Admission costs $12. For information, call 548-9394 or visit www.echolakecoffeehouse.org. The Town Hall is located at 9 Montague Road in Leverett.
