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.
Song & Story Swap
Singer-songwriter Carrie Ferguson will perform at this month's Song & Story Swap at 7 p.m. on Feb. 4 at The Nacul Center, 592 Main St. in Amherst
Ferguson has been performing since 1990, both solo and with her band, The Cherry Street Band, and has opened for the likes of Anne Heaton and The Mammals. She has been billed alongside Catie Curtis, The Stone Coyotes and Melissa Ferrick. Ferguson released her first full-length solo CD, "Riding on the Back of The Wind," in 2010, which features Pioneer Valley musicians Jim Henry, J.J. O'Connell, Mark Schwaber and Emily Breines.
The performance is free and open to the public. At the swap, people of all ages are invited to share stories and songs that are traditional, newly written or of personal experiences. Listeners are welcome. For information, call Paul Kaplan at 687-5002 or Jeff Lee at 636-1687.
UMass music
A saxophone master class and concert will be held with guest artist, Claude Delangle, a Paris Conservatory professor and world renowned saxophonist, with other performers, Nadine Shank and Scott Bailey. Both held on Feb 4, the master class will take place at 2:30 p.m., at the Fine Arts Center room 44, while the concert will take place at 8 p.m., at the Bezanson Recital Hall. There is no charge to observe the master class. For the 8 p.m. performance, tickets are available online at www.umasstix.com/musicanddance, at the Fine Arts Center box office, 545-2511, or at the door: $3 for UMass students; $5 for other students; $10 for the general public.
On Feb. 7 at 8 p.m., also at the Bezanson Recital Hall, a concert of new works composed and performed by jazz graduate students will take place, with the jazz faculty and UMass' Jazz Ensemble I. The event is free.
Nicholas Orovich, trombone and euphonium professor at the University of New Hampshire, along with Christopher Kies on piano, will perform at the Bezanson Recital Hall, UMass on Feb. 8 at 8:15 p.m. Tickets are available online at www.umasstix.com/musicanddance or at the Fine Arts Center box office. Tickets cost $3 for UMass Students; $5 for other students, seniors and children; $10 for the general public.
Film Fest
The 19th Annual Massachusetts Multicultural Film Festival, "Intersections: Fiction/Non-Fiction," will open Feb. 8 at 7:30 p.m. with the premiere of "Free Men," Moroccan-born Ismaël Ferroukhi's fictionalized exploration of the unsung role of North African Arabs in saving Jews from Nazi persecution in occupied Paris.
The festival continues through April 25 with weekly screenings of films from around the world, including documentaries and fiction from Iran, Poland, Guatemala, France, Germany, Israel, Finland, the U.S., Mexico, Palestinian Territory and the United Arab Emirates. New work by renowned directors including Werner Herzog and Lourdes Portillo will be shown, as well as movies by western Massachusetts filmmakers Wendy Woodson and Charissa Owens, and University of Massachusetts Amherst alumna Pamela Yates.
Coming up this month:
Feb. 15: "The Green Wave," from Iran, captures the emotions of protestors during Iran's 2009 uprising
Feb. 22: "Alamar," Mexican director Pedro Gonzales-Rubio's film about a young man in search of his Mayan roots. Screening with Charissa Owens "Love, The Trees."
Feb. 29: Werner Herzog's new film, "Into the Abyss," an investigation of a triple homicide in Texas.
For a full list of screenings, visit www.umass.edu/film. Most are held at UMass in the Isenberg School of Management Flavin Family Auditorium (137 SOM). Screenings are free and open to the public.
At Freedom Trails
"Crossing Boundaries" an exhibit of photographic works by Ani Rivera and Anna Rotty is on view at the Freedom Trails Gallery, located at Valley Frame Works, 534 Main St. in Amherst. Rivera is the gallery owner; Rotty is the gallery director.
The exhibit, which addresses techniques and photographic process through intergenerational perspectives, represents a variety of photographic-based work that connects analog and digital processes along with mixed media. The goal, the artists say, is to exemplify today's expanding definition of the photographic image.
Gallery hours are Tuesdays through Saturdays from 11:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. For information, call Rotty at 256-0949 or send an email to anna@amherstvalleyframeworks.com.
