Young Skeptics Club

The inaugural meeting of the Young Skeptics Club, founded by Dan Courtney (the person who gave the first atheist invocation at a Greece Town Hall Meeting), was Thursday afternoon, at the Fairbanks Road Elementary School in Churchville. He created this first-of-its-kind club in response to the evangelical Good News Club, which operates in the same school (and across the country). We met a few weeks ago to review the kickoff's lesson plan, with a theme of: “Fact or Opinion?” Dan developed an hour of material including presentation, interaction, reading of a story, and, of course, snacks! In the run-up to the Club's first meeting, it got lots of press, from articles in the D&C and Washington Post to the Christian Post and Glenn Beck's The Blaze. The YS founders were interviewed by Evan Dawson on WXXI, and were notified that a reporter from Channel 13 would be at the meeting to run a story that evening.

Several of the YS team

So a team of eight of us signed in, donned our Young Skeptics t-shirts, and waited for the kids to show up. Compared to the several dozen kids who attend the school's Good News Club, we were off to a slow start – two intrepid sisters, ages 5 and 9. No matter – we plunged right in, and these two adorable girls were totally game! I sat down at their table with them, to try to take the pressure off of them to answer all of Dan's questions, and to encourage a little silliness. At one point their father came in to observe, along with the reporter (and she interviewed him as well as Dan: http://www.13wham.com/news/features/top-stories/stories/young-skeptics-club-first-meeting-19309.shtml).

Dan had attended a Good News Club meeting a while back and encouraged the rest of the team to do the same, so off I trundled the next day to observe their meeting. When I approached Beth, the woman who appeared to be in charge, she seemed very defensive and secretive, and said she'd have to check with someone because they are very “protective of the kids” from outsiders (since I am not in that district, and I don't have kids in the school), and since they are a private club, they have no legal obligation to let me observe. She escorted me out of their main meeting room, and closed the door. I waited patiently in the hall and watched as various kids in the club were whisked away to other rooms (one instructor carried a sign ominously titled “Consequences”). After ten minutes, Beth returned with her husband, Richard, who informed me I was not welcome today, but I could request permission by calling him two weeks in advance of a future meeting, so he could discuss my background and motives (I suggested that we could do that right there and then, but he wanted to defer to his team to make a decision). I did ask him what he was afraid of, since I promised to be quiet, not take pictures, etc., and suggested that perhaps my impression of the group might be favorably changed by observing, but he expressed his doubt at that. It seemed to me they felt a little threatened by my presence! (Dan later pointed me to the school district's website that states that meetings by community groups, such as YS and Good News Club, must be open to the public:  http://www.cccsd.org/files/filesystem/3280%20July%202009.pdf). Wish I'd had that in my back pocket at the time!)

The goal of the Young Skeptics Club is to encourage kids to think, not to tell them what to think (which the Good News Club has covered – they specifically target impressionable young elementary school kids, and I can imagine that their “weapons are fear and surprise”...). I'll be co-developing the lesson plan for our February meeting, whose topic is “Evidence.” Everyone is welcome, no need to call in advance for permission (the kids do need permission slips from their parents). I hope someday some of the Good News Club coordinators get curious enough to join us. But I suspect curiosity is not in their wheelhouse, although that's just my opinion...

Other fun links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_News_Club (down at the bottom)

http://christiannews.net/2015/01/12/atheists-from-better-news-club-launch-program-to-counter-christian-good-news-club/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/religion/atheist-parents-take-on-christian-good-news-club-with-better-news-club/2015/01/08/3487b884-9766-11e4-8385-866293322c2f_story.html

https://richarddawkins.net/2015/01/in-response-to-christian-club-at-elementary-school-some-atheists-are-launching-a-skeptics-group-for-kids/

Concentus Concert - One Down, One to Go

(originally written for Concentus' blog)

It's always exhilarating and sad when we reach the culmination of a season's practice and finally perform. Months of rehearsals go into preparing for our concerts – I actually calculated the rehearsal-hours this season: 40, spread over 16 Sunday evenings. Of course, very few in the group attended every rehearsal (I myself am guilty of missing two) because of various scheduling conflicts  or illness. Still, it took many hours to get performance-ready for a roughly one-hour concert. And in those hours we got to understand the pieces in a way that might be difficult to convey to the audience in a single hearing. But that is part of our objective: not just making nice music, but communicating with the audience – the wintry mood of pieces such as Harri Wessman's “Water Under Snow is Weary” (sung in Finnish) and Bruce Sled's wordless “Ice,” * or the whimsy of Jocelyn Pook's “Snow Carol,” or the chant-like quality of Ola Gjeilo's “Ubi Caritas” despite the changing time signatures in our music (as we try to follow Gwen's advice and “get rid of the bar lines”). I know some of us (like me...) have personal objectives as well – to get particularly challenging passages right this time, finally!

Perhaps because we've had almost an extra month of rehearsal since the concert is in January, instead of December, I feel more comfortable and confident with the music than I have for past performances. And perhaps because of that additional time I have grown to love the pieces I initially approached skeptically, as I've come to appreciate their musicality, and the reasons Gwen chose them for this particular concert. So I am very excited to share them with our audience, and doubly glad that we have two concerts, not just the usual one. And that's the sad part – that after living with these songs for so long, waking up to snatches in my brain, it's time to let them go, some of them forever (luckily, Gwen does recycle some of the favorites periodically, like Gjeilo's “Tundra,” one of my personal favorites).

So if you missed our Friday evening performance, you have another chance Sunday afternoon at 2pm at Third Presbyterian on East Avenue, before we head back to the rehearsal room to start preparing for our May concert with the RPO!

* To hear and see the sheet music for this incredible piece, click here: http://larrynickel.com/CypressAudio/Ice.html

Cobbs Hill Reservoir

on a clear day, you can see downtown...

Our dog loves it when we drive him to the reservoir for a walk – he sits up when we make the turn up the hill and he whines impatiently until we let him out of the car. We love walking him there for many reasons: the paved walkway, which is plowed in winter; the low risk of deer ticks, relative to the parks; the waste bins, for proper disposal of...things that need to be disposed of; and of course, the view. On a clear day, you get not just the best view of the city of Rochester to the north, but also stunning vistas to the south, and the rolling hills hiding the Finger Lakes.

...and south to the Finger Lakes

I occasionally walk there with my friend Gwen, as well. Most people seem to walk the route counter-clockwise, but Gwen likes to shake things up and walk clockwise, so that we frequently meet people face to face, rather than passing or being passed. We encounter all sorts of people – young and old, walkers (with and without dogs) and joggers, friendly and unfriendly. But while Todd likes to be driven right up to the reservoir, Gwen likes to start out in the neighborhood below, and climb up the hill. One time she took me through a lovely neighborhood, where we met a resident who explained the cleanup effort that resulted in the now hike-able Washington Grove Park, a remnant forest. According to the information panels, “Washington Grove potentially holds the tallest and oldest individuals of white and black oak, sassafras, and butternut in New York State.”

yes, there are tiny people down there!

Cobbs Hill Reservoir was completed in 1908, and the plaque on-site explains that, “of unsurpassed quality, the water in this reservoir flows by gravity from lakes Hemlock and Canadice located 30 miles south.” The walking distance around the reservoir, measured specifically from the center of the walkway, is .69 miles. The reservoir recently underwent major maintenance, to clean the muck from the bottom and repair some of the pipes, so has been empty for months. I learned, from chatting with a couple of the engineers, that the reservoir holds 144 million gallons of water and covers 19 acres. While the water apparently is filtered at some point before it enters the reservoir, it goes straight out from there to our taps. There has been some discussion regarding additional filtering to improve water quality, although the reports we occasionally get from the Monroe Water Authority usually look pretty good. One engineer suggested that if the quality deteriorated, they would need to consider a giant pool cover!

the engineers discovered the water flowed better
if they didn't replace a section of corroded pipe

The water is flowing into the reservoir again, and it will take about a month to fill. When just over half full, they’ll start letting water back into our pipes. Here in Rochester, we seem to take our tap water for granted, because it is safe, abundant, and virtually free. I, for one, would be happy to compromise on the third to ensure the first two are never compromised…

beautiful sunset...

...and lampposts!

Rochappella

When I moved home from London in 2003, I desperately missed my a cappella singing group, the Treblemakers. We sang a mix of doo-wop, show tunes, and barbershop, with a holiday repertoire for December gigs. I explored two groups in New Jersey, neither of which was satisfactory (one sang to CD accompaniment, and involved choreography; the other was directed by an octogenarian and barely sang 2-part arrangements). When I moved to Rochester, I thought the Sweet Adelines might be the ticket, so I went to one of their rehearsals. For so many reasons (they must stand for their entire 2.5 hour rehearsal, and tape themselves and be judged by other members; they use arrangements that are written in SATB format; and they have very specific instructions for applying eye shadow for performances), they were not. I finally discovered Concentus, which I love being a part of, but it’s not my favorite genre of music, as beautiful as it is.

Some of my London friends urged me to start my own group, and I finally got the nerve, casually mentioning my dream to random women, and asking them if they sing. The usual response was a variation of “only in the shower,” but occasionally someone would say “yes”! We started small, and added friends, and friends of friends, until we reached critical mass, with 10 women. Rochappella was born. My goal for the group was to sing well enough to perform at nursing homes and the like, for free, and to have fun as well as bring some joy to our listeners. Although our target audience might not worry about the quality of our sound, we wanted to be decent, since there might also be staff and caregivers in the audience, who could hear…

Since we always have wine at our rehearsals, Lucy, who serendipitously lives across the street, dubbed us “a drinking group with a singing problem.” Ali, who I picked up at a holiday party last year, liked to say that we were “booking a year out.” And so now we are a year out. We just had our first performance, at the Brightonian nursing home, and we sang a mix of the familiar (including “Angels We Have Heard on High” and “White Christmas”) and the not so familiar (songs like “African Noel” and “S’Vivon”). It was heartwarming to entertain the residents and staff on a cold winter’s night, and to engage them in a sing-along before we departed.

We have one more holiday gig, and then we move on to the fun stuff – songs like “Summertime,” “Royals,” “Mister Sandman,” and a couple of Beatles arrangements (including one from the Treblemakers). Ali's already talking dates with the Brightonian for the Spring, and I suspect we can convince a couple of other nursing homes in Rochester to let us come entertain them next holiday season. In the meanwhile, there are songs to be learned and there's wine to be drunk, and “a girl has to celebrate what passes by.” I celebrate Rochappella, and the women who incredibly came together to create such a fun group, with such potential for the future.

Video Games Live with the RPO

members of Concentus who volunteered their voices
for the VGL concert

I’ve always dreamt of performing a choral soundtrack piece (preferably Koyaanisqatsi or La Double Vie de Véronique), but I guess Video Games Live is as close as I’ll ever come. There’s something about incidental soundtrack music that can be rich and compelling, with its tendency to use the chorus as an instrument – an extension of the orchestra. In the case of the VGL music, complexity was not a factor, although the lyrics were tricky – some seemed to be Slavic and others perhaps made-up, and by the end of the performance, I know most of the chorus had made up their own words to fit the fast-paced music! But it was rollicking. When Concentus’ conductor, Gwen, asked if I wanted to participate in what would be a motley crew of chorus members, I didn’t hesitate, even though it meant learning the music on my own (to mp3s sent by the concert coordinator) and an all-afternoon rehearsal immediately prior to the concert.

the orchestra watches as an audience member plays
Guitar Hero to mostly recorded music

This was the first time I’d been on stage with the RPO (singing the Holst didn’t count, since we were offstage behind a wall), and it was an amazing perspective on the musicians, conductor, and audience, whose energy we could see and feel. It was exhilarating to feel a part of the RPO, even though we were situated behind them and we feared our sound might not carry. The conductor and many of the musicians had earpieces that clicked the tempo for them, so they would stay together with the video projection (and the backtrack – there was obviously some electronic music that was being played simultaneously, perhaps even supplementing the chorus…).

There wasn’t a lot of finesse to this type of music – it was more theatrical (the music was really in support of the video) than interpretive – and it showed in the more casual approach of the conductor. At our choral rehearsal, we skimmed through the pieces, and received only minimal guidance from Maestro Fratianni about dynamics and entrances and cutoffs. The orchestra rehearsal was similarly lacking in subtlety – it really was all about the tempo – and the earpieces almost made the conductor redundant.

the audience are invited to shine their
cellphone flashlights

The event itself resembled a rock concert more than a traditional RPO performance. The audience was overwhelmingly young (people who were familiar with games like Tron, World of Warcraft, Tetris, and Skyrim), the songs were short, and there was a great deal of audience participation. This was probably the first exposure to the RPO for many, and it will be a challenge for the organization to find ways to continue to engage them in live orchestral concerts. At dinner between rehearsal and the performance with other Concentus participants, as well as principal clarinetist Kenny Grant (husband of one of the singers), we chatted about the need for more John Williams-type concerts, which stealthily expose a new generation to classical music.

conductor, creator/guitarist, and soloist
take bows as the orchestra departs

The final song was performed just by the show’s creator/guitarist (who had quite an ego…) and the soloist, as an audience sing-along. Many of the younger men in the chorus didn’t even need to twist around to see the words displayed on the giant screen behind them to add their voices. It made me think that there had been a lost collaborative opportunity for the RPO with a local college or high school choir. Not only would such a group have had more volume, they might also have been familiar with the genre, if not the specific music. And they could have brought additional audience to the hall in the form of family and friends. Their loss was my gain!

Ticket Forgiveness (not the traffic kind!)

Last Fall, a friend and subscriber of the NYC Ballet purchased extra tickets for us and two other friends, for a date in the Spring when I’d be in the city. But in her haste to get to her seat for that night’s performance, she didn’t bother to look inside the envelope. Apparently, there was mayhem at the box office that evening, and the agent misheard the request, and gave her tickets for February, instead of May. When she finally looked at the tickets in March, she was dismayed, and we both contacted the box office (they were no help, because they didn’t work for the ballet company) and then NYC Ballet’s customer service. They initially refused to exchange the tickets for the correct evening, even though we both explained the circumstances, and that it was unlikely that four of us all forgot to attend the performance. I even contacted the development office, promising to make a contribution if they rectified the situation (and checking online, there were still plenty of seats available for the performance we intended!). Radio silence, until a few days before the date, when the organization grudgingly reseated us for the correct date. What a struggle, and not the best way to build customer loyalty…

I’ve recently learned that two performing arts groups in Rochester have generous “ticket forgiveness” policies. Geva’s “Missed Performance Insurance” allows 6-Show Season Ticket Holders to see a show they’ve accidentally missed, as long as there is availability (you need to get there no more than two hours prior to curtain). Similarly, the RPO has something called “Subscriber Standby,” which allows subscribers to exchange unused tickets for a future performance in the same season, again, subject to availability. So one more reason to be a subscriber!

Obviously, both Geva and the RPO would rather you notify them in advance so they can re-sell your unused ticket, in addition to exchanging your ticket for a future performance. And if too many people abuse these forgiveness policies, the organizations might have to get less forgiving. Now, if you realize your error after the run of the show at Geva, or after the final RPO performance in May (it happens – my parents once showed up at the Kennedy Center for a concert only to find an empty parking lot and hall – they didn’t realize the tickets were for the prior year…), you’re out of luck. But as long as you catch your mistake in time, neither Geva nor the RPO will be as rude to you as the NYC Ballet was to me!

“Good People” – Great Show!

Charlie and I both thoroughly enjoyed Geva’s Good People, directed by Mark Cuddy, on its opening night two weeks ago – it’s funny, it’s thought-provoking, and it deals with issues that we here in Rochester can definitely relate to, even though it’s set in South Boston. And speaking of setting, the rotating triangular sets were fantastic and seamless (I’d seen this concept once before, in the first Broadway production of Chess, and it was a miracle no one was hurt, they were so erratic).

All of the actors are wonderful, and it was impossible to tell whose accent was real (Mark informed us at a pre-show talk that one of the actors actually hails from Boston) and whose were not, and Charlie and I each guessed a different person. I saw the show again on my regular subscription night, this time with my sister-in-law Kathryn, and my friend Jan. I was worried I might not enjoy it as much, knowing some of the jokes and all of the dramatic twists, but I think I actually liked it more, since I had had time to think about the issues in between. The characters of Good People remind us that, just as in Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken,” you can never know what might have happened if you’d chosen a different path. And they remind us that our memory is more elastic than photographic – we mold it to fit the story we want to make of the memory. That “truth” is not something absolute, and that one person’s “luck,” when viewed from a different perspective, is actually guided by unacknowledged, but very real actions on the part of other people.

Jan emailed me the next morning, saying, “I keep thinking about the play we saw last night, which is most often my measure of whether I really liked something or not – if I leave and never think about it again it probably was good, but not good enough to think about again. So I must have really loved the play.”

Good People is yet another memorable Geva co-production that will move elsewhere when it ends its run here on November 16. So unless you are planning to visit Indianapolis in January, see it here, soon.