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Hollywood in Our Hills Maestro Stephen Gunzenhauser Premiers the Works of Eight Hollywood Composers at his Endless Mountain Music Festival
Sailing Above Chemung County Beneath the Waves of Seneca Lake Streets Alive in Lock Haven
JULY 20211
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Volume 16 Issue 7
12 The Wild Rose of
Hollywood in Our Hills
Pennsylvania
By Lilace Mellin Guignard
By David O’Reilly
Wellsboro businesswoman goes from wilderness to TV.
Maestro Stephen Gunzenhauser (left) premiers the works of eight Hollywood composers at his Endless Mountain Music Festival.
22 The Streets Are Alive By Linda Roller
Turning lemons into lemonade in Lock Haven.
28 Beneath the Waves By Karey Solomon
6 Climb Every Mountain
Seneca Lake’s hidden history.
34 Back of the Mountain
By Lilace Mellin Guignard
By Jerame Reinhold Best friends.
Get geared up for bouldering at Organic Climbing.
18 Let’s Go Flying By Mike Cutillo
The International Vintage Sailplane meet takes off at Harris Hill. Cover photos (from top left) Jason Akers, Jesse Etienne, Joanna Pane, Kara Talve, Omer Ben Zvi, Perrine Virgile, Sam Ewing (courtesy Endless Mountain Music Festival), and Jesse Hartov (courtesy Marisa Gunzenhauser); cover design by Gwen Button; (from top) Maestro Stephen Gunzenhauser, courtesy Endless Mountain Music Festival; courtesy Organic Climbing; courtesy National Soaring Museum.
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w w w. m o u n ta i n h o m e m ag . co m Editors & Publishers Teresa Banik Capuzzo Michael Capuzzo Associate Publisher George Bochetto, Esq. D i r e c t o r o f O pe r a t i o n s Gwen Button Managing Editor Gayle Morrow S a l e s R ep r e s e n t a t i v e s Shelly Moore, Richard Trotta Circulation Director Michael Banik Accounting Amy Packard Cover Design Gwen Button Contributing Writers Maggie Barnes, Mike Cutillo, Ann E. Duckett, Alison Fromme, Lilace Mellin Guignard, Carrie Hagen, Roger Kingsley, Don Knaus, Dave Milano, Cornelius O’Donnell, Brendan O’Meara, David O’Reilly, Karey Solomon C o n t r i b u t i n g P h o t o g r ap h e r s Mia Lisa Anderson, Anne Barnett, Helen Barrett, Justin Barrett, Bernadette Chiaramonte, Diane Cobourn, Rachel Heitzenrater, Michael Johnston, Loraleah Marie Photography, Jerame Reinhold, Linda Stager, Sherri Stager, Sarah Wagaman, Curt Weinhold, Gillian Tulk-Yartim D i s t r i b u t i o n T eam Brian Button, Grapevine Distribution, Linda Roller T h e B ea g l e Nano Cosmo (1996-2014) • Yogi (2004-2018) ABOUT US: Mountain Home is the award-winning regional magazine of PA and NY with more than 100,000 readers. The magazine has been published monthly, since 2005, by Beagle Media, LLC, 39 Water Street, Wellsboro, Pennsylvania, 16901, and online at www.mountainhomemag.com. Copyright © 2021 Beagle Media, LLC. All rights reserved. E-mail story ideas to editorial@mountainhomemag. com, or call (570) 724-3838. TO ADVERTISE: E-mail info@mountainhomemag.com, or call us at (570) 724-3838. AWARDS: Mountain Home has won over 100 international and statewide journalism awards from the International Regional Magazine Association and the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association for excellence in writing, photography, and design. DISTRIBUTION: Mountain Home is available “Free as the Wind” at hundreds of locations in Tioga, Potter, Bradford, Lycoming, Union, and Clinton counties in PA and Steuben, Chemung, Schuyler, Yates, Seneca, Tioga, and Ontario counties in NY. SUBSCRIPTIONS: For a one-year subscription (12 issues), send $24.95, payable to Beagle Media LLC, 39 Water Street, Wellsboro, PA 16901 or visit www.mountainhomemag.com.
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5
Hollywood in Our Hills
Maestro Stephen Gunzenhauser Premiers the Works of Eight Hollywood Composers at his Endless Mountain Music Festival By David O’Reilly
M
aybe you watched this summer’s hit movie, Godzilla vs. Kong, or saw its trailer, or read a review. Did you find yourself wondering which monster you’d root for in battle? Godzilla’s got those stumpy legs, but an armored tail—and he breathes fire. Yeah, but look how Kong twists and turns. And those fists! So, which guy is smarter? Which one’s quicker? More sympathetic? Heroic? Now imagine yourself at an electronic keyboard. Your job is to turn each of these snarling beasts into…music. That’s the imaginative leap Hollywood composers make every day as they score music for film and TV. With digital synthesizers and sound libraries that can mimic kettle drums, a cello, the coo of a mourning dove, or a whole symphony orchestra, they evoke the fury of war, the tenderness of a kiss, a stalker’s creepiness, the sadness of goodbye. And on July 17, at Mansfield University’s Steadman Auditorium, the 2021 Endless Mountain Music Festival will celebrate the art of modern film scoring with the premiere performance of “The Emerging Hollywood Composers Concert.” Under the direction of Artistic Director Stephen Gunzenhauser, the festival orchestra will perform the works of eight young scoring composers who’ve lately made their marks on Hollywood. Starting with the 1940s and continuing to the past decade, each composer was assigned one decade and invited to capture the spirit of its films and TV in an orchestral work of about seven minutes. It’s a unique concept, consistent with the maestro’s aim to fill the festival with variety and surprises. “Keep in mind, the festival [it runs July 16 to August 1] is not designed to be a classical musical festival,” he explains from his home in Lancaster County. “It’s a festival of music.” Yes, there will be plenty of classical music, with works by composers like Rachmaninoff, Beethoven, and Mendelsohn—and some you may not know. Does the name Sergei Taneyev ring a bell? He was a student of Tchaikovsky’s, and Stephen thinks you’ll
like his Symphony No. 2. “It’s quite beautiful. I did the American premiere,” he says. “This is a piece that deserves to be heard.” But if long hair music is not your style, take heart. The festival’s sixteen evenings will include an all-Celtic concert, a brass quintet under the stars at Cherry Springs State Park, a “Movie Night” featuring a tribute to big band jazz great Artie Shaw, an Argentine tango take on Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons,” a Dobro blues guitar concert at a church, a free afternoon pops concert at Wellsboro-Johnstown Airport, and of course the “Composers Concert.” It promises to be one of the jewels of this year’s festival. “The talent involved in doing music for the movies is remarkable,” Stephen marvels. “If Mozart or Beethoven were living today in America, they probably would have chosen to be movie composers. I’ve always felt that the music that accompanies movies is what makes them successful.” To demonstrate that notion, he once showed the opening scenes of Woody Allen’s Manhattan at a concert without the original, soaring clarinet soundtrack from George Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue.” “Then we turned it around with live music,” he recalls with a fond chuckle. “The difference was remarkable.” The idea for The Emerging Composers Concert began in 2019 with Stephen’s daughter, Marisa Gunzenhauser. She’s chief operating officer at Sparks & Shadows, the acclaimed Hollywood scoring studio of Emmy- and BAFTA-Award-winning composer Bear McCreary. He and his team have scored such TV series as Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Battlestar Galactica, and Outlander, and such films as the 2019 Godzilla, King of the Monsters and this year’s Academy Award-nominated documentary, Crip Camp. “I was talking one day with Etienne Monsaingeon,” one of Bear’s in-house composers, Marisa explains in a phone interview from Los Angeles. “We work together, and he was showing me a piano piece he was improvising. He’s very young, very positive, and he was saying, ‘Oh, my gosh, I wish I could play this with a symphony orchestra, See EMMF on page 8
6
Courtesy Marisa Gunzenhauser
Pioneering piece: Kara Talve brings the 1940s to the Steadman Auditorium stage with her world premiere composition “Winter Rhapsody.”
7
Courtesy Marisa Gunzenhauser Minimal masterpiece: Perrine Virgile (center) brings her piece, “Odyssey of the New World,” to celebrate the 2010-2020 decade. EMMF continued from page 6
but I don’t think that will ever happen.’ And I said to Etienne, ‘Let me think about this. My father’s a symphony conductor. I think I can figure this out.’ I knew I couldn’t pitch the idea of Etienne writing one small piece for this big festival,” she recalls. “So I just started connecting the dots. And I thought ‘Okay, I work with all these amazing young composers, and part of my job is to make them feel supported and nurtured.’ They mostly work behind the scenes and don’t always get recognition.” The sparks in the shadows, so to speak. Marisa then seized on the idea of inviting perhaps a half-dozen young composers to each rescore their favorite movie, but quickly realized “that would get us into licensing. So, I sat down with Bear, and he started bouncing ideas around with me. We came up with the idea of each composer scoring a decade of film, and all of a sudden, there it was.” She then ran the idea past her dad. “He’s got the coolest job in the world,” she says. “I always wanted to work with him.” 8
“As soon as she told me about it, I said, ‘That’s fantastic. Come to me with details,’” Stephen recalls. “And she did.” By then she’d invited eight composers and “got them all to agree and be enthusiastic about the project.” Five score films and TV for Sparks & Shadows, one is independent, and two compose for other studios. The chance to step out of the shadows means a lot, they say. For her composition associated with the 1940s, Kara Talve, twenty-four, listened to works of the pioneer film scorer Erich Korngold, and the era’s jazz and big bands, which inspired the harmony and feeling of the piece. She calls it “Winter Rhapsody.” “What I liked was the process of writing it,” says Kara, who scores for Bleeding Fingers studio in Santa Monica. “In my line of work, you’re sending work off to clients and a lot of the time it comes back; they don’t like it, or they want changes. But this was my concert piece, and I wanted it to be very good…I could write what I wanted, and that was very freeing.” Stephen puts the premise in context: “When you see you see a name like John
Williams,” who scored such film classics as Schindler’s List, Saving Private Ryan, Lincoln, ET, and the Harry Potter and Star Wars series, “you say ‘Gosh, he sure did a lot of writing.’ But that’s not necessarily how it works. The composer does the main structure, but then they have a studio of five to fifteen people who work for them and fill it out. “These are composers in their own right,” he declares. “They’re living in the shadows, waiting for an opportunity to do their own movies.” By winter of 2020 the eight were hunched over their instruments and synthesizers, teasing out ideas. But their contributions didn’t end there. Each also created a twenty-minute “master class” video for EMMF demonstrating how he or she creates a film or TV score. Each is wildly different and thoroughly amazing, even if you don’t know a clef from a stave. You can view the classes, see the program, meet some of the artists, and buy tickets at the festival’s website, endlessmountain.net. Etienne Monsaingeon—the Sparks & Shadows scorer whose worry that he
might never perform his piece with a symphony orchestra inspired the “Composers Concert”—confesses he “didn’t sit down and watch movies from the [early] 2000s, because those were my teenage years, and I could draw from that.” A concert pianist at heart, Etienne, thirty, “tried to create a nice, emotional piece representing who I was” in that decade. Over four days he composed “Once Upon a Time.” Piano is the lead instrument, and the piece is “not too complex harmonically, in the style of the 2000s…The catchy melody comes back over and over, but it’s played with different orchestration and harmony each time, so you get a different feel.” Perrine Virgile landed 2010-2020 for her piece, a decade whose music leans towards a “very minimalist, repetitive style,” she says. “I love working in that genre.” Perrine, thirty-one, who works with Hollywood composer Jeff Russo scoring the Netflix hit The Umbrella Academy, points to British composer Max Richter and the austere contemporary Icelandic composer-performer Olafur Arnalds among the inspirations for her piece, “Odyssey of the New World.” She also confesses to a “crazy dream” of someday touring like Arnalds and, also as he did, recording albums of her own compositions. “Odyssey” has a theme “that loves full orchestra: more on the sad, lovetheme kind of energy rather than action or horror…I tried to give something to everybody in the orchestra, but it focuses on piano and strings.” It would “play great,” she says, against a backdrop of scenes from Interstellar, La La Land, and The Grand Budapest Hotel. Alas, a not-so-funny thing happened on the way to the 2020 Endless Mountain Music Festival and the premiere of the “Composers Concert:” the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions forced its cancellation. “We had no choice,” recalls the festival’s longtime executive director, Cynthia Long. “I even had to furlough the staff.” At Marisa’s suggestion, she and Stephen inaugurated a brilliant series of recorded performances, viewable online, that found a national audience See EMMF on page 10
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Congrats to our June Photo Contest Winner... Jerame Reinhold If you’re interested in getting on our photographer mailing list or to submit your photos for next month, email gwen@mountainhomemag.com or call 570-724-3838. 9
Courtesy Marisa Gunzenhauser
Sneak-peek: Sam Ewing brings the heartbreak and tragedy of romance gone wrong in his 1950s piece “Age of the Boom.” EMMF continued from page 9
for both the musicians and EMMF with the help of Triode Media Group, a video production studio based in Lancaster. “They put together twenty-five hours of concerts by the performers who’d been cancelled,” says Stephen. “We dedicated it to the first responders,” explains Cynthia, “and it opened with Aaron Copland’s ‘Fanfare for the Common Man.’” The virtual festival has attracted more than 38,000 paying views in forty countries. “It’s going to take a couple of years to recoup” the losses from 2020, she predicts. But thanks to the private, government, and corporate sponsors who allowed EMMF to hold on to last year’s donations, and revenue from the virtual performances, the not-forprofit festival has survived to celebrate its fifteenth season. Still, the premise of “The Emerging Hollywood Composers Concert” was always a live performance before an audience in a concert hall. It would have to wait until 2021 for its premiere. The Corning Museum of Glass’s 750seat auditorium, where this year’s concert had been scheduled, still won’t be open. And so, baton in hand, the maestro will be taking the podium at Mansfield University’s 55010
seat Steadman Auditorium. For added fun, scenes from each composer’s film decade will play on a large screen. What to expect? The composers explain. “I don’t consider myself a musician or a composer. I consider myself a filmmaker,” says Jason Akers. “Music is how I contribute to the making of a film.” As the oldest of the contributing composers, Jason recently launched his own scoring firm after working nearly seven years at Sparks & Shadows on some of its most celebrated projects. Jason “jumped” at the opportunity to score the 1980s. “I was an ’80s kid,” he explains, and recalls “responding so vividly” as a boy to the scores of Return of the Jedi and ET. The films of the decade also included Superman, Alien, Indiana Jones, Die Hard: “a ton of sci-fi and superheroes,” he says. He titled his piece “A Hero’s Journey.” It starts with a “building, rhythmic fanfare: the introduction of the hero…then the middle section gets small as the hero looks for something in a dark cavern.” At the “revelatory moment” the music gives way to “awe and glory,” then to strings at the hero’s near death, followed by an “epic battle in which the hero is triumphant,” ending with a “fanfare sendoff.” While most of the composers had
expected to attend the 2020 concert, the uncertainties of COVID-19 restrictions on air travel this spring compelled many to make other plans. Etienne won’t be traveling east to perform the piano piece that launched the concert, although Kara plans to attend. Stephen holds out the possibility of an “encore presentation [of the concert] next summer, so that they can experience their piece.” Joanna Pane chose the ’70s because “it’s just a pivotal era in film and music, and there are so many movies from that era I love: The Godfather, Amarcord, Taxi Driver. These films convey alienation and isolation in really profound ways.” She named her piece “Against the Odds,” and for its melodic theme relied on the feel of the 1977 Italian film, A Special Day, set in Fascist Italy. “I was trying to convey the angst and isolation we feel as a society despite all the interconnectedness of the modern world.” Ultimately, though, her piece affirms, she says, “the enduring nature of the human spirit in the face of struggle.” Jesse Hartov’s many projects with Bear include the score for Crip Camp: this year’s Oscar-nominated documentary on the disability rights movement that he calls See EMMF on page 32
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Lilace Mellin Guignard
The Wild Rose of Pennsylvania Wellsboro Businesswoman Goes from Wilderness to TV By Lilace Mellin Guignard
O
n Thursday evening, June 10, Rose Anna Moore (above) sat in Your Mama’s Mug in downtown Wellsboro, sipping a gin and tonic and surrounded by friends, to watch the first episode of Season 8 of ALONE on The History Channel. It’s a reality show that bills itself as “the most intense survival series,” in large part because there are “no camera crews” and “no gimmicks.” All eyes were trained on the television, waiting for Rose to appear. When she did, cheers filled the bar. “My voice came from the speakers and I thought this is so weird,” Rose says. This season the show takes place in the Chilko Lake wilderness in British Columbia, the largest high elevation lake in Canada. Here temperatures can drop to as low as thirty degrees below zero, and salmon come to spawn. Grizzlies eat salmon, and upwards of 200 of the bears live in the area where contestants are dropped off to fend for (and film) themselves. About halfway into the episode, Rose’s story begins. Most
12
folks in the bar know she owns and operates Moore’s Sports Center, a sporting goods store/training center in town, and is skilled at hunting, fishing, and trapping. But last year they did not know what she was doing when she was away from her shop and grown children for so long. The details of filming the show cannot be leaked, and even as I write this I don’t know how long Rose lasted and if she won the $500,000 prize. Rose loves the natural world, believes adaptability is her greatest strength, and is mostly self-taught in survival skills. She dedicates time and resources to educating youth, especially girls, about conservation and the culture of hunting. On screen she explains, “My end goal in this experience is to prove that as a woman I can do this. I’ve always been the hunter, never the hunted. Unless I get attacked by a bear, I don’t think I’m tapping out.” More cheers. “I’d forgotten so much of the early details,” says Rose. “I’d forgotten how smoky it’d been at first [from U.S. fires
blown north]. I’d forgotten how graphic the footage was.” She’s referring to the result of eating too many kinnikinnik berries on day five, and how good the audio was. Though she’d crawled off camera, the sound of her vomiting was distinct. How does a forty-three-year-old woman from Wellsboro come to be on such a show? Producers found her on social media. “People think you have to have a big following to get chosen for the show, but I only had about fifty subscribers to my YouTube channel when they asked me to submit a video application,” she says. There were about 20,000 applicants. Out of those, twenty-four were invited to boot camp that June. “They do that to make sure everyone can do what they say they can. And to get a sense of personalities.” Rose was withdrawn at first. “Others actually had their own survival schools. I kept thinking Here I am, just a girl who hunts.” She got the news at the end of July that she’d made the final cut. See Rose on page 14
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Rose continued from page 12
(3) Courtesy Rose Moore
“We were all asking each other, have you heard? They wait till the last minute to tell us so we have to rush to prepare. We still didn’t know where we were going.” Loyal watchers of the show know contestants are alone in the wilderness for as long as they can stand it—100 days is the max so far. But they’re away from their families much longer than that. (Missing family is a common reason for “tapping out.”) Season eight included a two-week quarantine. Rose didn’t learn where she was going till a few weeks before she left Wellsboro. In late July, she shipped out to quarantine hundreds of miles from and at a much lower elevation than their eventual location. “We were basically sitting there getting fat,” she says, which isn’t a bad thing in this case. But she was stir crazy. Eventually, careful to keep twelve feet away if she saw anyone, Rose started walking—fifty-plus miles in a few days. “The others said they’d look out their windows and say, there goes Rose with her backpack.” The next two weeks of orientation were focused Just a girl: Rose on learning bear safety, first aid, show rules, local Moore shows off her survival skills and federal laws, getting their certificates for legal during her time on trapping, and intense camera training. Then came the HIstory Channel’s the day to leave. It was September, she’s not sure of show Alone. the date. Rose was up at 3 a.m. to drink her last cup of coffee and give a quick call home. Leaving was staggered. Locations and order are assigned randomly through a series of drawings. Each spot has equal resources, including water, flora, fauna, and allows open fires. Luck would play a large role in everyone’s success. “You want to be dropped off early, so you have as much of the first day as possible to get set up.” Rose says with a wry grin, “I drew the last slot.” Soon enough, after being frisked and searched, there she was, the boat roaring away, a large pack full of her ten chosen survival tools—including a long bow—basic survival clothing, and bear spray. (Firearms are not allowed. Complete gear lists can be found on history.com.) Next to that was more than fifty pounds of cameras—one large with tripod, one medium hand-held, and a few small ones. She used the tarp to set up a temporary shelter. A thunderstorm was coming. It would be a while before she could really explore her area and try her hand at fishing. It was days before she saw the mountain range across the lake due to rain and smoke. No matter the weather, she had to shoot footage, which was collected every week at the random medical check. Other than that, Rose had no one around, only a satellite phone for emergency use. Back in Wellsboro, Rose notes that “we have earthworms and grubs everywhere. I couldn’t find an earthworm there to save my life. Literally.” She laughs. The fishing had been disappointing. The lake was shallow so far out that she couldn’t throw a line in deep water. The grizzlies were abundant, but, other than grouse, prey animals were scarce. Local regulations forbid hunting squirrels and mice. “There was a mouse eating my stuff, and I wasn’t allowed to eat it.” Rose wishes she’d approached the experience more like a game show rather than berating herself when she made a mistake. The mental and emotional fortitude required is as important as the physical. Everything takes a lot more effort when you’re hungry, and cameras required even more calories and time. When cutting a
14
See Rose on page 16
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Rose continued from page 14
tree, Rose would lug the big camera and set it on the tripod. She might climb a tree to set one high, put another on the ground, and wear a GoPro on her head. Then she’d cut the tree, drag it past the cameras, go back and move the cameras to camp, grab the tree and drag it into camp past the cameras. Since being home, Rose’s online presence is taking off. Her time is split between her store, her “My Quest” brand of products, preparing for her next hunt as she pursues the North American Superslam in archery, and mentoring new hunters. She also serves as the Northeast Regional Director of Hunters Sharing the Harvest, which gets venison to hungry Pennsylvanians. “I want to build community,” she says. She is unapologetic about who she is and what she does, but she doesn’t have the type of ego that enters the campfire circle before she does. “I never want to be the person you feel challenged by. I want to be the person who makes you want to challenge yourself.” Season 8 opens with a quote that reads, “The worst cruelty that can be inflicted on a human being is isolation.” Does Rose agree? “I would say yes if there would never be that social interaction again. But to be alone for smaller extended periods, I encourage that. I found out who I was long ago by being alone, and [then], when I come home, the level at which I appreciate people—I can’t explain that to someone who’s never experienced it.” Season 8 of ALONE airs Thursdays at 9:30 p.m. through August 18 on The History Channel. Past episodes can be viewed on history.com. Find out more about what Rose is up to at mooreroseanna.com, on YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram. Moore’s Sports Center is at 36 Plaza Lane; reach the store by phone at (570) 439-8024. Lilace Mellin Guignard raises her kids in Wellsboro where she plays outdoors, gets wild with community theatre, and shakes things up at Sunday school. She’s the author of When Everything Beyond the Walls Is Wild: Being a Woman Outdoors in America. 16
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Lilace Mellin Guignard Climbing interest: owner Josh Helke stands amid stacks of crash pads used to catch falling climbers.
Climb Every Mountain
Get Geared Up for Bouldering at Organic Climbing By Lilace Mellin Guignard
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y husband and I moved to northcentral Pennsylvania from Reno, Nevada, where we’d enjoyed rock climbing in the Eastern Sierras. Before that we’d lived and climbed in western North Carolina. When we moved here, we missed having crags close by. The ones we did find weren’t very tall and were a long hike in. We had little kids now and less time. Soon we had less fitness. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t bitter about giving up my favorite outdoor activity. So I’m feeling a bit sheepish discovering more than ten years later that Pennsylvania has a strong climbing community and even a popular manufacturer of climbing gear in Philipsburg, just outside State College. Organic Climbing, like the state’s distinctive sandstone and gritstone boulders, is a business worth tracking down. I drive two hours and, as I pull into the business park,
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my map software tells me the factory is on my left, but the two rows of solar panels tells me it’s on my right. I walk inside the open space with tables, shelves, and huge windows and instantly know the people who work here enjoy their jobs. The vibe is as obvious as the bright colors of fabric scraps and rolls stacked all around me. Around the corner is Josh Helke, owner and designer, who smiles, thanks me for coming, and shakes my hand. (I’ve really missed shaking hands with people I meet.) He shows me around and explains that he named the company Organic Climbing because it only makes gear for bouldering, a type of ropeless climbing that’s just the basics. No wearing a harness, belaying, clipping bolts, or placing protection, though you still need special rubber-soled shoes. It’s both more and less social because
you can go with a group and always be within talking range, or go by yourself to be one with the rock. In either case, crash pads are key. These pads range in size and thickness—thicker for higher falls—and are there to keep the boulderer from grounding, because inevitably you fall sometimes. There’s more commitment required to climb without a rope, but who among us didn’t love scrambling on top of boulders as a kid? This just takes that instinct and glee into the next level. Though the crash pads, chalk bags (chalk helps you grip), and packs aren’t made of organic materials, quality and sustainability are keystones of the business. Since the beginning, Josh has used the most durable Cordura Nylon. They sell replacement pieces to keep gear out of the landfill longer. Their iconic designs emanate from the use of fabric scraps to create tri-
welcome to color pieces, each unique. You may choose the same colors for your order as your friend, but the shape of the scraps determines how they’re put together. This approach and their solar power makes them nearly zero waste. They weren’t always in Pennsylvania. Josh, a climber since age five, started the business out west in 2004 after being involved with outdoor product design for other companies and seeing a dive in quality in a race to see who could market the cheapest gear. It was no longer the gear he’d grown up with, supplied by small companies making a core product they used themselves after work. He got fed up and began producing pieces in his house in Laramie, Wyoming, expanded to his garage, and soon to an A-frame he and his wife were caretaking. Friends worked out of their homes after school and work. After six years, Josh’s wife, who’d finished her doctorate in geology, got a post-doc in Minnesota, so the business moved there and took on more of a crew. In 2009, Liz Hajek got a faculty position at Penn State, so this is where the family and business settled. Turns out the state had always been in their top ten sales. I’m surprised to hear that. Bouldering has always seemed like a western sport. Josh agrees, but says there’s a specific flavor to east coast climbing and cycling—a sweaty, slimy greenness in our lush part of the nation. “At a time when large companies are buying up mom and pop independent companies in our industry and homogenizing once brand-unique product lines for big box retailers,” Josh says on a video, “our style is our voice.” Pushing against the tide is central to his work ethic. They source almost 100 percent from the U.S.A., and from the start he committed to building in this country as well, literally purchasing competitors’ sewing machines as they sent their gear overseas to be made. As COVID-19 sent greater numbers of folks outdoors, their demand for crash pads skyrocketed because suppliers like REI and Backcountry couldn’t keep the ones made overseas in stock. When the factory was shut down, the core employees sewed from their garages like in the early days. Since they do production sewing, where people sew the same pieces all day rather than a complete product, a van had to do pick-ups and deliveries. There was a surge of cyclists too, so they started producing bags for them under the name Nittany Mountain Works. The crisis has shown Josh the importance of cross-training, which he sees as the future of U.S. manufacturing. It also helps them have a generous vacation and sick leave policy, because there are people ready to fill in. Now they employ eight fulltime people and two dogs. Workers receive health bonuses, paid maternity/paternity leave, climbing gym memberships, and employee bonuses. Though doing the same thing all day might seem monotonous at first, they can listen to music or podcasts— even learn a language. “To make the product we want to make,” Josh explains, “the hands that make it need to be happy.” Don’t you want to work for this guy? Check them out at organicclimbing.com.
POTTER COUNTY
To our men and women in uniform past, present, and future... God bless you and thank you.
Hardwood Ceilings, Paneling & Wainscot Rough Lumber & Dimension Lumber Wood/Log Siding • T&G Flooring • Solid Tops Over 1,000 Molding Profiles
Lilace Mellin Guignard raises her kids in Wellsboro where she plays outdoors, gets wild with community theatre, and shakes things up at Sunday school. She’s the author of When Everything Beyond the Walls Is Wild: Being a Woman Outdoors in America. 19
Friday, July 16 • 7:00 PM
Mansfield University, Steadman Theatre - Movie Night! Steven Winteregg - Frog Prince Narrators: Catherine RobisonRanney & Todd Ranney Artie Shaw “King of Swing” Clarinet Concerto Featuring – Jacqueline Gillette Beethoven - Symphony No. 8 Sponsored by Citizens & Northern Bank
Saturday, July 17 • 7:00 PM
Steadman Theater, Mansfield University, Mansfield, PA Eight Emerging Hollywood Composers - straight from Los Angeles with Eight World Premiers Sponsored by Corning Incorporated Foundation & Mountain Home Magazine
Sunday, July 18 • 7:00 PM
Cherry Springs - FREE CONCERT EMMF Brass Quintet – (Park reservations call 814-4351037) Sponsored by The David Patterson Foundation & Seneca Resources
Monday, July 19 • 7:00 PM
Clemens Center - Elmira, NY Mendelssohn Octet featuring EMMF strings Sponsored by Corning Incorporated Foundation
Tuesday, July 20 • 7:00 PM
Steadman Theater, Mansfield University, Mansfield, PA “Hear the voices” featuring Catherine Robison-Ranney & Todd Ranney Sponsored by The Quality Inn of Mansfield
Wednesday, July 21 • 7:00 PM Williamson High School, Tioga, PA “Fire in the Glen” Celtic music Sponsored by Deerfield Charitable Trust
Thursday, July 22 • 7:00 PM Deane Center for the Performing Arts, Wellsboro, PA BYOB EVENT EMMF Brass Quintet Sponsored by UPMC Susquehanna
Friday, July 23 • 7:00 PM
Mansfield University, Mansfield, PA Piazzolla “The Four Seasons” of Tango Featuring - Hua Jin Choral Tribute to Oscar Hammerstein, conducted by Peggy Dettwiler Sponsored by Mansfield University
Saturday, July 24 • 7:00 PM
Steadman Theater, Mansfield University, Mansfield, PA Navarro - Downey Overture Paganini - Violin Concerto No. 1 in D Major Featuring - Ilya Kaler Taneyev - Symphony No. 2 in D Minor Sponsored by Corning Incorporated Foundation
Visit www.endlessmountain.net for updates/changes.
CLASSICAL/JAZZ/CELTIC/BLUES/CHORAL/PIANO/TANGO/BRASS/POPS 20
W W W. E N D L E S S M O U N TA I N . N E T
JULY 16TH THROUGH
AUGUST 1 2021
ST
e t a br e l e C
Sunday, July 25 • 7:00 PM
Clemens Center, Elmira, NY Duo featuring Eun-joo Kwak, piano & Ilya Kaler, violin Sponsored by Corning Incorporated Foundation
Monday, July 26 • 7:00 PM
Penn Wells Hotel, Wellsboro, PA Bram Wijnands Dinner 5:15 pm – 7:15 pm Call 570-724-2111 for reservations Sponsored by Penn Wells Hotel
Tuesday, July 27 • 7:00 PM
Deane Center for the Performing Arts, Wellsboro, PA EMMF Woodwind Quintet & Eun-joo Kwak, piano Sponsored by Guthrie
Wednesday, July 28 • 7:00 PM Mansfield University, Mansfield, PA Sheng Cai, piano recital Sponsored by Mansfield University
Thursday, July, 29 • 7:00 PM Knoxville Yoked Church, Knoxville, PA FREE CONCERT Abbie Gardner, Blues Dobro guitar Sponsored by Deerfield Charitable Trust
Friday, July 30 • 7:00 PM
Steadman Theater, Mansfield University, Mansfield, PA Lalo - Le Roi d’Ys Overture Márquez - Paisajes Bajo el Signo de Cosmos Rachmaninoff - Piano Concerto No. 3 Featuring - Sheng Cai Sponsored by Ward Manufacturing
Saturday, July 31 • 7:00 PM
Steadman Theater, Mansfield University, Mansfield, PA Rossini - Italian Girl in Algiers Overture Óscar Navarro - Rose in Flames Featuring Melanie Mashner, harp Wieniawski - Violin Concerto No. 2 in D Minor Featuring - Sirena Huang Dvořák - Symphony No. 5 in F Major Sponsored by Corning Incorporated Foundation
Sunday, August 1 • 2:30 PM
Wellsboro Johnston Airport, Wellsboro, PA FREE POPS CONCERT In Memory of Robert N. Dunham Featuring Broadway Musicals, Films & ending with the 1812 Overture Sponsored by Dunham Family Foundation, First Citizens Community Bank, Southwestern Energy & Wellsboro Electric Co.
This page brought to you in part by:
Orchestra Concerts Fri. & Sat. • Chamber Recitals Sun. through Thurs. Wellsboro • MansFifield • Cherry springs state park • knoxville • elmira • tioga
BOX OFFICE: 570-787-7800
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Courtesy Clinton County Economic Partnership and Visitors Bureau
The Streets Are Alive
Turning Lemons into Lemonade in Lock Haven By Linda Roller
T
here’s not much about 2020 that any of us want to make a part of summer 2021. But in Lock Haven, a little piece of creative socializing in pandemic times is continuing, to the delight of many businesses and people who live and visit this quaint river city. To allow for social distancing and keep restaurants and music alive, the city worked with PennDOT and the Federal Highway Administration in summer 2020 to close a portion of a state highway that runs through the center of town, creating a “pop-up” pedestrian mall and outdoor bistro. This year, starting in May and running through September, several weekends have been set aside to close the streets and allow all the food, music, and fun to spill out into the center of the city. For the Lock Haven business community, this is simply “business as usual,”
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creating new ways for the local merchants to serve the community. Since the 1930s, Lock Haven has had a business association dedicated to creating and enhancing Main Street shops. As it is for many such entities, the effort was uneven. Progress waxed and waned. But by 1998 there was a real push for new local businesses, according to Rick Vilello, then Lock Haven’s mayor. It couldn’t have come at a better time. By then, the businesses on the boulevard outside the city were established and had changed local buying habits. Downtown needed new direction. The Lock Haven Vitalization Team began working hard to bring events and new businesses to the downtown. By 2004, the Vitalization team applied for membership in the Main Street America Coordinating Program through the Pennsylvania Downtown Center. This
state organization helped with creating a structure that had been successful in many other communities. Through that program, the team, with the leadership of its first director, Maria Boileau, was able to apply for grants and become a non-profit organization. By 2005, they were ready to take downtown community development to the next level. As manager from 2005 through 2012, Maria was tireless in working with the business partners in Lock Haven, pursuing state and local grants, increasing the membership of the downtown organization, and fundraising. “It was exciting to see the community’s investment and involvement,” she says. One of the first things that the team did was make the downtown area more inviting. Grants were made available for upgrading buildings’ exteriors. A mural was painted on
HAMMONDSPORT Vesper Street and tied into the Hometown Heroes banners that lined the Main Street on new, elegant lighting that is charming to see by day, and transforms the downtown at night into a bright, inviting area. Rick Vilello and current mayor Joel Long were the instigators of the downtown streetscape’s projects, which took years to develop. As Rick comments, “This stuff doesn’t happen overnight.” But it takes more than a beautiful Main Street. There must be things to do. Downtown Lock Haven created and promoted events like Haven Holidays, River Town Clean-Up, Welcome to the Neighborhood Programs, Community Days, and The Best of Clinton County Summer Festival and Parade to kick off the summer season, just as visitors were arriving to enjoy all the outdoor activities in the area. There were even promotions for the businesses that filled the downtown area, like Small Business Saturdays, a Holiday Window Decorating Contest, and for extended hours enabling businesses to take advantage of the newly lighted and updated street. It took time and effort, but the downtown area was beginning to see new businesses and attract people in the evenings. The work was paying off. And then, a global pandemic shut the doors of small businesses and cleared the streets. Angela Harding, who has long been active with the Vitalization Team and had become a county commissioner, took the reins as president of the board of directors of Downtown Lock Haven while the doors were still closed, in May 2020. “The pedestrian mall was 100 percent the City of Lock Haven,” she says. It was a bold move, and a way to support the businesses and to, somehow, give a feel of a community social life that the pandemic had ended. The city and Downtown Lock Haven made the appeals, created the plan, and got the agreement from PennDOT and Federal Highway Administration to close State Route 150. And as the doors opened a bit by the middle of June 2020, the plan was in place. As Angela states, “Without the foresight to make a plan, Lock Haven might not have weathered this social and economic storm.” The socially distanced venue did help the businesses, particularly the restaurants that were in danger of not surviving. And it brought the community together. Angela says that COVID-19 actually had a small silver lining in that “it gave people a new appreciation for the small business in their community and made people want to be here and support the local merchants.” The worst days of the pandemic are hopefully over. But Lock Haven folks know a good thing when they see it. The city has decided to keep the pedestrian walkway in the center of town for several weekends in the summer through September. Main Street from Jay to Vesper will be closed to traffic at 3 p.m. Friday to 10 p.m. Saturday, July 9 to 10, July 30 to 31, August 13 to 14, August 27 to 28, and every weekend in September. The Grove Street stage will be filled with performances, and even more concerts will be at Triangle Park. The farmer’s market, started in 2020, will resume on Friday evenings. And the street with benches, tables, and people will be a perfect place for events like Best of Clinton County, LH JAMS and Art, the Hometown Hero Banner ceremony, and the Labor Day Regatta. See you there! Mountain Home contributor Linda Roller is a bookseller, appraiser, and writer in Avis, Pennsylvania.
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(4) Courtesy Jean Doherty, National Soaring Museum
Soaring sight: some of the sailplanes you will find this year include (clockwise from top left) Guy Byars in his Schweizer 1-20, Jim & Simine Short’s Schweizer 1-21, Ron Martin and his SGS 2-8, and Chad Wille with his Midwest Utility Glider MU-1.
Let’s Go Flying
The International Vintage Sailplane Meet Takes Off at Harris Hill By Mike Cutillo “Once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return.” ~Leonardo da Vinci, all-around genius “There are so many lovely sailplanes. To see then all flying together is really quite a sight. It’s a feast for the eyes.” ~Trafford Doherty, Director, National Soaring Museum
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any may know Elmira as the onetime home of such luminaries as Heisman Trophy winner Ernie Davis, astronaut Eileen Collins, fashion designer Tommy Hilfiger, and writer Samuel Langhorne Clemens, infinitely better recognized by his pen name, Mark Twain. What may not be so readily known is that Elmira—thanks to its topography and the foresight of Chemung County officials— not only is the “Soaring Capital of America” but the veritable birthplace of the sport of
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gliding, as in using wind currents and other forces of nature to pilot a motorless aircraft quietly and romantically over green and scenic hills and dales. And it’s specific types of gliders—known as sailplanes—that will be celebrated in all their colorful splendor on Elmira’s historic Harris Hill July 10 to 17 at the International Vintage Sailplane Meet. Held every four or five years since 1995, the IVSM was scheduled to go off last year but was “clobbered by COVID,” as National Soaring Museum Executive Director Trafford Doherty so eloquently and alliteratively puts it. The family-friendly event is different from a competition; it’s more of a showcase of the eye-catching sailplanes. As Trafford explained, in competitions, the planes take off and sometimes are gone for hours before returning, while at the IVSM they are constantly taking off, gliding through the air for a bit, then landing, to the delight of spectators—both aviation fans and fans-
to-be. “For those of us who are sailplane enthusiasts, it’s really quite a thing, and for the average folks, it’s a great spectator sport because you get to see some continued activity,” Trafford says. “This is really quite a thing for everyone.” But why Harris Hill and Elmira, you may be asking? It goes back to 1930 when Chemung County and Elmira city officials decided they wanted soaring, a popular activity in the immediate area, to become an attraction that would draw people from all over the world. “They went to great lengths to lure the National Glider Association, the NGA, to have their first contest here, flying off South Mountain, which is south of the city,” Trafford says. “In 1934, the county purchased the land that would become Harris Hill. It was farmland, and up until then they had been flying at half a dozen different hills, See Planes on page 26
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Nathan Benn. Parade spectators (detail). Farmington, NY. June 14, 1975.
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Planes continued from page 24
but when the county acquired the land, leveled it out, did this, that, and the other thing, all of a sudden glider enthusiasts had an 1,800-foot runway, so they didn’t have to do the old shot cord [think slingshot] launches. In 1937, they started using airplanes to launch the gliders, and they still use them to this day.” Gliders were developed in the 1920s primarily for recreational purposes. Sailplanes came along a bit later and have been used in military training. They differ from gliders in that they can ascend in altitude—or soar—as pilots use updrafts, usually warmer or thermal air, to climb sometimes thousands of feet in the air. And yes, they can stay aloft, literally, for hours. And yes, the topography around Elmira is perfect for the sport. “In this area, there are ridges facing any direction on the compass practically,” Trafford explains. “So back then, the only time there was soaring to be done was slope soaring on a windy day. If you had a wind blowing, somewhere around Elmira, there was a ridge facing that direction of the wind, whichever way it was coming. That’s why they selected Elmira as the official American [gliding] contest site.” But, back to today and to the IVSM, which is indeed a week long, draws sailplane owners, pilots and aficionados from all over the country, and includes social gatherings, banquets, daily presentations at the National Soaring Museum, food trucks, and a nearby amusement park for kids. Currently sponsored by the NSM, the Vintage Sailplane Association, and the Harris Hill Soaring Corporation, it glided into Elmira because of all of the infrastructure in place. “The local soaring club, in conjunction with the Schweizer Aircraft Company and the National Soaring Museum, [it was] between the three of those entities the idea came up to have a vintage glider meet, and it became the IVSM,” Trafford says. “You won’t be having these things elsewhere in the country, not formal ones called IVSMs. So it’s history before your eyes.” Schweizer, in fact, holds much personal meaning for him. It’s where his father took a job in 1959, moving the family from Hammondsport to Horseheads. Trafford learned to fly at the Schweizer Flying School and spent a lot of time at the local airport. He eventually moved back to Hammondsport to serve as director of the Glenn H. Curtiss Aviation Museum there for fourteen years, but returned to Horseheads in 2002 and has been director of the NSM for the past five years. His father also owned a Laister-Kauffman sailplane, also known as an LK. These planes were manufactured in the United States during World War II to help train cargo glider pilots. “He named it Goldilocks, and he sold the darn thing when I was young,” Trafford recalls with a laugh. “But there is a beautiful LK that comes to the IVSM, beautifully restored in its WW II colors with yellow wings and blue fuselage.” It will be one of over thirty vibrant, colorful, and historic aircraft gliding peacefully over the Southern Tier for a week in July, and making people, as da Vinci said, cast their eyes skyward. Call (607) 734-3128 or visit vintagegliderclub.org for more details. As a journalist covering the Finger Lakes for over thirty-five years, Mike Cutillo is always looking up because you never know what you’ll see. Contact him at mcutillo1@rochester.rr.com.
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Courtesy Arthur Cohn From the deep: underwater archaeologist Arthur Cohn smiles from the pilot house of the wooden tugboat C.L. Churchill.
Beneath the Waves Seneca Lake’s Hidden History By Karey Solomon
O
ld-timers around Seneca Lake used to say the lake doesn’t give up its secrets. Now, with gentle coaxing, it’s doing just that. “Driving through the Finger Lakes region, a modern-day person could be misled by the sheer beauty of the landscape and not realize just how much history is contained within those lakes,” says underwater archaeologist Arthur Cohn. This thought is often how he begins a talk about his ongoing sub-surface survey of the three largest Finger Lakes. The project, forced into hiatus in 2020, is about to resume this summer, when he hopes to finish exploring Seneca Lake and begin moving on to Keuka and Cayuga. In 1868 when the Brooklyn Flint Glass company relocated to Corning, they moved their equipment northwest via the Erie Canal, an event commemorated in 2018 by Corning’s GlassBarge as it retraced the route with celebratory stops along the way. Cohn
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worked with the Corning Museum of Glass on the historical perspective of this tour, and says he’s been long fascinated by the history of the Canal system, begun in 1817 while DeWitt Clinton was in office and known for a time as “Clinton’s Ditch.” That fascination, he says, “led me to a deeper study of the maritime history of Seneca Lake. Logically there was a shipwreck collection on the bottom.” He describes the intricate system of canals—the Erie Canal system also connected to other canals and waterways in northern Pennsylvania and beyond—as the interstate highway systems of their time, carrying goods and products to market. A family or business might invest their savings in a canal boat, typically a flat-bottomed barge built specifically to navigate the shallow waterways, powered by mules or horses who pulled the boat as they walked the towpath alongside the canal. Some rare canal boats were built with removable masts, allowing them to hoist sail
and traverse the lakes using wind power. Dug mostly by hand, the canals were originally only four feet deep. A canal family could live on their boat for the nine months each year the canals were navigable, so the boats were often built with a stern cabin to serve the needs of the family and a forward cabin to house their animals. Freight was nestled in the middle. Steamboats based in Geneva and Watkins Glen towed strings of canal boats between the two Seneca Lake ports, a system that worked well in calm weather. But an unexpected storm, a burst of wind, an unbalanced load, a woodstove-based accident, or other human error might send one or more boats to the bottom. The treasures at the bottom of a waterway are historical, Cohn says, and his approach to what he finds and calls “underwater heritage sites” is reverent and respectful. He never forgets about the people who were present See Waves on page 30
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on the boat when it went down. “I do a lot of the research, read about a family and the circumstances of their loss, and feel very connected to them,” he says. “There are accounts where the boat sank from under these people— mother, father, young children, an infant, thrown into the water in the middle of the night. When that happened, their survival depended on finding something to keep them afloat until rescue. All too often those circumstances led to horrible loss—catastrophic economic trauma at the least, losing their home, business, most possessions. If, God forbid, they lost a child…that’s very sensitive stuff.” Launched from the marina at Samson State Park in Romulus, the RV (Research Vessel) David Folger, named for a project benefactor, uses sonar and underwater cameras to map and photograph artifacts at the bottom of the lake. When they find a potential site, they’ll set up a Coast Guard-approved mooring rather than drop anchor, which he says could be destructive, “even catastrophic,” in archeological terms. A current point of interest the research team is hoping to explore this year is the remains of an early packet boat. “Designed not for freight but passengers—think of a Greyhound bus—when canals opened, packet boats were the only real alternatives to getting from Albany to the Great Lakes,” Cohn says, adding the only other choices were bad roads or smaller, less reliable watercraft. “We think we might have found one in Seneca Lake,” he says with excitement. The results of this research will be shared with the Buffalo Maritime Center in Buffalo, which is currently constructing a reproduction of the Seneca Chief, the packet boat that sailed from Buffalo to New York Harbor in 1825 to herald the completion of the Erie Canal. The reproduction boat is slated to undertake the same route on that bicentennial in 2025. The lakes’ cold freshwater environment helps preserve an archaeological record that not only encompasses canal history but also pre-canal watercraft, Native American, and military artifacts, as well as the occasional car, parts of a house washed downhill in a flood, and unexpected bits and pieces. Unfortunately, it’s also home to a gazillion quagga mussels, who encrust every submerged surface. A tiny mollusk related to the zebra mussel, the quaggas could be damaging these underground treasures. At this time, it’s guess work as to how much destruction they’ll wreak; previous research indicates they will ultimately destroy the boats’ iron fittings. While everything is documented, only photographs and information are brought up from the bottom. These are shared with the public at the Finger Lakes Boating Museum in Hammondsport via their website flbm.org and, it is expected, in future exhibits. There’s also a beautifully-illustrated progress report available at the Hammondsport museum for $25 whose title, Seneca Lake Archaeological and Bathymetric Survey Book, belies the wealth of information and history between its covers. “The boating museum has taken over sponsorship of the project,” explains Director Andrew Tompkins. “We’ve focused on post-World War II pleasure craft, and boats from 1920s through 1960s [before fiberglass], so when Art came to us, we thought that was a great fit for the museum. We don’t have that canal component, so it was natural for us to work with him on it. We’ll be doing a lot [with his research] in the coming years.” Karey Solomon is a freelance writer and needlework designer who teaches internationally.
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WeWe invite everyone from everywhere to come invite everyone from everywhere to come SAYRE HISTORICAL SOCIETY MUSEUM South Lehigh Avenue, Downtown Sayre “Experience Bradford Bradford County!” County!” “Experience
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Adventure Awaits Awaits
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History & Heritage
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CANTON LIONS CLUB PRESENTS
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EMMF continued from page 10
“very satisfying” to have worked on. His piece, “A Dream of the Sixties,” draws on the “epic, romantic, and vibrant” films of that decade. “There were so many great scores of that era,” says Jesse, twenty-six. “So, I tried to narrow it down to a few areas that really inspired me and weave a sort of dream sequence through several settings. There are elements of David Lean epics, fastpaced westerns, New York jazz scenes, and perhaps a musical.” “It was a ton of fun to write,” he says, “and I hope everyone enjoys all of these pieces.” If the concert is well received, the maestro envisions more commissioned pieces by other young composers in the years ahead and hopes to make master class demonstrations a permanent feature of the festival’s online offering. And where might he find the next generation of young American composers? Why not in the Endless M o u n t a i n s o f Ne w Yo r k a n d Pennsylvania that lend their name to this music festival? To that end, EMMF and the Science & Discovery Center in Corning this year launched a “junior composer” teaching program for school children— another of Marisa’s ideas—in Corning and Wellsboro. “The idea was to just introduce them to the software” that modern composers use, explains Bruce McLaren, “and show them how to do musical composition.” He’s an educator at SDC who led a three-day winter workshop along with Samara Gromer, a music teacher in the Elmira public schools. Each child had access to a laptop loaded with Melody Assistant, a sophisticated but user-friendly software that “uses traditional treble and bass staffs,” Bruce explains. “Once you’ve selected some instruments you start adding quarter notes, half notes, tempos, then you play it back and listen to what you wrote.” The Corning pilot workshop attracted six students between fourth and seventh grade; a Wellsboro workshop attracted two. “It worked out as well as we hoped,” says Bruce. “We’d really like to keep it going next year.” Stephen and Cynthia say the same. Perhaps because the ’90s were his
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very first decade, such films as Forrest Gump, The Lion King, Aladdin, and The Mask made a deep impression on Omer Ben Zvi growing up in Israel. Born in Boston in 1990, “I’m still very nostalgic for those films,” he says. “They were very adventurous.” He’s a composer at Sparks & Shadows whose scoring includes the TV shows Outlander, The Walking Dead, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D, and the video game God of War. He’d like some day to score a “big Disney animated musical.” The films of the ’90s “hop from emotion to emotion,” so for his piece “I wanted to create something that’s always moving around, traveling around,” says Omer. “I called it ‘Wanderlust.’ It has a singular melody that jumps from style to style because there’s so much to pick from.” Sam Ewing, thirty, another Sparks & Shadows composer, landed the ’50s for his decade—“a good one” for the movies, he says. He cites the classic films of Alfred Hitchcock, and specifically the “percussive” score for Psycho by composer Bernard Herrmann. “I love that score,” he says. “It’s a sneak-peek into my brain.” He’s currently at work with Bear on the “zombie apocalypse horror” TV series, The Walking Dead. A “huge sci-fi fan,” Sam also cites “the explosion of monster movies” in the ’50s, and such great B movies as The Creature from the Black Lagoon and Invasion of the Body Snatchers. The opening of his piece, “Age of the Boom,” “explodes the ’50s open. It just grabs the viewer,” but “overall it’s about heartbreak and tragedy and romance gone wrong.” Writing for “ The Emerging Hollywood Composers Concert” was a “great opportunity,” says Sam. “With all these amazing players” in the EMMF orchestra, “I wanted to make sure everybody has something fun to play. So, everyone gets a turn at the melody: brass, winds, strings. I want the audience to experience the whole orchestra at its maximum.”
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B A C K O F T H E M O U N TA I N
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Preserving dignity. At UPMC Hillman Cancer Center, we know that treating cancer is more than the cutting-edge research, technology, and medical advancements we’re known for. Our renowned cancer specialists treat more than the disease. They treat you. That’s why we’re proud to offer a scalp cooling system that’s effective in minimizing and even preventing hair loss during chemotherapy. These innovative caps cool the scalp and protect hair follicles. Patients at UPMC Hillman Cancer Center in Williamsport can receive Paxman® Scalp Cooling at no cost thanks to the support of Susquehanna Health Foundation. For more information, visit UPMCHillman.com/Williamsport.
36 UPMC is affiliated with the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.