March 2021

NEWS. ARTS. LIFE. | MARCH 2021 | FREE | SINCE 1971 CULTURE

ARTS

MUSIC

ROCHESTER'S HISTORICAL SOCIETY IS ON THE BRINK OF BEING HISTORY

ROCO'S LATEST EXHIBIT IS A REAL ARTPOCALYPSE

A DARKER AMANDA LEE PEERS COMES INTO THE LIGHT

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OUR

LØST YEAR

A LOOK AT HOW COVID CHANGED OUR WORLD AND WHERE WE GO NOW

MARCH 2021

IN THIS ISSUE OPENING SHOT

Pippa Kohn stands on the runners of her kick sled as Ben Thompson prepares Fritz and Ivan to run in Cobbs Hill Park.

PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

NEWS ON THE COVER

7

OUR LOST YEAR:

ARTS

26

The coronavirus hit our community a year ago. A look at how the pandemic has changed us, and where we go from here.

BY JEREMY MOULE

14

HISTORY IN THE UNMAKING:

Why the Rochester Historical Society is teetering on the verge of becoming history.

BY STEVE ORR

22

MUSIC THERAPY:

How Julia Egan’s band, EMDR, is helping her get past her past.

LIFE PUBLIC LIVES

52

The newly appointed Monroe County public administrator tends to the estates of the dead when no one else will.

BY DANIEL J. KUSHNER

40

REVEL IN THE DETAILS

SWEET DREAMSCAPES ARE MADE OF THESE:

Andrea Durfee’s watercolors are making a splash.

BY DAVID ANDREATTA

56

BY REBECCA RAFFERTY

44

A ‘COPPERS’ CLUBHOUSE:

How the Rochester Police Locust Club went from a fraternity to a police union and an obstacle to reform.

BY GINO FANELLI

‘SINNER’:

A darker Amanda Lee Peers comes into the light on her latest album.

BY FRANK DE BLASE

CRESSIDA DIXON GETS ‘DEATH CALLS’:

HAD ENOUGH OF BRITISH ROYALS?

So have we. Our choices for film and TV that bring historic leaders — outside of Europe — to life.

BY REBECCA RAFFERTY

58

THE CORONAVIRUS ‘SHE-CESSION’:

Women have been hit hardest by the pandemic's job losses.

BY REBECCA RAFFERTY

MORE NEWS, ARTS, AND LIFE INSIDE roccitynews.org

CITY 3

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March 2021 Vol 49 No 7 On the cover: Illustration by Ryan Williamson

CITY reserves the right to edit for accuracy, length, and readability.

280 State Street Rochester, New York 14614 feedback@rochester-citynews.com phone (585) 244-3329 roccitynews.org

Send your rants and raves to: feedback@rochester-citynews.com

CITY, 280 State St., Rochester, NY 14614 (ATTN: Feedback) ABOUT THAT “BLACK GOLD” . . .

Thank you for the article on composting, a topic that sorely needs attention (“Wasted potential,” February 2021).

There is no need, however, for most people to pay monthly fees to have someone haul away food waste. When I moved to the city of Rochester 17 years ago, I bought a resin composting bin from Chase-Pitkin for about $100. I layer non-meat food scraps and leaves throughout the year and about twice a year harvest “black gold” compost through the door at the bottom. I work this compost into my vegetable beds and distribute it around other parts of the garden, so I need to buy less commercially prepared compost as well. The compost does not smell — the heat generated through the decomposition process kills the bacteria. It’s ridiculously easy to do.

Mary Jane Curry, Rochester Composting has been my family’s religion since before I was born 65 years ago. We always had a compost pile, mostly of leaves, from which we could draw worms for fishing, and nourish our organic vegetable garden.

My father, Norm Levy, began reading Organic Gardening in the 1950s, when it was actually about gardening — not lifestyle.

Currently we are renting a house in the South Wedge, and unfortunately our compost pile was visited by two skunks, who zapped our dog and cut our composting endeavor short. I was 4 CITY

MARCH 2021

PUBLISHER Rochester Area Media Partners LLC, Norm Silverstein, chairman FOUNDERS Bill and Mary Anna Towler

Miche Fambro. PHOTO BY AARON WINTERS

ODE TO A BEAUTIFUL PERSON What a beautifully written article about a beautiful person (“Miché Fambro and the meaning of success,” February 2021). I had not heard that he had passed away, and was shocked and saddened at the same time.

My wife and I were lucky enough to have seen several of Miché’s incarnations.

No matter what the style of music was, we were always blown away. When we were just friends, we and a group of friends used to follow “The Deserters” wherever we could see them. We saw them perform at Scorgie’s, drove somewhere in Geneva another night and saw them at a couple of other bars in the Rochester area. When he moved on to “Miché and the Anglos,” we followed them around as well.

The last time we saw him perform, he was in Perry in Wyoming County at a festival, where he was singing, or crooning, some old standards. He had some CDs for sale, so I went up to buy one and worked up the nerve to talk to him a little. I asked him about one of the old Deserters song (“Going Nowhere”) where he would change one of the lines from “. . . using everyone . . .” to “. . . screwing everyone . . .” He laughed and said, “I must have been in a bad mood that night.” When he came back from intermission, he broke into the intro of a Deserters song, which made me smile.

Those of us who were lucky enough to see him perform any of his music, or even more so, to know him personally like the author of the piece, Adam Wilcox, were truly blessed. I urge people to search for his music and enjoy his talent. May he live on forever through his music.

Jeff Fellows, Rochester

happy to find Impact Earth and began subscribing to their curbside pickup.

Fifteen dollars a month was a bite out of my food budget, but I felt it was my duty.

This month, however, they announced that they would be more than doubling their price. This contradicts the company’s claim in your article that Impact’s acquisition of Community Compost could “ultimately drive down costs to consumers.” Ahem.

I think a partnership between Impact and the city and/or county may be the best solution. It has to be convenient to residents, as curbside recycling became some years ago. Most people will not schlep their scraps beyond the curb.

Let’s hope. In the meantime, I may schlep mine to Abundance or the Public Market for $5 a bucket, and look into skunk-proof composting containers like the city of Seattle provided free of charge when we lived there.

Rob Levy, Rochester

EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT themail@rochester-citynews.com Editor: David Andreatta News editor: Jeremy Moule Staff writer: Gino Fanelli Arts editor: Daniel J. Kushner Life editor: Rebecca Rafferty Music writer: Frank De Blase Calendar editor: Kate Stathis Contributing writers: Roman Divezur, Irene Kannyo, Ron Netsky, Steve Orr CREATIVE DEPARTMENT artdept@rochester-citynews.com Creative director: Ryan Williamson Designer/Photographer: Jacob Walsh ADVERTISING DEPARTMENT ads@rochester-citynews.com Sales manager: Alison Zero Jones Advertising consultant/ Project mananger: David White OPERATIONS/CIRCULATION Operations manager: Ryan Williamson Circulation manager: Katherine Stathis kstathis@rochester-citynews.com CITY is available free of charge. Additional copies of the current issue may be purchased by calling 585-784-3503. CITY may be distributed only by authorized distributors. No person may, without prior written permission of CITY, take more than one copy of each monthly issue.

CITY (ISSN 1551-3262) is published monthly 12 times per year by Rochester Area Media Partners, a subsidiary of WXXI Public Broadcasting. Periodicals postage paid at Rochester, NY (USPS 022-138). Postmaster: send address changes to CITY, 280 State Street, Rochester, NY 14614. Member of the Association of Alternative Newsmedia and the New York Press Association. Copyright by Rochester Area Media Partners LLC, 2021 - all rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, photocopying, recording or by any information storage retrieval system without permission of the copyright owner.

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Call this edition of CITY the “Retrospective Issue.”

It wasn’t planned that way. We just wanted to tell interesting stories. But as we stitched the magazine together, an unmistakable theme of “looking back” emerged.

We had always thought it would be of value to look back after a year of the pandemic — from where we’ve been to where we’re going. Recall that it was a year ago in March that the novel coronavirus surfaced in our community and upended our lives.

No one has gone untouched. As CITY News Editor Jeremy Moule writes in his introduction to his wide-ranging retrospective on the health crisis, “the pandemic [took] something from each of us to one degree or another.”

More than 51,000 people in Monroe County have been infected. Tens of thousands of residents lost jobs and income. More than 1,100 others lost their lives.

At CITY, we lost our nearly 50-year run as an alternative weekly newspaper.

It might be tempting to want to forget the previous 12 months, to move forward without looking back. But that would be a mistake for a couple of reasons.

First, neglecting to look back refuses to acknowledge all that we’ve accomplished in that time. What, you ask, could have possibly been accomplished in a year that has repeatedly been called a “lost year”?

Well, to simply have endured is an accomplishment. We challenge you to take in the timeline of events and the scope of the tumult chronicled in Moule’s retrospective (p. 7-13) and not feel a little better about your circumstances for just having gotten through it all.

The second reason it’s a mistake to shun the past is that there can be no foresight without hindsight. That brings us back to the broader theme of this edition.

Understanding how we got to where we are is a necessary step to taking honest stock of our situation and mapping a path forward. That goes for people, cities, and institutions.

Speaking of institutions, freelance writer Steve Orr takes us on a remarkable journey through the annals of Rochester’s oldest cultural institution, the Rochester Historical Society, to reveal why the organization today is on the brink of becoming history (p.14).

Over the last year, as demands for law enforcement reform have mounted in light of the death of Daniel Prude and the pepper-spraying of a handcuffed child at the hands of Rochester police, police unions have emerged as significant obstacles to change. CITY staff writer Gino Fanelli examines how the Rochester Police Locust Club evolved from a fraternity for cops to a full-fledged labor union, often defiant in its resistance to reform (p. 22).

The “looking back” theme continues in CITY’s arts coverage with profiles on up-and-coming singer-songwriter Julia Egan (p. 26) and established local musician Amanda Lee Peers (p. 44). Egan shared with Arts Editor Daniel J. Kushner how being a survivor of domestic abuse has fueled her creativity, while Peers recounted to music writer Frank De Blase how confronting and coming to terms with her past inspired her latest album.

Even the subject of our “Public Lives” feature, Cressida Dixon, the new Monroe County public administrator, recalls how a health scare 13 years ago propelled her to where she is today — happy and doing an important but obscure job (p. 56).

Living in the past is unhealthy, of course. But the past, it has been said, is like a rearview mirror. It’s important to glance into it every once in a while to gauge where you’ve been. But stare in it too long, and you miss what’s ahead of you.

David Andreatta, Editor

Thoughts about the new CITY? Tell us at feedback@rochester-citynews.com 6 CITY

MARCH 2021

OUR

LØST YEAR

BY JEREMY MOULE

T

he last 12 months have been repeatedly called a “lost year” — with the pandemic having taken something from each of us to one degree or another.

For most people, the last year was about canceled vacations and sports seasons, the proliferation of remote work and online learning, and severe bouts of cabin fever. For some, though, the year took everything. The virus has had a tremendous mortal cost. As of this writing, the deaths of more than 1,100 people and counting in Monroe County have been attributed to the virus. For comparison sake, about 1,400 county residents die from heart disease each year.

Nationally, more than 500,000 lives have been lost to COVID-19, according to Johns Hopkins University’s Coronavirus Resource Center, and the virus had killed almost 2.5 million people globally.

The pandemic, and the economic fallout around it, also ripped into people’s livelihoods. Roughly 22 million jobs were lost at one point in the last year, according to federal Labor Department data. The unemployment rate plunged to levels not seen since the Great Depression, a cruel setback considering that at the outset of the health crisis unemployment had been at a 50-year low. Only about half of those jobs have been recouped.

The blows kept coming. As people lost income, a potential housing crisis developed, prompting federal and state

leaders to enact unprecedented foreclosure and eviction moratoriums.

Officials also suspended the collection of federally-owned student loans and zeroed out the interest rate on the debts. New York officials suspended the state’s collection of medical and student debts.

The virus may never be fully eradicated; Dr. Anthony Fauci, the White House chief medical advisor and the nation’s most trusted voice on COVID-19, has said it’ll probably be endemic. That is, the virus will be ever-present like the common cold.

But the number of new COVID-19 cases are ebbing and every day more people are vaccinated, so the virus, it appears, will be under control soon enough.

Now it’s time to think about a post-pandemic future, and in doing so it would be wise to look back and consider what this global crisis has taught us. There are too many people with precarious jobs and too many of our neighbors who are one lost paycheck away from going hungry or a month away from losing the roofs over their heads.

The pandemic has shown that the country isn't working for too many people, particularly the vulnerable and people who’ve suffered decades of systematic discrimination.

As we learn to live with COVID-19, let’s remember where we’ve been, and let’s be better.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 8

roccitynews.org

CITY 7

In Monroe County, Blacks and Latinos are more likely to work in service, direct care, and hospitality sectors, leaving them at greater risk of exposure to COVID-19.

PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

Toll on tenants: Falling behind and crossing fingers Social inequities exacerbate pandemic’s racial gaps Racial disparities in health were already a problem before COVID-19 blazed its way through communities across the country.

But by grafting itself on the timeworn patterns of inequity, COVID-19 propelled them into the public consciousness like they had never been before.

In Monroe County, the statistics have been alarming.

Black and Latino patients have been diagnosed at a rate close to double that of white patients, according to a November analysis by the Center for Community Health & Prevention at the University of Rochester Medical Center. Black patients are hospitalized with COVID-19 at roughly four times the rate of white patients and Latinos at three times the rate. Both groups have died from illness at twice the rate of whites.

Nationally, the virus claimed so many lives in the first half of 2020 that it skewed Centers for Disease Control and Prevention life expectancy data. In a February report, CDC researchers found that life expectancy dropped by about one year for all Americans, falling to 77.8 years from 78.8. But it fell by two years for the Latino population, to 79.9 from 81.8, and 8 CITY

MARCH 2021

almost three years for the Black population, to 72 from 74.7.

But Blacks and Latinos have been disproportionately affected by the virus for the same reason they have higher rates of emergency room visits for asthma, have higher rates of uncontrolled diabetes and hypertension, and account for a higher proportion of Monroe County’s lead poisoning cases, explained Wade Norwood, CEO of the regional health research and planning organization Common Ground Health.

“As Stevie Wonder said, they’re in the back of the line when it comes to getting ahead.”

Structural racism and poverty are the root of each health disparity, he said.

“Since a crisis is a terrible thing to waste, since we have a light being shown on it, it’s the opportunity for us to think differently about how it is we consider economic status as being a determinant of health outcomes,” Norwood said.

In the Rochester region, Blacks and Latinos are three times as likely as whites to live in poverty, according to a 2019 report from Common Ground Health. They’re also more likely to live in neighborhoods with high concentrations of poverty and a lack of quality housing, where leaky roofs lead to mold and mildew that exacerbates asthma and where lead paint is unabated.

Blacks and Latinos in Monroe County are more likely to be essential workers in the service, hospitality, and direct-care sectors, where employees have little choice but to interact with large numbers of people, explained Norwood. These jobs also tend to be among some of the lowest paid and the workers tend to live in closer quarters, with many living in multi-generational households, Norwood added.

“These essential workers, who have not been staying at home, whose work has still entailed lots of high-contact, high-exposure potential to the virus, those folks are in the front of the line when it comes to having to be exposed,” Norwood said. “But, as Stevie Wonder said, they’re in the back of the line when it comes to getting ahead.”

The pandemic has been a massive public health concern, but it also set off a global economic crisis. As countless renters and homeowners across the country lost income or jobs, many were at risk of losing their homes.

Nobody knows exactly how many people are on the brink of eviction or foreclosure, though there’s consensus that a large portion of the population is at risk, particularly low-income households and people of color.

“So many people are so far behind” In the city of Rochester, landlords who own three or fewer properties reported that 44.4 percent of their apartment buildings had at least one unit in arrears, according to a landlord survey conducted for the city by a Bloomberg Harvard City Leadership Initiative researcher.

Of the 2,289 landlords invited to participate in the survey, 10 percent responded.

The researcher, Elijah de la Campa, estimated that citywide the amount of rent in arrears was between $3.2 million and $5.1 million.

“So many people are so far behind,” said Mark Muoio, program director for the Legal Aid Society of Rochester’s Housing Unit.

Muoio said that Rochester City Court currently has 855 eviction cases pending, most of which were filed between October and

29

%

OF U.S. ADULTS WHO HAD INDICATED THEY WERE BEHIND ON THEIR RENT OR MORTGAGE ANTICIPATED THAT THEY'D FACE EVICTION OR FORECLOSURE IN THE NEXT TWO MONTHS.

Coronavirus and civil unrest are forever linked Before May 25, the pandemic and the economic free-fall it had precipitated dominated headlines. But that day, a police officer kneeled on George Floyd’s neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds on a Minneapolis street and killed him.

Tenant rights activist groups have urged state officials for stronger eviction protections during the COVID-19 pandemic.

PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

December. Not all of them are tenants who haven’t paid rent, which is a key distinction. State law prohibits evicting tenants who haven’t been able to make their rent due to pandemic-related hardships. Courts, however, can still issue money judgements for back rent in those cases.

Monroe County and the city of Rochester have established programs to help struggling tenants and homeowners, including direct rental assistance payments. According to city officials, the city’s direct rental assistance program has 500 applications that are under review.

But the pandemic’s strain on tenants, homeowners, and landlords is not a problem specific to Rochester.

The U.S. Census Bureau has conducted semi-weekly household surveys throughout the pandemic and it reported that 11 percent of New York households were, as of Feb. 1, either behind on rent or mortgage payments, or had little to no confidence that their households would make the next month’s payment on time.

Of the adults living in households that were behind on rent or mortgage payments, 29 percent said it was very or somewhat likely that they’d face eviction or foreclosure within the next two months.

Floyd’s killing ignited nationwide civil unrest. People took to the streets in cities across the country to protest not only his death, but the systemic and structural racism that his death — and later that of Daniel Prude — came to represent.

In that sense, the pandemic and the mass racial justice demonstrations were intrinsically linked. Just as people of color were at disproportionate risk of arrest, incarceration, and police violence, so too were they at greater risk than whites of contracting COVID-19.

On May 30, Black Lives Matter organizers in Rochester put together a protest in response to Floyd’s killing. By some estimates, more than 1,000 people marched through downtown, chanting, singing, and denouncing the Rochester Police Department.

Around 4 p.m., the crowd encircled the city Public Safety Building on Exchange Street.

There, two patrol cars were destroyed, city vehicles were flipped over, and demonstrators danced on a police cruiser.

Officers quashed the protest by firing PepperBalls and tear gas canisters into the crowd. By 7 p.m. the crowd had dispersed, but looting had begun in some areas of the city and adjacent suburbs, and both the city and

One of many Black Lives Matter marches that took place in the Rochester area during the course of the pandemic.

PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

county called a 9 p.m. curfew.

Similar scenes had played out in cities across the country.

Protests, organized

by Free the People Roc, continued on a regular basis throughout the summer. As the crowds repeatedly called on city government to “defund the police,” officers working crowd control generally kept their distance.

They took on a renewed sense of urgency by September, however, when Prude’s death at the hands of Rochester police officers was made public.

The nightly demonstrations that followed were met with higher levels of force from the police, especially as protesters neared the Public Safety Building. The officers fired indiscriminate volleys of tear gas and PepperBalls into the crowds, the latter striking some protesters in the head and chest. The Democrat and

Chronicle reported that officers fired over 6,000 PepperBalls during the first three nights of protests.

The pressure generated by activists and demonstrators ultimately led the city and county to make changes to the ways they handle people in mental distress, as Prude was the night he was suffocated.

County Executive Adam Bello pledged to bulk up an Office of Mental Health program that pairs mental health clinicians with police officers responding to calls in which a person is experiencing a crisis.

Mayor Lovely Warren’s administration created a Person in Crisis team staffed by 14 workers who are to respond to some mental health or substance abuse calls instead of police.

Both the city and county efforts are still under development.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 10

roccitynews.org

CITY 9

A YEAR OF COVID March 7, 2020: Gov. Andrew Cuomo declares a state of emergency for New York due to the growing number of COVID-19 cases statewide.

March 27: The city shuts down public playgrounds, basketball courts, athletic fields, and outdoor fitness equipment.

March 11: The first case of COVID-1 in Monroe County is confirmed in a person who had traveled to Italy.

The World Health Organization declares that COVID-19 can be characterized as a pandemic.

May 31: THREE MONTHS SINCE THE PANDEMIC HIT. Monroe County has 2,871 confirmed COVID-19 cases,952 of which are active. On average, there are 33 new cases a day. The virus has caused 219 deaths.

June 12: The KeyBank Rochester Fringe Festival announces that it will take place this year. The performances will be presented through streaming video.

March 16: School buildings close for the rest of the 2019-20 year and districts begin remote instruction for students. Rochester Regional Health and University of Rochester Medical Center hospitals close to visitors.

March 17: Alvin Simmons, 54, is the first person in Monroe County to die from COVID-19. Simmons worked at Rochester General Hospital and was an Army veteran with two children.

March 20: The 2020 Lilac Festival, scheduled for mid May, is canceled.

Most of Rochester’s other festivals will eventually follow suit.

March 22: Beginning at 8 p.m., all non-essential businesses close under Gov. Cuomo’s “NY on Pause” executive order.

March 24: Ted O’Brien, a former Democratic state senator and county legislator who currently leads the Rochester office of the state attorney general, is hospitalized with complications from COVID-19. He recovers and is released after nine weeks.

April 2: Rochester International Jazz Festival promoters announce that the event, scheduled for June, is postponed until the fall. On July 10, the festival is canceled for the year.

June 12: The board of the Out Alliance, an LGBTQ advocacy and services organization that’s been active in Rochester since 1973, suspends the agency’s operations because of financial problems, which were exacerbated by the pandemic.

May 5: University of Rochester Medical Center and Rochester Regional Health announce that they’ll be among the institutions working with Pfizer and BioNTech to test COVID-19 vaccine candidates. The FDA grants emergency approval to the companies’ vaccine on Dec. 11.

June 23: The year’s primaries become the first elections in New York state where every voter is eligible to cast a ballot through the mail. But confusion among voters and poll workers regarding absentee and in-person balloting leads to complaints.

May 11: Gov. Cuomo announces that the Rochester region had slowed the spread of the virus enough that businesses could begin reopening in a phased approach.

June 25: The city and its sponsors begin a six-week run of drive-in movies in the Frontier Field parking lot.

May 30: Hundreds of people march through downtown Rochester to protest the May 25 killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers as well as police brutality and racism within law enforcement. The protest ends in front of the city Public Safety Building and violence breaks out.

Officials impose a curfew across the city and county.

July 1: The Rochester Red Wings cancels its already delayed season.

July 6: The city reopens its basketball courts and athletic fields.

The state also gives the go-ahead for low-risk youth sports to start.

July 13: Gov. Cuomo announces schools can reopen in the fall as long as the region’s infection rate remains below 5 percent over 14 days.

July 28: Kodak announces that it anticipates receiving a $765 million loan from the federal government to start making chemicals for pharmaceuticals, including drugs that treat COVID-19. In August, the government halts the loan amid a Securities and Exchange Commission probe of the deal and stock transactions that happened around the time it was announced.

Sept. 1: The county reports o new cases of COVID-19, the lo number of cases reported in a day since March 18.

Sept. 2: The March 23 arrest Daniel Prude, and his subse death at the hands of Roches police officers, is made publ Weeks of daily protests ens

Sept. 10-14: Monroe County reopen, with many using a m in-person and remote learni

Aug. 13: The Rochester City School District announces that students will begin the coming year using remote learning.

Oct. 21: Gov. Cuomo announc movie theaters in most of th can reopen with reduced cap long as the region’s COVID-1 positivity rate averages less percent over 14 days. On Nov Monroe County’s seven-day rate crosses the 2 percent th and remains above that mar February.

Aug. 14: Bowling alleys are permitted to reopen.

Aug. 19: Colleges and universities across the region resume on-campus instruction for the fall semester and Rochester Institute of Technology is the first school to begin classes.

Aug. 31: A FULL SIX MONTHS HAVE PASSED. The number of people in Monroe County hospitalized with COVID-19 hits its lowest point since the pandemic began. There are 12 people in the hospital, seven of whom are in ICUs. Monroe County has 319 active confirmed COVID-19 cases and is averaging 16 new cases a day.

Infections slowed considerably throughout the summer, but the total number of cases to date has risen to 5,209, with 292 deaths.

Oct. 24: Early voting for the election begins. Thousands County residents, many of w their ballots could get delay mail, line up at polling sites

Nov. 9: Rochester and sever County towns become COVID “yellow zones” under the st microcluster strategy. The m brings with it some restricti well as a push for additional in schools.

200 DEATHS

100 DEATHS 1 DEATH

MARCH 10 CITY MARCH 2021

APRIL

MAY

JUNE

JULY

AUGUST

only six owest a single

t of equent ster lic. sue.

schools mix of ing.

ces that he state pacity as 19 s than 2 v. 1, positivity hreshold rk through

Nov. 23: The state classifies the city of Rochester and parts of a few towns as “orange zones” under its microcluster strategy. The designation means businesses including gyms and hair salons have to close, and that restaurants and bars cannot offer indoor dining. Due to public pressure and court rulings, some of the restrictions are loosened.

Nov. 30: NINE MONTHS HAVE PASSED. Toward the end of October, the number of COVID-19 cases began to rise rapidly. To date, there are 15,296 confirmed cases, 3,201 of which are currently active, as well as 328 deaths. The county is seeing an average of 429 new cases a day.

Dec. 1: The Genesee Brewery announces that it will not have a keg tree this year. The lighting ceremony had been a Rochester tradition since 2013.

Dec. 11: Gov. Cuomo announces that salons, barber shops, and gyms located in orange zones can reopen.

Dec. 23: Gov. Cuomo announces that the state is developing a plan that would allow some Buffalo Bills fans to attend the team’s Jan. 9 playoff game against the Indianapolis Colts.

It’s the Bills first home playoff game in 24 years and the team, playing in front of roughly 6,700 spectators, wins 27-24. Bills Stadium can hold over 71,000 people.

Dec. 31: Amidst a surge of cases related to holiday gatherings and travel, Monroe County records 838 new cases, its highest single-day total of the entire pandemic. It’s also averaging 563 new cases a day, though by the end of January the figure drops to 315.

Jan 4: New York officials report the state’s first case of a more infectious COVID-19 strain that has its origins in the U.K. Jan. 20: The state opens a vaccination site at Dome Arena in Henrietta, though demand for the shots far exceeds supply.

Feb. 5: The Rochester Americans — the Amerks — play their very delayed 2020-21 season opener at Blue Cross Arena against the Utica Comets.

Feb.23: To date, Monroe County has had 50,882 confirmed COVID-19 cases, 2,161 of which are active.

On average there are 139 new cases a day and the virus has caused 1,124 deaths.

Feb. 8: The Rochester City School District resumes in-person instruction for students in pre-K through grade 6, with students in higher grades returning to classrooms on Feb. 22.

Feb.28: A FULL 12 MONTHS HAVE PASSED. Monroe County has recorded over 51,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases and more than 1,100 deaths.

Feb.18: The county reaches 1,100 deaths.

NUMBER OF CASES 700

600 DEATHS 500 DEATHS

650 700 DEATHS

800 DEATHS

600

400 DEATHS

550

500

Jan. 27: Gov. Cuomo ends yellow and orange zone restrictions in Monroe County and across most of the state.

900 DEATHS

450

400

Jan. 28: Dr. Michael Mendoza, Monroe County’s public health commissioner, clears the way for schools to resume “high-risk” sports.

general of Monroe whom fear yed in the s.

ral Monroe D-19 tate’s new move ions as l testing

350 1,000 DEATHS

Feb. 3: Monroe County records 1,000 COVID-19 deaths.

7 DAY AVERAGE OF CONFIRMED COVID-19 CASES IN MONROE COUNTY

Dec. 15: COVID-19 vaccinations begin in Monroe County, starting with a group of 10 employees at the University of Rochester Medical Center.

SOURCE: MONROE COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC HEALTH

300

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100

50

300 DEATHS

0

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The arts go dim

School daze

Art galleries and museums are slowly resuming normal operations, theater troupes are preparing shows for the stage, and state officials are working with venues and talent across New York to launch a performing arts series.

But it has been a slog for arts organizations, whose bottom lines have been decimated by the pandemic.

Music, the visual arts, and performing arts all need audiences to thrive, but the state shutdown that began in March forced stages to go dark, concert halls to fall silent, and museums to cut off access to patrons.

Even though the state lifted restrictions on some businesses and activities, musicians and other performing artists are still limited in their ability to stage live, in-person shows.

All of this has meant that local creatives have had to get, well, creative.

Early in the pandemic, musicians and bands started streaming live performances from both polished and makeshift home studios using Facebook, Instagram, and even Zoom. Many used the lull to push out new singles and records, or to work on collaborative projects.

Instead of inviting the public in to view paintings, collages, photographs, sculptures, and other forms of visual art, galleries curated online exhibitions.

Organizers of the popular First Friday art openings pivoted and turned the monthly event into a series of online presentations by artists.

While its doors were closed, the Memorial Art Gallery offered virtual tours of exhibits. Likewise, the George Eastman Museum directed would-be patrons to its online collections catalog, which includes thousands of digitized items. Both museums are now open.

The Fringe Festival shifted its roughly 175 productions to a mix of pre-recorded, on-demand shows, and live performances streamed online.

Several of the area’s film festivals also shifted to online programs and screenings.

As spring and summer approach, the seasons hold a promise of some return to live music, dance, and theater performances, though it will be some of the larger institutions and productions testing the waters.

Geva plans to offer a full outdoor production in August, for example. And after postponing and ultimately canceling its 2020 event, the Rochester International Jazz Festival is set to happen this year on the Rochester Institute of Technology campus, which organizers say will better allow for physical distancing and other COVID-19 countermeasures.

Rochester’s art scene never went dormant, but its vibrancy has yet to return.

12 CITY MARCH 2021

At the beginning of the pandemic, all schools moved to remote learning. Most districts are now using a hybrid blend of in-person and online instruction for students. PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

The 12-month COVID-19 pandemic is often described as a “lost year,” and perhaps nowhere has that been felt more than in the country’s schools.

When schools, colleges, and universities closed down in March 2020, the thinking was it was temporary, with some officials talking about a two-week shutdown. But as it became clear the pandemic would carry on well beyond that time frame, institutions switched students — from elementary schoolers to college post-grads — to remote learning.

It was a rocky transition. Instructors and school administrators had to figure out how to conduct lessons on video conferencing platforms, and they had to work with parents to figure out how to get students the hardware, software, and internet connections they needed.

The problems were particularly acute, and remain so, in Rochester public schools, where many students didn’t have adequate internet access in their homes. The school district provided students with mobile Wi-Fi devices and Chromebooks, but the reviews have been mixed.

Parents were in unfamiliar territory, as they had to assume some teaching roles, often while they were still working. Students suffered because they weren’t around their classmates throughout the day, and because clubs and sports were put on hold.

This fall, universities and colleges

reopened their campuses to students, though every school is using a combination of in-person and online instruction so as to keep space between everyone in classrooms and labs.

Many public school districts took a similar hybrid approach, though the Rochester City School District used remote learning for most students through part of February.

After a year of remote learning, school districts and families are still working through kinks. Districts have struggled with student attendance in some cases, while some students have found it difficult to remain engaged in online classes. One day in January, a person logged into a Penfield middle school virtual classroom from Indiana and posted racial slurs in the chat section.

There are those who champion remote learning and see potential for it to provide a better learning environment for students who are easily distracted or for students who do better when they can learn at their own pace.

But online learning’s detractors have been more vocal. Their argument is a simple one: that a screen is no substitute for face-to-face instruction as well as in-person interaction with teachers and classmates. There are tangible and intangible benefits to the school environment, which provides the kind of socialization that COVID-19 robbed from most everyone.

WFH: Turning homes into workplaces The way many people work may never be quite the same.

Prior to the pandemic, telecommuting was already growing in popularity among workers and employers. But as government-mandated COVID-19 shutdowns forced companies to reduce office headcounts, sometimes by 100 percent, many rapidly shifted to work-from-home models.

Suddenly, employers and workers raced to make sure company systems could be accessed remotely and that employees were connected not just by phone and e-mail, but by productivity tools such as Slack, Teams, and WebEx. Zoom, with a capital “Z,” is now an everyday verb.

“WFH” — working from home — became as ubiquitous as “WTF.” Several surveys and polls have tried to pinpoint the percentage of the labor force that’s been working from home during the pandemic, but the numbers vary. A Gallup poll from October found that 33 percent of respondents were working from home on a full-time basis and 25 percent on a part-time basis. Of the respondents, 41 percent said they weren’t working remotely at all.

By comparison, 2018 Census Bureau data showed that 3.6 percent of the workforce telecommuted during at least half of its work week, according to an analysis by the consulting firm Global Workplace Analytics.

33% 25% 41% WORKING FROM HOME FULL-TIME

WORKING FROM HOME PART-TIME

NOT WORKING REMOTLEY AT ALL

GALLUP POLL OCTOBER 2020

Stanford University economist Nicholas Bloom, who had conducted several nationwide remote work surveys, estimated in June that 42 percent of U.S. employees were working full-time from home. Another 26 percent of the labor force, largely essential service workers, continued on at their workplaces. The remaining 33 percent were not working at all.

Workers and employers both want remote work to stay, at least to an extent. In the October Gallup poll, two-thirds of respondents stated that they want to continue working from home after the pandemic. In August, Harvard Business School researchers reported that one-third of the firms they surveyed believed that remote work would be more common after the pandemic ends.

But not every job is suited to remote work. In December, the Pew Research Center released the results of a survey it conducted on remote work, and 62 percent of respondents said that their jobs cannot be done from home.

Pew survey respondents with a bachelor’s degree or higher were far more likely to have jobs that could be done from home than those with some college education, a high school diploma, or less. The same pattern emerged for upper-income workers versus middle- and lower-income workers.

The shift to remote work also highlighted one of America’s technological and social struggles. Bloom reported that in his surveys, only 65 percent of respondents said they had internet connections robust enough to support “workable video calls.”

“The remaining 35 percent have such poor internet at home – or no internet – that it prevents effective telecommuting,” he said, noting the inequality as one of several already developing around telecommuting.

Voters waited in long lines at Perinton Square Mall on Sunday, Oct. 25, 2020, during the first weekend of early voting in the presidential and general elections. PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

Changing the way we vote — and who votes It took a global pandemic for New York to experiment with allowing all registered voters to cast their ballots by mail. The de facto test went well enough that lawmakers are now pushing to amend the state’s constitution so voters have the choice to vote by mail in every election.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo issued an emergency order in April 2020 that cleared the way for New Yorkers to vote by absentee ballot in the June primaries. All they had to do was check the temporary illness box on their ballot applications. The state Legislature would later pass a law allowing the same for the November general election.

The idea, of course, was to avoid crowding at polling stations, which state health officials feared could turn an election into a superspreader event. More than a quarter of voters — 27 percent — submitted an absentee ballot. By comparison, absentees accounted for just under 5 percent of ballots cast in the 2016 presidential election.

The virus was able to do something that good government and election reform advocates had tried to do for decades: push state officials to enact no-excuse absentee voting.

The way state law currently stands, in normal times anyway, people are eligible to apply for and receive an absentee ballot if they won’t be in the county on Election Day or meet one of several other criteria, such as having a permanent illness or disability.

No-excuse absentee voting allows

any registered voter to get a mail-in ballot with no qualifying circumstances.

The approach is hardly radical or exotic. New York is just a dinosaur when it comes to voting.

Twenty-nine states and the District of Columbia have noexcuse absentee voting, and five states conduct their elections almost entirely by mail, with minor exceptions for dinosaurs.

159 MILLION

ABSENTEE BALLOTS CAST IN THE U.S.

Supporters of universal mailin voting argue that it makes participating in the democratic process more convenient and more accessible. Voters would no longer have to take time out of their work day to vote or line up transportation to polling sites, for example.

Whether the wider availability of absentee ballots bolstered voter participation in the 2020 elections is difficult to say, but it sure didn’t hurt.

A record 159 million Americans cast a ballot in the presidential election.

Presidential election years always have higher voter turnout than the contests in between, and the stakes were particularly high in November.

In Monroe County, 78 percent of registered voters cast a ballot, the sixth-highest turnout rate over the past 40 years of presidential elections, according to the county Board of Elections. roccitynews.org CITY 13

NEWS

IMPERILED HERITAGE

History in the unmaking Rochester Historical Society archivist Bill Keeler examines Seth Green’s handmade tackle box. Green was a pioneer in fish farming and established the first fish hatchery in the United States.

PHOTOS BY MAX SCHULTE

Out of sight and out of mind, Rochester Historical Society, the city’s oldest cultural institution, is selling off its collection to stay afloat.

BY STEVE ORR

O

ut of sight and out of mind, Rochester’s oldest cultural institution is floundering, its storied collection shrinking and largely inaccessible to the public.

The Rochester Historical Society, founded 160 years ago, is almost broke.

To pay the rent, it periodically sells off items its representatives say are superfluous to its mission of collecting and preserving records and artifacts important to the city’s history.

Meanwhile, the society doesn’t have a full inventory of its holdings or a website, has a lone part-time employee, and has moved four times in the last 14 CITY JANUARY 2021

12 years. The last was in December, when the society quietly decamped to a cheaper space on University Avenue with less than half the square footage of its previous home.

Historians and museum officials have expressed deep concern, and in some cases outright anger, over the society’s stewardship of a ballyhooed collection that includes belongings of some of the city’s most prominent names, including Susan B. Anthony, Frederick Douglass, and Nathaniel Rochester.

“While it’s common for these institutions to operate on bare-bones

budgets, the Rochester Historical Society seems to be a colossal failure, a disaster,” said Michael Leroy Oberg, a distinguished professor of history at SUNY Geneseo.

“It’s sad, because the resources they have are stunning,” Oberg added. “If they still have them.”

The state has been asked to look into the historical society’s collectionmanagement practices, but officials in Albany declined to say if they are doing so. State regulators undertook a similar inquiry a dozen years ago though took no action.

Behind the scenes, movers in the

local and state museum world have met several times with society leaders about mapping out a way forward, but none

of those discussions have borne fruit; there has been no infusion of cash, no sharing of staff, no facility adequate to showcase the collection.

“For years and years and years, there’ve been discussions about RHS struggling financially, struggling with their storage situation,” said Andrew Marietta, a vice president of the New York Council of Nonprofits, who took part in some of those discussions.

The society’s leaders have resisted interactions that they fear could lead to a splintering of the collection and are loath to lose control over an institution that has endured since the Civil War. While they acknowledge that money is very tight, they deny that the institution’s financial position is so dire as to warrant splitting up the collection.

“Each organization wants a piece of what we have but no one wants to take it on comprehensively,” said Alinda Drury, the society’s vice president. “The society is not in such dire straits that we have to think about divvying it up, and I think there are lot of people in the historical community that don’t want it divvied up.”

A big fear among society leaders, Drury said, is that ceding control to outside organizations could lead to state bureaucrats swooping in and some of Rochester’s most precious artifacts winding up elsewhere.

“We are trying our damnndest to make sure the collections stay more or less intact and in Rochester,” Drury said.

ONCE A MUSEUM Rochester lacks a true museum of local history. The Rochester Museum and Science Center has large collections of historical material, but its public focus is more on science.

The Genesee Country and Susan B. Anthony museums are good at what they do, and the Landmark Society, George Eastman, Strong, Rush Rhees and others have collections that speak to the past. But none present collections broad enough, nor a mission ambitious enough, to tell the full story of the Rochester region.

The Rochester Historical Society once filled that niche. Today, however, the society, which possesses more than 200,000 artifacts and papers, is quite literally stuck in the past.

The brainchild of the noted Rochester social scientist Lewis Henry

Shoes made by a Rochester cobbler for his bride on their wedding day. PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

Morgan, the society was founded by an act of the state Legislature in 1861. But it remained a paper organization until 1887, when the society was mobilized

by Caroline E. Perkins, an active matron with an interest in history and philanthropy who had co-founded Rochester School for the Deaf.

Plans to rejuvenate the moribund group then were said to have been laid at a social affair in Perkins’ mansion on East Avenue — a fitting narrative considering that through much of its history the society was propped up by and run for the edification of wealthy east-side families.

Today, that legacy is an albatross. As those families fell away over time, so too did their largesse toward the society.

“There was a longstanding perception that Rochester Historical was an elite organization that was not public-facing. That was true,” said the society’s president, Carolyn Vacca, a professor who chairs the history department at St. John Fisher College.

“That hurt the organization.”

In its early decades, the society played a prominent role in Rochester Society with a capital “S.” It hosted lectures by professional and amateur historians. It collected and preserved the personal papers of accomplished

Rochesterians. It opened its collection to historical researchers.

But membership was by invitation only, and there is scant evidence that any of their lectures were open to the public. The collection in those days was lodged in a downtown bank building, then in the private Reynolds Library in a Corn Hill mansion.

That changed in 1912, however, when the society’s papers and growing collection of relics became centerpieces of the new Municipal Museum, a civic celebration of history, science, and industry fashioned from an old prison in Exposition (now Edgerton) Park.

Papers were kept secure on site, and items were on display for public view.

Ten years later, the society began publishing bound volumes of historical research papers, a practice that would continue for the next quarter-century.

Some papers were less erudite than others, and many trumpeted the lives of the city’s founders and other wellto-do white people to the exclusion of others. But they were nonetheless highly valued by those who study the history of the region.

Those years were the society’s heyday.

But in 1936, the city put the society out on its ear.

The museum at Exposition Park was closing, and those planning a new edifice on East Avenue — what would become the RMSC — wanted no part of the society’s version of local history.

The museum’s powerful director, Arthur Parker, dismissed society officials as disorganized amateurs dabbling in history.

Facing homelessness, the organization fell back on benefactors and its old hidebound ways.

It moved temporarily to a small donated building on Lake Avenue until 1941, when a longtime member bequeathed a striking Greek Revival mansion at East Avenue and Sibley Place, known as “Woodside,” that would become the society’s most enduring home.

Woodside would house the collection and open to visitors from time to time. But at its heart, it would be, as the society’s president told the Democrat and Chronicle at the time, “a clubhouse for members, a pleasant place to meet one’s friends, to have a cup of tea by an open fire.”

CONTINUED ON PAGE 16

roccitynews.org CITY 15

Carolyn Maruggi, a volunteer with the the Rochester Historical Society for over 10 years, sorts through old scrap books kept by Rochester families. PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

Boston painter Charles Sprague Pearce’s "A Peasant Girl," once held by the Rochester Historical Society, was sold and fetched $63,500 at auction. PROVIDED PHOTO

16 CITY MARCH 2021

SELLING THE PAST To lay people who patronize museums, “deaccessioning,” the term for selling off pieces of a collection, is a dirty word.

Attempts to dispose of high-profile works often stir controversy.

In fact, though, deaccessioning is a common practice that is typically reserved for moving items out of a collection that are no longer central to a museum’s mission in order for the museum to raise money to acquire new, more relevant pieces.

The Rochester Historical Society’s aggressive and opaque practice of deaccessioning over the last dozen years or so, however, has raised questions and eyebrows in New York museum circles.

“The sale of collections . . . has been a concern that I’ve heard from other organizations in Rochester and from the Museum Association of New York, for some time,” Marietta said.

Outside experts have asked the state historian to formally request an inquiry by the state Attorney General’s Office, according to Erika Sanger, executive director of the Museum Association, which is based in Troy, outside Albany.

The experts have raised questions both about the society’s deaccessioning practices and its overall collection management, she said.

Sanger said she did not know if State Historian Devin Lander made the request of the attorney general, and neither Lander nor the Attorney General’s Office would comment for this story.

Vacca insists there is no bad blood with Albany. “Devin Lander … is a big supporter of Rochester Historical,” she said. “We have not been under any kind of surveillance, or even in moderate disfavor with the state.

They are nothing but supportive.”

Outside experts complain that the society is secretive about its deaccessions and its collections-management policy, and wonder if the society is selling off too much without first offering other local museums a chance to acquire its surplus.

“I am not sure what processes the historical society is going through in order to deaccession the items from their collection that seem to have been sold over the past couple of years,” said Becky Wehle, CONTINUED ON PAGE 18

roccitynews.org CITY 17

Still, the occasional appearance on eBay of items listed as being from the Rochester Historical Society has fueled persistent rumors that items have been stolen or were being sold under the table.

Vacca laughed off the speculation, explaining that those items were sold appropriately through auction houses and then offered for resale with the society’s ID tags still attached.

“People are convinced that we are somehow sneaking around and putting stuff out on eBay and selling off the collections, and none of that is true,” Vacca said.

A vintage steel wagon from Hart’s grocery store circa 1900 sits on a shelf at the Rochester Historical Society’s new home on University Avenue.

PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

president and chief executive of Genesee Country Village & Museum.

“It’s hard to say based on what we’re seeing, but there are certainly pieces in the Rochester Historical Society collection that should stay in museums.

I would hope that if they got to the point of deaccessioning those, there would be a conversation with other museums,” she said.

Drury said that society officials have notified other museums if significant items are being deaccessioned but only so that those museums can bid on them at auction.

The society doesn’t offer the materials directly to other museums, she said.

‘GRANDMA’S ATTIC’ Society officials insisted they are deaccessioning properly, purging only items that are either duplicative or for which the society has been unable to establish a tie to Rochester. For instance, the society has deaccessioned firearms, pieces of furniture, silverware, paintings, and duplicates of clothing.

Daniel Cody, whose job as collections manager from 2010 to 2018 18 CITY MARCH 2021

included recommending artifacts for deaccessioning, recalled coming across a collection of dozens of petticoats. “How many do you need?” he asked. “Do you need dozens of them? No.” In many cases, the society has no idea of the objects’ provenance. For all anyone knows of some items, they could be a souvenir some wealthy patron picked up on an overseas trip and gave to the society.

“There are many, many of these because, as I like to say, we were Grandma’s attic, and long ago before there was all the systematic recordkeeping, people just dropped things off,” Vacca said. Because of state rules for deaccessioning, it can take more than a year to dispose of such items.

The society has roughly 1,000 paintings. Some of those that have been sold at auctions were 19th century images of people wealthy enough to commission a portrait, but nobody of an apparent consequence to Rochester.

The most valuable piece the Rochester Historical Society unloaded at auction was an oil painting by Boston

artist Charles Sprague Pearce titled “A Peasant Girl” that fetched $63,500 nine years ago.

The society primarily relies on two auction houses for deaccessioning: Cottone Auctions in Geneseo, Livingston County, and Schultz Auctioneers in Clarence, Erie County.

Cottone’s website lists 208 lots from the society that have been offered for sale at auctions dating back to 2012, the Pearce painting among them. Fine art, antique guns, ceremonial swords, none of which had any obvious connection to local history, also drew bids of thousands of dollars.

PAYING THE RENT While the society has never publicly documented its deaccessions, representatives said they provide the state historian with lists of all items that are sold, as required by regulations.

Cody, who kept the records related to deaccessioning during his time at the society, said he never heard about lists of items sold being sent to Albany. He also knew nothing of what society representatives described as a board committee to oversee the disposal of artifacts.

More broadly, though, the society’s former collection manager said he worries the organization’s need for cash might be prompting the board to sell off items it should be keeping. He said he was dismayed to see an ornate wardrobe with local historical connections sold at one recent auction.

“The current board wants to reduce the size of the collection to what they can afford to store,” said Cody, now an adjunct faculty member at Finger Lakes Community College. “And they have only a few hundred members. How are they making money other than by deaccessioning?”

Exactly how much revenue deaccessioning generates for the society is not clear. The society would not provide a copy of its latest tax filing with the IRS, saying it was not complete.

The previous five annual filings, however, suggest the organization auctioned off artifacts worth an estimated $382,500 but netted just under $55,000 from those sales. Society officials attributed the gap to the cost of moving objects to auction, the percentage of the sales taken by auctioneers, and estimated values of items that may have been inflated.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 20

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Those figures don’t square with the sale prices on Cottone’s website, which are higher, or with Cody’s recollections.

Drury downplayed the take from deaccessioning, but she and Vacca make no bones about what they do with the money: They use it to help cover the society’s biggest expense — rent.

Cody said deaccessioning revenue was never put to rent when he worked for the society, and both he and other museum experts questioned the appropriateness of the practice.

The state historian’s office declined to comment, saying it had no authority over the historical society’s actions, but referred state museum regulations, which specify that funds generated by deaccessioning cannot be used for “operating expenses or for any purposes other than the acquisition, preservation, protection or care of collections.”

Vacca and Drury said they consider rent to constitute storage and conservation of the collection, and thus an acceptable use.

“Carolyn has checked with them (state officials) and there has not been an issue with them on that,” Drury said.

“We have not been called to task for anything inappropriate.”

LIFE ON THE RUN The society’s money troubles can be traced to around the turn of the millennium.

Woodside functioned as a meeting place for members as well as a “house museum” filled with period furniture and historic objects. It was open to the public for a small admission fee, but few people came.

If they had, they might have been appalled. The 12,000-square-foot house, stuffed to the rafters with the society’s collection, was a mess and in disrepair.

“It was my job to walk around to make sure the squirrels hadn’t chewed another way into the building,” said Cody, who was an intern at Woodside in 2008.

The society, which then had a staff of two or three, had begun to spend more than it took in — a practice that its financial statements suggest has continued.

Something had to give.

In June 2007, the society’s board dismissed the executive director for overreaching and overspending. A year later, it proposed selling Woodside and moving the bulk of the collection to rented quarters in the Rochester Public 20 CITY MARCH 2021

A bust of Abelard Reynolds, the architect of the Reynolds Arcade building downtown and Rochester's first postmaster, is in the collection of the Rochester Historical Society. PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

Library’s Rundel Memorial Building.

Proponents of the sale said the proceeds would return the society to a sound financial footing, while Rundel would provide secure storage for its artifacts and allow new exhibits that would draw many new patrons.

Opponents on the board predicted the proceeds would be frittered away on rent and the society would wind up having to sell off its collection.

It was the biggest controversy in the society’s history.

Opponents sued to block the sale, and the state Department of Education, whose regents charter museums and oversee their work, began an investigation into the society’s stewardship of its collection.

A state judge ruled in November 2008 that the sale could proceed.

Dissidents tried but failed to get the regents to remove the board, and the state probe came to nothing.

As opponents had warned, the move to Rundel proved financially disastrous. Rent ate up money, Vacca recalled, as did legal fees from the Woodsite fight and ambitious programming in the new space.

The society eventually stopped paying rent and in 2014, when its five-year lease expired, it had to leave Rundel. With its savings and income dwindling, the society began to hopscotch across the city.

The East Avenue mansion “Woodside,” was the Rochester Historical Society's longtime home until 2008. PHOTO BY DAVID ANDREATTA

First it stored its relics in the former Sibley Building, then undergoing renovation. When the owners asked them to leave, the society moved across town in 2016 to an old defense plant on Lincoln Avenue whose owner has carved out space for a variety of groups.

TIGHT QUARTERS In December, the organization returned to its east-side roots, taking what Vacca called “a wonderful space” in a brick building on University Avenue near Culver Road.

It is, though, a much smaller space

than previous quarters; the society had to borrow space elsewhere in the building to fit all of its belongings. The room is below ground level with limited windows — anything but museumquality storage.

The small size means deaccession will continue, if not accelerate. “We’ll try to consolidate everything in the space we can afford,” Drury said.

During a recent visit, it was crammed full of shelves of books and stacks of artwork for which there is no wall space.

A pile of no-provenance artifacts destined for the auction block sat near the front.

Top: Busts of Hiram and Elizabeth Sibley sit among miscellaneous items at the Rochester Historical Society on University Ave. Bottom: The society is in the process of deaccessioning items in the collection that representatives say have no direct link to Rochester.

PHOTOS BY MAX SCHULTE

Soon, Vacca said the society hopes to open what she called their “openstack museum” to the public, with a few visitors at a time negotiating the steps.

(There is no elevator.)

Some sort of public access is a must, and outside museum experts have pressed the historical society on this point.

“In their last two locations, public access has been very limited,” said Wehle, of the Genesee Country Village.

“Organizations chartered by the state Board of Regents are required to have their collections accessible to the public.

The access does not appear to be there right now for people to see the pieces in the collection that are significant.”

There have been a number of sit-downs in recent years with other museums and organizations looking to assist in some capacity. In 2016, talks about a merger or collaboration with Genesee Country Village came to naught.

In March 2019, outside museum officials sat for a meeting with the society that could be seen as an intervention. Lander, the state historian, took part via phone.

“Everyone that was in that room two years ago expressed that we’re deeply concerned that that collection has not been on view for years,” recalled Sanger, of the Museum Association, who was there.

Lack of funds has also hampered one basic undertaking that outside experts pressed for at that 2019 meeting — a full inventory of the society’s collection.

That remains a work in progress, Drury said. So does a project to combine various indices of the society’s documents into a single searchable index that could be put on the website for scholars and laypeople to use.

But not only is there no searchable index, there’s no website. That, too, is a work in progress.

MONEY IS TIGHT, BUT ‘WE ARE NOT BROKE’ The society’s latest available financial filing shows it took in $70,000 in 2019

and spent $85,000. About $42,000 of its revenue came from contributions from members, who number several hundred. It had about $21,000 in the bank.

Vacca said the society has enough money to keep its head above water.

“We would not have moved to a new location without money to pay the rent.

We are not flush but we are not broke,” she said.

The society recently held discussions with Vacca’s employer, St. John Fisher College, that resulted in a scholarship for Fisher students to work with the society’s collection.

Vacca said the college may be able to help it apply for foundation grants that

would fund day-to-day operations.

Funding from local government would help, but Vacca and Drury said, somewhat resentfully, that appeals to the city and Monroe County have yielded nothing. Other historical organizations get such funding; in Buffalo, government support allowed the historical society there to operate a full-fledged museum.

Drury acknowledged that the days of the society running the kind of museum where people can meander through exhibits are long gone. Instead, the society is looking to showcase small displays in their own space and in other public locations. Even that, though, will take new funding, Drury said.

Whether other museums and nonprofits in the Rochester region will be able to help — or be allowed to help — is uncertain.

Wehle said collaboration, if there is to be any, will have to start with transparency and open minds.

“The leadership of the historical society should share with the Rochester community what the state of their collection is and what their current financial situation is, so we can all work together to make sure their collections are available to those in the community who want to access them,” she said.

Oberg, the SUNY professor, founded the college’s Geneseo Center for Local and Municipal History to promote and support organizations like the Rochester Historical Society.

“When you connect people to the history of what happened in their community,” he said, “they learn that they themselves are the forces of history, that their stories matter.”

The society should be making those connections for people in Rochester, he said.

“I think there are ways out of this with creative and energetic leadership,” Oberg said. “There are a lot of people who want to help. There are a lot of historians who would help but haven’t been asked. I don’t know how deep a hole they’re in, but they have treasures.” roccitynews.org CITY 21

NEWS

TO PROTECT AND TO SERVE POLICE

Rochester Police Department officers prepare to engage during the riots of 1964, the same year the Rochester Police Locust Club negotiated its first labor pact with the city.

PHOTO COURTESY THE CITY OF ROCHESTER

The evolution of the Locust Club:

From cop fraternity to roadblock to police reform

BY GINO FANELLI

A

@GINOFANELLI

round the time that a Rochester police officer pulled out her pepper spray to use on a 9-year-old-girl, Mike Mazzeo, the president of the Rochester Police Locust Club union, pulled out a pen to sign a lawsuit contesting recent appointments by the police chief to the Rochester Police Department’s top brass.

Two days later, Mazzeo stood at a podium at the union’s headquarters on Lexington Avenue in blue jeans and a black sweater facing a firing squad of news reporters and stumbled through an explanation of the “psychological trauma” experienced by officers at the scene and blamed the girl’s mother for escalating the incident.

“It resulted in her, no injury to her,” Mazzeo said. “If they had to go and push further, and use more force, 22 CITY MARCH 2021

GFANELLI@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM

there’s a good chance she could’ve been hurt worse.”

His response to the incident, which thrust Rochester and its police onto the national news circuit for all the wrong reasons yet again, was widely ridiculed.

Keith Olbermann, the itinerant liberal news and sports broadcaster, retweeted a video clip of Mazzeo at the news conference with the remark, “This idiot shouldn’t be sent to the grocery store to get a loaf of bread without a guide and four maps, let alone be a policeman in a large city anywhere in the world.”

How did it come to this? How does a union come to offer up a perspective so out of step with public opinion?

The answer for the Locust Club has been more than a century in the making. Since the organization transitioned from a social club for cops to the city’s recognized collective

bargaining unit for police some 60 years ago now, the union has had a double-barreled primary charge: protect the rights of officers and defend those accused of misconduct.

The work has taken union representatives to court, to arbitration hearings, and to news conferences, where, like Mazzeo as of late, they can

come off as defending the indefensible and twisting logic to its limits.

In the process, the Locust Club, like its union counterparts across the country, has emerged to many as an intractable roadblock to reform.

Mazzeo said a fair review of the Locust Club’s record over the last decade or so would show that the union has consistently pushed back against public safety initiatives “that have not been in the best interests of all in our community,” including decentralized police services and politicians’ tendency to parse crime statistics in a way that benefits their chances at re-election.

“I believe our most important function is to be the watchdog against bad public safety policy by city, county, and state governments,” Mazzeo said.

Five months before the girl was

pepper-sprayed, Mazzeo aggressively defended the officers involved in the death of Daniel Prude, arguing that they conducted themselves consistent with their training. Not only did the county medical examiner determine the officers suffocated Prude with their restraint holds, they did nothing to soothe Prude after he grew increasingly frantic.

They never summoned mental health professionals, nor offered him a blanket or put him in a patrol car, even though he was naked on the road and the temperature hovered just above freezing.

Prior to Prude’s death becoming public, the Locust Club filed a lawsuit to hobble the creation of the Police Accountability Board, which city voters overwhelmingly approved by referendum. A state judge mostly sided with the union, although the litigation is ongoing. More recently, the union filed a lawsuit to delay the public disclosure of police disciplinary files.

Across the country, police are routinely shielded from public and departmental accountability by layer upon layer of contractual and legislative protections, most of which unions fought for over the decades.

“Everyone’s losing in this setup, in this void of accountability,” said Lee Adler, a professor of labor law and union leadership at Cornell University. “That void of accountability is created by two things: one is the training, and the way police are mandated to act, based on this training, and the second place we have to look, which may be more controversial, is how and why have police been assigned to do this work?”

A ‘COPPERS’ CLUBHOUSE The Locust Club was born in the early morning hours of an April day in 1904.

Several officers met at the corner of South Avenue and Capron Street after a midnight tour of duty to discuss forming an organization to “promote the social, physical welfare and the material improvements of the members of the Rochester Police Department,” according to an annotated history of the union available in its online archives.

It was a bold move that split the rank-and-file by age, according to the history, with veteran officers wary of the idea and younger officers hungry to organize. Supporters were motivated by discontent among the ranks with pay, uniforms, and pensions — many of the

This mansion at 111 Spring St. formerly served as the Locust Club's headquarters.

PHOTO PROVIDED

same issues the union takes on today — and emboldened by having secured a picket line for striking coal drivers a month earlier.

Among the most pressing issues for officers of the day were new city ordinances that forbade detectives from holding office for a set tenure and required officers to wear their uniforms around the clock, even when they weren’t on duty.

Although police in New York City a dozen years earlier, in 1892, had formed what is now the largest police union in the country, the Police Benevolent Association, as a fraternal organization, no mid- to large-sized

A headline from the Democrat and Chronicle in May 1965.

police department in the United States had an organization dedicated to addressing labor issues, according to the history.

The Locust Club claims to be the first police union in the country, although that’s debatable because the organization would not be a recognized bargaining unit for another nearly 60 years, long after the American Federation of Labor began chartering municipal police fraternal organizations as affiliates.

On April 17, 1904, the Rochester officers who spearheaded the effort, incorporated as the Locust Club, the name having been taken from the stiff and strong wood of the locust tree from which police batons were carved.

Like most police fraternal organizations of its time, the Locust Club had no formal relationship with the city, but its representatives informally bartered for better wages and working conditions. Four years later, it would join the New York State Patrolmen’s Association.

By 1921, the Locust Club was assuming a greater role in the social lives of officers. That year, the club bought a 22-room mansion on Spring Street built in 1830 by Thomas Hart Rochester, the son of Col. Nathaniel Rochester. Prominent residents of Rochester donated furniture — from a piano to game room equipment — and a who’s who of the city — from the mayor to judges to the district attorney — attended a celebration of the new clubhouse.

The mansion was a place where, according to the union’s history, members would “socialize freely” by playing cards, shooting pool, or unwinding with a drink. The club hosted “midnight shows” that featured movies, vaudeville acts, dancers, and comedians, and threw exclusive parties for cops, each of whom was allotted a single invite.

A 1939 thumb-sucker Democrat and Chronicle article headlined “Off duty with the officers,” referred to the Locust Club as having evolved into “purely a social organization,” and detailed the atmosphere inside what the author called the “coppers’” clubhouse.

“Meet them all together at a good party, however, with petit complaints and minor crimes alike forgotten as just part of the day’s job, and you’re in for a good time,” the article read, concluding with, “A grand place, a good gang and a lot of fun.”

FROM SOCIAL CLUB TO LABOR UNION It was in the early 1960s that the Locust Club we know as a political power began to take shape.

For decades, the club had done nothing to address a lingering complaint among officers about their mandatory 56-hour work week and unpaid vacations.

That changed in 1962, when the AFL-CIO was formally recognized by the city, and the Locust Club began petitioning the city to be recognized as a police union. An early victory, one that helped legitimize its ability to organize and flex muscle, was the club successfully lobbying Albany for a 40hour work week that year.

The following year, the city recognized the Locust Club as the collective bargaining agent for police and the union began negotiating contracts for officers up to the rank of captain.

From there, the shift from a fraternity of “a good gang” of “coppers” to an aggressive bargaining unit unafraid to take on the city was swift.

The union even sold its Spring Street clubhouse in 1964.

In the summer of that year, the first year that the Locust Club negotiated a labor pact, the union reportedly rejected the city’s contract offer for CONTINUED ON PAGE 24

roccitynews.org CITY 23

$250 annual raises over two years three times, becoming the only one of the city’s three public service unions to thumb its nose at the city.

The union eventually accepted a deal in August, after the race riots that upended the city, that would give officers raises of roughly $1,000 over two years, reportedly making Rochester police the ninth highestpaid in the country.

Emboldened by its success, the Locust Club turned its focus to the fledgling Police Advisory Board — a distant ancestor of today’s Police Accountability Board. Specifically, the union mounted a legal challenge to prevent the board from forming.

The litigation failed, but bolstered the union’s image as a relentless defender of officers.

A few years later, in 1968, Locust Club brass took a shot at City Hall, when then-President Ralph Boryszewski alleged publicly that afterhours drinking and gambling hubs were protected by “the silent consent of public officials.”

Public Safety Commissioner Mark Tuohey and Police Chief William Lombard filed departmental charges against Boryszewski, at the urging of City Hall, accusing him of lying.

But in the ensuing weeks, the Locust Club drafted letters to President Lyndon Johnson and Gov. Nelson Rockefeller to enlist their help in getting the charges dropped, and the International Conference of Police Associations offered its support to the union and Boryszewski. After two days of deliberation, Tuohey exonerated Boryszewski.

Councilmember Andrew Celli lamented that the hearings were “a whitewash” and charged that the Department of Public Safety was improperly run. Boryszewski responded by saying Celli was unfit to hold office.

“Mr. Celli’s inflammatory remarks are hardly conducive to law and order,” Boryszewski wrote that year.

“Councilmen don’t ordinarily play politics with the Police Bureau. The City Council should reprimand Celli.”

Notably, Celli’s son, also named Andrew, is the lawyer who is currently representing the City Council in its ongoing legal battle with the Locust Club over the union’s lawsuit seeking to strip the Police Accountability Board of key disciplinary powers.

24 CITY MARCH 2021

Rochester Police Locust Club President Mike Mazzeo. PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

In 1970, Rochester police officers went on a six-hour strike over wages, an action that violated the state’s Taylor Law and a pre-emptive order from state Supreme Court Justice Jacob Ark. Yet, when it came to reopening contract negotiations between the union and the city, the union and its officers were granted amnesty.

Notably, again, Ark is the father of retired state Supreme Court Justice John Ark, who found in favor of the Locust Club in its case against the Police Accountability Board.

THE LABOR MOVEMENT AND DISCIPLINE What many people don’t know about public service unions is that their leaders continue to be rank-and-file members of the agency they represent and get paid by taxpayers.

In the case of Mazzeo, he holds the rank of investigator with the Rochester Police Department, which pays him $151,200 a year in salary and benefits, according to the city budget.

Like other union leaders, though, he doesn’t do police work with any regularity. He is on what’s known in the police contract as “release time,” which frees him to spend nearly all his working hours on union business.

For that, he also receives a paycheck from the union. In 2018, the last year for which tax records were available, The Locust Club reported paying him an additional $28,600, financed by union dues, which total roughly $880,000 a year.

The double-dipping arrangement, however maddening it may be to adversaries of the union, is not unusual.

In fact, there is court precedent that it is constitutionally mandated.

The union’s relentless defense of its members is also mandated by previous federal and state court decisions.

In the 1950s, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a series of decisions in cases in which railway unions were charged with purposely not representing their Black employees. One June 1952 ruling stated that labor organizations designated as bargaining representatives have “a duty to represent in good faith all workers of the craft.”

Adler, the labor law and union leadership professor at Cornell, explained that based on the Supreme Court decisions, and subsequent decisions in state court, a union could decide against representing anyone in disciplinary matters, or to represent all members in such processes, but cannot pick and choose members to represent.

“Whether it’s whether white folks, or Black folks, or Hispanic folks who have seen members of their community harmed by the police, they often don’t understand why the police union should defend them at all, because they just see it as the officer did something wrong,” Adler said.

“But the police union looks at it as we have this responsibility to look at this,” Adler went on, “and as I have seen and heard so many times from police unions, they find the police officers are acting consistent with their training.”

This has been a common refrain from Mazzeo in high-profile cases of alleged misconduct. Indeed, for decades the Locust Club’s contract with the city has guaranteed that any member facing disciplinary charges would receive representation.

The Locust Club has also intervened on matters outside of the internal discipline process. When Officer Michael Leach fatally shot 18-year-old Denise Hawkins in 1975, the union filed a court order to block the release of Leach’s personnel files.

In December 1975, Locust Club attorney Pat Dinolfo, the father of state Supreme Court Justice Vincent Dinolfo, reportedly said the release of information around the Hawkins case would “dangerously hurt the ability of the police department to do its job.”

Following Hawkins’s death, the Locust Club accused the City Council of “interfering” with the Rochester Police Department for placing Leach on leave, pending an investigation. A grand jury was empaneled and Leach was exonerated. He went on to reach the rank of captain.

A CONTRACT GROWS AND GROWS Employment terms for police officers are generally dictated by state civil service law. But collective bargaining agreements — union contracts — refine the protections and benefits for officers.

The Locust Club’s current contract with the city, for instance, includes provisions covering wage increases, paid leave, work schedules, uniforms, “release time,” and officer ranks.

But by far the longest and most detailed section of the agreement is that covering the discipline of officers accused of misconduct — and it has grown over time, as the city has agreed to concession after concession.

In 1974, the earliest year for which CITY could obtain a Locust Club contract, the provisions on officer discipline didn’t account for a full page.

Today, they take up four pages.

The contract used to simply detail, in six straightforward provisions, how a disciplinary hearing would be carried out. The officer in question would be informed of the charge against him; a hearing would be scheduled; and the officer would have a representative of the union present and a lawyer, if he chooses. If the charge is sustained,

the officer would receive a copy of the findings, and documentation would be added to the officer’s personnel file.

Those procedures still exist, but there are many more. Today, there are 23 provisions in the contract that guide officer disciplinary proceedings, and their rights in the process.

Hearings nowadays are to be held “at a reasonable hour, preferably when the member officer is on duty, and during the daylight hours,” and not more than 18 months after the alleged misconduct. For minor disciplinary matters, like letters of reprimand, the window is limited to 90 days from the alleged incident.

Both sides can call witnesses, and after the hearing panel has finished questioning the officer, the union representative or attorney can cross-examine.

The officer and their representative also have a say in who sits on the three-person hearing panel. Police brass are to provide the officer a list of three other officers, two of whom he can select to sit on the board.

Then the officer submits a list of three superior officers, one of whom would be selected by the department. The chief has the final say.

The modern contract also has provisions that specifically protect the union. One prohibits the city and the department’s Professional Standards Section from asking the officer any questions regarding conversations between union members.

On top of all of these added-on rules and regulations is a provision allowing the Locust Club to complain to the chief in writing if it feels any of the protocols were violated. The chief would then take that complaint into consideration when deciding discipline.

Mazzeo himself has been the subject of misconduct investigations.

In May 1991, a 33-year-old Mazzeo was suspended with pay from his role as a vice squad officer in the Rochester Police Department’s Highway Interdiction Team, a rotating squadron of narcotics officers known as the HIT Squad. He was indicted on federal charges, alongside several other HIT officers. Among the accusations were that Mazzeo punched a man, used his gun to threaten someone, and stole overtime funds.

Mazzeo was found not guilty in 1993, and returned to active duty after a two-and-a-half-year suspension.

The front page of the Democrat and Chronicle from May 1970.

A RIFT IN THE LABOR MOVEMENT Despite the at times outwardly bumbling public faces of the Locust Club, people on the ground working toward police reform generally acknowledge, if somewhat begrudgingly, that the Locust Club is skilled at achieving its purpose.

“You can look at their contracts, they’ve been very, very successful in creating a set of rules that determine how police officers are treated,” said Conor Dwyer Reynolds, the executive director

of the Police Accountability Board.

“Mike Mazzeo is very good at his job.”

Police unions have long been regarded with suspicion in labor circles for their tendency to view themselves as distinct from the labor movement. That suspicion has worsened with mounting instances of police violence and the police unions’ resistance to demands for reform.

In June, members of the Upstate New York chapter of Workers United called on the AFL-CIO to expel police unions from its ranks, in

solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement. The group cited a history of police unions not aligning with the values of workers’ rights. The AFLCIO resisted that call and similar pressure from other unions.

“We recognize that the fact that Black people are disproportionately working-class makes failing to be antiracist and supporting police unions an even greater betrayal of working-class struggle and unity,” a statement from the group read.

Mazzeo said expelling police unions is not the right answer.

“Attacking unionized workers while failing to hold policymakers responsible is wrong and why we have the problems that we are facing right now,” Mazzeo said.

Dan Maloney, the president of the Rochester Labor Council, said he supports both Mazzeo and the Locust Club as part of the broader labor movement. He echoed a frequent Mazzeo deflection — the problem isn’t the union, but rather the procedures and protocols put in place by the department, in which the union has little say.

Indeed, in the matter of the death of Prude, Mazzeo has vociferously defended the officers’ use of the “segmenting” maneuver to restrain him, arguing that the officers were trained to use the technique.

“You cannot blame our members for using what they are taught and are following procedures that they have no control over,” Mazzeo said. “I publicly stated that if that training is wrong and the procedures are wrong, change them.”

Segmenting is meant to be a quick and effective way to subdue a noncompliant person, and is taught to officers in most every police department in New York as part of a statewide police curriculum. But Prude was already in handcuffs and immobilized when officers applied the technique.

“Mike administers the contract for the cops in the city of Rochester, but he does not have much say in anything over the hirings and firings, and doesn’t have much say over training and protocol,” Maloney said. “He’s been screaming for change.”

roccitynews.org CITY 25

ARTS

MUSIC THERAPY

JULIA EGAN GETS PAST HER PAST THROUGH HER MUSIC

BY DANIEL J. KUSHNER

@DANIELJKUSHNER

DKUSHNER@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM

S

ongwriter Julia Egan’s hauntingly beautiful song “Insomnia” starts unassumingly, with a deceptively calming two-note theme on the acoustic guitar.

“The memories are coming back, and it’s like a dream,” she says as she plucks out the tune in the living room of her Rochester apartment. “It’s a nightmare.

So it’s very eerie. It’s very isolating. It’s two notes, it’s two strings.”

Egan emits a ghostly “ooh” and the emotional reality that the song unpacks bubbles to the surface — sleepless remembrances of traumatic moments from an abusive domestic relationship.

“That’s creepy as hell, man. That gives me nightmares every single time I hear my own melody,” she says with a nervous chuckle.

The idea of even picking up the guitar to play music, let alone writing songs to help process her experiences, was practically unthinkable for Egan while in the throes of that relationship.

But that was before she extricated herself from that situation, took part in trauma therapy, and started piecing together the original songs that became the expressive vehicle for her band EMDR. The band, which she started in 2018, released five EPs’ worth of indie chamber pop music last September.

A new single called “Home” is set for release on March 30.

“I’m not the same person sitting before you that I was in that relationship,” she says. “I was way skinnier, I had no energy, and any feelings I felt around playing music were inhibited and shut down.”

The name of Egan’s project, EMDR, comes from the therapy she underwent — Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing — in which patients are induced to recall painful and traumatic memories to address associated but latent negative thoughts and feelings.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 28

26 CITY MARCH 2021

Julia Egan has used the music of her band EMDR to transcend past trauma and abuse. PHOTOS BY JACOB WALSH

NEW MUSIC REVIEWS PHOTO PROVIDED

“ASHES” BY BEEF GORDON (FEAT. HIERONYMUS BOGS) “Ashes” is a long-distance collaboration between Rochester-based pop showman Beef Gordon and alt-folk artist Hieronymus Bogs, who relocated to New Mexico after several years in the local scene. While the seeds of this project were planted in Rochester, the pair first crossed paths in New York City in the early 2000s.

At first listen, “Ashes” appears to reference a fire, but the somber lyrics also speak of distress. Bogs contributes the lyrics and plays guitar over a hypnotic, stripped-down beat that was produced and recorded by Gordon. Bogs anchors the song with his stoic tenor, although the duo takes turns singing the lead and PHOTO PROVIDED backup vocals. Gordon’s arrangement on his Casio keyboard matches songs such as Buffalo Springfield’s “For What It’s Worth” in spirit, while a retro-sounding solo makes for a distinctive highlight.

The accompanying video merges scenes of both performers in separate locations, including Highland Park and Mims Lake, a burned outdoor area in New Mexico. In a sense, “Ashes” affirms that sometimes the most inspired art comes out of the most difficult circumstances.

— BY ROMAN DIVEZUR

“WE USED TO BE HAPPY”

BY ALYSSA TRAHAN When country singer and Fairport native Alyssa Trahan beat feet to Nashville in 2016, it was with a dream

and a handful of songs that she had tested out on the hometown crowd.

Now, she’s testing her music out on a much broader audience with “We Used to be Happy,” a single from her upcoming album “Baby Blues & Stilettos,” due to drop this spring.

Trahan’s beautiful voice and sincere, even bashful delivery precede her, but there’s a kind of Nashvegas veneer to the new single that indicates that it’s slightly over-written. That isn’t to say it’s a bad song. I just long for simplicity when I listen to country, and in particular, Trahan’s music.

She co-wrote the song with three other writers, but the resulting pop-music gloss seems to dull the authenticity that’s so present in her live concerts. If the powers that be want to give Trahan wings to reach the next level, they’d better leave the flying — and writing — to her. She won’t let ’em down.

— BY FRANK DE BLASE

The simpatico achieved is the result of the group’s two leaders, saxophonists Owen Broder and Ethan Helm, who have played together since attending the Eastman School of Music. After graduating in 2012, they moved to New York where they formed the group, which includes the equally strong Addison Frei on piano, bassist Ethan O’Reilly, and Matt Honor on drums. Grammy winner Ryan Truesdell produced the CD, released by Inside Out Music.

All of the tunes on “Our Highway,” recorded live at New York’s SubCulture, were written by Helm. “Alice In Promisedland” continues the duality theme with bluesy sax melodies layered over Frei’s gorgeous arpeggios. The pianist plays an especially strong solo on “American Whispers: Streams – An Old Church.” The album ends with Helm’s elegiac “The Farmer’s Region.”

An accompanying 45-minute video is full of split-screen montages, capturing the hectic pace of travel and the beauty of America. To experience the video album, check the band’s website for a list of live-streaming events.

— BY RON NETSKY

“INSIDE THE MOON”

BY GREAT RED

“OUR HIGHWAY”

BY COWBOYS & FRENCHMEN “Our Highway,” the new album by Cowboys & Frenchmen, begins with a haunting saxophone melody. Seconds later, the group launches into a wonderful cacophony of free jazz. It’s a fitting start to an album exploring the balance between order and chaos when a band tours. The hallmark sound of this musical travelogue involves two saxophones in unison, harmony, or slight dissonance.

I shouldn’t be surprised at how quickly Great Red’s third EP “Inside the Moon” grabbed me with just one listen.

The band’s outstanding indie-pop pedigree and presence assure a quality ride around the turntable, unfettered.

Led by vocalist-rhythm guitarist and songwriter Zach Kochan, Great Red includes lead guitarist Mark Bamann, Ryan Yarmel on bass and background vocals, drummer Andrew Tachine, and Will Smillie on synthesizers.

I immediately fell in love with the Rochester quintet’s indebtedness to Matthew Sweet and sparing use of pop elements. The music’s mostly mellow, with a few dynamic turns to punch things up. A prime example is Bamann’s mindblowing guitar solo on the closing track “Your Light.” You may just have to wipe your brains off the wall afterward.

Hyperbole aside, this is a terrific stack-o-wax. Self-recorded in a cabin on Honeoye Lake, “Inside the Moon” was written as a response to Great Red’s previous EP “Die Alone,” and was inspired in part by a live performance by the band Portugal the Man. — BY FRANK DE BLASE

“LONER’S PARADISE”

BY RYAN SUTHERLAND If you’re into artists of the posttroubadour pop movement — such as Webb Wilder, Marshall Crenshaw, or the late “Excitable Boy,” Warren Zevon — then the waltzing ease of Ryan Sutherland’s new CD “Loner’s Paradise” is for you. The Rochester singer-songwriter rolls out the dreamy music with equal parts mystique and stark reality.

The mood and tone are held together by a guitar style so casual it almost sounds random. It’s not that Sutherland is a bad guitarist; a flashier player might have steamrolled the delicate spirit of the songs.

Sutherland is the right man for the job.

“Loner’s Paradise” is for anyone who seeks melancholy. It isn’t strictly for loners, as the title suggests. Case in point, there are several independent contractors bangin’, clangin’, and twangin’ away on this Ben Moreyproduced album. Guest artists like drummer Alex Coté on drums and pianist Katie Morey add nice flourishes throughout. Ben Morey also makes slick contributions as a multi-instrumentalist.

— BY FRANK DE BLASE

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Egan says that the eye movement exercises helped evoke a dissociative state that enabled her to look back on the memories with a fresh perspective and discern why she reacted how she did in certain moments.

“Instead of saying, ‘I feel worthless,’ you say, ‘Oh, I wasn’t equipped to deal with that then. I can deal with it now,’” Egan says. “It’s a positive cognition.”

Egan says that realization became the foundation for her music, in which songs such as “Insomnia” and “Zero Accountability” are reflections of her reprocessing her memories.

While it can take time for abuse survivors to trust others, it also takes time for them to trust themselves, says Meaghan de Chateauvieux, president and CEO of Willow Domestic Violence Center in Rochester, which counsels and shelters abuse victims.

“They’ve been told for so long, for so many years that they are worthless, that they don’t know anything, that they’re misinterpreting everything,” de Chateauvieux says. “There’s just horrific abuse and psychological manipulation that’s been happening to them by the one that should really love them the most.”

For Egan, the act of writing music was more important than the storytelling in the songs. She was regaining something that she had lost — her connection to music itself.

Egan was an undergraduate student at Eastman School of Music, studying classical guitar performance, when her boyfriend became abusive. She recalls how he made her feel worthless with petty put-downs and jabs.

“Anytime I would play for that person, they would be unimpressed, unenthused, and they would say, ‘I just don’t know why you don’t prepare more,’” Egan says.

Her abuser’s demand that her playing be flawless was to the point, she says, that she was afraid to pick up her guitar. She recalls hardly touching her guitar back then.

Even after a successful recital performance to earn her degree, she recalls, her abuser sniped at her abilities. After graduating, Egan says she didn’t play her guitar the entire summer that followed, fearing her abuser’s criticism.

“You’re constantly buffering that abuse and saying, ‘No, don’t touch me.

Don’t take away the things I care about.

For me, that was music and playing guitar, and I felt like I lost that,” she says.

28 CITY MARCH 2021

PHOTO BY JACOB WALSH

“Abuse is not just something that you can sense.

It’s something that lives in you.

It’s something that wants to stick around.”

Now 26, she is pursuing her master’s degree in ethnomusicology.

Still, her experiences with her abuser linger.

Her song “My Head” — the opening track on the first EP, “Week 1/ Anger/Paralysis” — recounts one of her last interactions with him.

He had invited her over to watch sports on TV, and he spent the time texting another woman he was dating.

When Egan asked to be driven home, he complied but not without repeatedly yelling, “I fucking hate you!” for the entire five-minute ride.

Egan says she began to panic, and even contemplated jumping out of the moving car.

“Abuse can be verbal and physical at the same time,” Egan says. “Of

course it’s verbal — he’s speaking, and he’s shouting. But it’s physical because it’s literally hitting my eardrums and literally messing up my brain — my ability to think — to the point where, yeah, I do feel scared. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I don’t know if he’s going to swerve the car into a tree and get us both into an accident. That’s why it’s physical, because it’s visceral.”

De Chateauvieux agrees that verbal abuse, used as a tool for manipulation, can take a physical toll. Abuse victims can register higher blood pressure, experience gastrointestinal problems, and be susceptible to migraine headaches, she says.

“The ability to think clearly when you’re in a space like that of constant trauma can be really impacted — you’re always afraid,” de Chateauvieux says.

On “My Head,” Egan sings out with pained conviction, “I gotta get you out, out of my head/ I gotta get you out, I gotta get you out,” as if it were a mantra. But she says she still hears her abuser’s angry epithet in her mind on a daily basis.

“Abuse is not just something that you can sense,” she says. “It’s something that lives in you. It’s something that wants to stick around.”

The song “Zero Accountability” was

her first after leaving the relationship.

Its lyrics reveal how she began to attempt to shed the emotional burden of his torment: You said it was satisfying watching me squirm/ Well when am I ever gonna learn?

Can you just take it back?

Call me delusional/ I don’t care what you have to say to distract me from the fact that you have zero accountability.

More songs followed. She soon had enough for three EPs. Once she completed “Long Summer,” which would appear on the third EP, she noticed that the theme of each set of songs paralleled the stages of grief. She committed to writing the final two EPs on depression and acceptance, and took the name EMDR. In making music for the band, Egan held nothing back creatively. It was a cathartic decision.

“I’m just playing music that I really enjoy and lets me explore the expanse of my feeling, which you can’t do when you’re in an abusive relationship,” she says. “All of your feelings get crushed into this tiny box, and you can’t tell them to anyone.”

MUSIC //

With evolving NYS guidelines for live music, events are highly subject to change or cancellation. It’s wise to check with individual venues to confirm performances and protocols.

ACOUSTIC/FOLK

CONTEMPORARY CLASSICAL

thelittle.org/music. Sat., March 27, 7:30 p.m.

Christine Lavin. Golden Link Folk Singing Society, online. goldenlink.org. Sat., March 6, 7:30 p.m.

Virtual Sing Around. Golden Link Folk Singing Society, online. goldenlink.org.

Tuesdays, 7:30 p.m.

of Music, online. esm.rochester.edu/live.

Thu., March 25, 7:30 p.m.

Eastman Audio Research Studio. Eastman School of Music, online. esm.rochester. edu/live. Tue., March 16, 7:30 p.m. fivebyfive: Composer Chats. Livestream, online. fivebyfivemusic.com. Sat., March 27, 1:30 p.m. Mar 27: Sungmin Shin & Sophie Stone. Live performances, video premieres, and chats with host Evan Meccarello.

Musica Nova. Eastman School of Music, online. esm.rochester.edu/live. Wed., March 17, 7:30 p.m.

OSSIA. Eastman School of Music, online. esm.rochester.edu/live. Thu., March 4, 7:30 p.m.

Annie Wells. Virtual Little Cafe, online.

BLUES

Bill Schmitt & The Bluesmasters. 75 Stutson, 75 Stutson St. 75stutsonstreet. com. Thu., March 25, 8 p.m. $20.

CLASSICAL

Bach: Cantatas. Eastman School of

Music, online. esm.rochester.edu/live.

Sun., March 28, 3 p.m.

Bach, Mozart, & Strauss. Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, online. rpo.org.

Through March 28. $25.

Beethoven & Prokofiev. Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, online. rpo.org.

Through March 12. $25.

Brahms from Oz. Pegasus Early Music, online. pegasusearlymusic.org. Fri., March 19, 7:30 p.m. and Sun., March 21, 4 p.m.

Celestial Sounds: A Virtual Reality Experience with Salaff Quartet at RMSC’s Strasenburgh Planetarium.

chambermusicrochester.org/concerts.

March 19-22.

Chamber Percussion Ensemble. Eastman School of Music, online. esm.rochester. edu/live. Tue., March 23, 7:30 p.m.

Classical Guitar Night. Virtual Little Cafe, online. thelittle.org. First Sunday of every month, 7 p.m.

Coleridge-Taylor & Mendelssohn.

Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, online. rpo.org. March 4-April 18. $25.

Eastman@Washington Square. Eastman School of Music, online. esm.rochester. edu/live. Thursdays, 12:15-12:45 p.m.

Faculty Artist Series: Guy Johnston, cello; Yoojin Jang, violin; Chaio-Wen Cheng, piano. Eastman School of Music,

online. esm.rochester.edu/live. Fri., March 26, 7:30 p.m.

Faculty Artist Series: Alexander Kobrin, piano. esm.rochester.edu/live. Mon., March 29, 8 p.m.

The Juliani Ensemble. Virtual Little Cafe, thelittle.org/music. Fri., March 5, 6 p.m.

Mozart, Brahms, & Saint-Georges.

Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, online. rpo.org. Through March 23. $25.

Souvenir de Florence. Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. rpo.org.

March 18-May 2. Ravel, Debussy, & Tchaikovsky. $25.

String Fever. Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, online. rpo.org. Through April 4. Pops with Jeff Tyzik. $25.

Truth Is of No Color: Concerts for Social Justice. Rochester Philharmonic

Orchestra. rpo.org. March 15-April 29.

Tuba Mirum. Eastman School of Music, online. esm.rochester.edu/live. Mon., March 15, 7:30 p.m.

Composers Sinfonietta. Eastman School

JAZZ

The Cool Club & the Lipker Sisters. 75

Stutson, 75 Stutson St. 75stutsonstreet. com. Fri., March 12, 8 p.m. $20.

Eastman New Jazz Ensemble. Eastman School of Music, online. esm.rochester. edu/live. Tue., March 9, 7:30 p.m.

Jon Seiger & the All-Stars. 75 Stutson, 75 Stutson St. 75stutsonstreet.com. Sat., March 20, 8 p.m. $20.

Laura Dubin & Antonio Guerrero.

Livestream, online. Ongoing, 8:30 p.m.

Live on FB. Mardi Gras in New Orleans. Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, rpo.org. Through April 6. Jeff Tyzik, conductor. $25.

Prime Time Brass. 75 Stutson, 75 Stutson St. 75stutsonstreet.com. Sun., March 14, 1 p.m. $15.

Saxology. Eastman School of Music, online. esm.rochester.edu/live. Tue., March 16, 7:30 p.m.

Wine Down Wednesday. The Penthouse, 1 East Ave, 11th floor. 775-2013. Wed., March 10, 5 p.m. Mar 3: Bill Tiberio Band. Mar 10: Virgil Cain. Mar 17: Mike Melito. Mar 24: Uptown Groove Acoustic Quintet, Ma2 31: Andrew Franklin O'Connor. $20.

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Berwick Fiddle Consort: Ayont Yon Glen. Pegasus Early Music, online.

pegasusearlymusic.org. Fri., March 5, 7:30 p.m. and Sun., March 7, 4 p.m.

Collegium Musicum. Eastman School of Music, online. esm.rochester.edu/live.

Thu., March 18, 7:30 p.m.

Irish Songs with Casey Costello. Virtual Little Cafe, online. thelittle.org/music.

Sun., March 14, 3 p.m.

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Fri., March 19, 7 p.m.

Friends of Eastman Opera Competition.

Eastman School of Music, online. esm. rochester.edu/live. Sat., March 6, 7:30 p.m.

Voice & Opera Department: Spring Recital. Eastman School of Music, online.

esm.rochester.edu/live. Wed., March 17, 5 p.m.

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roccitynews.org CITY 29

ARTS

NEW BEATS

Producer Demetriuse Smith, aka Cello Brown, in his home studio in Irondequoit. PHOTOS BY JACOB WALSH

FIGHTIN’ WORDS Rochester hip-hop artists combat racial injustice

BY DANIEL J. KUSHNER

I

@DANIELJKUSHNER

n his new politically-charged song, Rochester rapper BrandonEv White challenges the listener with a simple question: “How U MAGA???” The message — meant to challenge complicity with racism and white supremacy — is delivered via a musical Trojan horse of smooth jazz saxophone set over a loping hip-hop beat. It is as if White is trying to make a bitter pill easier to swallow for a white easy-listening audience.

While “How U MAGA???” is quick to point out the bigotry of former President Donald Trump, White also picks generational failures in the American economic, political, and 30 CITY MARCH 2021

DKUSHNER@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM

media landscapes that have perpetuated the marginalization of Black people.

From the beginning, hip-hop has highlighted the plight of Black America.

And the last 14 months of racial injustice have felt like an inflection point that demands a response. White is one of several Rochester hip-hop artists for whom the deaths of Ahmaud Arbery, George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Daniel Prude, and others — as well as the far-right riots and attempted pro-Trump coup at the U.S. Capitol in January — have been indelibly etched into their music.

White’s lyrics ask pointed questions: What’s CNN gonna do when this

clown is gone?

Will they dial down the heat, or keep the fire on?

White, who uses the stage name Bushido Garvey, says that many Americans are not angry that Trump helped spread white supremacy and racism as president, but that he did so without dog whistles and appealed to a wide swath of the country.

Do we MAGA through KKK or 401ks Through the quiet, or the riot, or wide gray?

“In the song, I say, ‘Which wing of the vulture? Which fang of the snake? Antivenom should be the culture.’ Right?”

White says. “They’re competing wings, but both of these wings kind of allow for this awful bird to fly.”

A compilation album that White participated in recently as Bushido Garvey, called “Negus Don’t Bow” and released in November 2020, pulls even fewer punches and expresses more vitriol.

Local producer Demetriuse Smith, aka Cello Brown, brought together several of his favorite Rochester rappers for the project, including White, Azariah (from Young, Black, and Gifted), Skribe da God,

Rapper BrandonEv White, aka Bushido Garvey. PHOTO BY JACOB WALSH

Capital Cee, and Hafiz.

“When I approached everyone with the idea, I said, ‘Listen, just give me your rawest thoughts.’ You notice in the lyrics that no one really held back on anything,” Smith says with a chuckle.

On the album’s closing track “Nexx on da Noose,” Hafiz’s expletive-ridden tirade doesn’t mince words: Fuck America, coward/ Please put my neck in a noose/ I’d rather die right here than to work for you.

Smith acknowledges that the lyrics of “Negus Don’t Bow” are incendiary, but hopes that it will provoke people to listen and confront racism headon. Negus (pronounced nee-guhs) is synonymous with “king” and is a title historically used for monarchs in the countries of Eritrea and Ethiopia.

“Anyway that this album can open up your eyes, to listen to what’s going on, to the message — that one verse, that one bar, could have you listening to the entire album, just off anger,” he says. “I want the attention. I want people to realize that there’s a fire that’s really starting in this country, that needs to be extinguished right now.”

The track “The Negus in You” — sung quietly but with the conviction of an Old Testament prophet by SunDula Amen — is about empowerment and recovering from the disenfrachisement of Black people that began with slavery and continues today.

With a single, repetitive melody, SunDula Amen sings, “It’s the power of the sun inside your skin that makes it glow. It’s the truth behind the history they hate to mention. It’s the fact you’re learning everything that you weren’t supposed to know. It’s the rightful place that you’ve decided you’re reclaiming.”

The album title, “Negus Don’t Bow,” is not only a reference to this legacy of African royalty, but also an aspirational metaphor for the current Black experience, Smith says.

“It’s basically a command laced in a description,” he says. “Basically, don’t bow. Don’t fall for what’s going on, and at the same time, remember who you are. Remember who you can be, remember what you’re capable of.”

Though the Rochester-born hiphop band Suburban Plaza is now based in Los Angeles, its members responded in solidarity with the local Black Lives Matter protests of the deaths of George Floyd and Daniel Prude by cutting an EP, “TULSA.” “There’s nothing more helpless than seeing people that you know and love in your hometown directly being affected by something like that,” says Suburban Plaza singer and guitarist Yone Norwood.

“We didn’t really care about promoting it or anything like that,” Norwood says. “We just wanted to give something to Rochester, just to communicate with our city. Whoever else received, that’s amazing, but this was just an open letter from us to our city.”

Yone, Jerry Rescue, Wave, and Dave Hamilton. PHOTO BY MIKE CILANTRO

The primary message behind “TULSA” is that the dehumanization of Black people doesn’t just reside in the distant past of American history, but is an active part of its present. For Suburban Plaza, the death of Prude at the hands of Rochester police officers was the breaking point that gave rise to the EP. Suburban Plaza keyboardist and producer Jerry Norwood, aka Jerry Rescue, who is a cousin to Yone Norwood, says Prude’s death was reminiscent of the infamous murders of civil rights leaders in 1964.

“It brought back the instances of Chaney and Goodman and [Schwerner] down in Mississippi,” Rescue says. “In 2020 or 2021, we still can’t get a federal lynching bill passed, things like that — that was a lynching that was on camera.”

On the band’s single, “Philando/ NAT,” the hard-hitting reality of the song is in keeping with the spirit of

“TULSA.” Yone sings mournfully, and with a subversive twinge of autotune: Why you don’t care when you steal a Black life?

Always remember, you’re still a n***** at the end of it all The song was inspired in part by what Yone calls “a sad, but frequent conversation” all too common among Black families.

“My mother told me before she passed — she used to always tell me — ‘Be great, do great,’” he recalls. “‘You’re an amazing person, but always be cautious, because at the end of the day in this America, you’re still a Black man. No matter what, no matter how high you get, they’ll always look at you that way.’”

roccitynews.org CITY 31

VISUAL & PERFORMING ARTS [ Opening ]

Bertha VB Lederer Gallery, SUNY Geneseo, 1 College Circle, Brodie Hall 203. Geneseo. Robert Doyle At

Work Art Rest: Portraits 2019-2021 | Linda Condon: Reflections in Time.

March 28-May 8.

Geisel Gallery, 2nd Floor Rotunda, Legacy Tower, One Bausch & Lomb Place. Object Lessons: Recent Works

by Lee Hoag. Mondays-Saturdays.

Through Apr 30. thegeiselgallery.com.

Livestream, online. Liberated from Storage: Selections from the SUNY Brockport Art Collection. March 8-28. today.brockport.edu/calendar/ fine_arts.; Crystal Z Campbell: from the corner of my eye. March 1-22. Mar 15, 8pm: Reading by Campbell & talk with Julie Niemi & Almudena Escobar López. Registration required. Hartnett Gallery. blogs.rochester.edu/hartnett.

Main Street Arts, 20 W Main St. Clifton Springs. Diner’s Club Show.

March 6-April 16. Virtual Reception: Mar 6, 5pm. Christina Bang, Paul Brandwein, Edward Buscemi, Tarrant Clements, Bob Conge, Kurt Feuerherm, Bill Hand, William Keyser, Susan Mandl, Peter Monacelli, & George Wegman. mainstreetartscs.org.

Pittsford Fine Art, 4 N Main St. Pittsford. March Featured Artist: Kathy Armstrong. March 1-31. pittsfordfineart.com.

RIT City Art Space, 280 East Main St.

RESILIENCE. Thursdays-Sundays, 1-5 p.m. Through Mar 14. cityartspace. rit.edu.

Rochester Contemporary Art Center, 137 East Ave. Last Year On Earth | The

Warp & Weft | Through The Cracks | UnJustness. Reception: Mar 5, 6-9pm.

Reservations required. Through May 8. $2. rochestercontemporary.org.

[ Continuing ] Art Exhibits

Bertha VB Lederer Gallery, SUNY Geneseo, 1 College Circle, Brodie Hall 203. Geneseo. Sculptors Drawing.

Through March 10. Artists: Colin Chase, Valeria Cray, Dan DeZarn, Lynn Duggan, Ronald Gonzalez, Allen Topolski. geneseo.edu/galleries/ current_lederer.

Bertha VB Lederer Online Gallery, SUNY Geneseo. The Misogyny Papers:

Apology by Victor Davson. Through April 1. geneseo.edu/galleries.

Bridge Art Gallery, URMC, 300 Crittenden Blvd. Youth for Racial

Teaching Artist Virtual Showcase.

Through April 1. Teacher Feature Tuesday posts & Instagram Live Friday studio tours. flowercityarts.org.; Start Here: High School / Middle School Virtual Art Exhibition. Ongoing. rit.edu/ artdesign/bevier-gallery.; Penfield Art Association Virtual Winter Show & Sale.

Ongoing. penfieldartassociation.com.

Memorial Art Gallery, 500 University Ave. 276-8900. Season of Warhol (to

Mar 28) “To Help People See”: The Art of G Peter Jemison (Mar 12-Nov 14).

Mill Art Center & Gallery, 61 N Main St. Honeoye Falls. For the Love of Art. Through March 31. By appointment.

230-7232.

NTID Dyer Arts Center, 52 Lomb Memorial Dr. Palettes of Nature.

Ongoing. A collaborative exhibit with deafgreenthumbs. rit.edu/ntid/ dyerarts-center.; Black is Black: Blackity AF. Ongoing. Part II: Generational Oppression. rit.edu/ntid/ dyerarts-center.; This is Not Normal: Deaf Modernist Sensibilities. Ongoing. rit.edu/ntid/dyerarts-center.

Rochester Celebrates 50 Years.

Through March 21. 271-2540.

Brutality & Accountability Initiatives in Rochester from the Portable Channel Archive. Ongoing. An online playlist of digitized videos produced

by Rochester-based media activists Portable Channel between 1971-75.

Readings & Spoken Word

Visiting Authors Series. Thursdays,

7:30 p.m Virtual Writers & Books, wab.org Mar 4: Athena Dixon, “The Incredible Shrinking Woman” Mar 11: Lyz Lenz, “Belabored: A Vindication of the Rights of Pregnant Women” Mar 18: Mary Frances Winter, “Black Fatigue: How Racism Erodes the Mind, Body, & Spirit” Mar 25: Hilary Leichter, “Temporary.”

Art Events

CommUNITY Arts & Wellness Festival.

Tuesdays Livestream, online.

Registration required JLF@rochester.edu.

Changemakers: Rochester Women Who Changed the World. Through May 16. W/ museum admission: $14/$16. rmsc.org/changemakers.

Studio 402, 250 N Goodman St.

Unmasked: Self-Portraits 2021.

Through March 13. Open First Fridays 6-9pm & by appointment. 269-9823.

Sylvan Starlight Creations, 50 State St., Bldg C. Pittsford. Dwight

Myers: Abstract Art. Through Mar 31. sylvanstarlightcreations.com.

Victor Farmington Library, 15 W. Main St. Victor. Local Artist Exhibit &

Auction. Through March 12. Exhibit is in-person & online. 924-2637.

Virtual Genesee Country Village & Museum, online. Mumford. Explore

the Collection. Ongoing. gcv.org/ explore/online-collection.

Virtual George Eastman Museum, online. Eastman Museum at Home.

Ongoing. eastman.org.

Virtual Memorial Art Gallery, mag. rochester.edu. Explore the Collection.

Ongoing.

The Yards, 50-52 Public Market.

Film

Image City Photography Gallery, 722 University Ave. Excellence: Camera

Visual Studies Workshop, 31 Prince St. vsw.org. A History of Police

Rochester Museum & Science Center, 657 East Ave. (rmsc.org). The

Seaman, Dexter Benedict, Mary Taylor.

Through Apr 1. pittsfordfineart.com.

Cobblestone Arts Center, 1622 NY 332. Jason Dorophy. Through April 11.

Reels (to Jun 6) | Carl Chiarenza: Journey into the Unknown (to Jun 20) | One Hundred Years Ago: George Eastman in 1921 (to Jan 2022).

Wednesdays-Sundays.

Daily Virtual Screenings. Ongoing.

Pittsford Fine Art, 4 N Main St. Pittsford. Trio of Guest Sculptors: Jay

Residency Final Showcase. Through March 13. Reception Mar 5, 6-9pm:. theyardsrochester.com.

George Eastman Museum, 900 East Ave. eastman.org. Stacey Steers: Night

Virtual Little Theatre, thelittle.org.

Fri., March 5, 6-10 p.m., Sat., March 6, 6-10 p.m. and Sun., March 7, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Livestream, online. artsandwellnessfestival.wordpress.com.

Justice: Not A Moment, But a Movement. Through April 30.

275-3571.

Viewings by appointment. 398-0220.

32 CITY MARCH 2021

Livestream, online. Heart-to-Art:

Livestream, online. Screening &

Discussion: “Kiss the Ground” (2020).

Thu., March 11, 6 p.m. Panelists Elizabeth Henderson & Glenn Gall.

Rochester Area Interfaith Climate Action. RAICA.net/events.; Screening & Discussion: “Gather” (2020).

Thu., March 25, 6 p.m. RAICA. cherylmfrank@yahoo.com.

Virtual Dryden Theatre, eastman.org.

Dryden Theatre at Home. Ongoing.

ExhiBits: Women Running Rochester.

Season of Warhol: Black Artists Engagement Project. Sat., March 13,

2 p.m. Virtual Memorial Art Gallery, mag.rochester.edu Lavonne Barfield, Martin Hawk, Erica Jae, Cocoa Rae, Narada Riley, & Brittany Williams.

Tradition Meets Contemporary Seneca Art with G Peter Jemison. Sun., March

28, 2 p.m. Virtual Memorial Art Gallery, mag.rochester.edu .

Who We Are: Decolonizing Visual Narratives. Thu., March 18, 6 p.m.

Virtual George Eastman Museum, online. Artist talk with Citlali Fabián $10 suggested. eastman.org.

Dance Events

11th Annual inspireDANCE Festival.

Through March 7. Livestream, online. sas.rochester.edu/dan.

BIODANCE at Home. Through March 21. Livestream, online. biodance.org.

Rochester City Ballet: “Green Eggs & Ham”. March 12-21. Livestream, online. $15. rochestercityballet.org.

Theater

Constellations. Fridays, Saturdays,

7:30 p.m Livestream, online. Out of Pocket, Inc $15. muccc.org.

Festival of Ten: Revisited. Fridays, noon. Livestream, online. Fine Arts Series at SUNY Brockport of 10-minute plays Mar 12: “In a Perfect World” Mar 19: “Squirrels in a Knothole” Mar 26: “Martha’s Choice” 395-2787.

Social Distancing: A Monologue Play.

Ongoing. JCC CenterStage Theatre, online. jccrochester.org/centerstage.

Where Did We Sit on the Bus?.

Through March 7. Livestream, online. $30. gevatheatre.org.

MARCH HIGHLIGHTS INSIDE WXXI PUBLIC MEDIA | WXXI-TV PBS AM 1370 NPR | CLASSICAL 91.5 FM WRUR 88.5 FM | THE LITTLE THEATRE

It’s What’s Happening Baby Saturday, March 6 at 8 p.m. on WXXI-TV Famed disc jockey “Murray The K” hosted a legendary CBS-TV special, “It’s What’s Happening Baby” in the 1965. It featured iconic artists singing some of the greatest hits of all time, which are now shared with you.

Repeats 3/7 at 4 p.m.

Photo: Murray The K with The Ronettes Credit: TJL Productions

Joe Bonamassa: Live from the Ryman Saturday, March 13 at 10 p.m. on WXXI-TV On September 20, 2020 Joe Bonamassa hosted his final performance of 2020 during a livestream concert from the Ryman theater in Nashville, Tennessee. In this 60-minute special Joe presents his new studio album “Royal Tea,” which was inspired by his guitar heroes Jeff Beck, John Mayall & The Bluesbreakers, Eric Clapton, and Cream.

Photo credit: Chris Wood

Aretha Franklin Remembered Saturday, March 20 at 10 p.m. on WXXI-TV Celebrate the legendary Queen of Soul and the first woman inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame with her greatest hits from television appearances spanning the 1960s-2000s.

Credit: TJL Productions roccitynews.org CITY 33

WXXI-TV • THIS MONTH

Urban Forge: Ozark Artistry Friday, March 12 at 10 p.m. on WXXI-TV In Mountain View, Arkansas, a talented group of men and women keep the time-honored tradition of metalsmithing alive through their daily work at Urban Forge. This film takes you behind the scenes of a blacksmith shop dedicated to creativity, skill, and artistry.

Independent Lens: Coded Bias Monday, March 22 at 10 p.m. on WXXI-TV When MIT Media Lab Researcher Joy Buolamwini discovers most facial recognition does not see dark-skinned faces or women with accuracy, she embarks on an investigation that uncovers widespread bias lurking in the algorithms that shape the technology powering our lives.

Photo: MIT’s Joy Buolamwini Credit: Steve Acevedo

Fast Forward: Look Into Your Future Wednesday, March 24 at 10 p.m. on WXXI-TV If you could see your family’s future, would you change anything?

This documentary follows four millennials and their parents as they travel through time to meet their future selves. Wearing an MIT-produced “aging empathy suit” and working with professional make-up artists, they grapple with the realizations, conversations, and mindset required to age successfully.

Photo: Abe Barrientos helps his son Leo cross a footbridge in MIT’s AGNES Aging Suit.

Fauci: The Virus Hunter Sunday, March 28 at 7 p.m. on WXXI-TV This film takes an in-depth look at Dr. Anthony Fauci’s life story and career. Informative and engaging on-camera interviews with some of Dr. Fauci’s colleagues and friends, including Dr. John Gallin, Dr. Michael Osterholm, and medical historian Victoria Harden, offer insight into his career and family life, while the compelling images and videos archived by the Associated Press give an expansive view of the true depth and breadth of his contributions and service to this country and the world.

Credit: AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster 34 CITY MARCH 2021

CELEBRATING WOMEN’S HISTORY MONTH In honor of Women’s History Month, WXXI celebrates women’s achievements with programs that spotlight them. For more programs, visit: WXXI.org/wh.

Renée Fleming Night Friday, March 19 at 8:30 p.m. on WXXI-TV It’s Renée Fleming Night on WXXI-TV. First, enjoy a 2019 Peer to Peer with David Rubenstein interview, where Rochester native and America’s favorite diva talks about her career, her family and her plans for the future. Then at 9 p.m. WXXI presents her 2020 concert from Dumbarton Oaks in Washington, D.C., where Renée performs a program of popular arias and lesser-known gems in Great Performances at the Met. Credit: Andrew Eccles

Perfect Union: A Musical Tribute to Ruth Bader Ginsburg Monday, March 8 at 8 p.m. on WXXI Classical FM 91.5 From trailblazing jurist, cultural and feminist icon, and passionate classical music admirer, hear stories and memories of the Notorious RBG and her reverence in the legal and opera worlds as told by family and friends.

American Masters: Flannery O’Connor Tuesday, March 23 at 8 p.m. on WXXI-TV This is a lyrical, intimate exploration of the life and work of author Flannery O’Connor, whose distinctive Southern Gothic style influenced a generation of artists and activists. Credit: Courtesy of Joe McTyre

American Masters: Twyla Tharp Friday, March 26 at 9 p.m. on WXXI-TV Explore legendary choreographer Twyla Tharp’s career and famously rigorous creative process, with original interviews, first-hand glimpses of her at work, and rare archival footage of select performances from her more than 160 choreographed works. Credit: Courtesy of Marc von Borstel

Loretta Lynn: My Story in My Words Pictured: Cicely Tyson Credit: Courtesy of Dennis Oulds/Hulton Archive via Getty Images

American Masters: How it Feels to Be Free Tuesday, March 9 at 8 p.m. on WXXI-TV American Masters looks at the lives of trailblazing Black female entertainers Lena Horne, Abbey Lincoln, Diahann Carroll, Nina Simone, Cicely Tyson, and Pam Grier. They challenged an entertainment industry deeply complicit in perpetuating racist stereotypes and transformed themselves and their audiences in the process.

Saturday, March 27 at 10 p.m. on WXXI-TV 2021 marks the 50th anniversary of “Coal Miner’s Daughter,” the Loretta Lynn song that became a book, a feature film, and an indelible part of popular culture.

Like so many other songs written by Loretta, the lyrics told the story of her life and spoke to women who struggled to make ends meet. Loretta’s simple, straightforward song stories gave legitimacy to the joys, heartaches, struggles and triumphs of daily life.

Credit: Courtesy of David McClister roccitynews.org CITY 35

TURN TO WXXI CLASSICAL FOR MUSIC PERFECTLY TUNED TO YOUR DAY A Woman’s World: Women Composers of the Baroque Monday, March 8 at 12 p.m. on WXXI Classical 91.5 FM Pegasus Early Music presents a concert of women composers from the Baroque era, including Barbara Strozzi, Elizabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Francesca Caccini, Isabela Leonarda, recorded live at Downtown United Presbyterian Church in Rochester in November 2013. Artists include soprano Laura Heimes; violinists Dongmyung Ahn and Daniel Lee; Emily Walhout on gamba; Michael Beattie, harpsichord; and Deborah Fox, theorbo. Mona Seghatoleslami hosts.

Live from Hochstein Wednesday at 12:10 p.m., beginning March 24 on WXXI Classical 91.5 FM Live from Hochstein, hosted by Classical 91.5’s Mona Seghatoleslami, presents performances by some of the finest artists from the Rochester area’s musical community, broadcast live from the Hochstein Performance Hall. Due to COVID-19, the series returns with archival programs from previous years. We hope to add live performances to the schedule when it is safe to do so and will share news of that in the coming months.

5 Things of Note about Maureen Rich Host of Road to Joy, heard Tuesdays 6-8 p.m. on WRUR-FM 1. How did you come up with your show name? I wanted to reflect how music has shaped my life. The best parts of my life have always had a soundtrack, whether I was playing music, or going to a show, or listening to music for comfort. My memories have always been musical. I wanted to share that road I’ve been on - and “Road to Joy” seemed to reflect that.

2. Who is your favorite musician? I have so many... Susan Tedeschi, The Wood Brothers, the Black Pumas, The War & Treaty. I can’t pick just one!

Metropolitan Opera Saturdays at 1 p.m. on WXXI Classical 91.5FM Launched in 1931, the Met’s Saturday Matinee Broadcasts are the longest-running classical radio series in American broadcast history. That rich tradition continues unbroken in the 2020–21 season with an expanded schedule of encore broadcasts selected from the company’s audio archives. Below are the operas airing in March.

3/6 3/13 3/20 3/27

Bizet: Carmen (performed 11/1/14) Mozart: Le Nozze di Figaro (performed 1/10/18) Rossini: Le Comte Ory (performed 2/2/13) Mozart: Don Giovanni (performed 3/10/12)

3. What’s the best part of hosting/producing your show? I love the deep dive of finding new music and figuring out how to put a playlist together so it has context. That context can be to a current event or a special occasion, or just how it works with the rest of the songs. There’s a bit of an art to it and I’m always honing my ability to communicate through the music.

4. What’s your day job? I work at WXXI/WRUR and Reachout Radio (WXXI’s 24-hour closed-circuit radio reading service for those with visual impairments) in Radio Operations, helping put the stations on the air. It’s very singular and detail oriented. I like that focused side of the job.

5. Do you play an instrument? I’ve been playing the ukulele for a few years now. It has been a deep source of joy for me to learn, and although I don’t play well, I play well enough for me (most of the time).

Photo credit: Richard Ashworth

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AM 1370, YOUR NPR NEWS STATION + WRUR-FM 88.5, DIFFERENT RADIO America, Are We Ready: The First 100 Days of the Biden Presidency Thursdays at 8 p.m. on AM 1370 Join this national conversation during the first 100 days of the Biden administration. WNYC’s Brian Lehrer hosts this live call-in shows featuring broad, good faith, inclusive conversations that lift the voices of callers around the country. To join the discussion, call 844-745-TALK (8255).

Intelligence Squared US: Has the GOP Lost Its Way?

Black Radio: Telling It Like It Was Sundays at 10 a.m. on WRUR-FM 88.5 This six-part series tells the story of radio’s role in the 20th century transformation of the African-American community. First aired in 1996, the specials have been reformatted into six hours for 2021. Original host Lou Rawls guides us, with new narration from original producer Jacquie Gales Webb.

Through interviews, historical airchecks, comedy, drama, and music, the series reveals the remarkable correlation between milestones of Black radio programming and African-American culture. Among other topics the series explores the role of radio during the great migration of Blacks from the South, trail-blazing Black DJs and stations, and Black radio during the Civil Rights movement.

Sunday, March 7 at 9 p.m. on AM 1370 What should the Republican party look like after Donald Trump? For many prominent establishment figures, including those behind The Lincoln Project, the GOP has lost its way. The only way back, they say, is to purge the forces that brought Trump to power. But others warn that rejecting the millions of voters who supported the former president is the wrong call for the American right. Rather, the GOP should instead double down, focus on bridging the establishment and grassroots factions of their party, and find a way to move forward together. In light of shifting political sands, we ask: Has the GOP lost its way?

FIVE FACTS ABOUT WXXI NEWS’ JEFF SPEVAK 1. Your role in the newsroom: WXXI Arts & Life Editor. Raising the level of sarcasm.

2. College + degree: Ohio University, BA in Journalism, minor in English.

Among my classmates was ESPN pro football reporter Peter King. My writing professors included Walter Tevis, who wrote “The Hustler,” “The Color of Money,” “The Man Who Fell to Earth” and “The Queen’s Gambit” and Daniel Keyes, who wrote “Flowers for Algernon.” None of them would have any reason to remember me.

Witness: Women’s History Month

3. Favorite place in Rochester: I love this city, but I wonder what it will look like when the streets are safe from COVID-19. I suppose what I love most is just sitting in a bar, listening to a local band, watching to see who walks in the door. I haven’t done that for a year.

Sunday, March 14 at 9 p.m. on AM 1370 This special shares remarkable stories of women’s history, told by the women who were there. You’ll hear moving, inspiring, and even outrageous stories about a few of the most important women in living memory.

Segments include: Fighting for the pill in Japan, The Jane Fonda Workout, The Guerilla Girls: The women who launched an anonymous poster campaign against sexism and racism in the 1980s art world, and more.

5. Favorite interview and why: Too many. Patti Smith recalling watching the assassination of Robert Kennedy on TV with her father. Tony Bennett talking about his time as an infantryman in the winter of 1944, huddled in a trench on the front lines and hearing German soldiers talking to each other in their own trenches on the other side of the field. B.B. King describing how when he was young, he and the other neighborhood kids would trade places pretending to be Joe Louis and Max Schmeling. Chatting about UFOs with Annie Haslam, lead singer of Renaissance. John and Joe Dady remembering when they played with Pete Seeger. Maybe it was Rosie Flores’ heartfelt story about not having had children because she was so busy pursuing her music career; and then she started to cry, and I felt like a jerk for doing that to her.

4: Last book you read: Just finished Erskine Caldwell’s “Tobacco Road.” The first 100 pages are an argument about a bag of turnips, and it just keeps getting better.

Photo credit: Aaron Winters

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New indie favorites available to watch at home.

Browse the entire virtual library at thelittle.org.

FOOD & FLICKS

NOW PLAYING! Ruth Justice Ginsburg In Her Own Words Documentary detailing the life and career of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Lapsis Low budget sci-fi with big ideas, mysterious energy cubes, an evil corporation, cute yet somehow terrifying robots, plus all the Black Mirror vibes.

Leona An intimate, insightful, and moving international film that tells the story of a young Jewish woman from Mexico City who finds herself torn between her family and her forbidden love.

A Glitch In The Matrix A mind-blowing documentary that dives down the rabbit hole of science, philosophy, and simulation theory.

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What is it?

Food, paired with —and inspired by — a film.

You can pre-order the food in advance (via Little Online Shop), pick it up in person at The Little, take it home, watch the film, and then join an open discussion group about it the next day. The March meal and movie details can be found at thelittle.org.

Past F&F events include The Princess Bride in January and Hidden Figures in February!

Sign up for The Little’s E-Newsletter An e-newsletter for those who swoon over movies. Sign up at thelittle.org/newsletter for up-to-date information on private screening rentals, Food and Flicks events, movies streaming at The Virtual Little, online discussions, virtual concerts, and more Little content.

Easter Worship Services Please join Christ Church Pittsford for our online Easter service.

Irondequoit United Church of Christ L ENT: S EASON

OF

R E C OV E RY

S ERVICES Maundy Thursday April 1 7p.m. Worship

Easter Sunday April 4 @ 9:30a.m.

In-Person Worship

(Across from the House of Guitars)

Visit christchurchpittsford.com the evening before Easter Sunday to access the service.

Christ Church Pittsford • 585-586-1226 36 South Main Street • Pittsford NY 14534

Worship W hip with ith us lilive or li livestream t S Sundays d att 99:30 30 a.m.

We are an a Open and Affirming & Just Peace Congregation 6644 Titus Ave, Rochester, NY 146177 (585) 544-3020 • www.irondequoitucc.org (585 org

Wonn’t you join us?

Wo Maundy Thursday Tenebrae Service April 1 7:30pm Traditional Tenebrae service with readings telling the story of the Last Supper & Jesus’ betrayal.

Easter Sunday Service April 4 10am

Join us in celebrating the good news of Christ’s resurrection!

No reservations required - we have plenty of room for social distancing. Masks required.

Salem United Church of Christ 60 Bittner Street 14604 • www.christinthecity.com 2 CITY

NOVEMBER 2020

An Independent Catholic Church Where All Are Welcome Easter Services Holy Thursday - 7:00pm Good Friday - 12:00pm Easter - 9am & 11am Watch online or register to come in-person spirituschristi.org roccitynews.org CITY 39

ARTS

REVEL IN THE DETAILS

ARTWORK PROVIDED

SWEET DREAMSCAPES ARE MADE OF THESE

BY REBECCA RAFFERTY

W

@RSRAFFERTY

hile taking in one of Andrea Durfee’s vibrant watercolor or acrylic paintings that seamlessly, almost imperceptibly, blend human forms with landscapes, it’s hard to believe she just wings it. No preliminary sketches. No color studies.

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BECCA@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM

“If I have the impulse, then I’ll sit down and just sketch on the actual canvas or the paper and go from there,” Durfee says. “The first thing that’s laid out is the figure, and then I build the landscape around it. So it’s very much paying attention to the body

positioning, and what emotion that is communicating.”

The human figures are subtly embedded into sweeping backdrops of nature. A reclining woman becomes a mountain range. A woman curled up resembles a boulder. A woman

lounging dissolves into the dunes around her. They are sleeping giants, at one with the natural world. She has so skillfully placed the figures that, at a glance, it’s easy to miss them.

In some works, the figure is purposely prominent. She may be

a silhouette in the foreground, her frame functioning as a portal to another world filled with lush flora under a starry night sky. One woman stares into a cup she holds, as though reading tea leaves. Waterfalls cascade from the outstretched hands of a woman into a lake reflecting the moon. There’s something sacred and mystical about them.

“I create dreamscapes meshing figures with landscapes as expressions of the journey to wellness,” Durfee says in her artist statement. “My work focuses on themes of personal mythology, power, and dichotomous balance. Figures embody both strength and fragility, and geological processes often serve as metaphor for human experience.”

In March, she is planning to release a new series of paintings titled “Seers,” which she says explore connecting with unperceived energy and strength.

Durfee, 36, studied studio art and creative arts therapy at Nazareth College and works out of a home studio in the South Wedge. But her work has found an audience beyond Rochester.

Paige Stanley, of Washington, D.C., is a collector of Durfee’s art.

She bought her first piece a year ago for a friend who was having a baby and says she was drawn to Durfee’s work because it conveyed beauty and strength. Since then, she has amassed originals and prints for herself, commissioned a lake scene, and gave works to friends as a gesture of solace during the pandemic.

One of her favorites is a painting called “Aries” that depicts a woman reclining over a mesa, a pastel sky reflected in a river that snakes toward giant crimson blooms in the foreground.

Andrea Durfee. PHOTO BY RACHEL LIZ PHOTOGRAPHY

“It’s just a peaceful, very calming sort of focal point with some really beautiful colors, but also has a very interesting perspective,” Stanley says.

“It’s kind of an escape, the depth lets you get lost in it.”

Often Durfee’s paintings are accompanied by little poems created “in conversation” with the finished piece, a practice that she credits, along with her intuitive process, to her training at Nazareth.

“I find that it’s a really therapeutic process pulling together your thoughts and paying attention to your own emotional experience, what’s going on internally, instead of trying to put your will out onto the paper,” she says.

Her intuitive approach shouldn’t suggest she isn’t drawing from a wellspring of developed skills. During

her undergraduate years, Durfee focused mainly on printmaking, specifically reduction block prints — a technique of alternating carving layers of shapes from a single block of linoleum and printing a color for each layer, until the block is depleted and the print has layers of colors that form a picture.

“I loved seeing this piece of linoleum go from a full sheet to nothing,” Durfee says. “And the physical labor of working that out was really gratifying.”

Durfee only took one painting course, but says she rediscovered painting later on when she no longer had access to a printing press. Recently, she started experimenting with digital art. She uses Procreate to create digital paintings; some animated and bringing her beings to life.

“I think that I needed to kind of unearth some different emotions while I was creating, and a medium switchup is sometimes a really great way to do that,” she says.

Her subject matter stems from mixed influences. Durfee says her mother was a ballet teacher, and that she was a dancer herself in her youth, practicing ballet, tap, and modern dance. She says dance has informed her body awareness and interest in figures. But the hints of the fantastical in her paintings come from growing up obsessed with fairies and mythology.

“I really gravitated towards that kind of internal fantasy or the potential for connecting with something that was not available to our eyes,” she says.

“And that’s never really gone away.”

Durfee’s landscapes are dreamed up — except in the cases of commissioned paintings of specific places. But some of the blooms in her recent works are referenced from images posted by local flower company Pistil & Pollen. Durfee references her own form for most of the figures, but says she’s starting to ask friends to model for her.

“I think that my depictions of landscapes are really purely internal mode,” Durfee says. “Living in Rochester, we obviously don’t have access to a lot of these desertscapes or coastal imagery that I come up with.

“I think it’s probably a bit of escapism that allows me to work through real-life problems,” she goes on. “It’s almost like creating just a little manifestation piece that captures that power that I’m trying to tap into.”

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ARTS

‘LAST YEAR ON EARTH’

"Self-portrait 2020" by Avi Prynts-Nadworny who says the work was made during the hand sanitizer shortage and reflects what it felt like to be immunocompromised in 2020.

ROCO’S LATEST EXHIBIT IS A REAL ARTPOCALYPSE

BY REBECCA RAFFERTY

T

@RSRAFFERTY

his month, Rochester Contemporary Art Center launches a group exhibition ominously but aptly titled “Last Year on Earth.”

The title might conjure images of the End Times, but the name actually refers to our collective experience over the past life-altering year, which for many people felt like the march to Judgement Day. Rochester Contemporary invited artists in the region to submit work made after February 2020 that reflected on 42 CITY MARCH 2021

BECCA@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM

the bad and the good: traumas of the pandemic, political strife, racial injustice, as well as the human capacity for empathy, innovation, and hopefulness.

Call it an artpocalypse.

People had things to say. The gallery received so many submissions — around 475 — that it delayed the opening of the show by a month. Of those entries, more than 90 works by 60 artists were accepted. “Last Year on Earth” opens March 5, and viewing times can be reserved at rochestercontemporary.org.

Rochester Contemporary’s Executive Director Bleu Cease says the show was inspired by creative projects he saw emerging as the health crisis took hold locally around March and April of last year, such as the multitudes of people who crafted face masks and began documenting their home life in new and interesting ways.

“The central idea for the show was to try to be as representative as we could, including established and unknown artists,” Cease says.

Three jurors selected the artwork — Kelly Cheatle, Alexa Guzmán, and Tanvi Asher — each with reach beyond the fine arts realm, Cease says, and who have themselves in the past year responded to the needs of the community with creative, grassroots solutions.

Cheatle designed a version of face masks with see-through panels for reading lips. Guzmán founded Project AIR, an arts initiative that invited anyone and everyone to make protest posters and art in response to racial injustice at the

Carmen Cibella's photograph, "Militarized Police Oppression in War Memorial Square."

"By a Lot," part of a triptych by Lisa Nudo.

hands of police. Asher used her Market at the Armory Instagram account to promote the creations of local makers during the pandemic.

“It’s kind of strange in life, when you get a hard stop,” Cheatle says of the pandemic-induced freeze on life as we knew it. “It forces you to reevaluate. So often we’re on autopilot, and being shaken from that habit leads to opportunities for growth. This show was an opportunity to see how our artists and creators used this time, and how they responded to this time in their artwork.”

Carmen Cibella, an artist from Hamburg in Erie County, responded with a series of black-and-white photographs that documented the protests to Daniel Prude’s death that evoke sympathy for the demonstrators.

A sculpture titled “Life Net” by Cynthia Cratsley, of the Southern Tier village of Odessa, depicts the United

"Dueling Identity" by Kelly Hanning.

States as a burning building. The people trapped within can save themselves and each other, if they’ll only leap into the face mask “net” below.

As a juror, Cheatle says she detected some common themes among the submissions. For one, many of the portraits had a similar look to them, an expression that she says is hard to put into words but completely relatable.

“Once you see it, you’re like, ‘Oh, I’ve seen that face in the mirror,’” she says. “I recognize that look, even though these are all individual portraits of completely different people. It’s just this sort of longing and sadness and ennui and you know, acceptance all at the same time, with a tiny sprinkle of hope in there. Very evocative of this time period.”

Cheatle says she also noted the impact our physical distancing had on photography. In many works there’s an evident space between the photographer and subject,

simultaneously capturing our desire to connect and our collective isolation.

Ditto for Rochester artist Steven Piotrowski’s painting, “COVID Window Visit with Mom.” The piece shows an elderly woman behind a window lowering her mask to reveal an elated smile and the reflection in the window of the masked artist taking her photograph.

One piece that struck Guzmán is “Constant Disappointment,” a painting by another Rochester artist, Steven Peet.

The image is a heap of beer cans in a trash can, paired with his bleak, brief artist statement: “For many the year has been one gut punch after another. How do you cope?”

Guzman says she related to the sentiment because the pandemic “presented a lot of obstacles and trials and tribulations in people’s lives that we were just expected to deal with, without much assistance from the government.”

But Guzmán, Cheatle, and Asher also selected several works that speak of, as Guzmán put it, the “hope that comes from being in a low point.”

For example, Rochester artist Roxanna Mendoza created “The World,” a sculpture of rings of paper cranes that reflected a vision of the world reconnected. Another instance was an abstract painting of shifting colors called “A New Day” by Barbara Mink, of Ithaca. She painted the piece a week after the November presidential election.

“Last Year on Earth” has three companion exhibitions: RCTV is curating “Through the Cracks,” the video art “Unjustness,” and “The Warp & Weft,” a multilingual archive of stories organized by Mara Ahmed. A set of three new stories and audio recordings will be released each week via RoCo and Mara Ahmed’s social media. roccitynews.org CITY 43

ARTS

PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

44 CITY MARCH 2021

A CHANGE IN TUNE

BY FRANK DE BLASE

FRANK@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM

A DARKER AMANDA LEE PEERS COMES INTO THE LIGHT WITH “SINNER”

A

manda Lee Peers sat in the kitchen of her north Greece home in a chair with a gaggle of helium balloons tied to the backrest. Sunlight streaking through the windows showered a vase of sunflowers. On the table lay party favors, remnants of a recent birthday celebration.

She was there to discuss a time in her life that she doesn’t like to talk about much; a dark time that flies in the face of the cheerful ambience of the room but fueled her muchanticipated six-song album “Sinner,” released late last year.

“This album explores the side of life I don’t really talk about a whole lot,” she says. “It’s the pain, the dark times, the struggles I’ve had… but also being aware of the light at the end of the tunnel.”

“Sinner” is a stark departure from her previous “Summertime State of Mind,” an upbeat acousticlaced EP released two years ago that emanated what she calls a “kidfriendly” sound. Her latest work is unapologetic in its raw emotion.

More eclectic, more electric, more punch. Its intensity leaves the listener out of breath.

It is the kind of art inspired by plumbing the depths of the soul, and reflects a transformation in Peers, both musically and in her appearance, that those who only remember her as the fresh-faced, girl-next-door who sang pop tunes on NBC’s “The Voice” nearly seven years ago now might be surprised to see.

Peers, 35, has traded in her signature flowing goldilocks, a hairstyle she says she felt “owned” her, for an edgy, close-cropped do.

The tattoos she wore on her upper arms have crept to her fingertips.

“Paradise” is tattooed across her knuckles in blue ink. A skull is on the back of one hand.

Amanda Lee Peers performing on NBC's "The Voice."

But the feelings and the darkness that inspired her, she says, had been there, latent and lurking. Perhaps ironically it was “The Voice” that helped surface what had been suppressed, specifically in her sharing with the television audience her story of growing up in a Christian household where, as she puts it, “being gay wasn’t part of the plan.”

The show was entertainment, first and foremost. The producers wanted interesting stories.

“I kind of had to figure out what my story was, and they helped pull that out of me,” Peers says. “I didn’t want to be the token lesbian on the show, but they made me realize it was an important story to tell. . . . I definitely left the show a different person.”

More than one cut on “Sinner” hints at heavy topics and the emotional weight they carried for Peers. Take just the opening lyrics of “Cruel Joke,” the fourth track, for instance.

So long, farewell, goodbye, I guess I’m going to hell/ ‘Cause it’s too late for me/ I can’t be who you want me to be.

“Blood on the Strings,” the second track, is a full-throttled march of redemption and power.

But it doesn’t come off forced, and her voice is propped up beautifully above the production.

All these feelings I’ve buried/ Is looking like a cemetery/ They coming back from the grave/ Calling out my name/ Better say a Hail Mary.

These songs, and the emotion they evoke, didn’t come easily to Peers. They took years to be coaxed into the light. Even as she recorded “Summertime State of Mind,” CONTINUED ON PAGE 46

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PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

46 CITY MARCH 2021

she wasn’t exorcising what she felt needed to be exorcized.

Stuff needed to happen. Peers needed to confront her past, her religion, even her family. She married her partner, Sandy Peers, in 2017. A year later, Sandy would die of what Peers casts as a degenerative disease.

“Sandy always pushed me to keep going and not to give up on music,” says Peers, who dedicated “Sinner” to her late wife. “I’m not sure if we’d be having this conversation now if it wasn’t for her.”

Peers delved deep into her past. She recalled being 19 and word getting around her church, the Open Door Baptist Church in Churchville, that she was gay.

When the news reached the pastor, she says, he kicked her out of the

church band and told her she would have to seek counselling for her sexual orientation.

It was a difficult spot for her and her parents. “They didn’t agree with how it was handled,” Peers says.

“But it was something that really wasn’t talked about with my parents at the time.”

Then came success on the local music scene with the experimental rock-roots band The Driftwood Sailors. The bluesy Peers-led project packed it in with its full-length album “White Hoses & Black Jeans” in 2012, but taking the necessary time off the day job to tour was too demanding at the time.

Peers went solo and caught the eye of the “The Voice” producers with a cover of Bill Withers’ soulful

“Ain’t No Sunshine When She’s Gone.” The headiness and celebrity of the show, which included being on Grammy-winning artist Gwen Stefani’s team, was followed by “Summertime State of Mind,” a romp with ballsy beats, funky flourishes, and a good-time vibe.

She cut off her hair. For a time, she packed in touring. After her wife died, she devoted herself to making music full time. All the while, she underwent a metamorphosis from a religious person to what she calls “a spiritual person.”

Still, as she says, “The dark wasn’t getting out. I don’t think I was ready to explore it.”

CONTINUED ON PAGE 48

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Peers' new album "Sinner" reflects a darker, deeper approach to songwriting than in her previous work. PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

48 CITY MARCH 2021

To mine the darkness, Peers sought the help of producer Sam Polizzi and Johnny Cummings. Their Rochester recording studio Sound Notion has recorded artists like Lou Gramm, Chris Daughtry, and Roses & Revolution, and worked on television shows and commercials.

Polizzi says he could sense that Peers was scratching for something below the lighthearted fare of her earlier work, and helped her bring out the songs that would eventually become the catharsis for her that is “Sinner.”

“I could tell she wanted to go in a different direction than she had in the past with her music,” Polizzi says. “Once we chose the songs, working with her felt like we had

known each other forever. We were always on the same page.”

A delight of “Sinner” is the job Polizzi and Cummings did highlighting Peers’ voice, careful not to overdo the sugar-coated studio stunts.

“She was open and loved to experiment with ideas,” Polizzi says.

“Actually, her talent made it easier to capture the sound. What was hard about it was making sure the production was as good as she is.”

Tour dates booked in Arizona, California, Colorado, and Florida to showcase her work had to be postponed due to the pandemic.

Now, Peers says she’s focused on making music and planning her

next studio recording. Just her and her guitar, her first love for which she was never made to feel guilty.

She knows, too, that love of any kind is something for which no one should feel guilty. What, then, was her sin?

“What isn’t my sin?” she says.

“It’s just being a human and I kind of more or less wanted to name the EP that because A, we’re all sinners in the Biblical sense, and B, it was kind of more like I felt I was being branded as a sinner at that time.

“So that’s kind of why I decided to name it that. I owned it. It was like, ‘OK, you want to treat me this way?’

Then that is how I’m going to be.”

SINNER

By Amanda Lee Peers RELEASED OCTOBER 30, 2020 AVAILABLE ON APPLE MUSIC, SPOTIFY, AMAZON AMANDALEEPEERS.COM

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ARTS

FRESH PERSPECTIVES

Songwriter-keyboardist Avis Reese used COVID-19's pause on live music for new collaboration. PHOTOS BY JACOB WALSH

PANDEMIC AND RACIAL RECKONINGS FUEL BLACK ARTISTS

BY IRENE KANNYO

F

or artists, the extreme changes of 2020 — from the world being put on hold by disease to the country’s reckoning with racial injustice — had an undeniable effect on their creative output and, in some cases, led to more radical art.

Sweeping and sudden COVID-19 regulations meant artists were forced to contend with the notion that they were deemed “non-essential.”

As museums, galleries, theaters, and music and arts venues shut down and major arts events — like the Lilac and jazz festivals — were canceled, creatives were left in the lurch.

But the Rochester arts community 50 CITY MARCH 2021

quickly made moves to adapt.

In April, the WOC Arts Collaborative held “COVID-19 Live ROC,” a 24-hour live-streamed event of local performances to raise money for emergency grants for BIPOC creatives who lost income.

In May, several Rochester art spaces collaborated to produce a virtual First Fridays event, and Rochester Contemporary Art Center’s annual “6x6” opening was held exclusively online.

By the end of spring, as artists and audiences were adjusting to a “new normal,” the image of a Minneapolis police officer killing George Floyd

inundated TV screens and prompted artists to respond anew. It happened again in the late summer, when the public learned of the death of Daniel Prude at the hands of Rochester police officers five months earlier.

Their deaths brought systemic racial injustice to the fore.

In speaking to a few Rochester artists to see how the crises of last year affected them creatively, two themes emerged.

RARE OPPORTUNITIES FOR REFLECTION AND CONNECTION For local R&B singer-songwriter Marshay Dominique, the events gave

her time to reexamine her sound, work on new projects and take her writing in a more honest direction. One outcome of this process was freeing herself of preconceived notions about what it takes to reach success as a musician. “[2020] taught me that I can definitely stand on my own as an independent artist,” Dominique says.

“I want to just be raunchy. I wanna swear. I wanna be angry. I wanna party. I wanna sound like a rapper even though I’m not.”

Dominique released a mixtape on Soundcloud last year that she says hints at her new sound.

Artist, filmmaker, photographer,

Marshay Dominique. PHOTO BY JACOB WALSH

and organizer Adrian Elim says time suddenly allowed them to focus more intimately on their art, and in particular, collaborations — some of which culminated in the “New Futures” project, a series of videos inviting Black people to envision their future beyond injustice, oppression, and turbulence. Preview visuals, published on Elim’s social media, featured femme voices and bodies from across the diaspora, broadcasting what a new era for global Blackness looked and felt like, from Elim’s lens.

One of Elim’s goals was to shake up perceptions of how people working in the advocacy space should behave.

Elim wanted to challenge the idea that “just because you fight for social justice, you have to live a very tortured, impoverished, really shitty life on the backend.”

“That is not fucking true at all,” they say. “We deserve luxury, we deserve creativity, we deserve to look as fab as possible. . . . We are human and this is a holistic thing.”

A forced break from traveling and touring enabled Avis Reese, the

songwriter, keyboardist, and music director of Danielle Ponder’s soul band, to work on a project she might not have been able to otherwise.

Reese contributed to the progressive hip-hop band Suburban Plaza’s tracks “Philando/Nat” and “Nat II.” The latter appeared on the group’s EP “TULSA,” released in November to fortify and inspire Rochester Black folks demonstrating all summer.

“It felt really good to have it be not just a song just for pure entertainment, but really a song that spoke to the moment that we’re in right now,” Reese says of the song, her first collaboration with the band.

Her sentiment is a common one.

When the Rochester community’s focus turned almost entirely to the fight against local police brutality, artists uplifted the message of the movement in their own personal ways.

CONVERSATIONS WITH THE MOVEMENT Rapper, singer, and actor Chi The Realist, a.k.a. James Boykins, returned to Rochester from Los

Angeles to join the protests. He wrote a song for the cause called “Flippin’ Shit Over,” which he calls a “battery for the revolution.”

“Protesting became such a ‘I’m getting ready to go to work’ thing,” Boykins says. “It’s emotionally draining. It’s mentally draining, especially knowing that I have to put on this gear and get ready to go out there and potentially have my life in danger. So it was like, well now that this song is done, if anybody needs anything to fuel them, I will fuel you.”

Mixed media artist and Monroe Community College faculty member Athesia Benjamin won a Wall Therapy mini-grant, which enabled her to create a mural at the Rochester Public Market. The piece is simple and vibrant: “Black lives built this country” written in black, green, and red against a white backdrop.

“That was inspired by some of these incredible handmade protest signs,” Benjamin says. “There’s one sign this young man in South Carolina was holding, and it just really struck me. It said ‘“Matters” is the minimum.’ So I

kind of added to that.”

Benjamin says that it’s important to honor and teach the societal contributions of Black people, beyond a mere acknowledgement that “Black lives matter.”

“I just felt so inspired to put that really radical truth — but more truth than radical — on that wall,” she says.

One of Elim’s artistic priorities in 2020 was centering on darker skinned Black femmes, who are often on the front lines of Black Lives Matter protests, and challenging perceptions placed on them by the world at large and even other activists.

“Trying to flip these notions on their head, you know, dark-skinned Black people can’t be soft, or they can’t be tender,” Elim says. “When people think ‘soft’ they think ‘light,’ and I’m like, ‘Why?’ I know why that is, but I’m not interested in that narrative. How do you treat people who are experiencing trauma, who are at the forefront of these things and who are now reacting to things, but then they are not allowed the space to process, be afraid, and be vulnerable?”

Dominique channeled the long history of oppression against Black people in her music. On her Instagram page, she previewed a song called “Maafa (Roses Remix).”

In the post, over a track called “Roses,” produced by SAINt JHN, Dominique sings her take on the true story of a runaway slave while a selfie snaps in and out of focus, as if there were static interference.

“I flash images from the Black Holocaust, from slavery: people with whipped backs, people with chains on, just very horrifying images — someone hanging from a tree — and this is all in the middle of my pretty face,” she says. “That was the point.”

Dominique says she didn’t want to shy away from the reality that injustice toward Black people is ongoing.

“When I go research what happened to my people and I still see it happening today, I’m not okay,” she says. “So it was like, ‘Put this here and leave it. Don’t take it down.

Don’t put it on private.’”

roccitynews.org CITY 51

LIFE

PUBLIC LIVES

BY DAVID ANDREATTA

@DAVID_ANDREATTA

DANDREATTA@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM

Cressida Dixon: Tending to the dead when no one else will

A

bout three people die each week in Monroe County without a will to bestow their earthly possessions unto family or friends or charities. Many of them die as they lived — poor, alone, and unseen.

Yet their dying touches off a flurry of life in the office of the county public administrator, an obscure agency that manages estates when there is no one else to do so, often when the deceased leave behind no instructions on how to disperse their belongings or have no known heirs.

“Truth be told, you get ‘death calls,’” explained Cressida Dixon, a seasoned estate lawyer at the firm of Bond, Schoeneck & King, who in January was appointed the first new public administrator in 20 years, becoming the first woman to ever hold the post.

The calls come mostly from hospitals and the county medical examiner, sometimes police and nursing homes.

“Some of them are just like you think: someone passed away, we need you to find the family. Some are someone died alone in the street, someone died alone in a snowbank, and it makes you think . . .” Dixon trailed off and sighed. “That’s where I have to remove my personal emotional side, or try to.”

Large counties in New York have a public administrator appointed by their Surrogate’s Court, the court where wills are probated and legal battles are waged over the assets of the dead. In Monroe County, anywhere from 150 to 200 estates a year fall to the public administrator.

The job is something of a departure for Dixon, a 50-year-old married mother of two teenage sons, who has been practicing estate law for half her life, most of it at Nixon Peabody or Bond Schoeneck, where she specializes in death planning for “high-net-worth individuals.”

By contrast, in her role as public administrator, Dixon mainly deals with people who either hadn’t the means to plan for their deaths or 52 CITY MARCH 2021

never got around to it. The job requires her to be part lawyer, part sleuth, part therapist.

Combing through the personal effects of the departed for clues as to who they were and who might care about them is peculiar work.

Their residences, their furniture, their jewelry, their photo albums, their love letters, their credit card bills, their bank accounts, all of it has to be secured. The public administrator consults property records, genealogy websites, census data, and newspaper clippings in an effort to find relations. Appraisals are then obtained for items such as art, guns, collectibles, and vehicles, and estate sales are organized.

“It’s a huge responsibility, and not one that I am going to take lightly,” Dixon said.

She sat behind a desk in her office at Bond Schoeneck strewn with legal folders containing information about decedents now in her charge.

She and her team, a small group that includes another estate lawyer and a couple of paralegals at the firm, were still trying to locate a relative in a few cases. Down the hall, the personal belongings of one of the deceased were in a conference room for safekeeping.

While their titles suggest they operate in plain view, public administrators tend to work out of the public eye. They often only

stir attention when complaints arise over their competency or their pay or their political involvement.

Sometimes they run afoul of the law.

A few years ago, a former counsel to the public administrator in The Bronx pleaded guilty to grand larceny and a bookkeeper for the Brooklyn public administrator was sentenced to prison for stealing from the dead.

In 2012, Monroe County’s previous public administrator, Frank Iacovangelo, made headlines when he was sued by the family of a deceased woman after he arranged for her burial in a pauper’s grave in Scottsville without informing her family, claiming that a search for next of kin turned up nothing.

The woman, Sally Green, had a son and six siblings who lived in the Rochester area. Her remains were later exhumed and buried at Mt. Hope Cemetery.

A couple years earlier, Iacovangelo’s compensation aroused suspicion in the county Legislature when County Executive Maggie Brooks proposed doubling a taxpayer-funded stipend for office expenses to $100,000 from $48,000, sparking accusations of pay-to-play political patronage. Prior to Iacovangelo being appointed public administrator in 2000, his predecessor received a stipend of $12,500. The proposal passed the Republican-controlled Legislature

along party lines.

Iacovangelo and his law firm, Gallo & Iacovangelo, were generous donors to local Republican politicians and causes, having given hundreds of thousands of dollars during Iacovangelo’s tenure as public administrator. The Monroe County Republican Committee recently named his brother, Bernard Iacovangelo, the party’s acting chairperson.

Surrogate Christopher Ciaccio, a Democrat, won the race for the judgeship last year against the Republican candidate, Elena Cariola, who happened to be Iacovangelo’s daughter and the court-appointed deputy public administrator to her father.

Ciaccio said he had concerns with some of the commissions that Iacovangelo had claimed and that had been approved by the previous Surrogate’s Court judge, John Owens.

He appointed a new public administrator in Dixon when he took office.

“She has vast estate experience and had the interest in serving the public and seemed to have the role of public administrator in perspective, I’ll put it that way,” Ciaccio said.

He said he invited three law firms with estate practices to make a pitch to him to handle the public administrator’s duties. Bond Schoeneck, he said, had the most interest in performing a public service.

“Some people have made a lot of money in this job,” Ciaccio said. “But Bond Schoeneck also realized it was a public service job and they weren’t in it so much for the profit as the opportunity to perform a public service.”

The public administrator can be a lucrative position, although the state law governing its compensation is a complex hodgepodge of provisions exclusive to different counties.

When it comes to Monroe County, the statute is somewhat ambiguous. It provides that the public administrator is entitled CONTINUED ON PAGE 54

Cressida Dixon, an estate lawyer at Bond, Schoeneck & King, is the first woman to be appointed Monroe County public administrator.

PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

roccitynews.org CITY 53

PHOTO BY MAX SCHULTE

to legal fees and “reasonable and necessary expenses” to be taken from the estates in lieu of a salary, and may receive “expenses of his office,” the latter of which was the countyfunded stipend.

The statute goes on to say that the public administrator may extract commissions from estates, like most public administrators in New York, but must turn those commissions over to the county treasurer.

Six years ago, Owens, the Surrogate’s Court judge who appointed Iacovangelo, reversed course on those commissions. He wrote to the county explaining that he had studied the statute and interpreted it to read that the public administrator could retain the commissions. As such, he wrote, Iacovangelo would no longer forward his commissions to the treasurer. In response, the county stopped paying Iacovangelo the $100,000 stipend for office expenses.

The result was typically a yearly net gain for Iacovangelo, according to his annual reports on file with the court.

In 2019, for instance, the last year for which an annual report was available, Iacovangelo claimed 54 CITY MARCH 2021

nearly $191,000 in commissions, $177,000 in “reasonable and necessary expenses,” and $34,000 in legal fees, and recorded that his firm was paid another $497,000 in legal fees extracted from the estates.

The total payout: $899,000.

That was a particularly good year, buoyed by a few large estates. But records show it was not uncommon for the public administrator to take in excess of $400,000 in any given year.

While a majority of estates handled by the public administrator contain assets of less than $5,000, for which no more than $775 in legal fees can be awarded under the Surrogate’s Court fee guidelines, some estates are worth much more.

In 2019 the public administrator closed on one estate valued at $3.9 million, two with assets of close to $1 million, and two others worth in excess of $500,000. In those cases, fees are set by the court.

Ciaccio said he was permitting the arrangement allowing the public administrator to receive legal fees and commissions for the time being, but would push state legislators to clarify the statute.

Dixon acknowledged that the position can be profitable, and that there were ambiguities in the

statute detailing compensation.

But she said she accepted the appointment as a way to give back to her community.

She grew up in the tiny central New York city of Norwich and settled in the Rochester area shortly after graduating from Syracuse University College of Law. “I love my clients, but this gives me an opportunity to give back to my community,” Dixon said. “Truth be told, I probably haven’t given back as much as I should have in the past just because of my commitment to working in big firms. It makes me feel good, and it’s also good for my kids to see that.”

She added: “It’s sad to think so many people die alone.”

Dying alone was a notion that crossed Dixon’s mind in 2008 as she confronted her own mortality.

That October, she was 38 years old and exercising at her home in Penfield when she suffered a stroke.

Dixon recalled lying on the floor, the left side of her body paralyzed.

She was alone in the house with her sons, one of whom was an infant in a crib and the other 5 years old in a nearby room. She thought: I’m having a stroke; my children will be motherless; and I have no friends.

“I laid there on the floor and my only thought was if I die no one’s going to come to my funeral,” she said. “All I do is work.”

Dixon recalled being able to reach her cell phone and call her sister, whom she told through slurred speech that she thought she was having a stroke. The day before was World Stroke Day, and her sister had watched an episode of “The Oprah Winfrey Show” devoted to the subject. She acted quickly to summon an ambulance.

All the signs of an impending stroke had been there, Dixon recalled.

A day earlier, she said, her vision was intermittently blurry, she slurred words, and forgot her destination while driving to a lunch date.

Dixon recovered, albeit with some lingering effects of weakness on her left side that are imperceptible to the outsider, and re-evaluated her life. She changed law firms, found a better worklife balance, and found more time for her husband and children and causes important to her. She tells her story at American Heart Association events.

“I always say the stroke saved my life,” she said.

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roccitynews.org CITY 55

LIFE

A ROYAL PAIN

Television series "Juana Inés" tells the story of an outspoken and influential feminist nun who lived in 17th-century Mexico. PHOTO COURTESY NETFLIX

HAD ENOUGH OF EUROPEAN ROYALS ON TV? SO HAVE WE. Expand your worldview with these biographical films and TV shows that bring historic leaders — outside of Europe — to life

BY REBECCA RAFFERTY

A

record-breaking 29 million people streamed the fourth season of “The Crown” the week it dropped on Netflix last November. Blame it on the bored multitudes staying home and watching a lot of TV if you want.

But the show, which tells the story of Queen Elizabeth II’s reign and reveals the inner lives of the British royal family — humanizing them while taking a warts-and-all approach — is undeniably popular.

56 CITY MARCH 2021

@RSRAFFERTY

BECCA@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM

Most shows and films about British or other European leaders are. We’re inundated with movies and TV series that bring historic leaders to life (“The Tudors,” “Versailles,” “The King,” “Victoria,” and many more). Maybe our fascination is due to the fact that we don’t have royals in America.

But there’s a wide world outside of Europe that offers many stories of consequential historic leaders that are worth telling. While we’re impatiently waiting for the fifth season of “The

Crown” to be released (not until 2022, sorry!) take this opportunity to expand your geographic focus.

Many of the stories are about non-European leaders who are revolutionaries or religious figures, not necessarily heads of state or annointed rulers.

“Since it does seem to be so hard to think of fiction films and television shows that focus on established nonEuropean leaders, I wonder if one of the reasons ‘Black Panther’ has

been so popular is that it features an established African royal family,” said Jean Elisabeth Pedersen, associate professor of history at the University of Rochester.

Good storytelling brings to life the histories and struggles of those of people who have been marginalized in or left out of historic accounts recorded by occupying nations.

With a little digging, there are a number of television shows and films available, said Dr. Molly C. Ball,

Aung San Suu Kyi, who is once again under house arrest in Myanmar, is the subject of the 2011 film "The Lady."

PHOTO COURTESY MAGALI BRAGARD / COHEN MEDIA GROUP

who is a lecturer in the University of Rochester’s History Department and coordinator for the Latin American Studies minor.

“They can be riveting and open up a whole new geography to viewers,” she said.

The following list was compiled with the help of Ball and Pedersen.

“Juana Inés” One of Ball’s favorite series from the colonial period is the Mexican TV show, “Juana Inés,” about the life of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, an outspoken and influential feminist nun whose lesbian relationship got her into trouble in 17th-century Mexico. She was a self-educated philosopher and writer, and turned her nun’s quarters into a salon that was frequented by Mexico City’s intellectual elite. “Juana Inés is incredibly riveting and also gives some great insight into the complicated social structure,” Ball said.

“The Lion of the Desert” This 1980 film tells the story of early 20th-century Libyan revolutionary Omar al-Mukhtar, as the north African country fought for independence from its Italian colonizers. A teacher-turned general in 1911, al-Mukhtar organized and for almost 20 years led the Libyan resistance movement, and became a national hero and enduring symbol of resistance in the Arab and Islamic worlds.

“The Lady” Michelle Yeoh stars in Luc Besson’s biopic, “The Lady” (2011), about Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate who stood against the military government of Burma and was placed under house arrest for almost 15 years. She survived an assassination attempt. She went on to serve as state counsellor of Myanmar (equivalent to a

prime minister) and minister of foreign affairs from 2016 to 2021. This one’s incredibly topical — Suu Kyi was just placed under house arrest in February when military leaders overthrew her democratically-elected government.

“The Last Emperor” An epic biographical drama, the 1987 film follows the life of Puyi, the last Emperor of China, whose

1964 autobiography was the basis for Bernardo Bertolucci and Mark Peploe’s screenplay. The story covers a lot of tumult and change, jumping back and forth in time from 1950 when Puyi is a political prisoner of The People’s Republic of China to 1908, when Puyi is brought as a toddler to the Forbidden City to become the next emperor, all the way to the rise of Mao Zedong and the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s.

“Lumumba” The 2000 biographical film by Raoul Peck tells the story of Congolese politician and independence leader Patrice Lumumba, who played a significant role in transforming Congo from a colony long brutalized by Belgium into an independent republic in 1960. The film forefronts African nationalism and pan-Africanism ideologies, which have connections to the civil rights movement in the U.S. The story follows Lumumba through a turbulent time, in his role as the first prime minister of the Republic of Congo, working alongside the nation’s first president, Joseph Kasa-Vubu, to prevent the country from dissolving into anarchy.

A scene from the 2000 film, "Lumumba," about Congolese independence leader Patrice Lumumba. roccitynews.org CITY 57

LIFE

NOT WORKING 9 TO 5

Comedian Shirelle Kinder at Comedy @ the Carlson. PHOTO BY JACOB WALSH

THE CORONAVIRUS “SHE-CESSION” Women have been hit hardest by the pandemic’s job losses

BY REBECCA RAFFERTY

A

@RSRAFFERTY

year ago February, things were clicking for comedian Shirelle Kinder.

That month, she had achieved her goal of performing in New York City when she was featured at the “All Black Everything” comedy showcase.

She shared a stage with rising stars Jay Jurden and Opeyemi Olagbaju.

She received positive feedback and made connections.

58 CITY MARCH 2021

BECCA@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM

“I was so excited,” said Kinder, who lives in Rochester. “And then the world closed down.”

Kinder hasn’t done stand-up since the pandemic took hold. First, the clubs closed down. Then, she was unable to translate her brand of comedy to the virtual space. After a while, the events of the last year took a toll, even on someone who trades in levity.

“I never really saw myself as a professional,” said Kinder, who makes ends meet as a bartender at John’s Tex Mex in the South Wedge.

“But as soon as the pandemic hit, and my whole money flow changed, I really realized how much money I was making off of comedy.”

She is one of millions of American women for whom the health crisis cut into their working lives.

Women were on equal footing with men in the workforce at the outset of 2020, holding just over half of all jobs. By the end of the year, women were down 5.4 million jobs compared with 4.4 million job losses for men, according to federal Department of Labor data.

Roughly half of the 22 million jobs lost at the height of the pandemic have been recouped, according to

the agency. But that still leaves about 10 million jobs outstanding, jobs disproportionately held by women and people of color. The gap is due to steep job losses in three sectors dominated by women: education, hospitality, and retail.

“Job loss, small business closings and a lack of child care have created a perfect storm for women workers.”

In all, 2.5 million women have left the workforce altogether since the beginning of the pandemic, compared with 1.8 million men, according to the Labor Department. Last month, Vice President Kamala Harris said in an op-ed in The Washington Post that the former figure constituted a “national emergency.”

The Biden administration has seized on several elements of its proposed $1.9 trillion relief plan that officials say will ease the burden on unemployed and working women, including $3,000 in tax credits for each child, a $40 billion infusion in child care assistance, and an extension of unemployment benefits.

“Job loss, small business closings and a lack of child care have created a perfect storm for women workers,” Harris wrote.

AmberDawn Knox is a parent of two children in Rochester and voluntarily stopped working to accommodate pandemic life. Knox, who identifies as non-binary, was self-employed at their own home cleaning business.

They said their chronic illness made it difficult to work often before COVID, but that they loved the job, and enjoyed a certain level of flexibility when they were too sick to work. The pandemic was impossibly unaccommodating.

Knox stopped working in March, as the state went into lockdown, and hasn’t returned. They had young kids Kristen Klock is the owner of Root Catering. PHOTO BY JACOB WALSH CONTINUED ON PAGE 60

roccitynews.org CITY 59

to care for, and safety became the household’s first priority.

“I haven’t done anything since,” they said, adding that they’ve stayed afloat because their partner is able to work fully remotely, and a disability claim was approved.

Some have taken to calling the economic fallout from the pandemic the first female recession, or the catchier “she-cession.”

“It’s definitely been devastating.

From an emotional standpoint, from a business standpoint, it’s been an absolute nightmare.

You just wake up one day and your business is gone.

And it’s nothing that you did.”

An analysis last year by the National Women’s Law Center noted that the female unemployment rate reached double digits for the first time since 1948. The slide represented an abrupt reversal from the beginning of the year, when women held more payroll jobs than men — 50.04 percent — for the first time in a decade.

Kristin Klock, the owner of Root Catering, a full-service catering company in Rochester, said before the pandemic she employed 35 people and did about $1 million a year in business. The pandemic, she said, cut the company in half.

Root relied heavily on events — about 200 annually, including weddings, fundraisers, workplace meetings, and other gatherings — that dried up during the pandemic.

“It’s definitely been devastating,” she says. “From an emotional standpoint, from a business standpoint, it’s been an absolute nightmare. You just wake up one day and your business is gone. And it’s nothing that you did.”

Such problems are not exclusive to women, of course. People of all 60 CITY MARCH 2021

demographics have felt squeezed by the pandemic. Also worth noting is the dearth of data on how the pandemic has affected the livelihoods of people in marginalized groups, like transgender or non-binary people.

But, broadly speaking, the pains of the pandemic are felt most acutely by women. Although women occupied more payroll jobs than men just before the pandemic, the jobs traditionally dominated by women — so-called “pink-collar jobs,” such as those that involve social work or child care or secretarial work — remain generally lower-paying.

Now consider that women reduced their working hours more than men to care for children during the pandemic — as much as four to five times more, according to the findings of one study.

Katie Reagan, a bartender from Rochester, has yet to get back behind the bar at The Playhouse in Swillburg.

The popular arcade eatery is open for take-out, and Reagan is working, but her hours and pay are nowhere near approaching her days of busy Friday and Saturday nights.

“Bartending was my life,” Reagan said. “The energy, the thrill, the agony of it all. I lived for both the pain and the glory.”

Reagan pursued bartending after she was laid off from a corporate job that occupied most of her 20s. Now, like many who work in the service industry, Reagan is afraid for the future. She wonders how many bars and restaurants will recover, and to what extent.

The Playhouse, a cavernous former church once filled with the carnivalesque lights and sounds of arcade games was completely transformed

by COVID restrictions. Most of the games have been returned to the company’s warehouse.

Once a worker who reveled in a busy night, Reagan reduced her hours and her shifts are slower. Regan said she feels stuck between not feeling safe, and having to give up what she loves doing.

“Until I get vaccinated I don’t think I’ll be behind the bar again,” she said. “Even then, the world and the way we socialize has changed so drastically, will it ever be the same?

Will I even be able to make a living doing it again? I haven’t found other work yet because, quite frankly, I’m sort of in denial and I just don’t want to accept this as reality.”

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roccitynews.org CITY 61

LIFE

WHAT ALES ME

WITH A SECOND BUMMER ST. PATRICK’S DAY, THERE’S STILL ROOM TO CELEBRATE

BY GINO FANELLI

@GINOFANELLI

A

s much as St. Patrick’s Day is an Irish holiday, it is also very much a beer holiday, one in which sales of suds increase by 174 percent on average, according to a WalletHub report.

The American St. Patrick’s Day celebrates the culture of pub drinking — the all-day sipping sessions of the Emerald Isle’s low-alcohol, malty brews and the camaraderie that comes with it.

But for the second year in a row, COVID-19 has put a damper on

GFANELLI@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM

traditional revelry.

“It really is sad,” said John Urlaub, owner of Rohrbach Brewing Company.

“Not just as a brewery owner, but it’s part of who we are as Americans. I think social interaction is a key thing.”

Three Heads Brewing co-owner Geoff Dale lives for the opportunity to put on a good party, and St. Patrick’s Day offers one. Typically, Three Heads marks the holiday with its “Going Green” party, a reggae event that pays homage not to shamrocks, but to a different green plant.

The brewery will host the event virtually this year, just as it did for its January “Homegrown” birthday party, which it usually holds at Lovin’ Cup in Henrietta.

“You can either curl up in a fetal position, or you can adapt and have fun,” Dale said. “That’s what we’re doing, we’re dealing with the cards we’ve been dealt, and we’re going to make it work.”

While the St. Patrick’s Day parade won’t travel through downtown Rochester this year, and most

Patty’s Irish Ale

Amber Ale

Rochesterians will likely abstain from public partying, the beer is still flowing, and that alone is a reason to celebrate.

Irish styles such as red ales or dry stouts tend to be malty brews, light on the booze and heavy on bready, roasty, and caramel notes.

There’s a reason these beers don’t beat you over the head with alcohol like many American brews — like the United Kingdom, Ireland’s beer has historically been subject to an excise tax based on alcohol-by-volume, meaning stronger beers got dinged harder by the government.

American brewers ultimately gave Irish ales the domestic treatment — they have more hop presence, more intense flavors, and higher alcohol levels.

Birdhouse Brewing in Honeoye pumps out a supreme example of this IrishAmerican love child with its Let ’em Go Red Ale. This beer packs a hefty dose of Cascade hops, sourced from Drumlin Farms in Bristol, giving it a pithy, bitter finish which compliments a sweet, caramel malt backbone. The ale has a modest 5 percent alcohol level, so drinking a couple of pints won’t mean an early end to the festivities.

Birdhouse opened in May 2020, well into the pandemic, and hasn’t yet been able to make full use of its roomy space in the Finger Lakes, a grist mill in a former life.

“We’ve been open the whole time during the pandemic, so for us, we don’t know any different,” said co-owner Greg Searles. “It’s definitely not what we expected.”

“We’re definitely ready for a crowd,” coowner Scott Gillen said.

Birdhouse won’t get that crowd this St. Patrick’s Day, but the brewery owners hope that in the coming months life will return to a semblance of normalcy, bringing thirsty bar-goers back together to clink glasses, listen to some good bands, and put our beer culture back in motion.

“I really think that, once this is over and things start to open back up, we’ll see people coming out like we’ve never seen before,” Urlaub said.

DRINK THIS NOW Let ’em Go Red

from Birdhouse Brewing 8716 Main Street, Honeoye A simple, delicate balance of caramel malt notes gives way to a nuanced finish of dried fruits and a crisp, herbal hop bite.

62 CITY MARCH 2021

from Rohrbach Brewing Company 97 Railroad Street Bready malt sweetness shines in this simple, and traditional, take on Irish pubstyle ales. Find notes of honey, caramel, and just a touch of floral hops on the tail-end.

from Nine Maidens Brewing Company 1344 University Avenue, Suite 140 A thoroughly Americanized take on a Western European staple that plays a generous hop complexity against a backdrop of robust malt. Somewhat sweet, somewhat bitter, entirely crushable.

Thin Mint Irish Stout

from Irish Mafia Brewing Company 2971 Whalen Road, Bloomfield It’s like Guinness with Girl Scout cookies in it. What’s not to love?

roccitynews.org CITY 63

ABOUT TOWN Activism

Delta Talks: 5 Prominent Rochester Women Speak Out on Improving the City. Sun., March 21, 6 p.m. Livestream, online. facebook.com/RACDST1913.

Responding to Racist Remarks. Wed., March 17, 6:30 p.m. Livestream, online. $5-$10 suggested. surjroc.org/ workshops.

Spiritus Christi Lenten Speaker Series: My Journey with Racial Justice.

Thursdays, 7 p.m Livestream, online.

Mar 4: Mary & Steve Heveron Smith.

Mar 11: Damond Wilson. Mar 18: Jonathan Leach. Mar 25: Ashley Gantt. spirituschristi.org.

Lectures

16th Annual Reshaping Rochester Lecture Series. Wed., March 24, noon.

Nidhi Gulati, Senior Director of Programs & Projects at Projects for Public Spaces on transport and mobility. Livestream, online. cdcrochester.org.

All About St Patrick’s Day. Tue., March 16, 7 p.m. Livestream, online. Jack Kowiak, presenter. Brockport-Seymour Library. Registration required 637-1050.

Becoming a Restorative Campus: How Restorative Justice Can Build Community & Address Harm. Thu., March 11, 7 p.m.

Livestream, online. www2.naz.edu/events.

Bees!. Thu., March 25, 2:30 p.m.

Livestream, online. Seaway Trail Honey Zoom Program. Brighton Memorial Library. Registration required 784-5300.

The Birdlife of New Zealand. Fri., March 12, 7:30 p.m. Livestream, online. Jane Eggleston, presenter. Burroughs Audubon Nature Club bancny.org/programs.html.

Born Criminal: Matilda Joslyn Gage, Radical Suffragist. Tue., March 16,

7 p.m. Livestream, online. Angelica Shirley Carpenter, presenter. Registration required perintonhistoricalsociety.org.

Building Trauma-Sensitive Cultures in Schools. Fri., March 5, 10 a.m.

Livestream, online. St. John Fisher Virtual First Friday Lecture. Registration required sjfc.edu/calendar.

Carousels of Monroe County. Tue., March 9, 7 p.m. Livestream, online.

Linda Dawley, presenter greecehistoricalsociety.org.

Connected Communities: A Holistic Approach to Building Up Rochester Neighborhoods. Thu., March 25, 6 p.m.

Virtual Central Library, online. calendar. libraryweb.org.

A Dangerous Freedom: Abolitionists, Freedom Seekers & the Underground Railroad in Yates County. Tue., March

23, 7 p.m. Livestream, online. Tricia Noel, presenter. Geneva Historical Society.

Registration required 789-5151.

Emily Sibley Watson: Rochester’s Quiet Philanthropist. Sat., March 13, 10:30

a.m. Virtual Central Library, online.

Retired librarian Lu Harper & MAG chief Curator, Marjorie Searl present this installment of Mourning in the Morning.

Registration required calendar.libraryweb.org.

64 CITY MARCH 2021

Exploring Mars. Tue., March 9, 3 p.m.

Livestream, online. Steve Fentress, Director of the Strasenburgh Planetarium, through Penfield Public Library.

Registration required 340-8720.

George Eastman in 1921. Fri., March 12, 1 p.m. Virtual George Eastman Museum, online. $10 suggested. eastman.org.

Growing Up in a Frank Lloyd Wright House. Wed., March 24, 6:30 p.m.

Livestream, online. Kim Bixler, presenter.

Winton Branch Library. Registration required 428-8204.

James Waller: The Escalating Risk of Mass Violence in the United States.

Tue., March 23, 7 p.m. Livestream, online. MCC’s Holocaust, Genocide, & Human Rights Project. Registration required monroecc.edu.

Life in the Past Lane: History Along the Highways of NYS. Mon., March 8, 7 p.m.

Livestream, online. Chili Public Library.

Registration required 889-2200.

Michael Beschloss: What Makes a Great US President. Mon., March 8, 6

p.m. Livestream, online. UR’s Difficult Conversations as a Catalyst for Change series. Registration required 276-5757.

Rochester’s Rich History: The Untold Story of Shields Green. Sat., March 20,

1 p.m. Virtual Central Library, online. calendar.libraryweb.org.

Sam Patch, America’s First Daredevil.

Thu., March 4, 7:30 p.m. Livestream, online. Maureen Whalen, presenter.

Honeoye Falls-Mendon Historical Society 624-5655.

Surviving the 2020 Election. Thu., March 25, 5 p.m. Livestream, online. Drs. Sebastien Lazardeux & Katie Donovan.

Penfield Public Library. Registration required 340-8720.

Winter Walking Tour. Sat., March 27, 11 a.m.-1 p.m. Mount Hope Cemetery, 1133 Mt Hope Ave. $12. fomh.org/Events.

Women in Preservation & Design. Thu., March 11, 7 p.m. Livestream, online. $18. rochesterbrainery.com.

Literary Events & Discussions

Adult Book Discussion Group. Tue., March 16, 1:30 p.m. Livestream, online.

“Eat Joy: Stories & Comfort Food from 31 Celebrated Writers” Brighton Memorial Library. Registration required 784-5300.

Book Discussion Group. Thu., March 18, 2 p.m. Livestream, online. Fredrik Backman, “A Man Called Ove” Penfield Public Library.

Registration required 340-8720.

The Changemakers Book Club. Fri., March 26, 6 p.m. Mar 26: Jane Plitt’s “Martha Matilda Harper & the American Dream: How One Woman Changed the Face Of Modern Business” Livestream, online. Part of the Rochester Museum & Science Center exhibit, The Changemakers: Rochester Women Who Changed the World $15. rmsc.org.

The Hoopla Huddle. Mon., March 29, 6 p.m. Livestream, online. Toshikazu Kawaguchi, “Before the Coffee Gets Cold” Irondequoit Public Library. Registration required 336-6060.

Rochester Jewish Book Festival. Thu.,

March 4, 8 p.m., Sun., March 7, 4 p.m., Thu., March 11, 8 p.m., Sun., March 21, 8 p.m. and Thu., March 25, 8 p.m.

Livestream, online. $6-$11. rjbf.org.

Teen Book Discussion Group. Tue., March 23, 6:30 p.m. Livestream, online.

Ibi Zoboi & Yusef Salaam’s “Punching the Air” Brighton Memorial Library.

Registration required 784-5300.

Kids Events

Book & Beast at Home. Fourth

Wednesday of every month, 11 a.m.noon. Mar 24: “Twas the Day Before Zoo Day” by Catherine Ipcizade. Seneca Park Zoo online, senecaparkzoo.org Registration required.

Peter Rabbit Garden Party. Sat., March 20, 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Strong National Museum of Play, 1 Manhattan Sq. (museumofplay.org) $18/$23.

Unicorns & Rainbows. Sat., March 6, 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Strong National Museum of Play, 1 Manhattan Sq. (museumofplay. org) $18/$23.

Web of Life Winter StoryWalk. Sundays, 10 a.m.-4 p.m Genesee Country Nature Center, 1410 Flint Hill Rd Mumford gcv. org/explore/nature-center/nature-walks.

Recreation

Guided Nature Walk. Mon., March 15, 10 a.m. Tinker Nature Park, 1525 Calkins Rd Registration required. Genesee Valley Audubon Society 359-7044.

In Search of Owls. Fri., March 12, 1 p.m. and Sat., March 13, 1 p.m. Sterling Nature Center, 15380 Jenzvold Rd Sterling Registration required (315) 9476143.

Signs of Spring. Fri., March 19, 1 p.m. and Sat., March 20, 1 p.m. Mar 20, 10am: FB Live event. Sterling Nature Center, 15380 Jenzvold Rd Sterling Registration required (315) 947-6143.

Signs of Spring Walk. Sun., March 21, 2 p.m. Letchworth State Park, 1 Letchworth State Park . Castile Registration required.

Meet at Mount Morris Entrance Gate 4933682.

Winter Waterfalls Walk. Sun., March 28, 6 p.m. Letchworth State Park, 1 Letchworth State Park . Castile Registration required. Meet at Inspiration Point. Bring a flashlight 493-3682.

Yoga in the Pines. Sun., March 14, 10:30 a.m. & 1 p.m. Cumming Nature Center, 6472 Gulick Rd. $18. rmsc.org.

Young Moon Spring Equinox Walk.

Sat., March 20, 6 p.m. Letchworth State Park, 1 Letchworth State Park . Castile Registration required. Meet at Archery Field Overlook 493-3682.

Special Events

17th Annual Inside Downtown Tour.

March 19-28. Livestream, online. $20/$25. landmarksociety.org.

Be a Kid Again: Adult Hours. Fri., March 12, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Strong National Museum of Play, 1 Manhattan Sq. (museumofplay.org) $15/$20.

Innovations in Global Health Conference. Sat., March 27, 9 a.m.-

4 p.m. Livestream, online. Rochester Institute of Technology. Registration required campusgroups.rit.edu/gharit.

Maple Sugar Festival. Fridays-Sundays Genesee Country Village & Museum, 1410 Flint Hill Rd Mumford $8-$12. gcv.org.

Maple Sugaring. Saturdays, Sundays, 9 a.m.-2 p.m Cumming Nature Center, 6472 Gulick Rd. Through Mar 28 $8$11. rmsc.org.

SIMCON 42. Fri., March 26, 6 p.m.midnight, Sat., March 27, 10-midnight and Sun., March 28, 10 a.m.-9 p.m.

Livestream, online. UR Simulation Gaming Association Simcon.org.

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roccitynews.org CITY 65

LIFE

LEADING LADIES

Across 1. Constellation elements 6. 1980s video game in which the player controls a knight riding an ostrich 11. Salon supplies 15. Breakfast grains often stored in packets 19. Butterfly chrysalises, e.g.

20. Where Amelia Earhart was lost 21. Withered 22. Pulitzer winner James 23. Rochester woman named the 2012 FIFA World Player of the Year 25. Grammy winner for Best Metal Performance in 1998, 2002 and 2020 26. Confident 27. Gaucho’s weapon 28. Unit equal to 304.8 millimeters 30. Rochester woman Wendy O. ___, controversial singer for the Plasmatics 32. Allegorical island 36. Modernists, informally 38. Grades on the middle part of a bell curve 39. One of 82 for Saturn 40. Digital greeting 42. Warhol genre 44. Students with “board” authority 47. Holder of an encl.

48. Competitor of Liquid-Plumr 49. Abbreviation on the sidewall of a tire 50. Critic who awarded thumbs up to “Thelma and Louise” 52. Beefy bovines 54. Best and worst of Dickens?

57. Island state of Australia 60. Find x, say 61. Word with bone or cavity 62. James of jazz 63. Raise 64. Spineless political advisors 66. Word that can denote average, poor or excellent 68. Cleanliness 70. Female domesticated ungulate 72. Rochester woman whose grave becomes a pilgrimage site each November 75. Shoulder pads or parachute pants 66 CITY MARCH 2021

PUZZLE BY S.J. AUSTIN & J. REYNOLDS 1

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3

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5

6 20

19 23

24 27

32

33

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39

40 48

47 52

53 61

60 64 70

65 72

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81

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90

93 100

99

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105 110

111

112

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118

125

126

129

130

76. Shrink 78. Eco-friendly way to dry 79. Lacking a certain compass 81. Recent rival of a Yank 82. Blue hue 84. Tune from the ‘50s, e.g.

86. Responses to sermons 89. Olive Garden add-on 91. Feminist Germaine 92. Stump 93. Fencing blades 94. Material for a driveway or a roof 96. Pathway in a grocery store 98. Suffix with serpent

102

1 2 3 4 Across 13 14 15 16 17 18 1. Word that follows 14 the start of each22 21 starred answer 17 5.

On the ocean 25 26 20 10. "...hear ___ drop" 28 29 30 31 23 24 14. Pound of poetry 28 36 37 35 15.38Tips 16. Russo of 34 35 36 37 41 42 43 44 45 46 "Outbreak" 41 17. Chop ___ 49 50 51 18. *** Edward 44 Teach, 54 55 56 57 58 59 familiarly 47 48 20.

Asia's ___ Sea 63 62 51 21. Dark time for poets 66 67 68 69 58 59 60 22. Lets up 64 73 74 23. Many four-doors 75 25. Billionaire Bill 68 78 79 28. The Braves, on80 scoreboards 71 83 84 85 87 88 30. Middle of86 many German names 91 63. Rough breathing 31. "Go 92 on ..."

64. *** Place for 34.

March 17 94 95 96 97 98 miscellaneous honoree, for stuff short 103 104 67. Baja's opposite 38. Close to closed 68. "If all ___ fails 106 107 10840. Mine, in 109 ..."

Marseiille 69. Vow taker 114 115 113 41.116 *** Cold 70. Farm sounds comfort 119 120 12144. Ones born before 71.

122 Beliefs 123 124 72.

Common thing?

Virgos 127 128 73.

"Green Gables" 45. Jessica of "Dark girl Angel" 131 132 46. "___ Johnny!"

Down 47. Hosp. areas 48. ___ Jeanne d'Arc 1. Tablelands 49. Stimpy's cartoon 2. Blue shade 99. Good friend of Stimpy 3. "___who you loud and pal 120. Rochester woman co-wrote and starredclear" in 100. Empire overthrown by 51. Some college “Bridesmaids” Alexander the Great in 330 BCE students 4. Eric Clapton love 125. Craftiness song 103. Start of question often 53. Greets heard from the back seat 126.

Pleasantly sour 5.

Optimally nonverbally 104. Prefix with freeze 127. Hole ___ 6. Mah-jongg piece 58. Popular typeface 105. Jane Rochester’s maiden 61. Gallery 128. display Hereditary class of Hindu name society 106. Have an objection 129. Simba’s evil uncle in “The Lion King” 108. Stop signal 130. Part of the process 110. Rochester woman who won an Olympic gold medal in 2012 131. Lady ___, first female member of British Parliament 114. Jordan’s queen ___ 132. “Keep your ___ the ball” 116. Vegetarian gelatin substitute 117. Give ___ on the back 118. Common baby food vegetable

7

8

9

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11

12

5

15

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21

42

45

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7 8 9 1 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3 4

Answers to this puzzle can be found on page 29

Down 1. Place for a mud bath 2. Nursery rhyme vessel for the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker 3. P.D. alert 4. Aviator pioneer founded in Rochester in 1937 5. Fasten, as a button 6. Queens neighborhood west of Hollis 7. Gambling parlor legalized in NY in 1970 8. Milit. branch that often produces astronauts 9. Race place indicated by a red ribbon 10. Largest alpine lake in the United States 11. Cause of a Mar. clock change 12. “That hurt!”

13. Beethoven’s “Sinfonia ___” 14. Payer of fees on an eBay transaction 15. Refuge in the desert 16. Ingredient in cerveza 17. Six years, for a senator 18. Notices 24. Tailors 29. Chewing gum company that added trading cards to packages in 1950 31. “I don’t care if they do” 32. Make ___ of things 33. Classic TV sidekick 34. Rochester woman who defeated Tom Richards in the 2013 Democratic mayoral primary election 35. ___ Lopez, character who comes out as gay on “Glee” 37. Message often sent in Morse Code 41. Louis XIV et Louis XVI 43. The Panthers of the Big East 44. Rochester woman whose signature roles include Desdemona in Verdi’s “Otella” 45. “thank u, next” singer Grande 46. Took a good, long look 48. Formal 51. Low sax 53. First lady 55. Fast-moving venomous snake

56. Roosevelt with many human rights achievements 58. In 59. Decline an offer 61. Beverage brand reformulated as a natural product in 2017 62. Otolaryngologist, familiarly 65. Non-negotiables 67. Fish 69. Spiral 70. Friendly spook 71. One way to be caught 73. Org. for Penguins, Sharks and Panthers 74. More hirsute 77. Capital of Togo 80. Actress of the Adams family?

83. Insects with elbowed antennae 85. Cherished 87. Inning for closers 88. “Now you ___, now you don’t” 90. Sports awards since 1993 91. Forbidden food source on many low-carb diets 92. Heavy hammer 95. Point 97. Autumnal garment 101. Boils over 102. Prep some leftovers 103. Decorates 104. ___, breathing and circulation (the “ABCs” of CPR) 105. Command paired with “Return” 107. Canon rival 109. Weapon used in 6-Across 110. 1975 summer blockbuster 111. “The Iliad”, for one 112. Simba’s best friend in “The Lion King” 113. Uncommon and valuable 115. Hoot 119. Fuel additive brand 121. Lead-in to cone 122. Suffix with expert 123. Skater Midori 124. Col.’s superior

roccitynews.org CITY 67

68 CITY MARCH 2021