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came together by way of Sears & Roebuck’s prefab housing division. Appreciative Master clarinetist, Oskar Espina Ruiz, is king of Litchfield County’s audiences have been flocking to this esteemed Music Mountain. | By Sandy MacDonald acoustical marvel ever since. Six years ago, globally acclaimed clarinetist, the choruses i’ve sung with have taken me Oskar Espina Ruiz, likewise a prodigy, who began all over the world: Switzerland, Uruguay, Japan… performing with the Bilbao Symphony Orchestra Somehow, though, a premier New England music in his mid-teens, accepted the reins from Jacques’s mecca has eluded me all this time, awaiting son, Nick Gordon, an NBC executive who had run unnoticed in my very backyard. Tucked away in the show for nearly a half-century. Falls Village, a well-preserved 19th-century hamlet For Music Mountain’s long-time devotees, the northwest of Hartford, is the venerable roster has changed only incrementally. Espina concert venue Music Mountain. Ruiz is an experienced festival founder and In 1930, at the onset of the Great curator who does all his Depression, Jacques Gordon—a child Oskar scouting in person. “The prodigy Russian violinist who led the Espina artists that I present are Chicago Symphony in the 1920s— Ruiz artists with whom I have either snapped up this 130-acre sylvan paradise played or heard live. Here, it’s and erected a 300-seat concert hall. common for artists to return Don’t let your eyes deceive you: and the quality has always What may look like retro been over the top.” Colonial Revival actually EN CO R E
The Hills Are Alive
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Avid skier Larry Corlear, of Glens Falls, NY, had a small problem on the home front: cold, wet ski boots strewn across a cluttered mudroom. The boots stayed wet, the floor chaotic. An engineer by trade, Corlear got to work inventing his own elegant solution, the Puelche Dryer, a highly functional yet stylish stainless-steel shoe and boot drying rack with retracting pegs. The dryer is super practical for mountain living. PuelcheDryer.com $1,299-$3,999
G. ALLEN AYCOCK
Puelche Boot Dryer
