Join the music makers at monthly circle

MILLERTON — For anyone who loves music there will soon be a place to go to enjoy the rhythmic sounds and harmonic melodies of voices and instruments melded together in joyous celebration. The location? The North East Community Center (NECC). The activity? The Millerton Folk Jam. The organizer? Nancy Carey Johnson.

 â€œI just love to sing and play. It does my heart good. It’s good for my soul, maybe,â€� she said. “Music literally pours out of me, everywhere I go. What it is for me is a heck of a lot of fun.â€�

Johnson came up with the idea after participating in a similar music circle in the Chatham area, where she formerly resided. Since moving to the Millerton area, however, she’s been searching for a place to sing and play her guitar.

“Manna Dew and Irving Farm are no longer doing their open mic nights,� said the singer-song-writer. “I thought I would really like to play and there’s nowhere to do it, so I contacted the community center and said is there a possibility of doing this. They said, ‘Sure.’ So I’m putting together a folk jam and am quite excited.�

Although the music circle is entitled “folk jam,� Johnson said the music brought into the circle does not have to be strictly folk music. It can be pop music, rock, jazz, etc. And not all participants have to sing or play an instrument. People can attend just to listen. Regardless of why one attends, Johnson said the event will offer a mix of socializing and musicality for those present.

“I think it’s a chance to connect, a chance to sing and play,� she said. “A lot of people love music but have chosen other paths in life and this is the only chance they get [to play and perform].�

Musicians, and that means not only those classically trained but also those without any training at all, are invited to bring any and all types of instruments. Johnson said she looks forward to seeing guitars, stand-up basses, banjos, flutes, harmonicas, fiddles and more.

“Bring what you have and do what  you love,â€� she said. “It’s really about passion.â€�

The Millerton Folk Jam is free to join and open to all. Although children are welcome, Johnson said the circle is truly for adults. She also emphasized that there is no drinking or partying allowed — the circle is for playing music, pure and simple.

The folk jams are scheduled for the second Saturday of the month on a regular basis, from 7 to 11 p.m., at NECC. The community center is located at 51 South Center St. in Millerton. The first music circle is planned for Saturday, Oct. 10. 

Latest News

South Kent School’s unofficial March reunion

Elmarko Jackson was named a 2023 McDonald’s All American in his senior year at South Kent School. He helped lead the Cardinals to a New England Prep School Athletic Conference (NEPSAC) AAA title victory and was recruited to play at the University of Kansas. This March he will play point guard for the Jayhawks when they enter the tournament as a No. 4 seed against (13) Samford University.

Riley Klein

SOUTH KENT — March Madness will feature seven former South Kent Cardinals who now play on Division 1 NCAA teams.

The top-tier high school basketball program will be well represented with graduates from each of the past three years heading to “The Big Dance.”

Keep ReadingShow less
Hotchkiss grads dancing with Yale

Nick Townsend helped Yale win the Ivy League.

Screenshot from ESPN+ Broadcast

LAKEVILLE — Yale University advanced to the NCAA men’s basketball tournament after a buzzer-beater win over Brown University in the Ivy League championship game Sunday, March 17.

On Yale’s roster this year are two graduates of The Hotchkiss School: Nick Townsend, class of ‘22, and Jack Molloy, class of ‘21. Townsend wears No. 42 and Molloy wears No. 33.

Keep ReadingShow less
Handbells of St. Andrew’s to ring out Easter morning

Anne Everett and Bonnie Rosborough wait their turn to sound notes as bell ringers practicing to take part in the Easter morning service at St. Andrew’s Church.

Kathryn Boughton

KENT—There will be a joyful noise in St. Andrew’s Church Easter morning when a set of handbells donated to the church some 40 years ago are used for the first time by a choir currently rehearsing with music director Susan Guse.

Guse said that the church got the valuable three-octave set when Harlem Valley Psychiatric Center closed in the late 1980s and the bells were donated to the church. “The center used the bells for music therapy for younger patients. Our priest then was chaplain there and when the center closed, he brought the bells here,” she explained.

Keep ReadingShow less
Picasso’s American debut was a financial flop
Picasso’s American debut was a financial flop
Penguin Random House

‘Picasso’s War” by Foreign Affairs senior editor Hugh Eakin, who has written about the art world for publications like The New York Review of Books, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and The New York Times, is not about Pablo Picasso’s time in Nazi-occupied Paris and being harassed by the Gestapo, nor about his 1937 oil painting “Guernica,” in response to the aerial bombing of civilians in the Basque town during the Spanish Civil War.

Instead, the Penguin Random House book’s subtitle makes a clearer statement of intent: “How Modern Art Came To America.” This war was not between military forces but a cultural war combating America’s distaste for the emerging modernism that had flourished in Europe in the early decades of the 20th century.

Keep ReadingShow less