MARLBORO — A new alliance between Kingdom County Productions and Marlboro College dedicated to bringing high-quality performing arts events to Windham County will be presenting three world-class events at Marlboro College in the next couple of weeks.
It all starts with singer/songwriter Ethan Lipton's Obie Award-winning show “No Place to Go” on Sept. 28, and continues with A.M. Doyle's humorous and poignant play, “Robert Frost: This Verse Business” on Oct. 5 and British early music vocal ensemble Stile Antico performing “Choral Treasures of the Renaissance” on Oct. 9.
These three shows are the inaugural productions of the 2013-14 Windham County Performance Series, the brain-child of Jay Craven, Kingdom County Productions artistic director and Marlboro College film studies professor.
Although the first three events will be on the Marlboro College campus, this season's ambitious line-up of up to a dozen events showcasing music, theater, dance, and circus arts will be staged in various locations in Brattleboro, Putney, Marlboro, and Bellows Falls in the coming months.
Lipton's “No Place to Go” is a musical ode to unemployment. Part love letter to his co-workers, part query to the universe, part protest to company and country, the songs are steeped in American traditions of yore - jazz, blues, country, lounge - with modern subjects like internet romance, racism, pets, and police.
Lipton is joined by Eben Levy on guitar, Ian Riggs on upright bass, and Vito Dieterle on sax, a trio that has been playing with Lipton for over seven years. This production at the Whittemore Theater on Marlboro College is presented with support from the New England Foundation for the Arts. Tickets are $25 advance and $28 at the door. Tickets for students are $20.
On Sunday, Oct. 5, at 7 p.m., also at Whittemore Theater, Emmy-winning actor Gordon Clapp will play Robert Frost in A.M. Doyle's “Robert Frost: This Verse Business,” a one-man show about the great New England poet who for 45 years traveled across the nation sharing his enduring verse, dry wit, and “promises to keep.”
Clapp is best known for his roles as Mike Medavoy on “NYPD Blue” and his Tony-nominated performance as instigator Dave Moss in the Broadway revival David Mamet's “Glengarry Glen Ross.” Reserved tickets are $25 in advance, and $28 at the door. Tickets for students are $6.
On Wednesday, Oct. 9, at 7 p.m. in Persons Auditorium at Marlboro College, Stile Antico will perform Choral Treasures of the Renaissance.” Working without a conductor, the singers of this early music ensemble perform as chamber musicians, each contributing artistically to a musical result that is praised for its vitality and commitment, expressive lucidity and imaginative response to text.
Their program includes work by 15 composers representing a range of styles, from the intensity and fervor of the Flemish masters, to the distinctive and exquisite sound-world of Tudor and Jacobean England, to the polychoral fireworks of Vivanco and Praetorius. Tickets are $26 in advance and $30 at the door. Tickets for students are $15.
Tickets for all productions can be purchased online at www.KingdomCounty.org or by calling 802-748-2600 or toll-free at 888-757-5559. (All phone and internet orders will have a $3 per ticket fee added).
During the remaining months of 2013, Windham Country Performing Arts Showcase will also be bringing to the area Arlo Guthrie on Nov. 8, and Natalie MacMaster performing “Christmas in Cape Breton” on Dec. 6, both of whom will perform at the Latchis Theatre in Brattleboro; as well as the world-class clown Bob Berky at Next Stage Arts in Putney on Dec. 8.
In 2014, the season will continue with such illustrious events as Ballet Jazz of Montreal at the Bellows Falls Opera House on Jan. 26, Goat in the Road Theater performing “Instant Misunderstanding” at Marlboro College on Feb. 7, and the Tony Award-winning troupes, the Acting Company and The Guthrie Theater, in a presentation of “Hamlet” at Latchis on Feb. 20.
“Last year I presented in the area a few musical events with artists of the caliber of Rosanne Cash and Natalie MacMaster to help raise funds for 'Northern Borders,' the film I was directing at the time,” Craven says. “But I was also testing the waters for the community's receptiveness to bringing nationally acclaimed performing artists to Windham County. Those events were successful, but this new performing arts series will include theater and dance as well as music.”
Craven says that music “is the safest thing to produce. Theater and dance are much more expensive to stage.”
Collaboration was going to be needed, and he didn't have to go far to find it.
“After finishing 'Northern Borders' and completing the tour to promote the film, I went to [Marlboro College president] Ellen McCulloch and suggested the series in collaboration with the college. I really enjoyed working with Marlboro College during 'Northern Borders,' and was eager to collaborate with the school again. I believed this series would be a great sell to Marlboro because it both gave multiple arts exposure to its students and enabled the school make a larger a connection with the community at large.”
McCulloch says she was excited to get on board.
“Performing arts are an integral part of the culture at Marlboro College, and we are thrilled with this opportunity to bring leading performers to the region,” she says.
McCulloch has extensive experience in the arts, as former executive director of both the Vermont Council on the Arts and President's Committee for the Arts and Humanities under President Clinton, and welcomes the collaboration with Kingdom County Productions.
Craven, who takes no pay for directing the series, says, “I know that such a large-scale endeavor is a risky venture, but I believe that it is the right thing to do at this time. We need to investigate ways we can organize in the community to get people to come see kinds of events that may be a new experience for them. Partnership is the key.”
He says Windham County is “a place where fabulous activities and partnerships prosper. We hope to form alliances with organizations that already exist like Brattleboro Museum and Art Center, the Jazz Center and Vermont Performance Lab. For instance, we intend to work with New England Youth Theatre, whose students have extensive background in performing and understanding the works of Shakespeare. 'Hamlet' will give many of them their first chance to see a new take on performance with a professional Shakespeare production.”
To Craven, the Windham County Performance Series is all about creating community through the arts.
“Among many other reasons, I feel that these shows are important to Windham County, because they bring an often disparate population together in moments of shared community.”