This year’s installment of the Cazenovia Counterpoint festival takes its cue from the fact that 2017 is the Centenary of the Women’s Suffrage movement in New York state, which began in Central New York. A feature is the premiere of scenes from a newly commissioned opera about Matilda Joslyn Gage — a central figure in the suffrage movement whose Fayetteville home now houses the Gage Foundation. No surprise, then, that programs feature music and art by women, and issues dealing with equal rights for all.
On July 21 at Caz Theater, attendees will hear songs by women composers, as well as Act I scenes from the opera by Ithaca composer Persis Vehar, dramatically relating the birth of the movement. Come meet Matilda, as well as Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Frederick Douglass and even L. Frank Baum. (Caz Counterpoint is a presentation of the Society for New Music.)
Visual arts are well represented by the invitational regional Art Exhibit from July 1 to 30 in venues throughout the historic village (Cazenovia Public Library, Common Ground, Cazenovia Artisans, Cazenovia Jewelry, Isabella’s, The Key, St. Peter’s Episcopal Hall).
This summer it’s curated by four artists who are nationally renowned: Jim Ridlon, Linda Bigness, Bob Gates and Toloa Perry, which is why the list of 30 artists reads like a who’s who of artists in Upstate New York. The Art Exhibit Reception is set for 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. July 15 at St. Peter’s Hall, with music by Christopher Spinelli, a prize-winning classical pianist and former Society for New Music Rising Star from Manlius (art work includes acrylics, ceramics, collage, fiber arts, illustration, mixed media, painting, pastels, photography, printmaking, sculpture watercolor).
An added art component this July is David Harper’s “We See You Mrs. Riester” exhibit, a very special collaborative sculpture celebrating the 100th year of Stone Quarry Hill Art Park’s (SQHAP) founder, Dorothy Riester. Eighteen regional artists participated in this assemblage. The 4:30 p.m. reception for that exhibit concludes Family Arts Day at SQHAP, July 23, followed by ice cream, lemonade and cookies under the trees.
Music begins with a Rising Stars concert at 12:30 p.m. on July 12, and another on July 19, both at St. Peter’s Hall. Rising Stars features regional prize-winning musicians paired with young regional composers. Musicians perform the standard repertoire and premiere a work written for them in collaboration with their composer. Rising Stars composers and musicians hail from Pulaski, Poland, Cazenovia, Camillus, Manlius, Fayetteville, Baldwinsville and Syracuse University.
Beyond Rising Stars, the music varies stylistically from concert to concert, with new jazz on July 13 by the MG3 organ jazz trio at 6:30 p.m. at Lakeland Park, led by Liverpool native Melissa Gardiner. Another innovative concert features immersive lighting and sound at Route 20 Sofa Company. Electroacoustic works & video will be heard/seen, along with solo cello works written for and performed by guest cellist Elinor Frey. This program is curated by Christopher Cresswell, with lighting by Katie Gilliland, both Caz natives, now professionals in their respective fields in England and Buffalo.
A guest ensemble, Trio Casals, performs music by five NYS women composers at 4 p.m. on July 16 at First Presbyterian, including WCNY-FM host and Cazenovia’s own Diane Jones. Another innovative show is a cabaret style concert at Critz Farm July 19 featuring the premiere of Christopher Cresswell’s “Maybe home is the sum of all our stories.” The composer joins the chamber ensemble for this, along with music by the 2017 Pulitzer winner Du Yun, and others.
Back by popular demand is “Sound Wandering II” during Family Arts Day on July 23. At 3:15 p.m. wander among five sculptural sites at SQHAP and hear different music at each, including the Sacred Dance Collective following a solo trombone up winding paths to the hilltop for the premiere of “Park Music II” by Edward Ruchalski.
Programs for Young Musicians (in addition to Rising Stars) include the Young Composers Corner. Twelve middle and high school students will be mentored in creating original music in any style during morning and afternoon sessions at Cazenovia Public Library from July 17 to 22. This is free, but registration is required. YCC will be led by Chris Cresswell who just completed his degree in composition at the University of Birmingham, England.
Writing is an important component of the festival, presented in collaboration with the Downtown Writers Center and with support from Poets & Writers in New York City. Writers from Armory Square Playwrights are creating short plays about suffrage and equal rights, which will be ‘read’ and acted at 3 p.m. July 15 at St. Peter’s Episcopal Hall.
There will be a Writers Corner double-header at 7:30 p.m. July 18 at St. Peter’s Hall, with Hamilton College’s Jane Springer and Syracuse University’s David Wojciechowski reading from their newly published books. Ithaca poet Sarah Jefferis will be the Writers Corner guest at 2:30 p.m. July 23 at Stone Quarry Hill Art Park, preceded by a 1pm Poetry Round Robin on the hilltop, open to poets of all ages, led by Fayetteville poet David Hitchcock.
These events are free and open to the public.
