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Busy Reality Limits Virtuality

7/12/2013

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I haven't been prattling on as much here on The (non)Daily Consternation because I've been working hard on making arts and music happen in the real world.  It's very exciting that many of my dreams are actually becoming reality. 

First, I organized a classical concert June 29 at Common Street Arts.  This has come about through the ripening of a number of factors.  1) My involvement with CSA. 2) My casual discussions with my daughter's cello teacher.  3)  My law partners' willingness to sponsor the event. 4) My increased familiarity with various online event calendars. 5) My ongoing discussions with Atlantic Music Festival and Daponte Quartet.  And there's a whole lot more subtle discussions, conversations, and research, but suffice to say all these simmering ingredients have finally cooked themselves up into a real manifestation of musical goodness.   It was a wonderful evening at the gallery, with great music, but more than a little residual stress for me.  I learned a lot during this first concert experience and have ideas to make it smoother and less laborious next time.

I feel like I've realized and am at peace with the concept that, at my age, I'm never going to be the musician or be the artist.  But it seems my lot in life, and where I can really be useful, given my skill-set as a lawyer and problem solver - but one who happens to have had a 4-year art education and has a BFA and a self-taught love of music and theater - is to be a patron of, advocate for, and organizer of musical events.  Essentially, a friend of the arts.

To that end, my service on the Board of Directors for Common Street Arts has been very personally rewarding, and I feel I'm in for the long haul, with no real eye on any horizon for not being involved.  There's so many exciting opportunities for enhancing this community and it's downtown and economy  through CSA that I can't imagine not being a participant.  I find it comes naturally to launch into a prolonged and passionate advocacy speech on behalf of CSA - genuine and spontaneous - reflecting to me and presumably others my sincerity (or insanity?).

Atlantic Music Festival is the other organization I have great enthusiasm about helping to become a bigger factor in Waterville.  I have been helping out on a small basis with providing local information to the artistic director about venues, fill-in musician contacts, junior high and high school music directors, housing possibilities, and other "local knowledge" kinds of issues that have been difficult for AMF to sort out due to their remote headquarters in New York City.  Their presence here each summer strikes me as a gift and an incredible fluke, and I would hate to see them choose to locate elsewhere because they felt unwelcome and unappreciated in Waterville.

If I can weave together the strands of CSA, AMF, downtown revitalization, and my historical pursuits, I'll really be at the nexus of all the things I want to be.
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Atlantic Music Festival 2013

7/9/2013

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Well, I'm pretty darned excited because Atlantic Music Festival has returned to Waterville.  Time for classical music concert binging.  Each year I've learned more about the festival; learned more about music instruments; their voices and capabilities; developed new-found love for various composers I was only slightly familiar with; and discovered new composers.  It has also been impressed upon me that the best audio recordings really can't capture the magic of live classical performance.

As part of my webtivism, I've been corresponding with the festival's artistic director and sharing some of the digital resources I've developed, like my roster of online event calendars originally developed as an offshoot of my "put Waterville's restaurants on VisitMaine.com" project and my Arts Calendar.  The same roster has been serving Common Street Arts also.  It would be great to have a kind of "Friends of Atlantic Music Festival" group of locals to help with publicity when they fly in each summer.  I envision the Kennebec Classical Series of CSA might serve that function, as well as fostering year-round classical performance here in the Elm City during the rest of the year.

Anyway, I encourage you all to explore one or more AMF concerts.  The musicianship and enthusiasm of the players is dynamite.  Because the events are free, it is a great way to explore classical music, expand your exposure and knowledge, introduce youth to classical, and just enjoy up and coming superstars of the classical world without any financial risk at all.  


Though I will miss the first one or two concerts this season, I plan to beat my 9-concert attendance record from last year.  There are a whopping 20 concerts scheduled at press time.

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    The Daily Consternation 
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    Tom lives on the east side of the Kennebec River and works on the west.  He relocated from Arizona to Maine, by pure choice,  in 2001 and loves music and history.  He may change any viewpoint expressed on this site at will and without warning.

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