Author: Michael Witthaus

Glimpse in Concord readies new show

By Michael Witthaus
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For its inaugural show in February 2024, Glimpse Gallery featured four artists hailing from the South, along with two New Hampshire painters and another from Vermont. Glimpse owner Meme Exum always intended for the space, tucked down an alley by the Capitol Building in Concord, to reflect her home region, but knew it would take time.

A little over a year later the seeds Exum and curator Christine Landry-Boullion planted to entice New England artists and buyers to Glimpse are coming to fruition.

“The trajectory’s been just straight up, positive, wonderful,” Exum said recently. “I now have a lot of folks submitting their work, and it’s giving me more flexibility with how I can create the shows.”

The choice provided by a deep well of talent allows for shows weighted between up-and-comers and established artists like Robin Whitney Fairclough, who anchored a successful show in October. It also allows for thematic balance, as with an upcoming exhibit of seven New England artists that includes the colorful abstracts of Rosie Wolf Williams alongside darker works by Talia Dinger. Williams’ paintings suggest prairie impressionism, such as the colorful movement in “Breaking Free” and “Lion and the Mouse,” an Aesop’s fable-inspired piece glowing with childlike energy.

Dinger’s mixed media works focus on monochromatic subjects and explore topics like alienation in “I’ll Miss You” and the frailty of hope in “Holding On To You,” which depicts a person hanging by a thread over a pool of lava or something equally threatening. Her three-dimensional pieces are particularly impressive, such as “Out of Time,” an eyeball-shaped, working clock spilling an acrylic tear, and the abstract chest X-ray, “Golden.”

Matthew McCain uses gray scale and shadow compellingly in “If You Go, I’ll Stay,” a foreboding work depicting either an interrogation or an illuminating moment. The main subject’s posture is ambiguous; the artist leaves interpretation up to the viewer.

“I love how people can see different things while looking at the same image, and I really try to exploit that in my artwork as much as possible,” McCain writes in his bio.

A few of McCain’s pieces are adorned with butterflies to convey nostalgia for a bygone time. Similarly whimsical are the line and circle drawings of Amy Moffett. Their simplicity is underscored by her creative process; each is begun with eyes closed, so Moffett can feel the shapes before seeing them. The works are colorful and affordable — all cost under $100.

Mark Ruddy has shown at the Glimpse Gallery before, but as with other shows, this exhibit will feature all new works.

“Every time it has to be completely different, because I don’t want people to see the same thing ever,” Exum said. “Every show has to be its own new art and the energy that it carries.”

A series of three Ruddy paintings is hung for the upcoming show. Two are of vintage pugilists, arranged around a close-up of the recently renamed Gulf of Mexico on a map. Each picture is covered with multicolored polka dots, a motif he’s used in other works to juxtapose a serious subject with something lighter.

Brenda Wilbert is both a mixed media and fine art digital artist. “A Moment of Bliss,” a treated photograph of a woman in a river drinking water from her hand, is an example of the latter. Her riotous collages employ a wide range of textures and colors, from metallic pen lines to painted fabric, watercolors and ink to stunning effect.

The works of Lakes Region artist Benjamin Archibald are a blend of realistic portraits of wildlife, such as the peacock in “Glory,” along with patterned portraits done for charity. For the latter, donors purchase one or more fingerprint spots on a piece like “Heliosa,” which welcomes patrons at Glimpse’s entryway.

“I love what he’s doing,” Exum said. “He’s taking his art to this level where he’s making it a communal process… .”

Glimpse Gallery April/May show opening reception

When: Saturday, April 12, 5-7 p.m.
Where: Glimpse Gallery, 4 Park St. (Patriot Building), Concord
RSVP: [email protected]

Featured photo: Courtesy photo.

Klezmer Conservatory Band in Concord

By Michael Witthaus

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The lively folk song “Hava Nagila” is a staple at Jewish weddings and other celebrations, but when Hankus Netsky started the Klezmer Conservatory Band it was part of a very niche musical tradition that carried on mostly in synagogues. Netsky decided to change that. Surprisingly his inspiration was an Irish musician.

Nearly five decades later, his group is credited with reviving klezmer music for modern audiences, making several albums and performing around the world. Their music has been in films, including one narrated by the late Robin Williams, and they’ve worked with many musicians, including an ongoing collaboration with Itzhak Perlman.

The last one happened after Netsky lured a reluctant Perlman into a jam session — more on that later.

An April 6 show at Concord’s City Auditorium will be special, with the full Klezmer Conservatory Band on stage, Netsky shared in a recent phone interview.

“We need to give a little present to New Hampshire,” he said, noting that their last time in Concord, “we came with a small group … we didn’t even have a trumpet player.”

Netsky came to New England Conservatory as a student in 1973. Five years later he was hired by the school’s Third Stream Department. The name came from NEC President Gunther Schuller, who felt that much contemporary music resulted from mingling “streams” of classical and jazz.

Schuller, Netsky said by phone recently, “felt very strongly that he couldn’t possibly talk about the 20th century of music without looking at the works of Ellington, James B. Johnson, Louis Armstrong, etc.” Netsky saw a role for Jewish music from the Ashkenazi communities of Ukraine, Romania and other Eastern European countries.

There were other tributaries, and as the Third Stream definition broadened, Netsky made klezmer’s case.

When Netsky was studying at NEC, he’d found boxes of klezmer 78s in his uncle’s basement that were once owned by his great-grandfather. He was amazed.

“By then in the Jewish community, the music,” he said, “was very perfunctory.” So he began transferring them to cassette.

The recordings revealed “there was a whole tradition of music that was on a really high level,” he said. “I kind of reinvigorated that stream.” Netsky began sharing them with students when he joined NEC’s faculty. He found common ground with guitarist Mick Moloney, who’d worked to bring long-lost Irish music back to the forefront.

“The real session music was more or less forgotten at that point, and he revived it,” Netsky recalled. “I went to one of his Irish sessions, and I went, ‘Oh! I get it! You have a party, serve some food, and then everybody comes and you teach them the music’; so that’s really what happened. Then one of the students got this idea we should do a concert.”

The young group contributed a three-song set as part of an evening of Jewish music. It was supposed to be a one-off, but in days they had three offers to do full concerts. They sent a tape to Garrison Keillor and quickly received an invitation to appear on his NPR show, A Prairie Home Companion, the next time it stopped in Boston.

From that point on, they’ve led a resurgence of the once moribund tradition, appearing everywhere, from synagogues to Carnegie Hall. They’ve spawned other bands as well; the genre-bending Klezmatics, founded during the mid-1980s in New York City, includes KCB founding member Frank London.

Then there are the many collaborations, the most famous with Perlman. It began haltingly, however, after an attempt at melding his legendary violin talents with jazz players like Oscar Peterson left him, according to many, dissatisfied. When a rep from NPR’s Great Performances contacted Netsky about Perlman’s interest in klezmer, she offered caution.

“He felt kind of burned by this jazz project,” he recalled her saying. “He just wants to learn about the music, but he doesn’t feel like he’s going to be ready to play it. Your job is to get him to take his violin out and feel good about what he’s doing.” Netsky knew there were certain songs that Perlman would have listened to as a young child in Israel, so he began with those. Perlman, his interest piqued, took out his violin and joined in. Mission accomplished.

“Then we started playing more serious klezmer music,” Netsky continued. “He recognized the tunes, and, again, right away he was playing along. Then we started going around the band, having people improvise, and then he improvised. He realized right away that this actually was something he wanted to do.”

Klezmer Conservatory Band

When: Sunday, April 6, 2 p.m.
Where: Concord City Auditorium, 2 Prince St., Concord
Tickets: $23 at eventbrite.com

Featured photo: Courtesy photo.