Category: Art & Theater

A Christmas Carol returns to Palace

By Michael Witthaus
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A sure sign of the holiday season’s arrival is the return of A Christmas Carol to the Palace Theatre in Manchester. The Charles Dickens tale of spiritual redemption always provides a reliable way to spark a fire in even the coldest heart. The Palace’s Artistic Director, Carl Rajotte, believes this year’s production has even more to offer.

To begin with, the technical toys at the company’s disposal are constantly being tweaked. A new video wall installed in 2019, but too late for that year’s run, was used for the first post-pandemic production. In subsequent years, they’ve found new ways to leverage the technology.

“We’re playing a lot more with special effects this year and we’re definitely doing different videos,” Rajotte said by phone ahead of an initial first act rehearsal. “It’s not just here’s the brand-new video wall. It’s complementing other things; we’re getting better with combining the lighting, the projections and the special effects.”

There are new costumes, and new blood. “Four people from Jersey Boys have stayed on to do Christmas Carol,” Rajotte said. “We have Austin Mirsoltani back from Beautiful. He played Gerry Goffin in that; he’s playing Bob Cratchit this year. There are quite a few new people to the show. It’s fun.”

When Rajotte came to the Palace in 2002 he was charged with bringing magic back to the perennial holiday production. At the outset, he had desire and a vision but not much else to work with. “They didn’t really have the money back then to hire a composer,” he said. “We had to use a lot of public domain or a cappella music. We even did tracks for many years.”

In 2013 the show went on tour, providing Rajotte with an opportunity to upgrade.

“I said to the board and the president, ‘We’ve got to create our own music now; we have to hire a composer,’” he recalled. Joe Mercier, a local composer, came on board. “We created a whole new show — the same script, but all new music. Then the year after that tour, we brought it back to the stage here. It’s been that music since then.”

Colorful, kinetic and professionally cast, the Palace’s unique version of A Christmas Carol has evolved into an effort on par with Broadway shows and national touring companies. It’s a crowning achievement for a company that in recent years has consistently punched above its weight class.

Though it’s a well-oiled machine, the presence of actors who haven’t done the Dickens story before keeps Rajotte and his team on their toes. “We know it like the back of our hands, nothing shocks us,” he said, “but we forget sometimes that for people brand new to the show, it is not an easy project. There’s a lot to do, and a lot to learn.”

The Palace Youth Theatre company is again represented, with 140 young actors split into four teams. Rajotte noted that many of them have been part of the show for years, like Jenna Bienvenue, who plays Elizabeth in Spirit of Christmas Past. “She’s an adult now, a professional. I asked her, in front of everybody on the first day, ‘How many Christmas Carols have you done?’ She said, ‘Well, gosh, I can’t count. Ever since I was 8, I’ve done it every single year.’”

The presence of the youngsters reminds Rajotte about what’s important in the family-friendly show. He often hears them singing along to adult numbers from their dressing room, which is next to his. “I love this show so much; we think about it all year long,” he said. “My goal when I put this together 22 years ago was to make it feel like it’s coming from a child’s point of view, that it’s how they would see things.”

A Christmas Carol
When: Fridays, 7:30 p.m., Saturdays, 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m., Sundays, 2 p.m. through Dec. 29, and Thursday, Dec. 19, 7:30 p.m.
Where: Palace Theatre, 80 Hanover St., Manchester
Tickets: $35 and up at palacetheatre.org

Featured image: A Christmas Carol. Photo Courtesy of the Palace Theatre.

Bye Bye Birdie revisits rock’s early times

Long before there was streaming and hundreds of cable channels, three networks ruled, and families gathered around the television like a hearth every Sunday night to watch the Ed Sullivan show. This is the world of Bye Bye Birdie, the latest performance from Community Players of Concord.

Opening Nov. 22 at Concord City Auditorium, the 1960 musical was inspired by Elvis Presley’s induction into the army, which sidelined him at the height of his career. It begins as Conrad Birdie (Travis Laughlin), his name a play on Presley’s rock rival Conway Twitty, goes to a small Midwestern town to kiss a fan on national television before shipping overseas.

This publicity stunt is the culmination of (ostensibly) a contest hatched by Rose Alvarez (Annie Lelios), the secretary and fiancée of Albert Peterson (Nathan Smith), who writes Birdie’s songs and needs a way to milk his cash cow a bit more. Rosie helps him pen a send-off tune called “One Last Kiss,” and the two decamp for Sweet Apple, Ohio, their star in tow.

Awaiting them are screaming teenagers, including Kim MacAfee (Holly Keenan), whose announcement of her resignation as President of the Conrad Birdie fan club was paused when Rose picked her name from a file drawer, and named her winner of the singer’s final smooch.

Kim’s leaving her post because at age of 16 she believes she’s matured past swooning for pop stars. This is one of many anachronistic touches in the show, like shared household phone lines — yes, kids, back then it was one to a family, attached to the wall and equipped with a dial.

It was also a time when having a steady was serious business, but Kim’s reassurances on that topic aren’t enough to placate her boyfriend Hugo (William Fogg). With help from a now-jealous Rose, set off by a showbiz climber (Emma Daley) making a play for Albert, he plots to sabotage the kiss.

Add to that brew Albert’s conniving mother (Valerie Kehr), who is intent on breaking her son’s engagement, and things heat up quickly.

Bye Bye Birdie is often performed by high schools and local theaters, but it’s Community Players of Concord’s first time doing it.

“It’s a good family show,” director Judy Hayward said by phone. “I found out after we decided that some of the people in Concord had wanted to do it for several years. I guess maybe the timing wasn’t right, and now it is.”

The musical is full of numbers brimming with joy and innocence, like “Put On a Happy Face,” sung by Albert to a high schooler, part of a Conrad send-off group in New York City who despairs that by the time her idol returns from his two-year military hitch, she’ll be too old for him.

Other standouts are “How Lovely to Be a Woman,” “A Lot of Lovin’ to Do” and “English Teacher,” the latter a reflection of Rose’s wish that Albert was in a different, more intellectual career than pop music. “Kids” is a charming complaint about wayward youth in the 1950s, while “Normal American Boy” is a slice of prehistoric public relations work.

Problems such as boys with too much Brylcreem in their hair and girls with shorn braces ready to conquer the world (and call mom and dad by their first names), all mad with rock ’n’ roll, are a welcome distraction at a moment when half of the country is loath to turn on the news.

Hayward is pleased with the progress of rehearsals, with both leads settling into their roles, and Laughlin finding his inner Presley. “They’re great, and they’re always prepared,” she said. “Annie was off book early on, which is always a plus, and Nathan’s doing a great job, and Travis is swiveling his hips just like Elvis.”

What’s her favorite part of this production? “Seeing it come together,” she said. “In the arts … there’s always something to improve. It’s not like making a costume — sewing something and having a finished product. Seeing this progression of things getting better and better, that’s what I like.”

Bye Bye Birdie
When: Friday, Nov. 22, and Saturday, Nov. 23, at 7:30 p.m., and Sunday, Nov. 24, at 2 p.m.
Where: Concord City Auditorium, 2 Prince St., Concord
Tickets: $20 ($18 age 65 and up, 17 and under) at communityplayersofconcord.org

Featured image: Travis Laughlin as Conrad Birdie. Courtesy photo.

Early holiday shopping at Form + Function Artisan Fair

By Michael Witthaus
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For anyone shopping for a special gift and looking to bypass Amazon and big box stores, the upcoming Form + Function Artisan Fair at 3S Artspace in Portsmouth is the perfect choice. The sixth annual event will include an evening market for the first time, on Friday, Nov. 15, as well as an all-day affair on Saturday, Nov. 16.

The event brings together more than 20 artisans offering everything from pottery to jewelry, textile products such as scarves and winter caps, even cosmetics, handmade in New Hampshire, Maine and Massachusetts. As the name implies, it’s usable art for sale, with care and craftsmanship that should impress most gift recipients.

Artisans include Donna Pioli, whose Claypio coffee cups, vases, colanders and bowls have unique glaze profiles and fanciful touches such as flowers that resemble melted ribbon candy. Amy Vander Els makes jewelry; her Lottie Necklace is a gold chain with a pale yellow serpentine turquoise stone dangling from it.

The clothing offered by Larkin & Larkin can be hippie-inspired — its proprietor began selling her art in San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury neighborhood. For example, there’s a denim jacket with an embroidery of a melding sun and moon as the centerpiece, but another has a country vibe, with Dolly Parton’s photo sewn on it.

Items vary in cost, 3S Arts Marketing Manager Sara O’Neill said by phone recently.

“It’s curated specifically to have kind of breadth in both the type of craft that people work on and also in price points,” she said. “In the ceramics category, we’ll have something in the $40 range, and it could go all the way up to $300. That swath also applies through jewelry. We have some glass-blowing crafts happening, and there’s range between those.”

There’s something for everyone, even those not interested in another cup or necklace, like Holmes and Hudson’s skincare products. “We actually carry them in our shop year-round, but I’m assuming they’ll bring some special things that normally we don’t carry,” O’Neill said. “Natural body products like soap and toners and hand creams, all of that kind of stuff.”

O’Neill is a fan of Off Menu Pots, a company that’s based in Portsmouth’s Button Factory. “I spend all of my money there every year at their booth,” she said. “I really love their large platters, and they do some small cups…. They have really great colorways, like a very terracotta kind of a blushy blue, and they draw florals and skulls, so it’s a little bit sweet and salty.”

The event provides an easy path to supporting the arts, O’Neill said.

“It focuses on the maker space versus what you might traditionally think of as visual arts, which we reserve for our exhibits in the gallery and the yard sale where artists submit 2D works,” she said. “This is more handmade categories versus painting, charcoal, that type of thing.”

It’s underwritten by 3S Arts’ five lead sponsors — AC Hotel, Katzman Contemporary Projects, MacEdge and Raka, all in Portsmouth, and The Brook Casino in Seabrook. “This is the third year in a row where they’ve chosen 3S as a beneficiary of their charitable gaming,” O’Neill said of The Brook, “and Katzman is a wonderful supporter of the arts, they have their own gallery… AC, MacEdge, Raka — it’s a wonderful group.”

Their support is vital, particularly at this moment.

“In this past year, hearing all of these stories of the art museum at UNH and the Mona Gallery, which has transitioned into another art gallery, but as a nonprofit going under. It’s a critical time if you don’t want to see these arts organizations go away,” she said. “It’s a critical time for us, for sure.”

Finally, the fair is a great way to keep giving local, and give back to the community. “Shopping for your loved ones this holiday season overrides that Black Friday feeling,” O’Neill said. “You’re getting something much more wonderful and original shopping at Form + Function. It’s Small Business Saturday — we kind of fall into that category.”

Form + Function Artisan Fair
When: Friday, Nov. 15, 5 to 9 p.m., and Saturday, Nov. 16, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Where: 3S Artspace, 319 Vaughan St., Portsmouth,
More: Free admission, details at 3sarts.org

Featured image: Courtesy Photo.

Folk show featuring banjos and ballads

By Zachary Lewis
[email protected]

Jeff Warner presents Granite Staters with songs from America’s past. He will be performing his program “Banjos, Bones, and Ballads” in Brentwood on Sunday, Nov. 10, and again in Lake Sunapee on Monday, Nov. 11.

“I’m working right now with New Hampshire Humanities in what they call their Humanities to Go program,” Warner said. “I get to do maybe 20 programs a year for nonprofit organizations under the aegis of the New Hampshire Humanities. I have four programs for them that I do since I’m an old-time musician or a folk singer, as you will.”

Each program features a specific theme of traditional music. “One is on old-time songs for kids, one is on old songs of New Hampshire, one is what I call ‘Banjos, Bones, and Ballads,’ which is an overview of American traditional music, and … logging songs and the history of logging in the Northeast. I’m New York City-bred, but I’ve been living in New Hampshire since 1997.”

The love of folk music was alive in his home when he was a child.

“I was raised by two people, my family, Anne and Frank Warner … who from early times in the ’30s were interested in collecting American traditional folk songs in rural eastern American places like the Outer Banks of North Carolina and the mountains of North Carolina,” Warner said. Their musical archaeology drove them through the country. “They also found a great number of old songs from loggers in the Adirondack Mountains and then specifically to my program ‘Songs of Old New Hampshire’ here.”

One source was particularly valuable in New Hampshire.

“They met a woman named Lena Bourne Fish in Jaffrey, New Hampshire, in 1941. She had been born in 1879 and knew hundreds of old songs without being able to read music. She just knew them from memory … she learned in her family and community,” Warner said.

“So I worked with her repertoire that she taught. I work with that repertoire and other songs that I have learned about New England culture and New England history to form a program, ‘Songs of Old New Hampshire,’ that features Mrs. Fish as the central part in the songs that she sang, old world ballads and new songs formed in America.”

Warner can perform a capella, the way many of these songs were originally sung, or with accompaniment.

“I add on to it with old-time instruments that I play, which include banjo and guitar, English concertina, and a bunch of what I call pocket instruments, which are old-time instruments kids used to play, like bones and spoons.”

His “Banjos, Bones, and Ballads” program is a favorite.

“Banjos, because that’s fun. Bones, because it’s one of the instruments that I play, representing old-time instruments that didn’t cost a lot of money that people used to play, including kids,” Warner said.

“I love to show kids what other kids might have played in 1800 or 1900, including spoons and a little metal instrument you play with your teeth…. Little things like that that were simple and fun and kids used to play and I can play them and show them how to do it”

Warner has a clear purpose for what he does, he said, “wanting to make sure I give people a sense of how old-time songs were conveyed by word of mouth in days before radio and phonograph players, and how people tended to learn from their families and then sing the songs in their community, so that the big folk song revival, which happened in the 1960s and all, becoming commercial music with the Kingston Trio and Bob Dylan and all those, is a rarefied thing. Mostly these songs have just stayed on past an oral tradition, changing as they go from community to community and state to state, and becoming representative of those communities and states whence they came.”

Banjos, Bones, and Ballads
Hosted by Brentwood Historical Society
When: Sunday, Nov. 10, at 2:15 p.m.
Where: Brentwood Historical Society Museum, 140 Crawley Falls Road, Brentwood

Hosted by Sunapee Seniors
When: Monday, Nov. 11, at 1 p.m.
Where: Lake Sunapee United Methodist Church, 9 Lower Main St.

nhhumanities.org

Featured image: Jeff Warner. Courtesy photo.