A lot of David Wilcox’s fans consider him a musical minister, his songs providing spiritual grounding as they rhyme and dance.
“If I feel hollow, that’s just proof there’s more for me to follow,” he offers simply in “That’s What the Lonely Is For,” a touchstone track from his mid-’90s gem, Big Horizon.
A fitting way to describe Wilcox’s approach to songwriting is “Language of the Heart,” also a song title from his major label debut, How Did You Find Me Here? In a recent phone interview, he likened his craft to bailing water from a boat. “Because the alternative is death,” he said. “It is purely self-preservation.”
Even if the world isn’t clamoring for another song, “What I need is to check in with my heart so that I stay current with my grieving and it doesn’t build up a backlog or break the dam,” he continued. “It’s a fun excuse; I pretend I’m being an artist, but really I’m just tending to my emotional buoyancy.”
In 2016, Wilcox began helping his fans process their emotions through his music via a bespoke song service. “I’ve kind of applied my songwriting talents to other people’s hearts and stories … that’s a fascinating thing for me,” he said. “I’ve done more than 70 of these custom songs now, and they’re all so specific and unique.”
The process begins with Wilcox spending an hour on the phone talking to a prospect, who is usually looking for a unique gift.
“To see if I can get to the heart of the song, I ask quirky questions, like, ‘What are some things on your shelf that have a story that would really take a while to tell?’ or, ‘What’s a thing you’d reach for if the house was on fire?’”
Testimonials to Wilcox’s Custom Built Songs fill the service’s web page.
“David has a keen ability to take a conversation and turn it into art,” said a customer named Bob, who surprised his wife on their 17th wedding anniversary with a Wilcox-penned ode to the rainforest. “He listened to our story and turned it into a beautiful song that we will enjoy for the rest of our lives.”
Writing in response to stories he’s heard is how, as a young introvert, Wilcox began his musical journey. “Someone would say something to me, and it would take me a day of sort of gathering my answer musically. Then I would come back, and I would sing them a song that showed I was listening. I did feel what you were saying.”
The spirituality in his music is the product of a wide open and still ongoing search for meaning, and words to express it.
“What I got growing up was a mystical sense that life is more interesting than it appears,” he said. “I was trying to find language for that because I was raised with no tradition at all. And that was a great way to come up, because I got my mystical sense first before I had any dogma or any stories.”
It’s not rooted in any specific dogma or belief system.
“I speak a lot of languages spiritually, and I am comfortable in a lot of settings. If people saw me coming out of some buildings, they’d say, ‘What the hell are you doing in there?’ I have prayed at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem,” he said, adding, “The fact that three religions landed in the same city on the same rock, I don’t consider that an accident. I consider that divine comedy.”
Wilcox has made 18 studio albums, starting with the independently released The Nightshift Watchman in 1987. His latest is 2023’s My Good Friends. His creative process is a blend of self-therapy and mysticism. “I call it metabolizing old pain. You take it apart and find that it’s made of discomfort, but mostly it’s … yearning, which has a sacredness. [It] comes from an assumption that life should be better, that you’re basing on … nothing but just faith.”
David Wilcox When: Friday, April 25, 7:30 p.m. Where: Dana Center, Saint Anselm College, Manchester Tickets: $45 at anselm.edu
Featured photo. David Wilcox. Photo by Lynne Harty.
Throughout May, restaurants across Manchester will compete to produce the best plant-based dishes.
Vegan Outreach (veganoutreach.org), a dietary advocacy group, helps cities across the country to organize month-long challenges in which restaurants add vegan dishes to their menus and compete with each other to create the most popular ones. In a given year approximately 20 cities participate in Vegan Chef Challenges. This year Manchester is one of them.
Joan O’Brien, the president of the New Hampshire Animal Rights League (nhanimalrights.org), is the organizer of the Manchester competition. “This will be the inaugural challenge for Manchester,” she said. “This is a national campaign and different cities participate. They choose a month [to hold the event in] and they approach restaurants and chefs in their city and ask them to come up with up to three new vegan dishes for that month and to feature them in the restaurant. And then diners are invited to come out [and order them]. Veg-curious people are invited to come out, as well as people who normally eat that way, and try the dishes, and vote on their favorites. Chefs are able to win awards for things like Best Entree or Best Dessert, and diners can actually win awards as well, for the most restaurants visited, that kind of thing.” There will be an award ceremony in June.
O’Brien said many types of restaurants will participate in the Challenge. According to the event’s webpage, participating restaurants include Stark Brewing Co., The Farm Bar & Grille, Vallarta Tequila Bar, 900 Degrees Pizzeria, Stash Box, Industry East Bar, Piccola Italia Ristorante & Martini Bar, Campo Enoteca, SubZero Ice Cream, KS Kitchen, Board and Brews, The Potato Concept and 110 Grill.
“We’re approaching everybody from the fine restaurants down to the sandwich shops,” O’Brien said. “It’s a wide net that we’re throwing, and we’re finding a lot of interest. For some, May is a busy month for restaurants. Some are understaffed and they just said they can’t take it on, but we’re finding a lot of interest from others.”
O’Brien said the goal of May’s Challenge is not to raise money or convince anybody to change their diet.
“It’s just about awareness,” she said. “The immediate challenge here is just to get more plant-based options out there. This isn’t a challenge for vegans; it’s really for omnivores who might be looking to reduce how much meat they eat. It shows people that [vegan foods are] not just tofu and salads. Vegan food is just as delicious as non-vegan food. And if you want to eat, if you want someone to make delicious food, who do you ask? You ask a chef, right? The chefs [in this challenge] are going to be showcasing some things that are really delicious.”
The Vegan Chef Challenge will provide an excellent demonstration for restaurant owners to see that there is real demand for plant-based dishes, O’Brien said.
“When we come to Manchester, to go to the Palace for a show or something, we ask ourselves where we should eat. We’re looking forward to having more [vegan dining] options in Manchester. Also, many vegans have something called the Vegan Veto. When a group is choosing a place to go out to eat, if there’s nothing vegan, they get to veto the restaurant.”
O’Brien said Manchester’s changing population makes it a good city for this challenge.
“Younger people are coming in,” she said, “more people who are thinking about what they eat. They want fresh, plant-based foods. So I think we’re on the right track.”
Manchester’s Vegas Chef Challenge
Manchester’s Vegan Chef Challenge will take place throughout May. For details and a list of participating restaurants, visit veganchefchallenge.org/manchester.
Featured photo: A winning dish by Frothy Monkey in the Knoxville Vegan Chef Challenge (photo credit – Heather Mount)
The Bridges of Madison County musical in Manchester
Even though it won Tonys for Best Original Score and Best Orchestrations, The Bridges of Madison County opened on Valentine’s Day in 2014 and closed in mid-May. Dr. Alan Kaplan, the founder and artistic director for the Manchester Community Theatre Players, has an inkling about why this happened and will apply his ideas in an upcoming production of the musical.
“This is a play I’ve been interested in for many years,” he said in a recent phone interview. Kaplan has read the novel, seen the Clint Eastwood-directed movie, and watched the first staging of the show in Williamstown, Mass. He even conversed with Jason Robert Brown, who wrote the Tony-winning music and lyrics.
The story centers on a fated couple and the decisions they must make when their connection becomes undeniable.
Francesca Johnson (Susan Schott) is a beautiful Italian woman who married an American GI as World War II was ending to escape her ravaged country. Twenty years later she’s preparing for a rare stretch of solitude on her Iowa farm while her family is away at the State Fair. Her reverie is interrupted when photographer Robert Kincaid (Don LaDuke) pulls into her driveway, asking for directions to a bridge he’s shooting for a National Geographic story.
The songs are varied and evocative, as good as anything to come from Broadway. “What Do You Call a Man Like That?” is an operatic waltz that perfectly captures the reticent housewife’s growing desire, while “Another Time,” an echo sung by Robert’s former wife, has a folky, Joni Mitchell feel. Sung by Francesca’s husband Bud (Dan Arlen), “Something From a Dream” is an aching ode to a marriage that, unknown to him, may be slipping from his grasp.
Though the music is powerful, it’s the story that brings power to the show. Hovering over forbidden love is the question of what might have been. In Francesca’s case, the man she left in Italy for glamor across the sea that never materialized, and for Robert, a driven nature that left little room for human connection.
For Kaplan, it was this element that attracted him most to directing The Bridges of Madison County.
“Usually with a musical, the music carries the show; the acting should be reasonable, but the music can cover it,” he said. “This is a musical where the actors have to really be on their game, and it gave me the opportunity as a director to really pull the most out of a cast in terms of acting ability.”
One of the challenges in presenting the play is conveying a sense of place and distance. Much of the action happens during phone calls between Francesca and her husband, Bud, as she struggles with her newfound love for Robert and how it might change her future. Some critics found the Broadway staging jarring.
“All the set pieces were on stage all the time,” Kaplan recalled, and juxtaposing cast members hundreds of miles apart was another problem. “You may have a bridge in the middle of a kitchen, or a refrigerator in the middle of an outdoor scene. It was confusing.”
Outdoor scenes more easy to accomplish in a movie were harder to do theatrically. So Kaplan took cues from Eastwood and placed a big screen at the rear of the stage to project scenery. A videographer was commissioned to capture locations in Iowa, and there is footage of Naples, Italy, and the cities Francesca imagined visiting in America.
The main set, Francesca’s kitchen, is on wheels and can be moved as the action demands. It’s an elaborate production for a community theater. That’s something Kaplan tries for whenever MCTP mounts a play, but it was particularly urgent in the case of this show, one so close to his heart.
“We didn’t want to just repeat something that only had a hundred performances on Broadway and then closed after four months,” he said, “I think that the reasons for it, as I mentioned, were pretty obvious. So the hope here is that we have improved on it.”
The Bridges of Madison County When: Fridays and Saturdays at 7:30 p.m. and Sundays at 2 p.m. through May 4 Where: MCTP Theatre at North End Montessori School, 698 Beech St., Manchester Tickets: $20 for adults, $18 for seniors, $10 for ages 18 and under at mctp.info
Featured photo:The Bridges of Madison County. Courtesy photo.
Veggies, flowers and trees for a low-effort gardening season
Alright, if one more person tells me they’re not a gardener because they don’t have a ”green thumb,” I’ll scream.
Anyone can grow veggies and flowers, and even plant a tree. Let’s look at 10 plants that will grow for you, regardless of your previous experiences. Just remember, the plants you start will need your attention daily until they have established a good root system and can get enough water in dry times. But if you can brush your hair and teeth daily before going to work, you can visit your seedlings every evening and give them a drink of water if they need it. Once established, they won’t need so much attention.
1. ‘Sungold’ cherry tomatoes
This is a fantastic producer of one of the best-tasting tomatoes in existence. Buy plants from your local nursery. Like all veggies, it needs six hours of daily sunshine or more, average to good soil, and a little water when first planted and in times of drought. It is a big, tall plant, so plant it with a metal cage around it to hold it up, the biggest you can find, preferably 54 inches tall. One plant can easily produce 100 to 200 tomatoes over a long season. I’d suggest two plants minimum, as they taste so good you will eat many on the way to the kitchen. Plant 24 to 36 inches apart. They are relatively disease-free.
2. ‘Bolero’ carrots
This is the gold standard of carrots. Tasty, productive. Its only flaw is that the seeds are tiny so people end up planting them too close together, and then not thinning them by the Fourth of July as they should. One solution? Buy pelleted seeds. They are coated in clay so they are the size of BBs and easy to plant where you want them. Plant in full sun and an inch apart, then thin to 2 inches. Improve your soil with compost — one bag will do for an average seed packet. Carrots need plenty of nitrogen, so add a little organic fertilizer, too. Water daily until the carrots come up, and then weekly in dry times.
Carrots need to be planted by seed directly in the soil. Photo by Henry Homeyer.
Although carrots come in many colors, I like the taste of conventional orange ones best. They certainly have more beta carotene than yellow or white ones. I had great luck with purple carrots last summer — they grew straight and gorgeous, but I found them a bit stringy. All carrots are a great source of vitamins B, C and K and potassium, fiber and antioxidants. Let your kids eat them right out of the ground, just wiped clean or sprayed with the hose.
3. ‘Black-seeded Simpson’ lettuce
Replant lettuce regularly to have salad all summer. Photo by Henry Homeyer.
Another workhorse readily available in six-packs from your local garden center. Much easier to buy small plants than to start seed. Full sun or light shade, decent soil. Pick leaves for sandwiches as they grow, or wait until they are full-sized and harvest the entire head of lettuce. If you buy seed, you can replant more lettuce every two or three weeks all summer. Be sure to thin out — lettuce seeds are small and it’s easy to plant seeds too close together.
Lettuce comes in many colors and textures. Your vegetable garden will come alive if you plant reds and greens or frizzy leaves and smooth leaves in patterns. Alternate them, planting seedlings 6 inches apart. Think of your garden as a painting, the plants as the colors and shapes that please your eyes.
4. Bush beans
Plant seeds in average soil in full sun after soil warms and there is no chance of frost. Bean seeds are big, easy to plant. Plant seeds 2 inches apart, thin to 4 inches. Rows 8 inches apart. Bush beans come in three colors: green, yellow and purple. The yellow ones have a distinct taste, but the green and purple taste the same to me. Purple beans turn a tepid gray when cooked, so serve them raw in salads when having guests. All freeze well.
Pole beans are easy to grow, too. ‘Kentucky Wonder’ is an old favorite. There is some extra work in growing pole beans: You have to build a trellis or cut some poles for a tripod they can climb. The rewards can be big: So long as you keep picking pole beans, they will keep or producing more beans. Not so for bush beans — they produce for three weeks and are done.
5. Verbenas
Verbena bonariensis is loved by monarchs in the fall. Photo by Henry Homeyer.
These are annual flowers that bloom all summer. There are many named varieties sold as plants ready to bloom at garden centers, all good. “Superbenas” are hybrids that are worth the extra price. They take hot and dry better than many annuals.
My favorite verbena is unusual: Brazilian verbena (Verbena bonariensis) is 4 to 6 feet tall on thin strong stems that need no staking. Monarchs love them for their pollen and nectar in late summer.
6. Marigolds
Marigolds come in a dozen sizes and colors — or more. They are a classic flower that loves hot, sunny places but will take some shade. They are quite fragrant. Great in containers or in the ground. Buy plants in six-packs to have plenty. Some people plant marigolds around their tomatoes to keep away insect pests. I’m not convinced that they really do that, but the color is a nice addition to the vegetable garden.
7. ‘Prairie Sun’ Black-eyed Susan
Prairie Sun. Photo by Henry Homeyer.
These flowers are a perennial that keep on blooming from July to Halloween. In Zone 4 or colder it is not fully hardy, so I buy some every year. Some survive my winters, some do not. It’s a great cut flower. Likes sun, but will take some shade. It isn’t really a black-eyed Susan, as the center eye is green. Another really hardy black-eyed Susan is called ‘Goldsturm.’ It blooms nicely, year after year, in late summer.
8. Catmint
Catmint. Photo by Henry Homeyer.
Catmint (Nepeta faassenii) is a perennial that loves hot, dry locations. It has light blue flowers that bloom for a long time. Not to be confused with catnip; your cat will leave it alone — and so will bugs. Bees and hummingbirds like it, but deer and rabbits don’t. ‘Walkers Low’ is a good one, 24 to 30 inches tall and wide.
9. Fothergilla
Fothergilla in October. Photo by Henry Homeyer.
This is a native shrub that blooms early in the season with white bottlebrush flowers. Its best season, however, is fall. It has great fall foliage with red, orange, yellow and purple leaves all on the same bush. Relatively slow growing, doesn’t require annual pruning. But that also means buy the biggest plants you can find. It takes time to get to full size — about 6 feet tall and wide.
10. Oaks of all sorts
Oaks are pretty for us and food for caterpillars and wildlife. Photo by Henry Homeyer.
These are the best trees for supporting pollinators as their caterpillars feed on the leaves. Caterpillars feed our baby birds, providing about 90 percent of their diet or more. Doug Tallamy, a Ph.D. entomologist in Pennsylvania, determined that a clutch of chickadees consumes between 6,000 and 9,000 caterpillars from hatching to fledging. If we don’t provide enough native plants like oaks, we won’t have food for our baby birds. You can help.
The pin oak (Quercus palustris) is one of the most used trees in the Northeast: it is fast growing and tolerant of pollution, compacted soils, road salt. A small one will grow 12 to 15 feet in five to seven years.
Think about planting an oak in the middle of your lawn as a specimen tree. It will attract birds, pollinators, and the acorns will feed wildlife. You don’t have to buy a seedling. In the spring look under an oak tree and try to find an acorn on the ground that has sprouted. Plant it where you want a majestic tree. Water weekly the first summer. Oaks are some of our most long-lived trees. I saw one in Pennsylvania at a Quaker meeting house that was said to be 300 years old.
Over the past 55 years I have planted more than 100 kinds of trees and shrubs in my 2-acre yard, and probably even more kinds of flowers. I eat veggies from my garden all year as I freeze and store them. Not everything works 100 percent of the time for me, but plants have evolved to succeed. So try planting some this summer. In the ground, in a pot or in a window box. You’ll be pleased and proud when your efforts succeed. I know I am.
Nashua Theatre Guild presents the New Hampshire premiere ofIncident at Our Lady of Perpetual Help, a play by Katie Forgette, tonight, tomorrow, Saturday, April 26, at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday, April 27, at 2 p.m. at the Court Street Theatre (14 Court St., Nashua). The story is a “bittersweet memory play about a Catholic childhood in the 1970s … a gently funny, often hilarious and touching production directed by Vicky Sandin,” according to nashuatheatreguild.org. Tickets cost $20 for adults, $18 for 65+, students and military.
Saturday, April 26
Today is Open Farm Day at Coppal House Farm (118 N. River Road, Lee, 659-3572, nhcornmaze.com) from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. featuring animal viewing, farm demonstrations, treats from local food vendors, live music, horse-drawn wagon rides and more.
Saturday, April 26
Today is Dance Day at Pumps & Pirouettes (250 Commercial St., Manchester, 518-5350, pumpsnpirouettes.com), from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. with classes running all day long in shortened blocks to allow new and experienced dancers alike the chance to try out all the styles that Pumps & Pirouettes offers including ballet, heels, jazz, hip-hop, k-pop, contemporary and more. Each class runs for 30 mins and costs $1.
Saturday, April 26
It’s Independent Book Store Day! Balin Books (375 Amherst St. in Nashua; balinbooks.com) will have refreshments, exclusives, a rack of advance reading copies and more with 10 percent of the day’s sales (including $1 per advance reading copy) going to the Nashua Soup Kitchen and Shelter, according to an email from the book store. Bookery (844 Elm St., Manchester, bookerymht.com) has plans for local authors, giveaways, discounts, live music and more, according to an email from the store. Gibson’s Bookstore (45 S. Main St., Concord, gibsonsbookestore.com) will offer “exclusive merch, giveaways, maybe even some games and activities,” according to an email from the store. Check with your favorite indie bookstore for updates.
Sunday, April 27
Lyle Lovett and his Acoustic Group perform tonight at the Chubb Theatre (Chubb Theatre at CCA, 44 S. Main St, Concord, 225-1111, ccanh.com) starting at 7:30 p.m Tickets start at $58.28.
Sunday, April 27
The Hooksett Lions Club Presents its 28th Annual Model Train and Modeling Show today from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Cawley Middle School (89 Whitehall Road, Hooksett). This event features vendors, operating layouts, raffles, a white elephant table, food, clinics and more. Admission is $7 for adults, $1 for children 6 to 12, and free for children five and under.
Tuesday, April 29
Meet Ellie, Nashua’s newest police dog at the Nashua Public Library (2 Court St., Nashua, 589-4600, nashualibrary.org) today at 1 p.m. Meet Officer Turcotte and his partner, K9 Ellie, and learn about Ellie’s job at the police department, ask questions or simply say hello.
Save the Date! Tuesday, April 29
The Flying Gravity Circus, featuring children and teens who learn the circus arts, will perform a show called “One Man’s Trash” Tuesday, May 6, at 7 p.m. at Pine Hill Auditorium at the HIgh Mowing School in Wilton. Tickets cost $16.30 for adults, $11.20 for kids. See flyinggravitycircus.org.
U.S. Rep. Maggie Goodlander told WMUR that she will not seek the U.S. Senate seat in 2026, according to an April 17 report. The race will have no incumbent for the seat as Sen. Jeanne Shaheen has said she will not run for reelection. U.S. Rep. Chris Pappas, a Democrat, announced his campaign for the seat in early April. Earlier this month, former New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu also told WMUR that he wouldn’t run for senate. In the April 17 story, which you can find at wmur.com, Goodlander endorsed Pappas in his campaign for the seat and Pappas endorsed Goodlander in her reelection campaign to the New Hampshire 2nd District seat.
Historic marker
The Black Heritage Trail of New Hampshire will hold an unveiling ceremony on Saturday, April 26, at 10 a.m. for a historic marker honoring author Harriet E. Wilson (the first Black novelist in the U.S. whose book was published in 1859), according to a Black Heritage Trail press release. The marker is on the historic Nehemiah Hayward Homestead (19 Maple St. in Milford) where Wilson was indentured as a child, the release said. A statue of Wilson stands in Milford in Bicentennial Park at 123 South St., where the Trail also has a marker about Wilson. See blackheritagetrailnh.org.
Weather ready
April 20 through April 26 has been designated Severe Weather Awareness Week, during which New Hampshire Department of Safety’s Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management will be offering information on preparedness and safety tips, according to a press release. “Flooding is the main disaster that affects New Hampshire. In recent years, the state has seen tornadoes, earthquakes, extreme heat and extreme cold,” the release said. See readynh.gov for tips as well as instructions for signing up for NH Alerts, a serive that will send information about tornades, floods, gas leaks, power outages and other emergencies to your phone or email. The N.H. Forest Protection Bureau and Gov. Kelly Ayotte have also proclaimed April 21-27 Wildfire Awareness Week in New Hampshire as spring is the beginning of wildfire season, according to a press release from the N.H. Department of Natural & Cultural Resources.
Recall reminder
Gerber Products sent out a recall reminder on April 18 for its Gerber Soothe N Chew Teething Sticks, originally recalled and discontinued Jan. 31, “due to a potential choking hazard for babies and young children,” according to the recall notice at nestleusa.com. “We are issuing a second press release about this recall due to recent reports of recalled product still available for sale on some retailer shelves and online,” the release said. The products were sold nationwide, including in New Hampshire.
Plymouth State University will host its annual Showcase of Student Research and Engagement on Friday, May 2, from 2 to 4 p.m. on the Plymouth campus in the Courtroom at HUB and at Silver Center and Museum of the White Mountains, according to a press release. Students from a variety of disciplines including the arts, humanities and sciences will present their projects on topics including mental health, biology, history and more, the release said. The event is free and open to the public. See plymouth.edu/2025-showcase-research-engagement.
Mosaic Art Collective (66 Hanover St. in Manchester; mosaicartcollective.com) will hold a Drop + Draw on Thursday, April 24, 5:45 to 8 p.m. “Open to all to just hang out and make some art together,” according to the post on Mosaic’s Facebook page.
Craftworkers’ Guild Spring Craft Shop at Kendall House (3A Meetinghouse Road in Bedford, behind the Bedford Public Library) will open Thursday, May 1, and stay open through Sunday, May 25, Thursdays through Sundays, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. See thecraftworkersguild.org.
Bring Back the Trades will hold a Skills Expo Saturday, April 26, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Londonderry High School (295 Mammoth Road in Londonderry) featuring more than 50 local trades organizations, according to a press release. The event is free and open to all ages and includes live demonstrations, equipment showcases and giveaways, the release said. See bringbackthetrades.org.
