Tay Washington, whose car was hit by James Fields, Jr. on August 12, is unable to work due to her chronic pain and brain trauma, and is seeking support from the community. PC: Eze Amos
For Tay Washington, August 12, 2017, started off as a normal day. She ran some errands, and then stopped to see a friend at Friendship Court with her sister.
When Washington learned crowds were gathering downtown, she drove over to take a look.
“I was amazed by all of the people with their signs,” says Washington. “I took a picture [and] proceeded to go home, [but] I got detoured” to Fourth Street, unable to drive forward or turn around.
“Me and my sister [were] staring at the crowd because we had never seen so many people before,” she says. “And then it was a blackout…All I heard was screaming and hollering. I didn’t see any help. When I opened my eyes, it was just chaos. I thought a bomb had went off.”
After a few moments, her sister realized that somebody had rammed into their Toyota Camry from behind. But it was not until later that they learned that 20-year-old self-proclaimed neo-Nazi James Fields, Jr. had intentionally sped down the street, killing 32-year-old Heather Heyer and injuring more than 30 others.
Washington was diagnosed with an ankle fracture. She started doing physical therapy, but her pain only worsened. Eight months later, a visit to an orthopedic specialist revealed that she had complex regional pain syndrome, a chronic condition with no cure.
Washington visited multiple specialists, but none of the medications and treatments she was given helped. She was also repeatedly put down and not taken seriously, she says.
“My job now is my body, taking care of it, so I do not flare up in so much pain that I cannot live day-to-day life,” she says.
Now 30 years old, Washington wants to work, but says she cannot because of intense pain and brain trauma, which causes her to have explosive episodes. Before the car attack, she had been on her way to becoming an EMT, and says she had received multiple scholarships and awards.
Though August 11 and 12—and the ensuing investigations and trials—made international headlines, it has not been easy for Washington to get the assistance she needs, both for herself and her daughter, who is now 11. She says she’s been denied disability benefits multiple times, and hasn’t been able to claim unemployment, since she hasn’t had a job in three years.
The Charlottesville Area Community Foundation’s Heal Charlottesville Fund has been Washington’s main source of financial support for the past three years, but CACF Director of Programs Eboni Bugg says donations have dwindled, and the fund is now out of money. Only three people—including Washington—have requested assistance from the fund in recent months.
Washington’s mother, Emma, a licensed practical nurse, covered some of her daughter’s expenses for a while, but when her 31-year-old son, Telvin Washington, was murdered in their hometown of Belzoni, Mississippi, last year, her own pain and trauma became overwhelming—her PTSD and panic attacks make it too difficult for her to work.
Washington says the last check she received from the fund will help her get through the next three months, but after that, she will have no source of income. She is also in need of long-term medical and emotional support, as well as legal counsel, and is accepting donations directly through GoFundMe.
“I feel left. I feel stuck. I feel invisible,” she says. “I’m screaming for help as Black young woman.”
Adrienne Oliver, an instructional coach for Albemarle County Public Schools, believes all students will be able to see themselves in the history of the United States, once the Reframing the Narrative program is implemented. PC: John Robinson
As protests against police brutality continue around the country, school districts are tackling another form of systemic racism and oppression: whitewashed history. Since last year, Albemarle County Public Schools has been working to create an anti-racist social studies curriculum, elevating the voices and stories of marginalized people and groups, which are often misrepresented by (or entirely excluded from) textbooks. And now, the district is one step closer to implementing the curriculum—called Reframing the Narrative.
Last week, the district’s history teachers—joined by over a dozen partner organizations and more than 100 educators from Charlottesville City Schools, Virginia Beach City Public Schools, and other districts across the state—met virtually to begin constructing a more comprehensive and inclusive U.S. history curriculum as part of the Virginia Inquiry Collaborative.
Fully addressing our country’s legacy of slavery, racism, and inequity is not an easy task, and “dependency on textbooks of any kind will only preserve the status quo and dominant narratives,” says Adrienne Oliver, an ACPS instructional coach who participated in the virtual workshops. “The current state standards continue to uphold such narratives, and so a heavy reliance upon outsourced materials is, in my view, antithetical to our work.”
Rather than find new textbooks (Oliver says she has yet to see an anti-racist one), the curriculum will rely on relevant texts and resources, primary source materials, and classroom discussions and activities—all working to “resist a retelling of dominant narratives and put learning into students’ hands,” says Oliver.
After a team of editors reviews and refines the results of last week’s workshops, inquiry-based U.S. history units, containing learning plans and assessment tools, will be uploaded onto an online platform for ACPS teachers, along with those from CCS and other districts, to use starting this fall.
Under the anti-racist curriculum, all students will be able to see themselves in the history of the United States, examining it from a variety of non-traditional perspectives, says Oliver. Black and brown students, along with others from marginalized backgrounds, may feel more acknowledged and empowered, as they study untold stories of resilience and resistance.
The revamped history courses will also better prepare students, especially those who are white, to deal with uncomfortable issues in our country, points out Bethany Bazemore, who graduated from Charlottesville High School this year.
“The only way as a society we’re going to get past this is if white people learn to be uncomfortable,” says Bazemore, who is Black. “Black people have been uncomfortable for 400 years and counting.”
“You need to understand and reckon with your history to really address the problems of the present,” adds program leader John Hobson. “It’s all connected.”
Last summer, ACPS partnered with the Montpelier Foundation to jump-start the Reframing the Narrative program. With the support of a $299,500 grant from the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation, history teachers from the division participated in professional development workshops at Montpelier, along with other field experiences and learning opportunities, during the school year.
Through these initiatives, educators “are able to understand possibly their own bias, and reflect and grow from there,” says Virginia Beach social studies instructor Nick Dzendzel, a participant in the Virginia Inquiry Collaborative. “It provides a whole new atmosphere inside of a school [or] department for those educators to start pushing for what they know and want to be right for the students—and not just adhering to what’s been done before.”
The CACF grant also helps to pay teachers as they develop the new curriculum outside of school hours, and funds student field trips to Montpelier, “centering the voices and experiences of enslaved people and the descendant community” at the former plantation, says Oliver.
Next year, the process will start over again, as Albemarle teachers update the division’s world geography curriculum for freshmen and world history for sophomores. The following year, the eighth grade civics and 12th grade government curriculums will also get an anti-racist makeover.
In partnership with ACPS and other state school districts, Charlottesville City Schools also began updating its social studies curriculum last summer. Participating teachers (who receive a stipend) have taken professional development courses at the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center focused on local Black history, as well as curriculum-writing workshops and field excursions around Charlottesville.
Last year, CCS Superintendent Dr. Rosa Atkins was among those appointed to the Commission on African American History Education, which is currently reviewing the history standards and practices for the entire state. By September 1, the commission will offer recommendations for enriched standards related to African American history, as well as cultural competency among teachers.
The white supremacist violence of August 11 and 12 was a catalyst, says Oliver, but these massive curriculum overhauls were years in the making. Grassroots organizers and activists, along with individual educators, have been advocating for and implementing anti-racist curriculums across Virginia for some time.
“If you’re doing this [alone] in your own classroom, it’s easy to get weighed down by barriers, by administrators, and by parents for working against the grain. It’s hard to do that every day,” says Virginia Initiative participant Sarah Clark, who teaches U.S. history in Virginia Beach. “But when you’re involved in projects like this, it’s like a rejuvenation…I’m not doing it alone.”
Dental Assistant Jodi Yount uses a Nomad machine to X-Ray a patient at the Charlottesville Free Clinic. The clinic bought the machine with money from a grant in December, and has been using it extensively under the new procedures of the COVID-19 pandemic. PC: Zack Wajsgras
Open wide
Parking lots have become the scene of all kinds of new activity in our virus-crippled world. Students are sitting in their cars to access school Wi-Fi. Religious congregations are meeting without getting out of their vehicles. And here in town, the Charlottesville Free Clinic is offering parking lot dental services for its patients: Two days a week, as many as 15 patients drive up and say “ahhh.”
The Free Clinic provides care to those who make too much money to qualify for Medicaid but don’t get health insurance from work. Parking lot dental checkups are just one way the clinic has adapted to life during the pandemic—they’re also doing curbside medication delivery and evaluating patients for financial eligibility over the phone.
“A lot of folks are losing their jobs, and therefore their insurance,” says Colleen Keller, the director of the clinic. “We anticipate having a lot of new patients by fall.”
The clinic has focused on maintaining its pharmacy services, and the most common medication it distributes is insulin. “We are seeing patients who aren’t always refilling on time coming in,” Keller says. “They know they are vulnerable, and they are working on their health. This is a silver lining.”
Like health care workers around the country, the free clinic’s staff is going full speed ahead. “As one staff member said, ‘It feels good that we can do something. It’s harder when I leave and go home,’” Keller says. “We have enormous gratitude for our jobs, and for the community who funds a free clinic.”
______________________
Neighbors helping neighbors
Since March 13, the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation’s Community Emergency Response Fund has raised more than $4.4 million from more than 600 donations—including a gift of $1 million from the University of Virginia—to help those who need it most during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The fund has awarded $200,000 in grants to local nonprofits that provide critical services, including the Sexual Assault Resource Agency and Blue Ridge Area Food Bank.
And through the Community Foundation’s partnership with Cville Community Cares and United Way of Greater Charlottesville, along with city and county governments, it runs a Community Resource Helpline to provide direct support to local residents in need of money for rent, groceries, and other essential expenses. The helpline has already assisted more than 7,200 people, and with the recent addition of an online form to make the process easier, the foundation expects that number to drastically increase.
______________________
Quote of the Week
“I am committed to an in-person fall semester in which we are back together in our classrooms, laboratories, studios, and clinics.”
—Virginia Commonwealth University president Michael Rao, as UVA and other schools are staying mum on fall plans
______________________
In Brief
A welcome site
The City of Charlottesville has a new digital home, upgrading its website this week from charlottesville.org to charlottesville.gov. The new website is sleeker and slimmer, with 500 pages compared to the previous site’s 2,000. At the City Council meeting last week, councilor Heather Hill promised a “new website, new domain, same commitment to service,” while communications chief Brian Wheeler acknowledged that “a lot of links are going to be broken.”
Hals monitor
Those who’ve long cherished Charlottesville’s (increasingly rare) quirks got a treat last week, when an alleged self-portrait of Dutch Golden Age painter Frans Hals showed up for sale on Charlottesville Craigslist. It’s going for $7.5 million (though the poster will consider “reasonable offers” and “partial trade for real estate”). Art historians consider Hals to be one of the best painters of his time, but local experts were hesitant to speculate on the painting’s authenticity. As for why the anonymous poster would want to part with such a treasure, the owner said only: “It is time for him to come under new stewardship.”
For sale by owner: Frans Hals self-portrait (for a mere $7.5 million). PC: Anonymous Craigslist user
Corner support
With COVID-19 keeping students off Grounds—possibly until next spring semester—businesses on the Corner have taken a huge hit. To help them survive, tech nonprofit HackCville has created savethecorner.com, which thousands of students have used to buy gift cards from their favorite Corner spots and donate to the Charlottesville Restaurant Community Fund. HackCville has also raised over $2,000 to buy meals from Corner restaurants for UVA’s contract workers laid off by Aramark.
Tragedy on the frontlines
Dr. Lorna Breen died at UVA Hospital on Sunday of self-inflicted injuries. While serving hundreds of coronavirus patients, Breen, emergency department medical director at NewYork-Presbyterian Allen Hospital, contracted the virus, but tried to go back into work after staying home for about a week and a half. After the hospital sent her back home, her family brought her to Charlottesville. According to her father, Dr. Phillip Breen, the pandemic had taken an extreme toll on her mental health. “Make sure she’s praised as a hero, because she was,” Breen told The New York Times. “She’s a casualty just as much as anyone else who has died.”
Due to the coronavirus, Trader Joe’s is limiting customers to 30 at a time inside the store. PC: Eze Amos
Suddenly, a new normal
Just two weeks ago—two weeks ago!—our schools were open, our basketball team was eyeing a tournament run, and our restaurants were dusting off the patio furniture for long evenings of springtime outdoor dining.
But thanks to the spread of the infectious and dangerous novel coronavirus, Charlottesville has had to quickly adjust to a new normal.
Parents are scrambling to keep their kids entertained for hours on end, and they can’t just throw them outside, because even the playgrounds are closed. Grocery stores have been cleaned out, as people stock up for a long period of social distancing (Trader Joe’s is limiting customers to 30 at a time inside the store). And on Monday, Governor Ralph Northam announced the closure of non-essential businesses—including gyms, barber shops, and salons—and banned gatherings of more than 10 people.
PC: Staff, Zack Waksgras, Eze Amos
The town’s health care infrastructure has braced itself for what appears to be an imminent rush of new patients. UVA hospital, which made drastic changes to its visitor policy March 22, has set up a screening station at its entrance, and health care providers are short on personal protective gear, including masks, gloves, and goggles.
Restaurants have shifted to take-out only, including Bodo’s, which for so long resisted the tantalizing potential of the Emmet Street and Preston Avenue stores’ already installed drive-through windows. In times like these, it’s good to accentuate the positive: Yes, we’re in the thick of a global pandemic and a total economic collapse, but at least we’ve got drive-through bagels.
____________
Quote of the Week
“The sooner we can get this health crisis under control, the sooner our economy will recover… We must put aside what we want and replace it with what we need.”
—Virginia Governor Ralph Northam on his directive, issued March 23, to close non-essential businesses for 30 days
____________
More masks, please!
Local health care workers are soliciting donations of masks, gloves, goggles, and other household goods in the face of a national shortage of protective gear. Paige Perriello, an area pediatrician, tweeted a picture of herself wearing a mask made of styrofoam and a piece of clear plastic with the caption “Charlottesville’s innovators are coming to our aid!” The initiative is called Equip Cville, and donations can be left at Champion brewery from 11am-1pm every day—see supportcville.com for details.
Pediatrician Paige Perriello PC: Twitter
Budget burdens
This year’s city budget discussions were contentious even before the added stress of a worldwide public health crisis. Now, with COVID-19 shutting down the restaurant and tourism industries, and meals and lodging tax revenues falling accordingly, the city has announced it will need to cut an additional $5 million from the final budget. The budget was supposed to be finalized in April, but for obvious reasons it will not be finished on schedule.
Community cares
The Charlottesville Area Community Foundation has raised more than $2 million for its emergency response fund, thanks to Dave Matthews Band’s Bama Works Fund, the Batten Family Fund, the City of Charlottesville, Albemarle County, and more than 150 other donors. In partnership with Cville Community Cares and United Way, as well the city and county, CACF will distribute the money to area households impacted by COVID-19 and community-based organizations that provide food, housing, and other forms of basic assistance.
Taking a stand
A group of UVA student activists has created a petition demanding greater resources and support from the university, particularly for students who are low-income, first-generation, and immunocompromised. The petition asks UVA to provide non-student workers (such as Aramark employees) and non-federal work study student workers with paid sick leave; refund housing, meals plans, and tuition/fees (or provide a prorated credit for next semester); offer housing to housing-insecure students and community members; and establish a mutual aid fund for students and low-wage workers with unexpected expenses, among other demands. It has been signed by more than 750 other students, alumni, faculty, staff, and community members.
This 1948 deed for a house in North Downtown restricts ownership by “persons of the negro race,” but does not prohibit having black servants on the property. Courtesy Jordy Yager
By Jonathan Haynes
“If you look at Charlottesville in-depth, you see racial disparities at every juncture,” says local freelance journalist and C-VILLE contributor Jordy Yager. “Health care disparities, disparities at police encounters, employment.” For his latest project, he will trace inequality in the Charlottesville area. “I started thinking about how people get to where they are, and dug into the history of Charlottesville,” he says.
Yager has received a $50,000 grant from the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation to construct a digital map of housing discrimination in the Charlottesville area, which he believes will illustrate the link between past institutional policy and modern-day inequities.
To complete the project, he has teamed up with local court clerks, private researchers, employees at the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center, and professors at UVA, who have enlisted their students to analyze documents at Charlottesville courthouses.
Andrew Kahrl, a professor of history and African American studies at UVA whose students are assisting with Yager’s research, says segregation was written into the housing market through covenants that prohibited sales to blacks. In some cases, covenants also kept Jewish buyers from buying properties.
“In Charlottesville, racial covenants were initiated by developers and neighborhood organizations seeking to preserve the racial homogeneity of the city,” says Kahrl. “They were also pervasive across the United States.”
Yager has found that homes in Rose Hill, Belmont, Fry’s Spring, and Locust Grove had deeds with racial covenants. “This is a problem because homeownership has been the number one tool to gain wealth in America,” he says.
In the 1930s, the Federal Housing Administration began to provide subsidized loans for mortgages, but only to Americans buying homes in neighborhoods that barred sales to African Americans—a process known as redlining.
These loans enabled white, middle-class Americans to make down payments on houses that would surge in value over the next few decades and lead to massive intergenerational transfers of wealth. Meanwhile, black Americans were relegated to neighborhoods with poor infrastructure, further entrenching them in poverty.
“When you purchase a home, you need certain things for property value to appreciate,” Yager says, listing indoor plumbing, water pipes, roads, and transmission lines as examples. “All these required requests to the city. White neighborhoods got them, black neighborhoods did not.”
The final project will be a 10’x10′ interactive display that will allow visitors to select a time period and compare racial demographics in property records to contemporaneous income levels and health outcomes in the area. It will be installed in a permanent exhibit in the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center.
Yager expects to complete the project near the end of next year.
The Charlottesville Symphony at the University of Virginia performed the second of two annual holiday concerts at Old Cabell Hall on Sunday, December 2. Photo by Martyn Kyle
As Charlottesville’s character has broadened, so has its classical music scene, which is now largely driven by community efforts to build the culture.
When Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach began transforming the sounds we were used to hearing, 250 years ago, people said it was the death of classical music,” says Benjamin Rous, music director of the Charlottesville Symphony. “And they have been saying that, for one reason or another, ever since. But classical music is still very much alive.”
Classical music is easy to find around Charlottesville, especially during the holidays. In fact, for classical music devotees, Charlottesville is an all-year-round kind of town, with choices from instrumental to vocal, large-scale to chamber, medieval to modern. “Whether for performers or audience members, this broad category of music we refer to by the sometimes narrow term ‘classical music’ has something for everyone,” says Michael Slon, music director of The Oratorio Society of Virginia and associate professor and director of choral music at the University of Virginia. “And for a town our size, there’s a tremendous array of offerings.”
A symphony orchestra, an opera company, and a large-scale symphonic chorus—Charlottesville has had all of them for decades. Being a university town helps, but as Charlottesville’s character has broadened, so has its classical music scene, which is now largely driven by community efforts to build the culture.
Major players
The Charlottesville Symphony at the University of Virginia, while based at UVA, has been run by the nonprofit Charlottesville Symphony Society since 1976. Fifteen of the orchestra’s 16 principals teach music in some capacity. The rest of the musicians are other faculty, UVA students, and members of the Charlottesville community; Executive Director Janet Kaltenbach notes “most of our musicians are well qualified to play in any professional orchestra in the country.” The Symphony presents five concerts a year, scheduled around the academic calendar—and around home football games, which shut down access and parking around UVA’s Old Cabell Hall, one of its two performance venues.
Janet Kaltenbach is the executive director of the Charlottesville Symphony at the University of Virginia. Photo by Martyn Kyle
The Charlottesville Opera began 40 years ago as the Ash Lawn Opera, offering summer open-air performances at James Monroe’s home. In 2009, the company moved its base of operations to the Paramount Theater, where it could offer larger-scale productions and draw bigger audiences. Two years ago, the company became the Charlottesville Opera. Martha Redinger, a current board member active with the organization since 2004, is proud of the Opera’s record of showcasing young singers who have gone on to become top-notch opera stars; its recent fundraiser featured nationally known bass-baritone Eric Owens, whose first paid professional gig was at Ash Lawn in 1992.
The Oratorio Society of Virginia celebrated its 50th anniversary last year with a commissioned choral work by Virginia composer Adolphus Hailstork, based on a poem by UVA professor and Pulitzer Prize-winner Rita Dove. The chorus is made up of about 90 auditioned amateurs who range from recent UVA voice majors to retirees. (Full disclosure: this writer is a member.) The Oratorio Society is affiliated with UVA’s McIntire School of Music (music director Slon also leads UVA’s choral groups), but its driving force is community volunteers.
The Virginia Consort, now in its 29th season, grew out of the Oratorio Society; building on the first group of 25 singers, Consort founder and music director/conductor Judith Gary has created a constellation of chorales. The Chamber Ensemble, about 40 voices, performs twice a year; additional singers are auditioned each year to create the larger Festival Chorus, which presents one large choral work with orchestra. The Youth Chorale program includes the High School Chorus and the Treble Chorus (both directed by Gary) and the Prelude and First Step Choirs (directed by local music and vocal teacher Donna Rehorn).
The Virginia Consort’s Festival Chorus performs a large choral work with an orchestra each season. Photo courtesy Virginia Consort
Chamber music and more
Charlottesville also has a long-standing and rich chamber music scene. The two major players, the Tuesday Evening Concert Series (called TECS, and started in 1948) and the Charlottesville Chamber Music Festival (begun in 1999), are by design complementary: from October through April, TECS offers a season featuring touring national and international stars, while the Festival’s September performances highlight emerging artists and edgier works. “We push the boundary of what chamber music is,” says Festival founder and board member Elsie Thompson, “and our audiences are willing to come along.” (All the classical groups in Charlottesville agree the audiences here are knowledgeable, enthusiastic and loyal; “the ecosystem here is exceptional,” says Rous, who took up the Symphony’s leadership in 2017.)
For chamber music fans willing to travel a bit, Staunton presents a top-notch music festival in August; Wintergreen stages a music festival in July-August; and Harrisonburg hosts the Shenandoah Valley Bach Festival every June (not to be confused with the non-classical Shenandoah Music Festival held in Orkney Springs).
Bringing the Paramount Theater back to life—an effort which Thompson helped steer—has given the Chamber Music Festival and other classical groups a larger performance space (in addition to popular venues Old Cabell Hall, the Martin Luther King, Jr. Performing Arts Center at Charlottesville High School, and First Presbyterian Church). The Oratorio Society holds its annual December concert at the Paramount, performing large-scale choral works with orchestra members. The Opera holds its two annual performances there (one a classical opera, the other a musical theater work), hiring local players for its orchestra and building its own sets. Fingers are crossed for spring 2019, with music supporters hoping that the UVA working group on university-community relationships might include the building of a top-class performing arts venue in its recommendations to President Jim Ryan. “We’re the only state university in Virginia that doesn’t have one,” says Kaltenbach.
Trevor Scheunemann (right), who has sung with the San Francisco Opera, the Washington National Opera, and the Opéra National de Bordeaux, rehearses for last summer’s production of Charlottesville Opera’s The Marriage of Figaro. Photo by Amy Jackson Smith
Victory Hall Opera, on the other hand, believes small is beautiful. This newcomer was launched three years ago by international opera singers Brenda Patterson and Miriam Gordon-Stewart, along with opera director and Charlottesville resident Maggie Bell. Patterson says, “We saw Charlottesville as a place that would support a newer, more innovative concept of opera, led by singers and based around singers.” Rather than the opera industry’s model of freelancing a production’s star roles, Victory Hall’s troupe of 12 singers fashions a season of small works—some classic, some contemporary, some original. The group has staged productions in PVCC’s Dickinson Theater, Alderman Library, Vinegar Hill Theatre, and (a groundbreaker) Monticello.
The money problem
Large or small, every organization faces the issue of funding—calling on volunteer board members, staff, and members to seek grant money and work on fundraising, in addition to selling tickets (which cover only around 25 percent of costs). Common grant sources are the Virginia Commission for the Arts, the Maurice Amado Foundation, the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation, and the Bama Works Fund of the Dave Matthews Band. Charlottesville isn’t home to many large corporations (i.e., potential donors), but local banks—Union Bank, Virginia National Bank, and Wells Fargo—are frequent contributors. In addition, each group has its base of loyal individual donors who love classical music, want to see it performed, and believe in its value for the community.
Every classical music group makes an effort to keep ticket prices reasonable, and offers subscriber discounts as well as cut-price or free student tickets. “We’re a university town, and people who live here—or move here, or retire here—expect a vital cultural scene,” says Karen Pellón, long-time executive director of TECS. “But people here also expect the concerts to be affordable, even though we are often bringing in the same artists they would pay far more to hear at Washington’s Kennedy Center.”
The Paramount’s director of operations and programming, Matthew Simon, faces the same challenge. The Paramount can bring in national names like this season’s big star, world-renowned pianist Murray Perahia. But top artists charge top fees, so Simon has to balance that cost with what he feels the Charlottesville audience will bear. In the meantime, the Paramount’s broadcast of the Metropolitan Opera’s “Live in HD” programs offers a higher-quality screen and space than most of the Met’s national network—“a better Met Live experience than you’d get in most big cities,” Simon notes.
Three Notch’d Road’s Simon Martyn-Ellis plays the theorbo during the baroque ensemble’s recording session at Emmanuel Episcopal Church in Greenwood. Photo by Mathias Reed
Early music
The smaller groups, which often perform more intimate works, rely on the area’s churches, which make wonderful settings for the early music (medieval, Renaissance and baroque) that Charlottesville is particularly rich in.
Three Notch’d Road, founded in 2011 by local musicians Fiona Hughes, Anne Timberlake, and David McCormick, presents baroque music played on instruments of the period. Concerts have included “Bach Comes to America,” and a recent program on Polish baroque music that was inspired by a sonata found in violinist Thomas Jefferson’s collection. The ensemble’s 20 professional musicians live and perform around the country. Hughes, now the group’s artistic director as well as a baroque violinist, says one of her goals is “introducing the music of the past in ways that overcome our assumptions about the past—for example, people are often surprised at how bright and active medieval music can be.”
Since 1991, Zephyrus has presented works of the medieval, Renaissance, and baroque periods, primarily vocal, although their performances will occasionally include professional instrumentalists. Its 16 to 20 singers are all local and nonprofessional. Megan Sharp, the group’s music director, says its music is well-suited to a church space such as St. Paul’s Memorial, Holy Comforter, or Emmanuel in Greenwood. Zephyrus has “quite a committed following” for the three or four performances it gives each season, says Sharp; the group is increasingly drawing young people and, especially this time of year, “people who want something that’s not the commercial stuff.”
Members of Zephyrus, which performs primarily vocal works of the medieval, Renaissance, and baroque periods, rehearse for their December 7 concert. Photo by Martyn Kyle
MIRA was begun in 2005 by local singer Raven Hunter, with an informal group singing Renaissance polyphonic vocal music that grew into an ensemble of 12 to 18 performers. “Our singers are professional, or semi-professional, or could be,” says Hunter. “I audition to keep the group small; the music we perform is usually six to eight voices [choral parts], and their sound has to blend well.” MIRA’s repertoire may extend back to medieval works, or forward into the 20th century for composers like Benjamin Britten who incorporate earlier styles.
The newest addition, Fire, is a small women’s a cappella group started by retired church musician and singer Linda Hanson as “a birthday present to myself.” Fire’s repertoire is sacred music from medieval to modern, “from what you would hear in a worship service to broadly spiritual,” says Hanson. Its public performances, held on the fourth Sunday in October and on Mother’s Day each year, benefit PACEM, a local organization that coordinates space and volunteers to provide shelter to the homeless.
Making it happen
“If you love music, make it happen” is a recurring theme. All of Charlottesville’s classical music groups are community-driven, from boards to donors to performers. Thompson—who, in addition to sitting on the board of the Chamber Music Festival, is also on the boards of the Oratorio Society and the Opera—says, “I’m not a musician, I can’t sing or play an instrument,” but she believes “music is a gathering place for the community.” Most small cities don’t have their own baroque ensemble, says Three Notch’d Road’s Hughes, but “I live here, and I really wanted to bring this wonderful music to our area.” The Consort’s Gary recalls that when her small group began meeting to sing together, “We didn’t intend to perform, but we had so much fun we incorporated.”
Karen Pellón, executive director of the Tuesday Evening Concert Series, says “we’re a university town, and people who live here expect a vital cultural scene.” Photo by Eze Amos
Another success factor: synergy. The groups informally network to avoid performing the same works, or on the same dates. Each group has its own niche, so they aren’t competing for audiences (or donors). And the groups cross-fertilize, which expands their offerings and audiences. The Symphony performed Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with the Oratorio Society and UVA’s leading choral group, the University Singers. The Opera has staged concert performances with the Oratorio Society as chorus. The Oratorio Society has appeared with the Wintergreen Music Festival and the Roanoke Symphony, and included the University Singers as well as local church and high school ensembles in its concerts. Both the Symphony and Three Notch’d Road have performed with UVA’s Chamber Singers, its smaller chorus.
To misquote Mark Twain, it seems recent reports of the death of classical music are greatly exaggerated. “It’s a wonderful thing for people to be making and experiencing music on a regular basis,” says Slon. “The Oratorio Society’s programming is geared to the singers, to our audiences, to possibilities for creative collaborations, and to a belief in the music itself.That’s part of our role, to be an advocate for the music.”
Now hear this
As you can see from our roundup of upcoming performances, there’s something for every music-lover this month, from performances to WTJU’s Classical Marathon.
Shopping in stores is so 2015, and several Charlottesville services are making sure you never have to step foot in one again. Starting now, locals can sign up for a membership with Shipt, a virtual marketplace with same-day shipping from Target and Harris Teeter, for $99 a year or $14 a month.
GrubHub, which bought out OrderUp last year, is an existing delivery service for area restaurants and fast food joints, and a newer service, called GoPuff, seems to have its own audience in mind.
Users can order “puff stuff” such as vapes, hookah shisha and rolling papers, while also choosing from a giant selection of (non-alcoholic) “dranks,” “munchies,” “eaaats,” supplies “for the crib” such as Febreeze or something called bedroom dice, “pints on pints” of ice cream or other refreshments that are “frozen af.”
For a flat delivery fee of $1.95, the people of Charlottesville have been ordering from GoPuff, mainly between the hours of 9pm and midnight, since March, according to Elizabeth Romaine, director of communications.
“GoPuff has been very well received,” she says. “We’re super excited to be here in Char-lottesville so that we can deliver our customers what they need, when they need it most.”
We checked in to see what it is exactly that locals need the most. Here are the top 10 products ordered in Charlottesville. No, bedroom dice didn’t make the list.
Top 10
1. Nestlé Pure Life water
2. Cheez-Its
3. Pepperoni Bagel Bites
4. White Castle cheeseburgers
5. Pepperoni Hot Pockets
6. Glacier Freeze Gatorade
7. Blue raspberry Laffy Taffy
8. Honey BBQ Fritos
9. Kraft Mac & Cheese
10. Sour cream & onion Pringles
“Jason Kessler never was and never will be a leader. …Speak privately with any other organizer of [Unite the Right] and they will tell you that working with Kessler was a nightmare. Talk to Jason, and he will say the same of them.”—Chris Cantwell, aka the “Crying Nazi,” on his Radical Agenda website
In brief
30 hate charges
photo Eze Amos
James Fields, 21, the neo-Nazi from Ohio who plowed into a crowd of counterprotesters August 12, killed Heather Heyer and injured dozens, was indicted on 30 federal hate crime charges June 27. Says Attorney General Jeff Sessions, “At the Department of Justice, we remain resolute that hateful ideologies will not have the last word and that their adherents will not get away with violent crimes against those they target.”
‘Festival of the Schmestival’
Justin Beights has asked for a permit to hold a family-friendly fundraiser for about 400 people at the site of last year’s deadly Unite the Right rally on August 12. He promises a celebrity dunk tank and a petting zoo, possibly with a giraffe, if approved. “It’s funny,” he told the Daily Progress. “That’s the date that worked for us. It was kind of a coincidence.”
Million dollar message
The Charlottesville Area Community Foundation will give $1 million from its “Heal Charlottesville” fund to 42 recipients in the wake of last summer’s KKK and Unite the Right rallies. The CACF saw it as an opportunity to invest in marginalized communities, says chair Jay Kessler, who is not to be confused with Jason Kessler, the man who brought the white supremacists to Charlottesville in August.
Saunders out, Curott in
Albemarle County spokesperson Jody Saunders announced her resignation effective July 6, and Albemarle police public info officer Madeline Curott has been tapped to fill in for Saunders at the County Office Building.
Packing heat
Police cited a Charlottesville man June 25 for packing a loaded .45 caliber gun in his carry-on at the Charlottesville-Albemarle Airport. Passengers may fly with firearms in their checked luggage if they’re unloaded and packed separately from ammo.
FLOW is a new arts festival that combines creativity-in-action and a heightened awareness of the natural world. The festival, including musician Gina Sobel, takes place along the banks of the Rivanna River in Darden Towe Park and Riverview Park. Publicity photo
This week two different organizations are bringing together people from various backgrounds to look at our community through a creative lens. One event will take place in a moonlit warehouse while the other will be on the sunlit Rivanna River. Here’s what they’re all about.
Idea Factory 1740 Broadway St. September 29
Aidyn Mills, the donor relations manager for the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation, has spent the last year and a half researching how to get people in their 20s, 30s and 40s—referred to as “next gen” —civically engaged in the community. A cultural anthropologist by training, Mills learned that while the demographic may not necessarily have excess financial resources, next geners don’t lack the enthusiasm, talent or time, “if directed in the right way.” Piggybacking on the CACF’s mission to help individuals “make thoughtful decisions about their philanthropy,” Mills has used her research to develop a program called Imagination Foundation that hits the sweet spot between structure and flexibility. The launch event, “Idea Factory,” will take place in a Woolen Mills warehouse and features an art installation by Claude Wampler and a sound installation by MICE.
So what is it exactly? Mills says she wanted to educate the audience by using a format other than a PowerPoint presentation. The whole concept is based on drawing from the diverse talents, skills and perspectives all community members have to offer. “The basic foundation is creative collaboration,” Mills says. “How do we all work together in addressing or approaching specific social [and environmental] challenges?” For instance, she asks, “Have you ever thought of asking your local mailperson what they think of urban infrastructure? I mean, who else knows the lay of the ground better than a mailperson?”
Idea Factory is only the first in a series of events focused on creative collaboration. There is no promise, Mills says, of solving all of our community’s problems in one night. “I think as organizations and institutions, for very good reason, we’re focused on outcomes and quantitative deliverables,” she says. “And I wanted to reside in the space of imagination for a while. I don’t think as a society we do that enough.”
Mills wanted a physical space that reflects this concept. Enter the empty warehouse. “Already that first step is pushing the bounds of how we do things,” she says. “And that’s what I’m trying to encourage our community to do.” She compares the warehouse to a blank canvas. The act of people coming together, she says, paints a picture of “what a resilient community can look like.” Rather than focusing on quantifiable results, Mills says, “The fact that we can come together and think and practice empathy and listening and creative problem-solving and critical thinking—that to me is an achievement. Let’s celebrate that!”
FLOW Darden Towe Park/Riverview Park September 30
Deborah McLeod, director of Chroma Projects for the last 10 years, was brainstorming a collaboration with the county when Dan Mahon, outdoor recreation supervisor with Albemarle County Parks & Recreation, proposed an art project on the Rivanna River. McLeod, who says, “I love the idea of going to the river, to see the river as a source of cleansing and a sacred aspect,” didn’t hesitate. The brainchild of McLeod and Mahon is FLOW, a dynamic art exhibition on and along the banks of the Rivanna that features a flotilla boat parade, art installations, live music, dance, theater, plein art painting and underwater photography.
The art installations both incorporate and represent their natural surroundings. Compared to typical art festivals, McLeod says, FLOW “is more conscious of environment.” For instance, local sculptor Renee Balfour has sourced invasive vines collected by Rivanna Master Naturalists volunteers to create a bower that will drape into the current. Alan Box Levine’s sculpture uses colored string to explore how trees communicate through their roots. Jum Jirapan will demonstrate suminagashi—a printmaking process that involves painting on water to create a marbleized effect—using silk fabric. McLeod’s own sculpture, a literal interpretation of the riverbed, consists of a rusted bedframe supporting a makeshift aquarium.
Meanwhile, along the riverbank, painters will paint the landscape plein air. McLeod says, “It will be interesting for visitors to see how two people looking at the same view will see it very differently.” Musicians, including Terri Allard, Michael Clem and the Chapman Grove Gospel Singers, as well as Front Porch students and teachers, will perform. Local dancer Some’ Louis will both dance in the water and use it as a percussive instrument, while Katharine Birdsall will lead a dance group along the walking path. Actor Megan Hillary will perform a piece of theater about Queen Anne, the river’s namesake, and Alexandria Searls, executive director of the Lewis & Clark Exploratory Center, will demonstrate underwater photography in the Rivanna.
“The way it’s designed,” McLeod says, “is that you experience an art happening and then you go through nature and there’s nothing, so your sensitivity is heightened to nature and what to anticipate next.” FLOW’s sponsor, Rivanna Conservation Alliance, will have a booth, as well as the Rivanna Master Naturalists. “So it really is a confluence of art and nature,” McLeod says. “This is part of my hope that this is a kind of going to nature to be healed and to get some of this anguish out of our systems.”
