Alt-country singer/songwriter Langhorne Slim will perform at Club Helsinki Hudson in Hudson, New York, on Sunday, March 26 (see item below). Photo: Lauren Massie Photography

Bits & Bytes: ‘Facing Our Truth;’ Eugene R. Fidell at Stockbridge Library; Langhorne Slim at Club Helsinki Hudson; Writers Read; water quality monitors needed

Following the staged reading of 'Facing Our Truth,' Multicultural BRIDGE executive director Gwendolyn Hampton VanSant will moderate a discussion with the directors and actors as well as members of the Council for Equity and Inclusion at Simon's Rock.

‘Facing Our Truth’ one-acts explore race, privilege

Great Barrington — Multicultural BRIDGE and Bard College at Simon’s Rock will present a staged reading of “Facing Our Truth” on Wednesday, March 29, at 7 p.m. at the college’s Daniel Arts Center. The reading is free and open to the public.

In 2013, the New Black Fest in New York City commissioned six diverse playwrights to write 10-minute plays on the topics of Trayvon Martin, race and/or privilege. The resulting collection by Winter Miller, Marcus Gardley, Dominique Morrisseau, Mona Mansour and Tala Manassah, Dan O’Brien with Quetzal Flores, and A. Rey Pamatmat continues to be presented around the country.

Directing the plays are Sara Katzoff, Emma Dweck, Jim Frangione, Chris Tucci and Amy Brentano. A mix of Simon’s Rock students, faculty, alumni and staff will perform. Following the staged reading, Multicultural BRIDGE executive director and Simon’s Rock alumna Gwendolyn Hampton VanSant will moderate a discussion with panelists to include the plays’ directors and actors as well as members of the Council for Equity and Inclusion at Simon’s Rock.

–E.E.

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Eugene R. Fidell to speak at Stockbridge Library

Eugene R. Fidell.
Eugene R. Fidell.

Stockbridge — On Sunday, March 26, at 4 p.m., the Stockbridge Library, Museum & Archives will present law professor and author Eugene R. Fidell as part of its Speaker Series.

In his book “Military Justice: A Very Short Introduction,” Fidell opens a window on the military judicial system, offering an accessible and balanced assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of military legal regimes around the world. The book illuminates U.S. military justice via comparison with civilian and foreign models for the administration of justice, with a particular emphasis on UK and Canadian military justice systems.

Fidell is the senior research scholar in law and the Florence Rogatz Visiting Lecturer in Law at Yale Law School and of counsel to the Washington, D.C. law firm Feldesman Tucker Leifer Fidell LLP. He served in the United States Coast Guard and co-founded the National Institute of Military Justice. He chairs the Committee on Military Justice of the International Society for Military Law and the Law of War and edits the blog Global Military Justice Reform. He and his wife, journalist Linda Greenhouse, live part-time in Stockbridge.

For more information, contact the library at (413) 298-5501 or info@stockbridgelibrary.org.

–E.E.

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Langhorne Slim to perform at Club Helsinki Hudson

Hudson, N.Y. — Alt-country singer/songwriter Langhorne Slim will bring his poignant, confessional lyrics and melodic style to Club Helsinki Hudson on Sunday, March 26, at 8 p.m. Virginia-born singer/songwriter Caroline Spence will warm up the crowd.

Born Sean Scolnick in Langhorne, Pennsylvania, Langhorne Slim graduated from the SUNY Purchase Conservatory of Music and began to gain public notice through several years of touring with the Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players and an appearance at the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival.

His song “Electric Love Letter” was chosen as a Rolling Stone editor’s pick and was also in the movie “Waitress.” He has toured with numerous artists including Cake, the Avett Brothers, Murder By Death, Violent Femmes, Josh Ritter, Drive-By Truckers, Old 97’s, Grace Potter and the Nocturnals and the Lumineers.

For more information, see the Berkshire Edge calendar or call the club at (518) 828-4800.

–E.E.

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Writers Read at the Lee Library

Ellen Doré Watson.
Ellen Doré Watson.

Lee — The Writers Read monthly reading series will present Ellen Doré Watson and Owen Lewis on Tuesday, March 28, at 5:30 p.m. at the Lee Library.

Watson’s most recent book is “Dogged Hearts” and a fifth full-length collection, “pray me stay eager,” is forthcoming. Her work has appeared in the American Poetry Review, Tin House, Orion and the New Yorker. Among her honors are a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award, fellowships to the MacDowell Colony and Yaddo, and a National Endowment for the Arts translation fellowship. She has translated a dozen books from Brazilian Portuguese including the work of poet Adélia Prado. Watson serves as poetry editor of the Massachusetts Review and director of the Poetry Center at Smith College, and teaches in the Drew University low residency MFA program in poetry and translation.

Owen Lewis.
Owen Lewis.

Lewis is the author of two collections of poetry–most recently “Marriage Map”–and two chapbooks. He is the recipient of the 2016 Hippocrates Prize for Poetry and Medicine and the 2016 Jean Pedrick Chapbook Prize of the New England Poetry Club. He has also received awards from the Mississippi Review, the Connecticut River Review, and the Kent and Sussex Poetry Society. He is a psychiatrist and professor at Columbia University where he teaches with the narrative medicine group.

For more information, contact David Giannini at davidgpoet@gmail.com.

–E.E.

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Water quality monitors needed for Housatonic, Hoosic watersheds

Lanesborough — Berkshire Regional Planning Commission, the Hoosic River Watershed Association and the Housatonic Valley Association invite interested individuals to a water quality monitoring training session on Saturday, April 1, from 10 a.m. to noon at Bill Laston Memorial Park, Route 7.

Once a month, trained volunteers will collect water samples at designated locations on the Green River in the Hoosic watershed and Wahconah Falls Brook and the southwest branch of the Housatonic River in the Housatonic watershed. The samples will be tested to determine bacteria levels.

Currently, all three tributaries are partly or wholly listed as “impaired” by the state of Massachusetts due to high bacteria levels in testing conducted several years ago. If the results from this year’s water quality testing show sufficiently low levels of bacteria, it will allow the tributaries’ status to be reconsidered by the state of Massachusetts and may allow these tributaries to be deemed safe again.

Volunteers will need to be available for one morning, once a month, from April through October. The time commitment each sampling day is about half an hour and is usually scheduled before 9 a.m. The day chosen for each sampling will be weather-dependent, as the sample must be collected following a period of dry weather. Volunteers must have transportation to their water sampling sites and must be physically able to collect the samples. HVA and HooRWA will provide all equipment needed for the sampling and will collect and deliver the samples to Premier Laboratory in Lee for analysis.

For more information or to register for the training, contact HVA Berkshire program director Dennis Regan at (413) 298-7024 or dregan@hvatoday.org. For information about the sample sites along the Green River in the Hoosic River watershed, contact HooRWA executive director Steve McMahon at (413) 458-2742 or s.mcmahon@hoorwa.org.

–E.E.