Sunday, June 22, 2025

News and Ideas Worth Sharing

Bits & Bytes: Hevreh Ensemble at Simon’s Rock; Ace Frehley at the Colonial; GBFD open house; Julia Ain-Krupa at the Bookstore; geology hike at Olana; poets’ reading at Lee Library

The Great Barrington Fire Department's open house will include a rope rescue demonstration and a fully simulated extrication of a patient from a motor vehicle using the Jaws of Life.

Hevreh Ensemble to perform at Simon’s Rock

Great Barrington — Bard College at Simon’s Rock’s Faculty Concert Series will present the Hevreh Ensemble, an instrumental group dedicated to the performance of music that reflects or was inspired by Judaism and Jewish culture, will perform a concert on Sunday, September 25 at 3 p.m. at the College’s Kellogg Music Center.

The Hevreh Ensemble was formed in 2004 by oboist Judith Dansker when she was asked to organize a special Selichot concert for Hevreh of Southern Berkshire. Since that time, the ensemble has performed throughout the United States at such places as Saint-Gaudens National Historic Site, Northampton Center for the Arts, Harlem School of the Arts, the Hudson River Museum, Synagogue for the Arts, the National Yiddish Book Center, and St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery. The group was recently invited to participate in the American Society for Jewish Music’s annual “Music in Our Time” Festival to be held at the Center for Jewish History in New York City and was also awarded a grant from the Harold Grinspoon Foundation to present a series of concerts in Massachusetts’ Pioneer Valley. The Hevreh Ensemble traveled to Germany in August 2013, to the Netherlands and Germany in 2014, and recently completed a return tour to Europe with concerts in Vienna and Prague.

The concert is free and open to the public. For more information, call (413) 528-7212.

–E.E.

*     *     *

Ace Frehley at the Colonial

Ace Frehley. Photo: Dove Shore.
Ace Frehley. Photo: Dove Shore.

Pittsfield — KISS founding member and Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame member Ace Frehley will perform at the Colonial Theatre on Tuesday, Sept. 27, at 8 p.m.

Through his work as a founding member of KISS and as a solo artist, Ace Frehley is championed as one of the most influential guitar players of the last four decades. With his smash 1978 self-titled solo album and post­KISS work, Frehley continues to be the best-selling member of the original band.

Splitting from KISS in the early 1980s, Frehley and his new band, Frehley’s Comet, released their eponymous debut album in 1987. From there Frehley issued a string of well-received solo albums. He reunited with KISS in 1996 for a five-year run that included high-profile appearances at the Super Bowl and the Olympics. Splitting from the group in 2001 after its Farewell Tour, Frehley took a much-needed sabbatical. Eight years later he returned to the music scene with “Anomaly,” his first new studio album in 20 years which also proved to be his highest-charting album since his 1978 solo debut.

Tickets to Ace Frehley are $60. For tickets and more information, see the Berkshire Edge calendar or call the Colonial ticket office at (413) 997-4444.

–E.E.

*     *     *

GBFD to hold open house

Great Barrington — Chief Charles Burger and the Great Barrington Fire Department (GBFD) invite the community to the department’s open house on Saturday, Sept. 24, from 9 a.m. – 1 p.m. at the Great Barrington fire station, 37 State Rd.

The day will begin with demonstrations of tasks the department performs at structure fires, including the how and why of forced entry, vent roofs, and deploying and flowing water through large hoses. Firefighters will then conduct a rope rescue demonstration and conclude the day with a fully simulated extrication of a patient from a motor vehicle using the Jaws of Life. Those in attendance will be able to try some of the activities hands-on, including forcing doors, flowing water through large hoses, and handling the equipment.

Bystander CPR training will be offered throughout the day. Firefighters will also be available to answer questions about the station, equipment and operations. Kids will have the opportunity to extinguish a simulated fire, try on firefighter gear, and tour the fire trucks. Handouts will include helmets, water bottles, and fire prevention material.

Parking will be available across the street at the former Impoco’s Video Store at 54 State Rd. and at the Southern Berkshire Court House. Handicapped parking will be available at the fire station. Free coffee, beverages and hot dogs will be provided by the Firefighter’s Association.

–E.E.

*     *     *

The Bookstore to host Julia Ain-Krupa

Julia Ain-Krupa.
Julia Ain-Krupa.

Lenox — On Saturday, Sept. 24, from 3 – 4:30 p.m., the Bookstore and Get Lit Wine Bar will host author Julia Ain-Krupa who will read from her debut novel “The Upright Heart.” Published by Williamstown-based New Europe Books, “The Upright Heart” the book tells the story of a Jewish man who returns to his native Poland from Brooklyn soon after World War II to pray for those he lost.

Julia Ain-Krupa is the author of “Roman Polanski: A Life in Exile.” She was born and raised in New York City, and spent some of her childhood in Krakow, Poland. In 2012, she received a creative writing Fulbright scholarship to Poland, where the idea for “The Upright Heart” was conceived. She lives in New York, Krakow, and Tel Aviv.

For more information, call the Bookstore at (413) 637-3390.

–E.E.

*     *     *

Geology hike at Olana

Robert Titus, center, leads a recent geology hike at Olana State Historic Site.
Robert Titus, center, leads a recent geology hike at Olana State Historic Site.

Hudson, N.Y. — The Olana Partnership will present a tour of Olana State Historic Site’s geological landscape with geology professor Robert Titus on Saturday, Sept. 24, from 3 – 5 p.m. Participants on the exploratory walking tour will learn about the bedrock geological history of Olana and the forces that shaped the artist-designed landscape.

Robert Titus, Ph.D, is a paleontologist who has done professional research on the fossils of upstate New York. He teaches in the geology department at Hartwick College. He has written four books: “The Catskills: A Geological Guide,” “The Catskills in the Ice Age,” “The Other Side of Time: Essays by ‘The Catskill Geologist;’” and “Hudson Valley in the Ice Age: A Geological History & Tour.”

The cost of the hike is $5 for the general public and free for Olana members. For more information or to register, see the Berkshire Edge calendar or call Olana’s education department at (518) 828-1872 x105.

–E.E.

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Writers Read at the Lee Library

Jayne Benjulian.
Jayne Benjulian.

Lee — The Writers Read monthly reading series will present Jayne Benjulian, Lori Desrosiers, and Peter Marcus on Tuesday, Sept. 27, at 5:30 p.m. at the Lee Library.

Jayne Benjulian’s poems and essays have appeared in literary and performance journals such as Barrow Street, the Cortland Review, Nimrod, Women’s Review of Books, and Poetry Daily. She has been an Ossabaw Island Project fellow; a teaching fellow at Emory University; a lecturer in the graduate program in theater at San Francisco State University; and a Fulbright teaching fellow in Lyon, France. She holds an MFA from the Warren Wilson College Program for Writers. Her most recent book, “Five Sextillion Atoms,” was released in June.

Lori Desrosiers.
Lori Desrosiers.

Lori Desrosiers is the author of “Sometimes I Hear the Clock Speak” (2016, Salmon Poetry), “The Philosopher’s Daughter” (2013, Salmon Poetry), and the chapbook “Inner Sky” (2015, Glass Lyre Press). Her poems have appeared in Contemporary American Voices, Best Indie Lit New England, String Poet, Blue Fifth Review, Pirene’s Fountain, and other journals and anthologies. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She edits the narrative poetry journal Naugatuck River Review and the online journal WORDPEACE. She teaches literature and composition at Westfield State University and Holyoke Community College (HCC), and poetry in the interdisciplinary studies program for the Lesley University MFA program.

Peter Marcus’s first poetry collection, “Dark Square,” was published in 2012 by Pleasure Boat Studio. His poems have appeared in the Antioch Review, Mudlark, the New England Review, Nimrod, Ploughshares, the Southern Review, and others as well as several human rights anthologies. He has received residency fellowships at Vermont Studio Center, the Quarry at Marble House Project, and Norton Island. He is the academic program coordinator for the Elms College accelerated bachelor’s degree in psychology programs at HCC and Mount Wachusett Community College.

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

–E.E.

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