Bess O’Brien is a filmmaker who lives in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom. Her newest film, Shout it Out, is in many ways a collaboration with its cast, a group of teenagers whose thoughts about being young in Vermont helped form the script. The movie will be touring the state this summer. Vermont Commons editor Rob Williams conducted this interview.

VC: Describe the genesis of the Shout it Out, “The Voices Project” movie. Where did the idea come from?

BIG TOP REVIEW - Smirkusology: The Science of “Circus Smirkus”

I’ve always liked the circus, and, like many, have considered running away to join it from time to time, as the old adage goes.

For those who haven’t seen Vermont’s very own “Circus Smirkus,” it is a unique one-ring show, featuring teenagers trained at the Greensboro-based circus camp in all kinds of Big Top-related activities – juggling, clowning, tumbling, and hanging by various parts of one’s body from all manner of contraptions suspended from the top of the tent.

by Jane Dwinell and Dana Dwinell-Yardley

Worried about high gas prices affecting everything from food to fun? Wondering what to do about your summer vacation? Try having one close to home. There are so many things to do in Vermont — so many reasons people from everywhere else to want to visit here. It’s your turn to discover Vermont.

Rob Hopkins' The Transition Handbook is a new, tremendously useful, and inspiring book on how to move, as the subtitle says, "From oil dependency to local resilience."

Richard Heinberg has spent a lot of time visiting Transition Towns in the UK, and he describes the movement as looking "more like a party than a protest march."

And it is a party, not a protest. The Transition Town philosophy is about making change where you are, with the people around you, not pressuring someone else to make the change for you.

Here's one small way this book has helped me:
I give a lot of peak oil slide shows, and I was intrigued by his suggestion for a "do-it-yourself" peak oil slideshow. You create the slideshow by printing up each slide on a piece of 8.5x11 paper, with circles and arrows (or, in any case, a paragraph) explaining the slide on the back of each one, and then hand the cards out to the audience. Each person's job is to meet every other person in the room and explain the slide he or she has. By the time everyone has met everyone else, they have had quite an introduction to peak oil. It really gets people invested in the ideas and helps them get to know each other!

I haven't tried the full DIY slideshow yet, but the idea has inspired me to cut off the final part of my standard slideshow and replace it with a visioning exercise about the future of Vermont. I then ask the audience to break up into small groups and share their visions. The room comes to life when they do it!

Though the book came out in March or so in the UK, it's not scheduled to be distributed in the US until September.* Normally, I try to buy books at local bookstores. This one is too good to wait that long for. You can order it online, with quick and surprisingly inexpensive shipping from the UK.

Big Old Life: Rani Arbo and Daisy Mayhem Visit the Valley

Spring is just around the corner.

I know, because Rani Arbo and Daisy Mayhem will be at the Valley Players for a Saturday night, April 5th performance.

And if you haven’t yet heard their newest CD “Big Old Life,” you’ll
feel spring blowing in on a warm musical wind by the time you leave
downtown Waitsfield this coming week-end.

Anti-Pop Strip Down: Kelly Joe Phelps' Tune-smith Retrofit
Hear more at Kelly Joe Phelps.

I was halfway through my third listen of Kelly Joe Phelps' newest musical project when it hit me.

The guy doesn't have a single repeated chorus or “hooky” moment on the entire CD.

This is news, I thought to myself. After all, we live in a “Baby, hit me one more time” era where, under the dictates of a music industry desperate to hold on to shrinking market share in the age of mp3 downloads and personalized ear buds, the goal of most every popular musician is to “cut through the clutter” in any way possible.

Wagtail's “One Clear Moment”: Two Albums in One

Listen at Wagtail' s web site.

According to percussionist Carter Stowell, it was fellow band member Kristina Stykos who coined the name “Wagtail” as a moniker for one of central Vermont's newest and most engaging acoustic foursomes. I swear there must be something magical in the drinking water out greater Montpelier way. Every time I turn around, my ears pick up the sound of something sonically good and wholesome floating across the breeze from the direction of the state capital.

So who is “Wagtail”? Longtime listeners within the central Vermont music scene probably know Stykos and Stowell (formerly with the band “Ekis”), may be familiar singer/instrumentalist George White, and are no doubt well-versed in the work of the prolific singer/fiddler Susannah Blachly. Put ‘em all together, and you've got “Wagtail” – a foursome that is really two bands ((at least) in one.

Rob's Note: Vermonters will need plenty of good music to get us through the long cold winter ahead. Lewis Franco's new CD delivers warmth, grace, and humor in equal measure, Check it out!

And trave safely this week-end.

THE REVIEW:

Not Pop Music, But “Mom and Pop” Music:
Lewis Franco's “Swinging in Daddyland”

Former Northern Power employee-turned-singer/songwriter Lewis Franco is one of Vermont's best-kept musical secrets. An understated and good-natured family man residing in the greater Montpelier area, Franco is one of the Green Mountains' most gifted musicians, a performer who is able to wrap well-crafted lyrics around catchy musical melodies, and possesses the guitar chops and musical sensibility to match.

The Chandler Music Hall in Randolph may be Vermont's coolest concert venue - the history, the intimate feel, the wonderful acoustics, the sweet little town, the great folks who run the joint - and on September 15, they're kicking off the 100th anniversary of the Chandler with a nine hour "101 Premieres" marathon performance.

Check it out here - and book your tickets now!

9-HOUR MARATHON PERFORMANCE TO KICK OFF CHANDLER CENTENNIAL SEASON

September , 2007 The anything-but-sleepy Vermont town of Randolph (pop. 5,000) will be celebrating the 100th anniversary of its beloved opera house with a rash of special events in 2007 - 2008.There will be 30 music, dance and theatre performances by noted soloists and ensembles, 8 gallery exhibitions, children's programs, the Central Vermont Chamber Music Festival, the New World Festival, the Fiddlehead Festival, and even a softball game between two deadly rivals in Randolph's cultural substratum. Arlo Guthrie will be on hand. So will Natalie MacMaster. The Chiara String Quartet, the Hilliard Ensemble and others will play new works by esteemed local composers, commissioned for the centennial.

A Declaration of Cultural Independence

By Craig Byrne

In Chelsea, Vermont we have two commons, North and South. Each mixes the old and the new. Our North Common is bounded by the church, Chelsea's twin stores, and a mix of stately and not-so stately homes. It also hosts our burgeoning farmer's market every Wednesday in the summer. Our South Common is home to the county courthouse, another mix of houses, Chelsea's public school, and the Wellspring Waldorf School, where two of my three kids are enrolled (the third is more of a mascot, at nearly age 3).

The Waldorf educational philosophy, developed by Rudolf Steiner in 1919, is nicely summed up for me in the title of a lecture given to the Chelsea community recently by Eugene Schwartz, a Waldorf teacher and consultant: “No Childhood Left Behind.” Mr. Schwartz' play on words speaks to the Waldorf belief and concern that children need time to come into the world, to unfold, and that to rush this process deprives children of a necessary process needed to thoroughly master and integrate their “heads, hearts and hands” and enter adulthood fully awake and engaged in life.