Ken Maiuri will be back at the piano leading the Group in rock, pop, old standards, and folk songs from the 20th Century. The Group Sing, which officially began in January of 2012 has continued meeting regularly these past 4 years. A sing along for singers and non-singers alike, Group Sing has over the years had such guest musicians as Suzzy Roche of the famed sisters group The Roches, Joe Blumental and his ukulele ensemble AEIOUkes, Henning Ohlenbusch, Chris Haynes, Billy Arnold, The Super-8 Players, Tom Mahnken of Trailer Park and the Young@Heart Chorus, often drawing capacity crowds numbering over 200 participants.
Patricia Shaughnessy, Senior Center Director, with members of her staff serving as supervisors, initially made it possible for the Center to be available to No Theater of Northampton in 2008 to rehearse a new theater work with the Young@Heart Chorus. Commissioned by the Manchester International Festival of England, No Theater rehearsed the show as a sing along, providing the audience with copies of the lyrics and inviting them to join the Chorus in singing the songs that became the 3rd production of the Road Show Trilogy, Young@Heart in END OF THE ROAD by No Theater. Roy Faudree, Director of No Theater, regularly returned to the Northampton Senior Center and capacity crowds have sung with the Chorus the songs that formed the new work, before END OF THE ROAD toured to the National Theatre of Oslo, Norway in 2013 (and earlier Manchester, Rotterdam, Ghent, Antwerp, New York City, Singapore, and Poznan, Poland).
No Theater had staged the Young@Heart’s first performance in 1983 when the Chorus was based at the Walter Salvo Residence (next door to the present Senior Center) and had directed and designed ROAD TO HEAVEN and ROAD TO NOWHERE, the Y@H/No Theater productions that toured the world from 1997-2007.
Why sing? As composer Brian Eno said on National Public Radio’s I BELIEVE program, “I believe that singing is the key to long life, a good figure, a stable temperament, increased intelligence, new friends, super self-confidence, heightened sexual attractiveness and a better sense of humor”.
The Group Sing at the Northampton Senior Center is two hours of singing, just for the enjoyment of singing with others. It’s for singers and non-singers alike. Although designed for the 50 and over crowd, the Group Sing is free and open to all ages. For more information or to be placed on the contact list, email NorthamptonGroupSing@gmail.com . The Northampton Senior Center is located at 67 Conz Street in Northampton, Massachusetts, phone (413) 587-1228.
Group Sing is funded in part by the Northampton Senior Services. In past years Group Sing has relied on funding from the Northampton Arts Council.
Photographer: Ruth Hutton