One of my all time favorite quotes is the final stanza from Percy Bysshe Shelley’s poem ‘The Keen Stars Were Twinkling.’ It describes perfectly so many nights I have experienced presenting music. The Annual Holiday Concert with Harvey Reid and Joyce Andersen was yet another perfect fusion of beautiful music, feeling and moonlight.
The combination of the sentiment expressed by the music, the holiday twinkle lights casting a warmth over the hall, and the way the room echoed like a tree sheltered canal with the audience transported in a gently swaying barge all came together to create a mood so completely tranquil.
The acoustic value of the room should not be underestimated. We are very fortunate to have some beautifully built historic town buildings available to us still. As so many like it, the Pike Hall is at some risk of being lost if we don’t continue to use it for community events. It needs repair and updating. It needs an audience more than anything though, just as any elder does, it has many tales to tell.Before we started presenting events at the Pike Hall I was unaware of it’s distinguished history of it’s design. The John Calvin Stevens Firm, a renowned American Architectural Firm, designed the Pike Hall. Please check out the history of the Pike Hall and ones like it in your area. You can learn about the Pike Hall at the Bonney Memorial Library in Cornish, which was the recipient of the proceeds from the Holiday Concert.
Part of our work at North Atlantic Arts Alliance is to support venues like the Pike Hall. I have had the pleasure of presenting music in state-of-the-art buildings but to be honest I love the shimmer and shake of an old town hall for acoustic music. I even love the drafty quality of the hall and how it causes us to huddle together for warmth, especially on a late December evening. Would the season be complete without it? Not for me.
Sing again, with your dear voice revealing
A tone
Of some world far from ours,
Where music and moonlight and feeling
Are one.
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