Tanglewood, Taconic Festival Blossoms; Sevenars Upcoming

By Stephen DanknerSpecial to iBerkshires
08:00AM / Wednesday, July 03, 2024Print Story | Email Story

The Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood opens its classical season Friday, July 5, as BSO Music Director Andris Nelsons takes center stage in the Shed with a powerhouse all-Beethoven program consisting of his supremely lyrical Violin Concerto, Op. 61 and concluding with the transcendental masterpiece Symphony No. 3 (‘Eroica'). On Sunday afternoon, July 7 Maestro Nelsons again directs the BSO, featuring the celebrated Metropolitan Opera diva Renée Fleming in an all-Richard Strauss program of operatic selections from "Die Frau ohne Schatten," "Intermezzo" and "Der Rosenkavalier."

Be sure to also consider attending the spectacular Taconic Music Festival for intimate and brilliantly performed chamber music in Manchester, Vermont.

Finally, plan to enjoy the convivial atmosphere at Sevenars Concerts, located in bucolic South Worthington, Mass. This season marks their 56th anniversary, as they present a festival season of six weekly Sunday afternoon concerts, beginning July 14.

There's so much music to experience in our culturally rich corner of the world! Read on for the details:

Tanglewood Shed Concerts

Friday, July 5, 8:00 p.m. in the Shed: Opening Night at Tanglewood with BSO Music Director Andris Nelsons leading the first Boston Symphony Orchestra concert of the 2024 Tanglewood season. Maestro Nelsons, conductor, with the stellar violinist Gil Shaham performing Beethoven's Violin Concerto, Op. 61, composed in 1806, and Symphony No. 3, Op. 55, (‘Eroica'), composed in 1803-1804.

Saturday, July 6, 8:00 p.m. in the Shed: The Boston Pops Orchestra: Maestro Keith Lockhart leads the Pops in a spectacular and wide-ranging program of Broadway showstoppers.

Sunday, July 7, 2:30 p.m. 2:30 p.m. in the Shed: The Boston Symphony Orchestra will be led by Andris Nelsons, with operatic soprano Renée Fleming in an all-Richard Strauss program.

Monday, July 8, 8:00 p.m. in the Shed: The Tanglewood Music Center (TMC) Orchestra will be conducted by Maestro Andris Nelsons in a program of Dvorak ("Carnival Overture"); Coleridge-Taylor ("Ballade in A Minor"), and Shostakovich (Symphony No. 5).

Taconic Music Summer Festival

With four concerts over two weeks of great programs in this exhilarating music festival, be sure to include Taconic Music on your "not-to-be-missed" concert agenda.

Why go? Based in Manchester, Vermont, co-founders Ariel Rudiakov and Joana Genova will showcase their outstanding festival-resident teaching/performing artists and young artists.

For information, including tickets, and Taconic Music's year-round programs, call (802) 362-7162 or visit online at directors@taconicmusic.org. Chamber Music Saturdays are $30. for adults, free for students and kids. Reservations are recommended. Concerts will also be livestreamed.

Arrive early for an informal pre-concert reception on every Chamber Music Saturday, beginning at 6:30, when the box office also opens. Enjoy a glass of wine or Töst, and mingle with friends before the concert begins.

Here's a listing of the Taconic Festival's programming over the next two weeks:

Saturday, July 6 at 7:30pm:

AN EVENING OF POPS
Ariel Rudiakov conducts the Taconic Pops Orchestra in an evening of light classical music and hits from Hollywood and Broadway, and themes from James Bond movies, TV shows. Featuring guest vocalist Maxine Linehan.

Wednesday, July 10 at 7pm:

MASTERCLASS with v iolinist Eugene Drucker. Experience firsthand how chamber music is refined and brought to a whole new level. Former Emerson String Quartet violinist Eugene Drucker will offer insights and guidance to Taconic's Young Artists as they prepare for their July 15th concert.

Saturday, July 13 at 7:30pm:
CHAMBER CONCERT III: Brahms and Mendelssohn
Eugene Drucker and Joana Genova, violins; Ariel Rudiakov and Stefanie Taylor, violas; Raman Ramakrishnan and Roberta Cooper, celli; Drew Petersen, Piano perform 19th century Romantic chamber music masterworks.

Monday, July 15 at 7pm:

YOUNG ARTISTS CONCERT II
Taconic's 2024 Young Artists perform works for string quartet, quintet and piano quartet in the final concert of Taconic Music's summer festival.

Sevenars Celebrates 56th Anniversary Season

Six Upcoming Sevenars Concerts

Opening Concert: Family and Friends:

Sunday, July 14, 4:00 p.m.: The Opening Concert of Sevenars Music Festival's 56th anniversary season offers exciting masterpieces for piano duo, piano solo, and cello - with Clifton J. ("Jerry") Noble, Rorianne Schrade, Lynelle James, and Christopher James. The program will include masterworks composed by Brahms, Rachmaninoff, Liszt, Holst (celebrating his 150th anniversary), and Gershwin (the "Rhapsody in Blue," in honor of the 100th anniversary of its 1924 premiere). In addition, Jerry Noble will perform his own composition written in memory of recently departed Sevenars family member David James, along with several other tribute performances by family members to be announced.

Looking ahead:

July 21, 4:00 p.m.: Sevenars welcomes revered violist Ron Gorevic in music especially composed for him; composers include - along with Bach, Reger, and Stravinsky - Laurence Wallach, Tasia Wu, Salvatore Macchia, and Kenji Bunch.

July 28, 4:00 p.m.: Sevenars is excited to present internationally renowned cellist Inbal Segev performing three Bach solo Cello Suites.

August 4, 4:00 p.m.: Exciting pianist Junwen Liang is Sevenars "Young Artist to Watch," performing Bach, Chopin, Liszt, Debussy, and Prokofiev.

August 11, 4:00 p.m.: Outstanding pianist Sayuri Miyamoto and oboist Joel Bard join Atlanta violinist/violist Jun-Ching Lin for a beautiful and varied program of solos, duos, and trios by Mozart, Robert Schumann, Clara Schumann, Respighi, Loeffler, Wallner and Paderewski.

August 18, 4:00 p.m.: The Sevenars season is capped off with the inimitable jazz of Jerry Noble, Kara Noble, Chris Devine, and John Van Eps.

Location: Sevenars Academy, 15 Ireland Street just off Rte. 112 at Ireland Street, South Worthington, Mass. Phone: (413) 238-5854 (please leave a message for return call) Website: www.sevenars.org.

Admission: There is no admission fee, but donations are welcomed at the door (suggested $20). Refreshments are offered free of charge.

Tags: The Classical Beat,

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Youth For The Future: Adwita Arunkumar

By Breanna SteeleiBerkshires Staff
05:14PM / Saturday, April 18, 2026

PITTSFIELD, Mass. — Williams Elementary School fourth-grader Adwita Arunkumar has been selected as our April Youth for the Future for her mentoring of a younger child.

Youth for the Future is a 12-month series that honors young individuals that have made an impact on their community. This year's sponsor is Patriot Car Wash. Nominate a youth here.

Adwita has cortical visual impairment; she has been working with her teacher, Lynn Shortis, and her, paraprofessional Nadine Henner.

"My journey with CVI means that I learned in a different way. I work hard every day with Miss Henner and Miss Lynn, to show how smart I am," she said.

"Adwita is a remarkable student. She's a remarkable child. She has, as she shared, cortical visual impairment, which is a brain-based visual processing disorder, which means the information coming in through the eyes is interfered with somewhere along the pathways, and we never quite know what's being interpreted and how and how it's being seen," said Shortis.

"So she has a lot of accommodations and specialized instruction to help her learn."

Recently Adwita has chosen to mentor 4-year-old Cayden Ziemba, who is also visually impaired.

"I decided to be a mentor to Cayden so that she can learn some new things. I teach her how to walk with the cane, with the diagonal and tap technique, I am teaching her Braille," she said. "I enjoy spending time with Cayden, playing games and being a good role model."

Shortis said the mentoring opportunity came up when Cayden was entering preschool at Williams, and they introduced her to Adwita.

"Adwita works really, really hard academically. She's very smart, but there are a lot of challenges in that, because of the way that it's so visual and she's a natural. She's just, it's automatic," Shortis said. "It's kind of like a switch is turned on and she becomes this extremely confident and proud person in this teacher role."

Adwita also has been helping Cayden on how to use her cane on the bus and became a mentor in a unexpected ways.

"Immediately at the start of this year, she would meet Cayden at the bus. She has taught Cayden how to use her cane to go down the bus stairs. Again, Adwita learned that skill, so it wasn't something I had to say to her, this is what you need to have Cayden do. She just automatically picked that up and transferred that information," said Shortis. "Cayden is now going down the bus step steps independently with her cane. And then she really works hard with Adwita in traveling through the hallways, Adwita leads her to her class every morning, helps her put her things away and get ready for her morning."

Adwita said she hopes Cayden can feel excited about school and that other students can feel good about themselves as well.

"I want them to know that Braille is cool to learn. You can feel the bumpiness with your fingers. I want people to know how you can still learn if your brain works differently sometimes. I need to have a lot of patience working with a 3-year-old. I need to be creative and energized," she said.

She hopes to one day take her mentoring skills to the head of the class as a teacher.

"I want to become a teacher and teach other students when I grow up. I might want to teach math, because I am great at it," she said. "I also want to teach others about CVI. CVI doesn't stop me from being able to do anything I want to. I want students to not feel stressed out and know that they can do anything they want by working hard and persevering."

Her one-to-one paraprofessional said she likes seeing the bond that has grown between the two girls, and can picture Adwita being a teacher one day.

"I do see her in the future being a teacher because of her patience, understanding and just natural-born instinctive skills on how to work with young children," Henner said.

Shortis also said their bond is quite special and their relationship has helped to bring out the confidence in each other.

"The beauty of it, there's just something about it their bond is, I don't even really have a word to describe the bond that the two of them have. I think they share something in common, that they're both visually impaired, and regardless of the fact that their visual impairment differs and the you know the cause of it differs," she said.

"They can relate. And they both have the cane. They're both learning some Braille. But there's something else that's there that just the two of them connected immediately, and you see it. You just you see it in their overall relationship."

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