The preservation of a Langley forest will be celebrated.
An Oct. 3 event will mark the two-year anniversary of the creation of the Blaauw Eco Forest in the Glen Valley.
Trinity Western University’s School of Arts and Music will host the celebrations of the Han Shan Project.
Local poet Susan McCaslin organized the first Han Shan event in 2012, and will speak at this weekend’s event.
Events begin at TWU at 11 a.m. in Music Building Room 201 for a presentation on discoveries in the forest, including a thriving population of red-legged frogs and the local bog flora.
From 1 to 2:30 p.m. at the forest at 257A Street off 84th Avenue, there will be poetry readings, the Opus Women’s Chorus, and remarks by artists Susan Falk, and a Forest Dance choreographed by Eleanor Felton.
The events are public and free.
Orangutan Project
Golf and primates – not a typical combination but the Orangutan Project is hosting a fundraiser at Newlands Golf and Country Club Oct. 3.
It’s an evening of light refreshments, a silent auction, conservation awareness and dancing.
Organizers have a presentation on deforestation, palm oil plantations encroaching on primate habitat and ways to help.
Leif Cocks, president of The Orangutan Project and Dr. Gary Shapiro from Orang Utan Republik will be here all the way from the jungles of Sumatra to launch The Orangutan Project Canada.
The event starts at 7 p.m. More information and $75 tickets are available at www.orangutan.ca or call 604-500-9613.
New event
Art and music are the focus of the Downtown Langley City Art Crawl Saturday and Sunday.
From 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. more than 24 businesses along the one-way Fraser Highway and Douglas Crescent are taking part.
The Art Crawl is an opportunity for the public to enjoy local art and music while exploring the many unique shops and restaurants lining the one-way Fraser Highway and Douglas Crescent.
Pick up a map at any participating business and enter to win Downtown Dollars.
Musicians will be found at various locations adding to the festivities.
The Downtown Langley Art Crawl is the brainchild of Rosemary Wallace and Pat Weibelzahl, both passionate about promoting the arts in Langley.
Weibelzahl initiated Arts Alive 22 years ago; as well she owned Heritage House Gallery for many years in the downtown core.
Passes on sale now
The Trinity Western University is promising heart in its School SAMC Theatre’s 2015-16 season.
From The Diary of Anne Frank in late October to Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night next March, there’s something for everyone onstage.
The season kicks off with The Diary of Anne Frank.
Spring offerings include New Generations, a popular student-run festival that offers short back-to-back plays each night, as well as Shakespeare’s classic romantic comedy Twelfth Night.
For the first time ever, SAMC Theatre is offering season passes, available until Oct. 5. For more information, email theatre@twu.ca or visit twu.ca/theatre.
TWU conference
TWU’s School of the Arts, Media + Culture presents the 10th annual Verge Conference Oct. 1 and 2. The Art+ Environment VERGE Conference brings together visual artists, performing artists, poets, and scientists who are passionate about a wide range of environmental issues.
Topics of exploration include how artists and scientists understand the environment as both home and sacred, and whether the health of our environment is inseparable from human flourishing.
Woven through the conference and extending through Oct. 3, will be a Sea Change Colloquium: presentations and conversations amongst artists, scholars and scientists concerned with ocean change. The Colloquium will examine how and why the global oceans are changing, and how this change is connected to global climate change. The day brings together ocean scientists and artists, who are convinced of the urgency of the issue, to talk and to collaborate in research-creation projects.
“The ocean is the placenta of life on the planet, an exquisitely balanced system that exists, like our own bodies, within a very specific chemical and temperature range,” said Colloquium organizer Erica Grimm, Ph.D., associate professor and chair of the SAMC Art + Design Department. “Human actions have caused profound shifts in the chemical and temperature balances of the global oceans. In my view, there is no more urgent issue than the global ocean change facing us today.”
Sunday concert
Langley Community Music School (LCMS) is introducing the community to new faculty by having them perform together at the popular Cafe Classico Concert Oct. 4.
Nikita Pogrebnoy, viola, and Henri-Paul Sicsic, piano, perform at 3:30 p.m. after the coffee and conversation at 2:30 in Rose Gellert Hall.
The viola and piano duo will perform the sonorous Brahms Sonata in F minor, as well works by Tchaikovsky, Michael Conway Baker and Joachim Ngou-Kang.
The program will also include the wonderful Schumann Novelette Op. 21 No. 8 for solo piano.
The event starts at 2:30 pm with a pre-concert conversation with the Pogrebnoy-Sicsic duo, hosted by LCMS artistic director Elizabeth Bergmann, highlighting anecdotal stories and insights about the music and the careers of the performers. There will be a short break with coffee and refreshments, before the performance from 3:30 pm to 4:30 pm.
“Piano is one of the most important combinations with a stringed instrument. There is so much to explore and to inspire musically with each different personality. It is something I am looking much forward to. I am very excited,” Pogrebnoy said.
World-renowned pianist Henri-Paul Sicsic, a concerto soloist, recitalist and chamber musician, has performed across North America and Europe. Sicsic has performed with symphony orchestras and other musical festivals throughout Canada, the United States, France, Spain, Russia, Finland, and Israel. As a soloist, he received first prize at the Grand Prix de la Ville de Nice Competition and top prize at the Royaume de la Musique National Radio Competition in France.
While on faculty at the UBC School of Music, he was awarded the Killam Teaching Prize, one of the highest academic honours awarded in Canada.
Sicsic has also produced several CD recordings, which have achieved notable acclaim.
Sicsic joined the LCMS faculty in 2015 and continues to perform world-wide.
Russian-Born violist and violinist Nikita Pogrebnoy has performed across Europe, Mexico, Central and North America, and the USSR, including soloist performances with the St. Petesburg Chamber Orchestra. He has performed for many dignitaries including the Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu and the Prime Minister of Canada on Parliament Hill for an audience of over 75,000 people. He has earned many notable international awards, including the Valentino Bucchi International Competition in Rome, Italy, and has been broadcast on national television and radio. Having taught at many notable universities across the continent, Pogrebnoy joined the LCMS faculty in 2015 and continues to perform world-wide as a soloist and chamber musician, including as a member of the Borealis String Quartet.
“We are extremely proud to have such distinguished faculty members at Langley Community Music School,” said LCMS Principal Susan Magnusson. “They are not only stunning performers but also inspiring teachers.”
Tickets for this Concerts Café Classico event are $18 for adults, $15 for seniors and $10 for students.
For those that want to attend several concerts during the season, a Concerts Café Classico flex pass is also available for any four concerts in the series for $65 adults and $54 seniors. Call the box office at 604-534-2848. The Rose Gellert Hall is located at 4899 207 St.
The Langley Community Music School (LCMS) is a non-profit organization and registered charity providing musical education to students of all ages and levels.
The Langley Community Music School hosts multiple musical concerts from October to May, including the Rose Gellert Hall Series, a Saturday evening concert featuring renowned Canadian and international musicians, as well as the Concerts Café Classico Series, a Sunday afternoon concert series featuring stellar local and touring musicians playing classical, jazz or contemporary works.
Visit langleymusic.com or call 604-534-2848.