Folk Painter Nellie Bly Ballard featured on WIOX

Last Tuesday,  August 9, 2016, I featured the late artist Nellie Bly Ballard on Catskills Folk, my bi-weekly radio program on WIOX, 91.3 FM community radio for the Catskills.  Nellie was active in the mid-twentieth century in Roxbury painting landscapes of her native area.  Some of her paintings were farm portraits, some were views of familiar valleys or villages, and others whose locaitons we have not been able to identify may have been fictional.  Though she only painted for the last two decades of her life, Nellie was very prolific and a number of her paitnings have survived in collections around the Northeast.  Catskills Folk Connection, along with the Roxbury Arts Group, will be presenting her work along with paintings by another local artist, Don Strausser, at an exhibit called "Growing Up To Brush" in October at RAG's Walt Meade Gallery in Roxbury.

Here is a photograph of Nellie Bly Ballard in her studio with a number of her paintings, followed by examples of paintings that may be in the October exibit:

Nellie Bly Ballard in her studio at her home on Bridge Street, Roxbuy, NY

John Ballard Century Farm

Farmer Getting Ice

Roxbury Run Development, Denver, NY

Margaretville Square Dance July 9

On Saturday July 9, from 7 to 10 p.m., John Jacobson and The Tremperskill Boys will offer another rollicking square dance, this time in eastern Delaware County, at the American Legion, 903 Main Street, Margaretville, NY  12455. (If you're not a GPSer, the Legion is to the left as you face the Catskill Watershed office building, formerly the offices of the Catskill Mountain News.)

We're hoping that our post card mailing, as well as listings on community events sites, and announcements on the radio will bring in not only beginners, but also experienced dancers whose families have taken part in traditional music and dance in the Catskills for generations.

The Tremperskill Boys will be playing old-time, familiar square dance tunes with calls by John Jacobson, who learned them from Hilt Kelly, the Catskills' legendary fiddler and square dance caller who passed away last year. All the square dances will be taught, including the traditional customs of square dancing (for example, once you start a dance stay with it so the other six people have someone to dance with!).   Between sets of squares, the band will keep your feet tapping with traditional and contemporary fiddle tunes and waltzes.

Admission is $7 per adult, under 13 free. Refreshments will be available.  For more information about this and future dances, call Ginny Scheer, 607-746-3521, or e-mail at vscheer@juno.com.

Catskills Folk Connection is supported by the Roxbury Arts Group and the square dance series is funded in part by the New York State Council on the Arts Folk Art Program, Governor Cuomo and the NYS Legislature and the O'Connor Foundation.

Summer Square Dances Scheduled!

Tremperskill Boys and guests play for a square dance in memory of Hilt Kelly, 2015.

Catskills Folk Connection kicks off its season with square dances in western and eastern Delaware County.

On Saturday, June 18, 7-10 p.m., with the Tremperskill Boys, John Jacobson will call a rollicking square dance in Walton.  It will take place in the Parlor at the Walton Theatre (you may know it as the "coffeehouse"), 30 Gardiner Place, Walton, NY 13856.  There will be dances to satisfy beginners, for whom dances will be taught, and squares for experienced dancers.  Admission is $7 per person, under 13 free.  Refreshments will be available.

On Saturday, July 9, 7-10 p.m. the same band and caller will offer a lively square dance in Margaretville.  It will take place at the American Legion, 903 Main Street, Margaretville, NY 12455. Beginning dances will be taught and more complex Catskills dances will be offered.  Same admission; refreshments available.

You may notice that we are scheduling our dances differently than in previous seasons.  For many years CFC dances took place on Saturday or Sunday afternoons.  But traditionally in the Catskills square dances were Saturday night entertainment.  So this summer our dances will be on Saturday nights, still offered as family entertainment, as they were in decades past.

Bring your kids and friends for a fun evening with the Tremperskill Boys, John Jacobson, and Catskills Folk Connection.

Catskills Folk Connection is sponsored by the Roxbury Arts Group, and its programs - such as these square dances - are funded in part by the New York State Council on the Arts Folk Art Program, Gov. Cuomo, the NYS Legislature, and the O'Connor Foundation, and are supported by WIOX Community Radio.   Contact: Ginny Scheer, vscheer@juno.com, 607-746-3521.