February 23 at 7 p.m. on WIOX: Square Dancing

Hilt Kelly and the Sidekicks: Don Strausser, Stella Kelly and Don Irwin

Tonight I am pleased to present for the first time on Catskills Folk a recording of Hilt Kelly and the Sidekicks playing and calling square dances. "Hilton Kelly & the Sidekicks: Catskill Mt. Square Dance Callers #1"was originally available as a cassette tape and has never been turned into a CD or a digitized music file.  My thanks go to Mike Teitelbaum here at WIOX who digitized the tape recording enabling it to be played on the radio. Hopefully, this will lead to wider availability of the recording in the future.

Listening to the tracks ftom this tape, WIOX listeners will realize (as I did not at first)  that square dance tunes are not necessarily the same as fiddle tunes, such as the ones on Hilt's CD "Catskill Mountain Fiddler."  On the radio program I will play as many of the familiar square dance tunes and calls as I can and compare them with square dance tunes and dances recorded by Camp Woodland in the 1940s & 50s in Norman Cazden's book Dances from Woodland, published in 1955.   Join me and delight in hearing square dance calls such as "Down the Center with a Butterfly Whirl" and tunes like Pistol Packin' Mama.  

-- Ginny Scheer, Folklorist

Church Architecture in Miniature

On WIOX tonight, Tuesday, February 9, 7 p.m., hear about Viola and Norman Marks's extraordinary miniatures of churches in the Catskills Region.

On display at The Charles Cook County Office Building in Delhi are a set of miniature carved and painted models of churches from our mountain region.  They were created by Viola Marks and her husband Norman Marks beginning in the 1950s.  Norman and Viola both worked at Bendix in Sidney and lived in Unadilla.  The church models are now part of the collection at Delaware County Historical Association, Delhi, NY.  DCHA organizes exhibits for the Cook building and this one will be on display until the end of February.

Listen tonight at 7 p.m. on WIOX 91.3 FM or wioxradio.org to find out where these churches were built.

Viola says that she sketched the churches, then translated the drawings onto graph paper, which Norman used to cut out the pieces of the models.  Viola carved some of the decoration with an Xacto knife and painted the models.  In keeping with her organizational skills as a systems analyst at Bendix, Viola labeled each of the models and kept a careful list of the churches to go along with the photos of the collection.

The architecture of our country churches in the Catskills is an excellent example of the style and variety of vernacular building in the Catskills. Included are examples of Greek Revival, Gothic Revival, as well as High Victorian Gothic churches, in shapes that hark back to European models or reflect the forms of more current trends.  What would be interesting to a folklorist is discovering how the building was conceived:  was it built by a local builder? with ideas, but no plans, from a builder's guide? He probably knew from the local tradition how to build the usual forms, but how did he add special features of certain styles?  How was this combination of folk form and high style detail affected by changes in transportation and communication?

I hope I have the opportunity in the future to research some of these buildings and to share my findings with you on Catskills Folk, alternate Tuesdays at 7 p.m. on WIOX, 91.3. FM and wioxradio.org.    

Unadilla; Episcopal Organized 1809, built 1816; Methodist built 1850; Presbyterian built 1844.

Unadilla Center: Methodist built 1830; Baptist Church Estab. 1844;
Friends Church (Rogers Hollow) Built 1904

Coventry: United Methodist; Wells Bridge: Baptist; The Methodist Church of Wells Bridge (recently destroyed);
Sand Hill Methodist Church built 1857; First Congregational Church of Coventryville Estab. 1804. 

United Church of Christ First congregational Church of Greene, Org. 1811. built 1987;
Meridale Presbyterian; First Baptist Church - Morris

Delhi: St.Peter's Catholic Church; First Presbyterian; West Delhi: United Presbyterian built 1846

Walton: United Presbyterian Church built 1866; First Methodist Church built 1894;
 Christ Episcopal Church built 1831

Otego: Baptist Church; Presbyterian Church Estab 1805; United Methodist Church

Dry Brook: ME Church Estab. 1867 (Viola's childhood church);
Sidney: First Congregational UCC founded 1808, Plymouth Church first opened 1858 

Sidney Center: Baptist Church constituted 1828; Sidney Center Untied Methodist Church
 Estab 1852 (arson); Harpersfield: Methodist built 1871

Front row: Unadilla Episcopal, Unadilla Presbyterian.
Back row: Unadilla Center Methodist, Unadilla Methodist, Unadilla Center Baptist

Lavern Kelley, Folk Artist

Folk Art in the Everyday Lives of Farm Women

On Friday, September 18 at 6 p.m., Ginny Scheer will give a presentation at the Livingston Manor Library, Livingston Manor, NY, about folk art expression among farm women.  It is the second presentation of a project called Farm and Field: the Rural Folk Arts of the Catskills Region, sponsored by the New York Folklore Society and funded in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.

Based on interviews with four women who grew up on farms or who make their living on farms, and including a little known historical folk artist, Scheer's slide presentation will examine how the expressive lives of these women relate to stereotypes of rural women's folk art and crafts, and how their creations come out of the rural culture of which they are a part.

The Livingston Manor Free Library is located at 92 Main Street, Livingston Manor, NY  12758.  for more information call 845-439-5440.

Square Dance October 4 at Walton Theatre

Catskills Folk Connection's 2013 square dance series

Catskills Folk Connection will offer its final dance of the season on Sunday, October 4 at 4:00 PM in the coffeehouse of the Walton Theatre, located on historic Gardiner Place in Walton , NY.  The dance will feature John Jacobson and the Tremperskill Boys, following in the tradition of the late legendary Catskill fiddler Hilt Kelly and his band, the Sidekicks. In addition to Hilt’s Catskills repertoire of eastern square dances, caller John Jacobson will feature some familiar and some innovative longways sets.

Come to this dance to experience the new generation of square dance calling that is keeping the tradition alive. Beginners are welcome and instruction for all levels of dancers will be available.  Admission is $7, ages 12 and under free. For more information contact Ginny Scheer, Folklorist, at 607-746-3521 or e-mail vscheer@juno.com. 

Catskills Folk Connection is supported by the Roxbury Arts Group.  It is funded in part by the New York State Council on the Arts, Gov. Cuomo and the NYS Legislature and the o'Connor Foundation.

Sunday, July 19 1-3 pm Square Dance

The Historical Society of Middletown, 778 Cemetery Road, in Margaretville, NY 12455, will host the July Catskills Folk Connection square dance on Sunday, July 19, as part of their 10th anniversary celebration.  From 1 pm to 3 pm John Jacobson and the Tremperskill Boys will play and call traditional eastern square dances familiar to experienced dancers, but with instruciton for beginners. The Historical Society invites you to come early and picnic on the grounds.  To top it off, throughout the afternoon there will be an ice cream social. Admission is $10.

For more information call Ginny Scheer 607-326-4206 or contact Diane Galusha through the "Contact Us" section of the Historical Society's website www.mtownhistory.org.

Square and Contra Dance at Pine Hill Community Center Sunday, June 21 from 1-4 pm!

Dancers at the Celebration of Hilt Kelly's Life, March 22, Halcott Grange

Casey Mullaney will again join John Jacobson and the Tremperskill Boys adding contra dances to the usual schedule of square dances at the Pine Hill Community Center's bi-monthly dance.  Catskills Folk Connection is delighted to coordinate with PHCC to create a full calendar of monthly dances, first one at PHCC and the other at a venue in Delaware or Greene County.

Come refresh your memory of learning to square dance - it's different than when you may have last encountered it as a child. Or come try out a contra dance - similar to square dancing but organized in two lines. No it's not "line dancing" but line dancers will enjoy it.

We hope you will decide to spend your Sunday afternoon listening to the Tremperskill Boys play Northeastern, New York and New England dance tunes, and trying both kinds of dances.  All dances will be taught, but there will be dances of both types for experienced dancers too.

See you at the Pine Hill Community Center, Sunday, June 21, 1-4 pm.  287 Main Street, Pine Hill, NY 12465.  845-254-5469 or e-mail from their website pinehillcommunitycenter.org.

Can't come?  The next dance is Sunday, July 19, 1-4 pm at the Historical Society of Middletown, 778 Cemetery Road, Margaretville, NY  12455.  For more information go to their website mtownhistory.org.

Pine Hill Community Center Dances are funded in part by the Messinger Family Fund, and NYS Council on the Arts, Gov. Cuomo and the NYS Legislature, with support from WIOX Radio.  Catskills Folk Connection is funded in part by NYSCA and the O'Connor Foundation, and is supported by the Roxbury Arts Group.