The Nashoba Symphonic Band, under the direction of David Wayne Bailey, will present its first concert of the 2026-27 Season “Masquerade” on Sunday, November 1st at 2 pm in the auditorium of Nashoba Regional High School, Route 117 (12 Green Road GPS), Bolton MA. The concert is free and open to the public – the hall is accessible to one and all.

The concert is (still) in the Halloween mood and opens a Waltz, a Mazurka , and a Galop from the Masquerade Suite, by Armenian composer, Aram Khachaturian, followed by the chilling Dance of the Skeletons, the soundtrack of a 1901 silent cartoon. The featured work on the first half will be a remarkable work by Barbara York, Encountering Baba Yaga, with alto saxophone soloist, Andy Kern. It will be remembered that the Baba Yaga was a witch in Slavic and Russian folklore who live in a house built on fowl's legs, and flew about in a giant mortar.

The second half of the concert opens with Night On Bald Mountain by Modeste Moussorgsky which many will recognize from the Disney film Fantasia. The program will conclude with a setting of themes from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

Nashoba Symphonic Band is a program of the Nashoba Friends of Music and supported in part by grants from the Ashby, Berlin, Bolton, Lancaster. And Stow Cultural Councils, local agencies supported by the MA Cultural Council, a state agency.

Members of the Acton Woman’s Club enjoyed a private tour at the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University on October 1st. Yasmine Vera, Museum Educator and Student Docent Program Administrator, led the 90-minute tour that included two of the current exhibits of contemporary art: ChromaForm and EN/LIGHTEN.
ChromaForm includes several large pieces displayed in the room just beyond the entrance. The works might at first appear to be decorative wall hangings, but before explaining the artist’s intent, Vera invited the group to say what they think the pieces represent. It was interesting to hear everyone’s first impressions, but they were always different from the artist’s intent, which made sense after hearing the explanation from Vera.
“If you don’t know a lot about contemporary or modern art, you probably will appreciate an explanation of what the artist is trying to express,” explained Audrey Stuart, member of the woman’s club who arranged the tour at the Rose for the “Antiques and Museum Goers” interest group. “We are not all art historians,” Stuart added. “In modern art, it is not easy to see what the piece is supposed to be.”
In the EN/LIGHTEN exhibit downstairs, Vera asked the group to say what they were seeing in Nam June Paik’s, “Charlotte Moorman II.” The work before the group consisted of a cello, a viola, several repurposed Motorola receivers, and embedded television screens, among other things. Everyone agreed that it is a representation of a woman because of the curves in the cello and its obvious bustline.
Vera explained that the work is an homage to Charlotte Moorman, who was a close friend and roommate of Yoko Ono in New York. Moorman, who had been a prominent figure in the 1970’s Women’s Liberation Movement, died from breast cancer.
Also viewed by the group was a large exhibit of contemporary art by living artist Jenna Gribbon, and the permanent installation “Mark Dion: The Undisciplined Collector.” The latter is a wood paneled room containing a variety of collectibles from 1961, the year the Rose opened.
When the Rose opened in 1961, there was not a lot of money to start an art collection for a museum, so pieces of modern art by lesser-known artists like Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol were purchased. Today, those are some of the famous artists with pieces in the Rose’s permanent collection.
Yasmine Vera explained that the permanent collection of the Rose is so large now that most of it is stored elsewhere and only a fraction of it is housed on site. Also, she explained that contemporary art pieces, which are becoming more popular, seem to be getting bigger and bigger, which is a challenge for the Rose in terms of exhibition space. Indeed, the pieces in ChromaForm are quite large, taking up most of the space beyond the entrance.
In 2009, it was announced that the Rose Art Museum would be closing due to loss of funding by its supporters who had been swindled by Bernie Madoff. Many thought they had missed their chance to visit the place. Fortunately, there were swift protests and strong efforts that were successful in reopening the Rose at Brandeis.
Joan Milnes is a member of the Acton Woman’s Club, a retired director of internships and career services in higher education on the North Shore, and a former food columnist for the Beverly Citizen. She lives with her husband in Acton.