03/14/08 - Greenwich Newswire - Greenwich News Reports From The Greenwich Citizen

First Selectman Peter Tesei strolls down Greenwich Avenue with his 11-month-old daughter, Caroline, in the town s 34th annual St. Patrick s parade last Sunday.

GREENWICH CITIZEN photo

Amy Mortensen

St. Patrick's Parade Purrrrfect

From all angles, the St. Patrick's Day Parade down sunny Greenwich Avenue Sunday afternoon was purrrrrfect.

Auditors Document Moynihan Stole $529K From Parish

A web of deceit self-woven over years by the Rev. Michael Moynihan, ex-pastor of St. Michael the Archangel Church on North Street, was broken last Friday when auditing reports showed that the priest cannot account for $529,000 in disbursements.

Bringing Clergy Abuse Out of the Darkness

Those gathered in the auditorium of Greenwich's Christ Church Saturday listened attentively as John Marshall Lee, chairman of Voice of the Faithful's Diocese of Bridgeport chapter, addressed a topic that is current and weighty.

SPORTS:

GHS State Case, Claims LL Swim Crown

MIDDLETOWN - Greenwich High's boys swim Coach Terry Lowe has looked across the pool at the Class LL championships and seen Fairfield Prep Coach Bruce Jaffe, his most consistent rival, on the other side for about the last 40 years.

Greenwich Watches New Canaan Skate Away with Title

New Canaan Ices GHS State Championship Hopes

Rosenband Lights it Up, But Cards Fall

OPINION:

Cell Phone Rudeness: A New Wrinkle

Does the name Martin Cooper mean anything to you? Perhaps not. Cooper is considered the inventor of the first portable handset - cell phone, in today's parlance - and the first person to make a call on a portable hand phone.

Past, Present and Future Trailblazers

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Of what use is freedom of speech to those who fear to offend?
- Roger Ebert

02/25/08 - Greenwich Newswire For Monday

Greenwich News Reports

Mail volume down Business slowing down at post office
Greenwich Time - Greenwich,CT
Jared Feldman patronized a business on Friday he rarely visits anymore, even if it costs 41 cents to use and requires little effort.

Feldman, 29, stood inside the Greenwich post office on Valley Road with a stack of envelopes to mail. The letters weren't his. He was mailing them for a yacht club. Otherwise, with the advent of e-mail, instant messaging, online bill pay and other electronic communication, he has little reason to use the post office anymore....

... Postmasters around Green-wich said they've already noticed a drop in volume so far this year.

"I'm seeing a lot less," said Bob Palmer, Old Greenwich postmaster.

Part of the dip may be attributed to the expected post-holiday season when there are fewer items to be mailed, said Greenwich postmaster Doreen Reichard. But she said there's a lot of customers who are going online to send communication, forgoing the handwritten letter.

"E-mail is so impersonal," Reichard said.

Instead of fighting technology for business, the postal service is transforming its services, such as allowing customers to print address labels and stamps from a home computer and request home pick-up of packages.

"It helps them save a lot of time," Reichard said of her customers who use www.usps.com. "They are probably mailing more because of that."....

... Riverside postmaster Astor "Ozzie" Spezzano Jr. said he has embraced technology as a way to help customers. More people are using "click-and-ship," which is the package pick-up service.

Spezzano said he directs customers to use the service on the Web site, since it can be more efficient for some people instead of stopping by the office on East Putnam Avenue.

Greenwich resident Bill Galvin, 65, who used the Valley Road office on Friday, said that it makes sense for people to use the Internet when possible....

Getty Agrees to $2.1 Billion Private-Equity Buyout (Update3)
Bloomberg - USA
Barclays Capital and RBS Greenwich Capital are advising San Francisco-based Hellman & Friedman on the purchase. The financing will be provided by Barclays, ...

TREASURIES-Bond prices tumble as US stocks firm
Reuters - USA
I think if you look for anything more than that, you're probably looking too far," said David Ader, Treasury market strategist at RBS Greenwich Capital in ...

Getty Images to Sell Itself for $2.4 Billion
New York Times - New York City
But Hellman & Friedman has obtained financing commitments from Barclays Capital, General Electric’s GE Commercial Finance and RBS Greenwich Capital. ...

Greenwich church hopes to restore 'circle of trust'
Stamford Advocate - Stamford,CT
By Hoa Nguyen

GREENWICH - Officials at Christ Church Greenwich are searching through old employment files to find any trace of two pedophiles said to have ...

Scholastic Roundup: Greenwich Academy squash teams wins New ...
Greenwich Time - Greenwich,CT
Coached by Karen Schmidt-Fellner, Greenwich Academy won the coveted crown with 109 team points,easily outscoring runner-up Choate Rosemary Hall (89). ...

Word on the street Officials: Town must now embrace Avenue's status
Greenwich Time - Greenwich,CT,USA
By Hoa Nguyen

Already considered one of the priciest retail stretches in the region, Greenwich Avenue should make the most of its high-end reputation, ...

College Notes: Verrico stars for Loyola swim team
Stamford Advocate - Stamford,CT
Jonathan O'Connor (Norwalk/Fairfield Prep) had an ECAC-qualifying time of 2:00.72 in the 200 butterfly for the Stags while Sasha Campbell (Greenwich) had a ...

Greenwich Blog Posts

Scarsdale is to Westchester as Greenwich is to Fairfield…
By Stephen Higley
As Greenwich dominates Fairfield County, Scarsdale has the richest and largest number of neighborhoods in the Higley 1000 in Westchester County. Four out of the five richest neighborhoods are found in Scarsdale including the 5th ...
The Higley 1000 - http://higley1000.com

Databases @ your library
Our Greenwich Library staff will provide a weekly half hour hands on introduction and practice on one database per session. Rosetta Stone provides a completely interactive online learning platform of language immersion designed to help ...
Greenwich Library | Today's Events - http://www.greenwichlibrary.org

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02/24/08 - Greenwich Newswire For Sunday

Will Christ Church Be Able To Stop The Child Abuse?

Greenwich News Reports

Tate's apology at sentencing prompts questions
Stamford Advocate - Stamford,CT
By Martin B. Cassidy

Jack Bausman heard Robert Tate, former Christ Church Greenwich choir director, confess Thursday to viewing child pornography and committing decades of sexual abuse of minors. But Bausman said he still has questions about Tate's admission that he had hired two pedophiles who preyed on choir boys.

At his sentencing Thursday, Tate, 66, apologized for knowingly hiring the two unidentified men and called himself "a coward" for firing the men but not turning them into police when they molested boys in the choir.

Bausman, a Christ Church parishioner who has known Tate for 34 years, said he had hoped for the benefit of parishioners that authorities would identify the men and say when they had worked at the church.

"The specifics I don't know and I don't believe they were part of the court record," said Bausman, one of the parishioners who helped put up Tate's $500,000 bond in January 2007. It is difficult to know what to think of Tate's admission without more information, Bausman said....

... Eugene Riccio, an attorney for Christ Church, on Friday said the current leadership of the church was unaware of the two pedophiles hired by Tate until prosecutors disclosed it last week and were reviewing whatever records and statements....

... Caldwell said Tate's actions had changed many lives including his own, playing a role in his leaving Russell's firm, though the former legal associates are still friends.

"Until yesterday, I don't think anybody knew the extent of what Mr. Tate was doing," Caldwell said Friday. "This guy dropped a neutron bomb on a community of people and changed their lives. What was said today, it certainly had a shocking effect on the parishioners."

Surging Greenwich stops New Canaan
Stamford Advocate - Stamford,CT
That was how Greenwich High School's regular season played out, so why should the script for its first playoff game be any different? ...

Historical society attempting to save Mayo Ave. home slated for ...
Greenwich Time - Greenwich,CT
"It is one of the most architecturally significant houses in Greenwich," said Nils Kerchus, consultant to The Historical Society of the Town of Greenwich. ...

GHS boys ice hockey aims to end playoff drought against Trinity ...
Greenwich Time - Greenwich,CT
By David Fierro As the eighth seed, the Greenwich High School boys hockey team entered the FCIAC Tournament quarterfinals last season against top-seeded ...

Greenwich Blog Post

Greenwich Choral Society
When: Sunday February 24th, 2008 - 05:30 PM Where: Greenwich Library at Cole Auditorium Dixieland Jazz Benefit Concert.
Greenwich Library | Today's Events - http://www.greenwichlibrary.org

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02/21/08 - Another Negitive National Headline About Greenwich. What Dose The Rest Of The Country Think Of This Town?

Ex-music director at Conn. church gets prison over child porn

From: KVIA-TV El Paso

An ex-music director at a Greenwich, Connecticut, church has been sentenced to 5 1/2 years in federal prison for possessing child pornography.

Sixty-6-year-old Robert Tate must also pay a $50,000 fine and participate in sex offender treatment.

Tate last year pleaded guilty to possessing child pornography. He then spent several weeks at long-term treatment centers for sexually deviant behavior.

Tate was choir director for 34 years at Christ Church, creating a music program that gained an international reputation.

Former President George Bush -- who now lives in Houiston -- attended that church while growing up. Funeral services for the ex-president's parents were held at Christ Church....

Former Christ Church Greenwich Choir Master sentenced to 5 1/2 ...
Stamford Advocate, CT
BRIDGEPORT -- Robert F. Tate, the former Christ Church Greenwich music director who pleaded guilty last year to possession of child pornography, ...

Ex-music director at Conn. church gets prison over child porn KTRE, TX Tate was choir director for 34 years at Christ Church, creating a music program that gained an international reputation. Former President George Bush -- who ...

Authorities: Music director hired pedophile at Greenwich church Newsday, NY ... Robert Tate faces nine to 11 years in prison under guidelines when he is sentenced Thursday. Tate was choir director for 34 years at Christ Church, ...

Church Choir Director Hired a Pedophile, Prosecutors Say
New York Times, United States
Mr. Tate, 65, was choir director for 34 years at Christ Church, an Episcopal church, and he created a music program that gained an international reputation. ...

02/09/08 - I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading Bill Clark's posts! How much sooner one tires of anything than his blog!

Musical Magic at Christ Church

by Bill Clark

Last night saw the continuation of the "second Friday" organ concert series at Christ Church, and it was a doozy. Not one, not two, but THREE organists participated, all somehow squeezing onto the same organ bench for the grand finale. Of which more anon.

It was pleasing to your scribe to see perhaps the largest turnout yet to date for one of these concerts. He wishes that the right hand and left hand of the Christ Church bureaucracy would function as smoothly together as the six hands and six feet of the organists did; the front-office publicity for this series has ranged from spotty to inaccurate to non-existent (which is why your scribe missed the last concert). C'mon, folks, how hard is it to put a sentence or two in the weekly newsletter and the incessant e-mails? And let's get the time right: the programs begin at 7:30, but are preceded by a short introduction at 7:15. So why not just tell everybody to be there by 7:15, not 7:00 or 7:30? It doesn't take an S.T.D. (doctorate in Sacred Theology) to figure that one out.

And thus it was that at 7:15 Organ Scholar Isabelle Demers stepped before us to deliver the preview of coming attractions. She gave us a run-down of each piece in her charming French-Canadian accent, full of anecdotal and incidental information much of which was new to your scribe. Look for portions of her commentary interspersed below.

The first piece, by the prolific English composer John Rutter, was based on the medieval Easter hymn, O Filii et Filiae ("O Sons and Daughers of the King"). Associate Director of Music James Kennerley, the Wunderkind from across the pond, and Organ Scholar Enrico Contenti, a student at the Institute of Sacred Music at Yale, played the theme and eight variations. James obviously enjoyed belting out the triumphant notes of the stately hymn on the trompette en chamade, located on the gallery organ at the rear of the church and the organ's loudest and most brilliant stop. Meanwhile Enrico's brilliant and flashy fingerwork on the chancel organ provided a sparkling counterpoint in full stereophonic sound. The two of them shared the pedalboard, as their four hands and feet showed off the various tonal colors of the organs' palette. It was a virtuoso piece, exquistely performed by two virtuoso organists.

According to Isabelle, Rutter even worked in some musical jokes, such a theme from Gershwin's Porgy and Bess; John remains, in your scribe's opinion, the finest composer of choral and organ music alive on the planet today. For more about the connection between him and Greenwich, click on the following link:

http://greenwich-gossip.blogspot.com/2007/12/holiday-choral-concert.html

Next followed Cesar Franck's Piece Heroique, ably performed by Enrico. Once again, Isabelle helped to put this bravura composition into context for us: it was written by Franck at the end of the Franco-Prussian war of 1870-71, in which France came out on the short end of the stick (end of the Second Empire under Napoleon III; start of the Third Republic). The sombre military bombast of the beginning eventually gives way to a softer, more lyric theme which ultimately prevails, along with dying drumbeats in the pedal as the clouds of war give way to an apotheosis of the French soldiers who died on their country's behalf. For all the times your scribe had heard this piece before, this time he heard it with new ears. Enrico's rendition was awesome.

Gustav Merkel's Sonata in D Minor for Four Hands and Feet was, for this listener at least, the high point of the program. As Isabelle told us, this work was composed for a competition, in which it took first place. Rarely heard - after all, as Isabelle said, how many churches have two organs and two organists? - it is nonetheless a classic of the Romantic movement. Redolent of Mendelssohn and Rheinberger, it is a work of brilliant sonorities and mile-a-minute fingering and footwork. The opening Allegro Moderato makes use of the dominant seventh as though it were going out of style, filling the air with the musical equivalent of ear candy. The gorgeously lyric Adagio milks the sentimental possbilities of the organ for all they're worth (which in this case is quite a lot). The final Allegro con Fuoco and fugue offer more breath-taking bravura playing, with - surprise! - more dominant sevenths at the end. One can hardly call Merkel a giant of the world of organ literature, but if you ever have the chance to hear this piece, dear reader, you will no doubt enjoy it as much as your scribe did.

A word about the performers: James and Isabelle did the musical equivalent of the Vulcan mind-meld on Star Trek, and played as if their two bodies were governed by a single mind. Their faultless technique, their total synchronicity as fingers and feet and notes were flying in all directions, were truly wondrous to behold. Another reason why this was the high point of the evening for your scribe.

Another musical curiosity, though much more pedantic than the Merkel, was Samuel Wesley's Introduction to the Grand Fugue in E Flat by Johann Sebastian Bach. The title is almost longer than the piece itself, and of course the question that raises itself is Why? Why write an introduction when Bach himself had already written one, which he called a Prelude? Perhaps the answer is that Wesley was trying to do a Reader's Digest version so he could get straight to the fugue and not tax the patience of his Regency-era audience; or perhaps he found his own notes easier to perform than Bach's. In any case, his piece is no sooner heard than forgotten, although at least your scribe can now say he has heard it.

Wesley was an odd duck. His father, Charles Wesley, was one of the great hymn-writers of the Christian church ("Christ the Lord is Ris'n Today," "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing"), and with his brother John founded the Methodist church. Samuel, on the other hand, seemed not to hold much stock in religious niceties; he cohabited with his wife without benefit of clergy for a lengthy period, and after siring three children with her moved on to the below-stairs maid, with whom he had another seven illegitimate children, the best-known of whom is Samuel Sebastian Wesley ("Lead Me, Lord," "Thou Wilt Keep Him in Perfect Peace"). It would seem he made up in his colorful personal life for the rather pallid quality of his music.

OK, with the Introduction out of the way, the glorious Fugue itself naturally followed. Again, James and Isabelle did the honors, although they eschewed the four-hands four-feet version by Wesley's friend, Ivor Novello. Instead, they just shared Bach's solo version, handing off the three fugal subjects to each other one by one. Why three subjects? Well, the Saint Anne Fugue, as it is also known, is based on William Croft's well-known hymn tune, "O God, Our Help in Ages Past"; this theme represents God the Father. A more sinuous theme represents God the Son, weaving between heaven and earth, as it were. The final ebullient theme, dancing like tongues of fire, represents God the Holy Spirit. Bach weaves them together one by one, until at the end all three are playing in joyous counterpoint together, a musical dramatization of the Trinity. Isabelle reminded us of the reason Bach chose the key: it has three flats.

James then did a bravura performance of Marcel Dupre's Prelude and Fugue in C Major. Never one to use a single note where a dozen or more would do, Dupre quite probably did just what Isabelle suggested to us: compose a piece of such "fearsome techical difficulty", as James put it, so that he would be the only one capable of performing his own work. Well, if that was his intent, he reckoned without the awesome skill of James Kennerley, who played the whole thing masterfully without even breaking a sweat. Your scribe thinks that old Marcel is probably turning over in his grave with envy.

A two-organ concert would hardly be complete without the work of Antonio Soler, who was the pioneer in this rather abstruse field. James went up to the balcony console, while Enrico played at the main one, and we were treated to a pleasing antiphonal rendition of the Concerto I para dos organos.

And then it was time for all three organists to play at once. Isabelle was the monkey in the middle, with James on her left and Enrico on her right. They played the Allegro con Brio, the final movement of Beethoven's 7th Symphony. Once again Isabelle's opening words were very insightful: she told us how at the first performance the audience reacted negatively, likening the music to "drunken carousing". So once again your scribe heard a familiar piece with new ears, and realized that they and Isabelle indeed had a point. Closer to our town time, as James' program notes informed us, Sir Thomas Beecham said, "What can you do with it? It's like a lot of yaks jumping about."

Well, there was indeed a lot of jumping about, but the three organists of Christ Church were infinitely more graceful than yaks as they energetically performed this most energetic of works. It's a pity that Beethoven himself could not have been there, with his hearing intact, of course; he would undoubtedly have cried tears of joy at hearing his music so gorgeously performed.

Afterwards, we all traipsed into the Family Room for the traditional wine and cheese afters. Your scribe would like to note that there were actually five performers last evening: the three organists, and Neil and Joanne Bouknight. Neil ran the audio-visual setup that enabled us all to watch the action at the console on a large screen, while Joanne did the camera work to bring us the picture. And as if that weren't enough, they also set up, hosted, and cleaned up after the reception as well. In the pantheon of candidates for sainthood who daily inhabit Christ Church, Neil and Joanne are high up on the list.

Once again, we here in Greenwich were treated to a world-class musical performance, right here in our own Town. Some people move here for the beaches, some for the schools, some for the beautiful neighborhoods, some for the nature preserves; but whatever the reasons people give for living here, dear reader, your scribe hopes you will always be quick to add another: "I live here because of the fabulous music in this Town." Your scribe certainly does.

Greenwich Gossip - http://greenwich-gossip.blogspot.com/

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