Chautauqua Travel Journal: Wrap-up

More than two weeks after coming home from Chautauqua Institution in upstate New York, I still return, though only in my mind, to my seven days up there, even as I became distracted with enough pressing concerns at home that I didn’t have the opportunity to set down my final thoughts.

On Days 6 and 7 of my trip up there, Week 3, “America: 1863,” came to an anticlimactic end in its treatment of the Civil War. The last two lecturers of the week at the grounds’ Amphitheater, Annette Gordon-Reed (left) and Joan Waugh, for all their polish as speakers, gave presentations only questionably relevant to the week’s theme or that advanced our knowledge of the period little.

I had found relentlessly persuasive Ms. Gordon-Reed’s Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: An American Controversy when it appeared nearly two decades ago.  I was looking forward to an equally convincing analysis of Andrew Johnson, and from some peeks I took at the book prior to the lecture, I was convinced I would learn much.

Explaining why she wrote about an American President perennially ranking among the worst (if not the worst) in history, Gordon-Reed correctly noted, “Just because someone is a bad President doesn’t make them an unimportant one.” Moreover, she probably surprised at least a few in the audience by asserting that in some respects, European race relations were even worse than ours (e.g., only recently did Cambridge graduate its first black doctor).

But her lecture never discussed what Johnson had to do with 1863, the focus of the week. (If I were to hazard a guess, I would say that in that year, Johnson lifted his chances of becoming Abraham Lincoln’s running mate by serving ably as governor of Tennessee after it came under Federal control again).

The week’s final speaker, UCLA historian Waugh (left), improved matters only slightly the next morning: at least she touched, in some way, on something related to 1863—the failed attack, by the black soldiers of the 54^th Massachusetts Regiment, on Fort Wagner in South Carolina (an event stirringly recounted in the1989 film Glory). But even in this instance, most of her lecture dealt with something unrelated: the “memory wars” that ensued when the guns fell silent at Appomattox.

Four traditions have vied for a hold on Americans’ beliefs about the Civil War since then: the Unionist, Confederate (or “Lost Cause”), reconciliationist, and emancipation traditions. While this was an interesting perspective, Waugh provided not so much history (the study of the past) as historiography (the study of how the past is interpreted). It really didn’t advance listeners’ knowledge of the Civil War or how it pertained to the present.

For that, I had to look to venues away from the Amphitheater. Kent Gramm, a professor of American literature, Civil War studies and creative writing at Gettysburg College, addressed a far smaller group gathered on the front porch and lawn in front of Alumni Hall. (His was one of the “Brown Bag Lunches” held mostly there throughout the week.)

One of the hoary myths associated with the Gettysburg Address, he told the audience, was that Lincoln wrote it on the back of an envelope while traveling by train to the great battlefield to dedicate the military cemetery there. In fact, however, that story derived not from fact but a 1905 novel, The Perfect Tribute.

That seemingly innocent tale did a great disservice to the President, Gramm said, noting that the President had begun writing the address almost as soon as he received the invitation to make a "a few appropriate remarks.” In fact, not only had the President begun rehearsing immediately, but many of his rhetorical tropes had been engraved in his memory. (One example: one of Gramm’s appendixes contains Thomas Gray’s “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard.” Perhaps Lincoln intended to invert Gray’s “unhonored dead” when he began the climax of the address by paying tribute to “these honored dead.”)

Adding Some Music to the Day

The real highlights of the end of the week were not the lectures but the musical performances. No, Chautauqua does not have music halls that are, in effect, urban jewel boxes. But for most of the week, it does offer a constellation of young performers, playing in venues that are usually a short walk from one’s room on the grounds. And the famous pop/rock acts booked on Friday nights attract throngs to the Amphitheater.

Approximately 80 instrumentalists, for instance, are enrolled in Chautauqua’s summer music program, with additional students involved with piano and voice. (The students’ season lasts one week less than the full season at Chautauqua, and the lack of an orchestra at the institution is one reason why attendance drops the last week of the season here.) The sheds on the ground, site of so many practice sessions, have gained a fame of their own, since one was where George Gershwin, when he was unable to concentrate in the 1920s at the place where I stayed, Carey Cottage Inn, composed Concerto in F. (My account of its composition and premiere is here.)

McKnight Hall, located on the grounds' "music campus," featured a student recital early Thursday afternoon. Ten students, ranging in age from 15 to 23, accompanied by pianist Kanae Matsumoto, played viola compositions by William Walton, Aul Hindemith, Bela Bartok, Rebecca Clarke, Ĥenri Vieuxtemps, Max Reger, and Maurice. Some of the performers, unused to speaking directly to audiences, showed it in their nervousness, but that quickly disappeared once they set to work playing their instruments, with precision as much as passion.

That night, in keeping with the Civil War theme of the week, the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra played selections celebrating the 150^th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation under the direction of guest conductor Steven Osgood, including “When Johnny Comes Marching Home” and William Dawson’s “Negro Folk Symphony.” Of special note was Marty W. Merkley’s dramatic narration for Aaron Copland’s “Lincoln Portrait” and Lawrence Mitchell-Matthews’ superb baritone on five African-American spirituals. (It is doubtful whether anyone in the audience ever heard “Wade in the Water,” “Balm in Gilead,” “Changed My Name,” “Give Me  Jesus,” or “Ride On King Jesus” rendered so movingly).

Michael McDonald was the pop headliner at the Amphitheater on Friday night. At only about an hour and 20 minutes, his was not a particularly long set, even by the standards of an institution where the music at the Amphitheater generally ends by 10 pm, and the energy dipped somewhat in the middle of the show. 

But the former Doobie Brothers lead singer did manage to string together his hits of the Seventies and early Eighties with the group (“What a Fool Believes,” “It Keeps You Running,” “Minute by Minute”) with the rhythm-and-blues songs by other artists that were his stock in trade as a young band member (and which he covered in his bestselling Motown solo albums), including “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” and “Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing.” McDonald’s husky baritone was ably backed by a cadre of talented musicians, including bassist Tommy Sims, whose hit for Eric Clapton, “Change the World,” was also performed by McDonald and the group on this night.

After the show, I got ready for my long drive home the next day. As with the other times I have visited Chautauqua, while I was glad to be heading home, I was also sorry to leave behind a place that had subtly but overwhelmingly seeped its way into my consciousness over the past week. I was equally sure that I would recall all that I learned—and the thousand sights and sounds of a slower way of life, completely alien to my urban lifestyle—in the days, months and even years ahead.

Chautauqua Travel Journal: Day 4

For a community with a lakeside, arcadian setting, Chautauqua Institution poses a virtually insoluble dilemma: how do you take advantage of all its varied offerings—cultural, spiritual, recreational, and entertainment—and still manage to rest?

The problem is multiplied exponentially through its Special Studies curriculum, an outgrowth of the institution’s longstanding, even historic, commitment to lifelong learning. The Special Studies catalog numbers more than 70 double-column pages for this season alone. You can take a course in almost anything: art, finance, computers, physical fitness, dancing, hobbies, cooking, languages…you name it. With most classes, you can choose to pay for an entire week or individual days.

This time, since I had some errands to run, I chose the latter, starting out with two Civil War-related classes: the poetry of Walt Whitman (a nurse during the conflict) and the Book of Job as seen through victims (notably, the families of Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis). This is in keeping with the kind of courses I’ve tended to take here: history, literature, religion, sometimes music and film.

My favorite place for a course over the years has probably been Hultquist, a modern building near the Amphitheater and the inn where I stay. Turner Community Center, closer to the Main Gate, is more of a hike. As for the Octagon (pictured), instructors and students must contend with speakers using microphones on the front porch of adjacent Alumni Hall and, even worse, heat and humidity.

In one sense, the Octagon is an appropriate site for a class on Job, since, when the weather is at its worst, the building sorely tests the patience of occupants. Fortunately, in Raymond Merz, we had an instructor equally well-versed in theology and American history who knew how to keep the class moving at a good clip. Moreover, it was good to read, in depth and in its entirety, a part of the Bible which, in its focus on sudden, undeserved calamity, is all too relevant nowadays.

Though I had to hustle to Turner make my 9 am class on “Walt Whitman: Cosmic Poet of the American People,” I was also very satisfied with this class. I had had only one, at most two, sessions on him in an American literature survey course in college. The instructor, Gretel DeRuiter, concentrated heavily on the texts themselves, bringing in biographical details strictly as needed. (Much of this would have been superfluous in any event, as the extraordinary sexual frankness of Whitman's verses leaves no doubt about his same-sex attraction.)

The two classes meant that, through early afternoon, my schedule would be full. Sandwiched between them was the 10:45 Amphitheater lecture on Lincoln by David Von Drehle. The focus of his recent book Rise to Greatness—the President in 1862—was, technically speaking, a year off this week’s topic. But he was focused, informative, often humorous, and, in his conclusion, deeply moving: “It was a phenomenal vision of America that he had. Of an America that is represented right here. Chautauqua represents the ‘right to rise.’ To make of ourselves what we can. To improve ourselves together, in community. This is the legacy of Abraham Lincoln.”

I used pockets of time in the afternoon to catch up on my writing and reading for the next day. If I was going to miss somebody, it was going to be longtime Democratic operative Donna Brazile; I doubted if she would say anything at the Hall of Philosophy that she hadn’t already expressed on CNN a thousand times.

Mid-afternoon on Tuesdays is “social hour” for the numerous denominations at Chautauqua. I took the opportunity to go to Catholic House, a handsome building close to the Amphitheater. Unfortunately, social hours here represent, with their rich variety of goodies, something troublesome for Christians: infinite temptation. In past years here, I have followed a college friend’s credo that calories don’t count on vacation. This time, though, eyeing my waistline, I decided to stick to good conversation and (non-alcoholic) punch.

The evening entertainment at the Amphitheater didn’t particularly interest me, so I ended the day’s activities with a piano recital late in the afternoon. Arriving a bit late for the start of the performance, I sat outside, along with several other people, waiting for a break in the program. Even with the doors closed, the music was quite audible. Unlike listeners inside, we were also regaled by the voices of singers practicing in small nearby shacks at the edge of the grounds. (Listen, don't mock those sheds: When he was having trouble concentrating while at the Carey Cottage Inn, George Gershwin secluded himself in one of these and made great progress on Concerto in F.)

Still, with the humidity having risen slightly, I was glad to sit in Lenna Hall (pictured) so I could better enjoy the Schumann and Chopin compositions played by the talented Evelyne Brancart.

Chautauqua Travel Journal: Day 3

A friend and longtime visitor to the Chautauqua Institution complained last year about the overwhelming sameness of the programming here from year to the next, and I doubt that the theme weeks for this year and next are making her revise that notion. The pattern for the nine-week summer season recently has gone something like this: an inaugural week featuring critic Roger Rosenblatt and “Friends” (back in 2014, after a brief hiatus; another week devoted to a country assuming greater importance than before (this year: Turkey; next year: Egypt); and another week given over, in one sense or another, to the Civil War, for that conflict’s sesquicentennial. (This year focused on 1863; next year will bring Ken Burns, who will surely touch on the conflict.) 

My friend has a point in her frustration with this lack of originality, but I, for one, never tire of the Civil War. The focus this week on 1863 is especially fruitful, covering the Emancipation Proclamation; political infighting; disruptions in gender relations; riots in the North and South; guerrilla warfare in Missouri; and, of course, the battles of Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, Vicksburg, Chickamauga, and Chattanooga.

The 10:45 morning lectures are the focal point of an entire week here in this upstate New York cultural Disneyworld, as well-known speakers or experts not only flesh out the week’s themes but also anchor much of the ancillary programming (e.g., afternoon lectures offered by the Department of Religion, “Special Studies” courses, even concerts and plays). The first day’s speaker has the major responsibility of, in effect, touching on themes to be explored later. The very vastness of Civil War change, however, makes it almost impossible to bring all of this into focus.

That, I think, limited the effectiveness of opening lecturer Catherine Clinton, of Queen’s College, Belfast, on Monday. She certainly engaged with the audience, offering a number of interesting, little-known facts (e.g., the Civil War was the second most costly for native-born Irish, exceeded only by World War I) and briefly relating her experience with Steven Spielberg as a consultant on his film Lincoln. But ultimately, I think discussing her own extensive research in greater detail would have focused her lecture somewhat more.

In mid-afternoon, I attended a lecture at the Hall of Christ, on “Tragic Dancing Ladies of Film” (i.e., Carmen Miranda, Eleanor Powell, Vera-Ellen, Carol Haney, and Rita Hayworth). As I got on line for the event, sponsored by the Chautauqua Dance Circle, I felt like a fish out of water. I estimated that males in the audience were outnumbered about 20 to 1 by women. (One of my friends--and he knows who he is!!!!!—would have regarded that ratio not as a deterrent, but as the most powerful incentive of all to attend.)

The lecturer, Nancilee Wydra, came armed with a host of terrific YouTube clips (the brilliant tap dancer Powell and the died-too-young Haney in the “Steam Heat” number from Pajama Game were revelations to me), an infectious enthusiasm for her subject, and a quick wit. (When one male audience member, beholding the ravishing redhead Hayworth, pronounced, “Now that’s the real deal,” she shot back about the star’s transformative dye job: “Not her hair!”)

(The image accompanying this post shows where I am staying, Carey Cottage Inn. Notice the American flags—a very common sight in this village, and extremely appropriate for a week that meant whether this nation would, indeed, remain "United.")

Chautauqua Travel Journal: Days 1 and 2

I must have come to the Chautauqua Institution, in the southwestern corner of New York State, at least a half dozen times over the years, and I have commented on this summer getaway--often characterized as an "intellectual Brigadoon"-- over the years. (See, for instance, this prior post of mine.) Each year, even though most of the structures of this Victorian gated, pedestrian-friendly  community appear unchanged, I always find something different. This year was no exception.

Day 1: On and Off the Road, Under a Heat Dome  

One difference was how I got here. Instead of taking an exit off the New York State Thruway, I drove on what promised to be the quicker Route 86. This turned out to be an unexpected source of stress, however. By the time I pulled onto the grounds, I was feeling exhausted and dispirited—even though I had previously looked forward to the theme this week: “America in 1863,” a continuation of a treatment of the Civil War (coinciding, of course, with the 150^th anniversary of the conflict) that will stretch into 2015.

The focus of Chautauqua cultural life is the Amphitheater, the site of many performances and addresses by public figures (most notably, Franklin Roosevelt’s August 1936 “I Hate War” speech). Saturday night would witness a performance of Peter Grimes by the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra. With this year being the centennial of the birth of Benjamin Britten, I had formerly been curious about how the great English composer’s 1945 tragic opera would be staged. Given my exhaustion from the last stage of my trip, however, the grim subject matter (a withdrawn, cantankerous fishermen, widely suspected of abusing young apprentices, is marked for destruction by his village) was not something I was in the mood for.

Though the company offered a well-mounted version of the opera, it turned out to be longer than I could endure. After sitting through the prologue and first act, I chose a minute-long change of scene—the moment when many audience members chose to slip out—to make my getaway, too.  It didn’t matter that the action onstage—thunder and rain—was being echoed outside the amphitheater.

We all desperately needed air. Those of us who could made it out as soon as we could decently did so. We might have felt some pangs of conscience about leaving a show to which its personnel had devoted their hearts, souls and exceptional talents. On the other hand, Peter Grimes showed every sign of going well past the 10 o’clock ending for most amphitheater performances. (In fact, it did not stop until 11 pm, three sweat-filled hours after it began.) Enduring the agony of a steambath—heck, stumbling blindly around under a heat dome--was out of the question. (I don’t even want to think about the agony of the singers and musicians all dressed up.)

(As it happened, another drama was occurring in the amphitheater, aside from the onstage drama or the internal struggle of audience members like me. An audience member had fallen at the Main Gate of Chautauqua, but insisted adamantly on attending the performance of Peter Grimes. By the time he made it to his set, the bleeding from his leg produced considerable consternation among the volunteers, who rushed around frantically to get him immediate medical attention.)

I kid you not: The terrible humidity of Saturday afternoon was continuing well into the evening. In fact, the air conditioning in my room seemed powerless, for the longest time, against the mugginess. I wondered when my fire-engine-red face would ever cool off again. At last, after midnight, the humidity began, blessedly, to recede.

Day 2: Mental Renewal

I felt renewed and refreshed on Sunday morning. At breakfast, a couple from my inn who had befriended me these last few years put me in a far better mood than I had been the day before. I had never experienced a full Sunday at Chautauqua. Now, I was in the proper mood to appreciate it.

The reigning spirit of Chautauqua might be best described as intellectually questing Protestantism—not surprising, as the village began as a two-week, outdoor normal school for Sunday School workers. Catholic services throughout the week are held on three different sites. The 9:15 mass I attended on Sunday morning was held in something the Hall of Christ, but the structure, dating back from the early 1900s, looks more like a classical temple, with Ionic columns in front and an interior whose studied plainness makes it rather different from the stained-glass, statue-dominated facilities that Catholics are intimately familiar with. (On the other hand, the message of the sermon—the need to go beyond just obeying the laws of God, to offer comfort, not just words of comfort, to all the “deeply wounded” people one meets—was something that all Catholics—indeed, everyone—should identify with.)

Following Mass, I rambled around the grounds with my small digital camera. After several times here, I think I’ve managed to photograph most of the buildings in this picturesque village. But the flower and plant life here continually impresses me with its range and beauty, and I tried to record as much as I could in a limited period.

Most Chautauquans wish there was as much variety among eateries here as in the flora. There are, by my count, only four such establishments on the grounds. It was with some pleasure, then, that I noticed that the Fire Department would have a barbeque chicken lunch around midday. The $10 charge brought a substantial amount of food—and, besides, went to a good cause.

Sixty artists got to display their wares in “Art in the Park,” in Miller Park, close by Chautauqua Lake. In other years, I came in at the tail end of these displays in the afternoon. It was far better to see all of this toward the beginning.

From past experiences, I know that if you hope to obtain a ticket for a play at the Chautauqua Theater Company, it’s best to buy in advance; otherwise, if you wait to buy it at the Bratton Theater, the show might be sold out. With that in mind, and particularly with the thought that the first show of this 30^th anniversary season, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, might be in high demand, I phoned a few days ahead.

Just before the show, I attended a discussion of the play held by the Friends of Chautauqua Theater. I didn’t have to worry that I would be ruining any surprises for myself: I had seen the 1958 film of Tennessee Williams’ 1955 Pulitzer Prize winner starring Elizabeth Taylor, Paul Newman and Burl Ives; later TV versions starring Natalie Wood and Jessica Lange as Maggie; and the Broadway revival a few years ago with an all-black cast headed by James Earl Jones. (See my review of the latter here.)

I had seen two prior shows of the Chautauqua Theater Company: a very fine production in 2002 of the George S. Kaufman-Moss Hart chestnut, Once in a Lifetime, and an adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s Three Sisters that was deeply misguided. Luckily, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof turned out to be superb. Director Lisa Rothe and designer Lee Savage came up with a “bourbon wall”-- dozens of actual bottles rising from the floor to the ceiling, a stark visual representation of the pickled state of ex-college football star Brick Pollitt. Just as striking, the bedroom shared by Brick and his sexually frustrated wife Maggie was visible from all sides, demonstrating the overwhelming lack of privacy they struggle with throughout the play.

Particularly fine in this production were Peter Mark Kendall as Brick and the show’s guest artist, Harris Yulin, as the self-made plantation owner Big Daddy. Kendall heightened the danger in a character regarded as weak (throwing his cane at Maggie in Act One, then revealing Big Daddy’s terminal-cancer diagnosis in Act Two—both actions taken, significantly, after Maggie and Big Daddy bring up the fraught question of Brick’s close relationship with deceased football buddy Skipper). Yulin, a fine character actor ubiquitous on TV, film and stage, revealed dimensions of paternal tenderness not usually associated with this overbearing, often profane patriarch.

The day ended with a “Sacred Song Service” in the evening in the Amphitheater. In keeping with the week’s theme, Glenn McClure’s Emancipation Oratorio was performed by the Rochester Oratorio Society, with baritone Soloist Lawrence Craig especially soul-stirring.