Sunken Garden Poetry & Music Festival

Summer Performance Series 2009

Please see FESTIVAL FACTS below for information about food, parking and seating.

The Festival will be held on Hill-Stead's grounds RAIN, STORM or SHINE.

2009 Poetry Festival dates are as follows:
(Every other Wednesday night June—August)

• June 10, Opening Night
• June 24
• July 8
• July 22
• August 5, Closing Night

OPENING NIGHT
June 10, Wednesday, 6:30 pm
Robert Hass & Brenda Hillman
Music by Classical Spirits
Pulitzer Prize-winner, environmentalist, teacher and former U.S. Poet Laureate (1995–97), Robert Hass has published numerous books of poetry, including Field Guide, Praise, Human Wishes, and Sun Under Wood, as well as a book of essays on poetry, Twentieth Century Pleasures. His most recent book is a collection of poems entitled Time and Materials (Fall 2007), which won both the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize. As U.S. Poet Laureate, Hass worked tirelessly both to heighten literacy and to promote awareness about the environment. His deep commitment to both issues led him to found River of Words (ROW), an organization that promotes environmental and arts education in affiliation with the Library of Congress Center for the Book. Awarded the MacArthur "Genius" Fellowship and twice the National Book Critics' Circle Award (in 1984 and 1997), Hass is a professor of English at UC Berkeley.

Hass will be joined by his wife, acclaimed poet and fellow activist Brenda Hillman, author of seven collections of poetry. Recipient of the William Carlos Williams Prize for poetry and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation, Hillman has developed a great interest in innovative and experimental lyric traditions, particularly in how Romantic concepts of nature and spirit are manifested in contemporary poetry.

Classical Spirits, a trio comprised of flute, viola and guitar, offers an exotic blend exploring both classical and contemporary repertoires of the world. On flute is Gonzalo Cortés, a native of Chile and formerly Principal Flute of the Classical Orchestra of Santiago, Chile; playing viola is Jessica Heller, a Connecticut native and Hartt School graduate who has performed with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the Erie Philharmonic, Classical Orchestra of Santiago, and the New Britain Symphony, among others; guitarist Daniel Hartington has performed in numerous master classes, teaches at several local schools including the Hartt Community Division at the University of Hartford, and is the director of the Connecticut Guitar Society's classical guitar ensemble.

June 24, Wednesday, 6:30 pm
Baron Wormser; CT Poetry Circuit Winners / Music by Uptown Trio

Connecticut Poetry Circuit Winners
Five winners of a Connecticut Poetry Circuit-sponsored, state-wide poetry contest among Connecticut college students will captivate the audience with their work. Poets include: Matthew Gilbert, an English/Creative Writing major at the University of Hartford; Jordan Jacks, an English major with a Writing concentration at Yale University; Susanna Myserth, an English & Religion major at Wesleyan University; Sarah Nichols, a General Studies major at Tunxis Community College; and Katie Rowe, a Sociology major at Albertus Magnus College.

Baron Wormser
Author of seven books of poetry, a poetry chapbook, a memoir and a collection of short stories, Baron Wormser served as Poet Laureate of Maine 2000–2005 and received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from the University of Maine at Augusta in 2005. He teaches in the Stonecoast MFA program and the Fairfield University MFA program, and directs the Frost Place Conference on Poetry and Teaching in Franconia, New Hampshire. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, and won the 2006 McGinnis-Ritchie Award for fiction from Southwest Review for his short story "William Blake." Baron Wormser lives with his wife on twenty-six acres in Cabot, Vermont.

New York-based Uptown Trio, with Sam Reider on piano, Jeff Picker on bass and Jake Goldblas on drums, will keep the beat from 6:30–7:30. "Impressive in its ability to achieve abstraction without sacrificing continuity and form" (Doug Ramsey, "Rifftides" May 2008) the trio has been honored with awards in artistry and achievement by the National Foundation for the Advancement of the Arts.

July 8, Wednesday, 6:30 pm
Night of Fresh Voices; Adult Poetry Competition runner-up Kim Roberts / Music by Freddie Bryant
Fresh Voices – four to six high school winners of Hill-Stead's Young Poets Competition selected from all corners of the state – represent some of the best writing being produced in Connecticut high schools today. These bright young adults will dazzle the audience with their verse and poise.

Kim Roberts, second place winner of Hill-Stead's prestigious Adult Poetry Competition 2008, will read from her prize-winning manuscript, Exhibitionist, a "beautifully crafted" work with "a strong range of approaches to form and fascinating materials" (Gray Jacobik, Connecticut poet and final competition judge).

Guitarist, composer and educator Freddie Bryant, a graduate of Yale School of Music and active on the New York music scene for over 20 years, returns to the Sunken Garden to perform Brazilian jazz with his trio.
www.freddiebryant.com

July 22, Wednesday
6:30 pm
Cave Canem Poets with Marilyn Nelson / Music by Tomas Doncker

Soul Mountain Retreat (www.soulmountainretreat.org) is a writers' colony in Haddam, Connecticut, established in 2004 by Marilyn Nelson, then Poet Laureate of the State of Connecticut. Cave Canem (www.cavecanempoets.org) is a non-profit organization committed to the discovery and cultivation of new voices in African American poetry (Cave Canem's Executive Director, Alison Meyers, was previously the Artistic Director of Hill-Stead's Sunken Garden Poetry Festival). This evening's reading will feature several Cave Canem graduates participating in a summer retreat at Soul Mountain. Marilyn Nelson will also read her work.

Producer, singer, songwriter and guitarist Tomas Doncker will perform "acoustic/neo-soul, with a touch of blues." Doncker, a mainstay on the New York music scene, has performed with numerous respected recording artists, including Bootsy Collins, Ivan Neville and Bonnie Raitt.

August 5, Wednesday, 6:30 pm
CK Williams; Adult Competition First Prize Winner Don Thompson / Music by The Bagboys
Author of ten books of poetry, a memoir, a book of essays, and several translations (including Sophocles' Women of Trachis and Euripides' Bacchae, among others), C.K. Williams has won numerous awards. His book The Singing won the National Book Award for 2003; in 2000, Repair won the Pulitzer Prize and the Los Angeles Times Book Award; his collection Flesh & Blood received the National Book Critics Circle Award. Williams was recently awarded the Twentieth Annual Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize; he is also the recipient of awards in literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the PEN/Voelcker Career Achievement Award, and fellowships from the Lila Wallace Foundation, the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment of the Arts. A Whitman-esque poet, Williams was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2003, and teaches in the Writing Program at Princeton University.

Teacher and author of several chapbooks, Don Thompson received First Prize in Hill-Stead's prestigious Adult Poetry Competition 2008. His chapbook manuscript, Back Roads, was described by final judge, poet Gray Jacobik, as "absolutely stunning, unified... deeply sensitive, responsive to the natural world..." Born and raised in Bakersfield, CA, Thompson has been writing poetry for almost 25 years. He lives on a family farm and teaches at a small prison and at Bakersfield College.


Musical guest The Bagboys (www.bagboys.com) will keep toes tapping with traditional and original Bluegrass and Western Swing.

Please email poetry@hillstead.org or call 860.677.4787 ext 121 with questions.

To be added to the poetry mail list (email or postal mail) contact Cynthia Cagenello at cagenelloc@hillstead.org.