Dundas Youth Centre seeing success at Morrisburg sites

Rain or shine, shoppers should plan to head to the Morrisburg Village Plaza for the 17th annual Antique Festival. The longtime event, now organized and hosted by the Downtown Morrisburg Business Improvement Area, will this […]

The second half of the 2012-13 St. Lawrence Acoustic Stage season will kick off next week; an outstanding roster of musicians is coming to South Dundas. 

“We have such a varied and exciting line-up coming to town starting this month,” said Sandra Whitworth, on the board of the St. Lawrence Acoustic Stage.

The extraordinary Natalia Zuckerman will open the spring series on February 16, with  Juno award winner, Amelia Curran, appearing on March 2. April 6, the incredible alt country band, New Country Rehab, takes to the stage. Grammy award winning fingerstyle guitarist, Laurence Juber, best known to many as lead guitarist in Paul McCartney’s Wings, will perform on April 27. 

The stellar St. Lawrence Acoustic Stage season will close out with a showcase for up and coming artists, Intimate Acoustics, on May 25.

Sandra Whitworth is also delighted to welcome some new additions to the St. Lawrence Stage “family” this spring. 

Now joining long time Stage supporter, Coffey’s Coffee, in sponsoring the spring musical series, are these local businesses: the law firm of Horner and Pietersma, Riley’s Valumart, Thom Realty Ltd., Seaway Valley Pharmacy, Morrisburg Home Hardware and the Bank of Montreal, Morrisburg branch.

“It’s been very heartening to have local businesses come on board and support us. It does feel like an acknowledgement from the Morrisburg community of the work we are doing,” Whitworth said. 

This spring, the Stage is also offering a number of workshops to the community.

First up, New Yorker Natalia Zuckerman (she is the daughter of the NAC Orchestra conductor, Pinchas Zuckerman) will hold two workshops. The first will take place on Saturday, February 16, at the Morrisburg Meeting Centre from 2-4 p.m., before Zuckerman’s evening concert.

Zuckerman is a virtuoso slide and blues guitarist, as well as a visual artist. In her local workshop, she will help students try out different slide guitar techniques and alternate tuning. She’ll get students using various materials such as glass, metal and lap style. Participants should have some familiarity with the guitar, but it is not necessary to have prior experience playing slide guitar.

Zuckerman is also presenting a  second workshop on Sunday, February 17, again from 2-4 p.m., in Cornwall, in partnership with the Art Gallery Cornwall (168 Pitt Street).  “Song Writing with a Painter’s Eye,” is for both musicians and artists. No prior visual or musical background is required, just interest. Natalia will be showing students how to create image-based songs, and song-based images. Each two hour workshop is $25 (funds for all workshops go directly to the artists). 

A minimum enrollment of eight participants is required for the Morrisburg workshop to run. Register for it by February 13, at the latest, at info@st-lawrencestag.com.  

On April 27, Laurence Juber will direct a workshop in Morrisburg entitled “Beatles, Wings and Six Strings,” before his evening concert. 

He will work with students on techniques for arranging songs such as building moving parts from basic harmony, voicing and articulating the melody and adding bass and groove to create a satisfying performance.

The cost of this workshop is also $25. A minimum of eight participants is needed for the workshop to run.

The St. Lawrence Acoustic Stage is an exceptional venue for the performing arts in South Dundas. 

“We are trying to build a ‘community’ as much as just an audience,” Whitworth said. “Community, as we see it, means a shared openness to music, the willingness to be a bit surprized perhaps by a performer or style. We offer an intimate setting for audiences to enjoy the talents of extraordinary musicians, often at half the price these same performers might command in say, Ottawa.” 

Reach the St. Lawrence Acoustic Stage at http://www.st-lawrencestage.com/shows.html.

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Last brought to South Dundas in 2008, the important and well received MasoniCh.I.P Child ID Program is being brought back to the area this year.

MasoniCh.I.P is a program whereby the local Masonic Lodge, free of charge, welcomes families to have information about their children gathered that will be invaluable should the child ever go missing.

“It is our sincerest hope that no family will need the resource provided in our packets, but if the need should arise, the information on the CD, that you are provided through our program, will be instrumental to law enforcement agencies in the recovery of a missing child. 

It only takes 42 seconds from the time the CD-Rom is loaded into the police computer for the Amber Alert broadcast to be sent throughout North America,” reads a press release from the Masons.

Don Salt, a member of the local MasoniCH.I.P clinic organizing committee, with the Iroquois-Cardinal Masons, Friendly Brothers Masonic Lodge #143, said that the first in a series of clinics that will be held throughout the year will take place April 19 and 20. 

They will have the clinic set up in a booth at the South Dundas Chamber of Commerce Home and Trade Show at the Morrisburg Arena.

In 2008, about 300 children participated in the local clinics and the Masons are hoping that they will be as well received this time around. 

“The children who were done at the last clinics, should be re-done,” said Salt, as they have certainly changed in five years. 

While some of the information stays the same, such as DNA and fingerprints, updating information such as height, weight and photos is very important.

Salt, who is a retired law enforcement officer, stresses the importance of this information and says that parents should try and get their teenage girls to participate in the  program. 

“To put it bluntly, they are the group at the highest risk,” says Salt.

Salt hopes that parents of all children, no matter the age, will seriously consider bringing them to the clinic at the trade show this weekend.

The MasoniCh.I.P. Child ID Program consists of five major components – vital child information, digital fingerprints, digital photographs, a digital video and swab for DNA.

All of this data is burned on to a CD, and given to the parents or guardian. 

Security and privacy are of the utmost importance; therefore, it is significant to note that the Ontario Masons keep nothing on file, with the exception of the permission form signed by the parent, prior to participation in any event. 

It costs the Masons about $3 per child to gather the information for parents, a cost which the local Masons Lodge gladly covers.

“If it helps find one child, it is more than worth it,” said Salt. 

The organizing committee plans to set up a couple of other clinics locally later this year; one at the South Dundas Soccer Tournament in Iroquois and one at Williamsburg Harvestfest.

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