The Met And Mimosas

We love the opera on VPR Classical. And with the Met’s radio and HD broadcast season in full swing, VPR is doing something else we love: having a party.

Join me for food, drink, and conversation with VPR and other Met in HD ticket holders on Sunday, January 22nd at 11 a.m. at the Top of the Hop, before the HD broadcast of the Met’s exciting new production, “The Enchanted Island.”

What a broadcast it will be, too! Combine two Shakespearean plays with the operatic music of several Baroque composers and the flawless technical and artistic prowess of the Met, and you have a recipe for a very “enchanting” afternoon! It will be a truly unique experience and I hope to see you there! Click here for more information.

- Joe Goetz, VPR Classical Host

Our Newest VPR Classical Fan

Caroline Anderson is only two and half weeks old, but she's been listening to VPR Classical for months. Congratulations to Karen and Seth Anderson! Karen is Traffic Specialist in VPR's Operations Department.

Caroline is a proud Walter Parker and Joe Goetz groupie.

A Taste Of The Manchester Music Festival

Last week, VPR audio engineer Sam Sanders and I were at the Arkell Pavillion at the Southern Vermont Arts Center in Manchester to record a concert with the Manchester Music Festival. But this was not just any concert...this was a celebration of music and history. It featured a large orchestra, largely comprised of young musicians from all around the country. It featured one of America's foremost concert pianists and host of NPR's From the Top, Christopher O'Riley. And the program featured 3 American works: Copland's "Hoe-Down" from the ballet "Rodeo," Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue," And Antonin Dvorak's "New World" Symphony No. 9, a work he wrote while living and teaching in New York City. All of this was part of the 250th anniversary celebration for the Town of Manchester, and it all happened on a cool, crisp, and moonlit night at the foot of Mount Equinox.

Sam and I were actually in Manchester for a day leading up to the performance, allowing ourselves plenty of time to get our sound equipment in place for the recording. It went very well, and by the time Thursday morning's dress rehearsal came around, I sat back and enjoyed the music from a seat in the empty hall. With about five minutes remaining in the Gershwin, I remembered my iPhone was in my pocket, so I decided to get a bit of video. The sound was actually quite good, so I thought I'd share it with you here as a sneak preview of the broadcast, which will be heard on VPR Classical in a month or so. And if it sounded THIS good coming from a cell phone video recording, just wait until you hear what our REAL microphones picked during the performance!

-Joe Goetz, VPR Classical

VPR Classical Photo Caption Contest II

By now you may have seen our series of VPR Classical posters online or in your community! Just how do Walter Parker, Joe Goetz, and Cheryl Willoughby come to look so perfect and warm and fun-loving, you might ask?

They don't. Well - not right away. As even the most casual photographer knows, getting the right shot - especially with a group of people - usually takes a bit of time. We eventually got our shot, but not before we got some hilarious outtakes! What a fun afternoon. Check out the photos below, courtesy of the VPR's lovely and talented Ty Robertson.

Then, hop on over to VPR's Facebook page where we're having a caption contest! Add your caption to the comments under the photo, and the caption that gets the most "likes" from your fellow Facebookers wins a new VPR stainless steel travel mug.



























(If you haven't seen the final product, check the posters out here, where you can also download some to post in your community!)

Join The VPR Classical Street Team!

If you're a VPR Classical listener, you already know how great our 24/7 classical music service is. Will you help us share the love with your community?

We're trying to raise awareness and listening to our many VPR Classical stations, including WOXR 90.9 FM in the Burlington area, and our two newest stations, WVXR 102.1 FM in central Vermont, and WOXM 90.1 FM in Addison County.

To help with this effort, we've produced a series of posters featuring VPR Classical’s local weekday hosts – Cheryl Willoughby, Walter Parker, and Joe Goetz. If you listen to VPR Classical, please download and print a few posters and hang them at your workplace, library, neighborhood coffee shop, general store, community bulletin board, or anywhere else people will see them! There are four versions of the poster to download and share: one for 90.9 FM Burlington/Plattsburgh, one for 102.1 FM in central Vermont, one for 90.1 FM in Addison County, and one featuring all of the VPR Classical Frequencies.

We also have some pre-printed posters at our Colchester studios in Fort Ethan Allen. If you're in the area, please feel free to come pick up a few!

Not sure of your VPR Classical station? Check out our coverage map to the left, and thank you so much for your help!

A Living Library

From VPR Classical Host Joe Goetz:

One of the most common questions I receive when meeting listeners is "what do you do when you're not on the air?" It's a good question. I'm only on the air for four hours each afternoon, yet the job is full-time. So what do I do for the other part of the day? I like to tell people that I'm a librarian.

Most of the time, my desk is covered with sticky notes, purchase orders, and several large stacks of CDs. Classical music CDs that arrive at VPR come to my desk, where I sort through them, log them, stick a label on them, and enter their track information into our massive music scheduling database. It's an exhaustive process, but it is also a very fulfilling one. After I have entered a CD into our database, I know that it will always be available to us for airplay, and that it can be enjoyed by our listeners for years to come.

(Volunteers Ann and Bruce, negotiating library space)--->

Recently it became clear that our library space was becoming more and more constrained. About a month ago, our trusty music volunteer, Ann Larson, mentioned to me that she just did not have room to shelve some of our new CDs. Luckily (thanks to a previous volunteer library project!), there are are now several rows of empty shelves that can accommodate the surplus. So I looked over the situation, came up with an (admittedly flawed) action plan, and enlisted another VPR volunteer, Bruce Simmons, to help Ann in making a mass move of CDs to the empty shelves.

As it happens I had already planned for a personal day off on March 5th, the day that all this was scheduled to happen. I left Ann and Bruce detailed notes about my -- "incredible" -- vision for the process, and left them to it.

Most of us have found out at some point in life, just because one has a plan doesn't mean it will work exactly as one had envisioned it. Ann and Bruce, early on in the process, ran into the shortcomings of my plan and decided to do it their way. And it turned out great! Our library now has the breathing room to continue expanding at its current rate, by my estimation, for at least another three years.

Thanks so much to Ann and Bruce for their help, and to our contributing listeners whose support enables us to keep adding essential material to our living, breathing, and always evolving music library.