SPRINGFIELD, Vt. – On Sunday, Oct. 20, at 3 p.m., composer and pianist David Feurzeig will play at the First Congregational Church of Springfield, 77 Main Street, as part of his Play Every Town series of concerts. Admission is free; donations for the Black River Action Team (BRAT) will be accepted.
In May 2022, Feurzeig embarked on Play Every Town, 252 free concerts in each of Vermont’s 252 towns, to confront climate change through the power of community and music. With this project, Feurzeig will become the first musician to perform in every Vermont municipality. He is traveling in his solar-charged electric vehicle throughout the state, offering free concerts to bring attention to the interrelated issues of climate and community, and to call into question the normality of long-distance touring and travel, while bringing the joy of music to his audiences.
“I want to support Vermont’s local communities with live performance in village centers and downtowns, while fulfilling UVM’s mission to serve as a resource for the whole state,” says Feurzeig, a professor of music at UVM, who specializes in genre-defying recitals that bring together music of an astonishing variety of musical styles, from ancient and classical, to jazz, avant-garde, and popular traditions. These striking juxtapositions, peppered with informative and humorous commentary, create eye- and ear-opening programs that will change how you hear all kinds of music.
Each program is locally tailored. In Springfield, Feurzeig will play music by the child Mozart from 1761, the year Springfield was chartered, and his beloved variations on “Twinkle Twinkle” from the year the Congregational Church was founded, while a selection of Chopin mazurkas from 1833 mark the year the current church building was completed. In 1954, U.S. Sen. Ralph Flanders of Springfield famously asked Joseph McCarthy “Have you no decency?” In honor of this signal moment in turning the tide of McCarthyism, Feurzeig will play Errol Garner’s 1954 classic “Misty.”
Springfield’s Kyle Washburn, a former student of Feurzeig at UVM, will join him for a rendition of Bach’s “Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring,” while Chloé Husser will sing Bill Withers’ “Lean On Me,” released in 1972, the year the church’s Yamaha grand was manufactured. Like every concert in the project, this one will include its own unique sonata by Domenico Scarlatti, “Sonata no. 66,” for this 66th concert in the project. Other solo pieces will round out the program. Admission is free, with voluntary donations going to the BRAT for their ongoing river cleanup work and work on flood resilience and promoting the planting of lots of native shrubs, trees, grasses, and flowering plants to help grow the soil so it can better absorb storm water. The bonus is all the shade and cooling of the microclimate wherever the vegetation is planted, replacing hard, hot surfaces where feasible.
Feurzeig finds his approach attracts new audiences to so-called “classical” concerts, and brings new insight to existing fans. “Classical music culture puts the ‘great composers’ on an almost religious pedestal. Once this was an indication of the audience’s love and respect, but now it just distances people from the music. It turns away new listeners, who feel like they’re in a stuffy museum instead of a live concert. If I don’t get a laugh from the audience in the first two minutes, I get worried.”
Follow Feurzeig on his journey on Instagram, find up-to-date events for your town via Facebook, or visit the website at www.playeverytown.com.