NEWBURYPORT — Earth Day celebrated the Newburyport way will feature locally grown musicians, a food smorgasbord, an interfaith blessing of the Earth and a sea chantey crooner on Sunday.
As part of the Going Green Initiative launched in November by the Greater Newburyport Chamber of Commerce, Seacoast Energy and Environmental Design (SEED) and the city of Newburyport, businesses, environmental, municipal and religious groups have united in the common mission to educate and inform citizens of healthy lifestyle changes that could protect and improve the planet.
Earth Day celebrants will be entertained in half-hour sets when eight local singer-songwriters turn the Bartlet Mall into a mini-Woodstock from 11:30 a.m. until 3:30 p.m. At the same location, local farms, Community Sponsored Agriculture (CSA) groups and a commercial fishing boat will offer information and edible food samples ranging from vegetables to seafood.
Lyra Engel, an Odonata Ecovillage Initiative founding member, organized the group of musicians.
"They are all from the local music scene and will be predominantly performing folk music. Imagine Studios in Amesbury donated the stage," Engel said.
Local artists include: Lucian Parkin, founder of Imagine Studios, at 11:30; Liz Frame with Kristine Malpika at noon; Doc Zig and friends at 12:30 p.m.; Mel Greene at 1 p.m.; Meg Rayne at 1:30 p.m.; Dan Fassett and Friends at 2 p.m.; Nancy Fiske at 2:30 p.m.; and Aunt Mimi at 3 p.m.
Frame, whom Engel says has a blues voice, has been writing, singing and producing her own brand of country and rock-a-billy music for years. Her promotion information says that she has been compared to Dwight Yoakum, Patsy Cline, Merle Haggard and KD Lang. Kristin Malpika will accompany on the drums.
Meg Rayne is a Newburyport singer-songwriter known for her Earth-friendly organizing, including co-producing a CD in the late '80s titled "For Our Children," which raised money for safe energy alternatives to nuclear power. She has four CDs to her credit including her newest, "Let's Put the Moon to Bed," which Metronome Magazine called "elegant and sophisticated."
Nancy Fiske is a member of the contra dance band Stone Soup that plays a monthly contra dance in Exeter, N.H, offering a blend of English and Irish dance tunes. She will mix those up with other American folk songs, all played on a variety of recorders.
The final performer of the afternoon will be a group called Aunt Mimi, a duo consisting of Steve Malatesta and Dermot Whittaker singing "off-beat" songs from the '50s to present. They feature harmony vocals accompanied by guitars.
The Second Annual Interfaith Blessing of the Earth will occur from 4 to 5:30. Featured at this event will be musician and sea historian Don Sineti of Mystic Seaport, Conn. The First Parish Church of Newbury and the Greater Newburyport Clergy Association will conduct the blessing outside at the rear of the church at 17 High Road, Newbury.
Sineti returns for his fifth Newburyport musical engagement. He will be accompanied by a five-string banjo and a small accordion called a concertina. Sineti says, "While my main instrument is my voice, I play the traditional instruments that sailors used."
Sineti is an environmentalist, musician and historian who sings with a deep "booming voice and hearty laugh."
Sineti suggests that those in attendance listen for a song called "The Dreadnaught," a traditional sea chantey written about one of the most famous "clipper packet" ships built in 1853 in Newburyport. The song immortalizes a ship famous for crisscrossing the seas as a commercial transport and a way of life.
He promises to perform songs that "will focus on the environment," he says. This includes songs by Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie and songs from the oral tradition such as "Michael Row Your Boat Ashore." Sineti will be joined by a group of Native American singers/drummers called the Wolf Cry Singers and the Goodhues band.
In addition to the blessing, a local high school student will receive a Stewards of the Earth and Spirit Scholarship. A student from either Newburyport or Triton will be selected based on his or her contribution to environmental awareness through a project that combined Earth stewardship and the human spirit.
To view a complete listing of all Earth Day activities, visit www.newburyportearthday.in
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