Watershed Post reader Sarah Mesh found evidence of spring, in defiance of the forecasts of snow for tomorrow, in Delhi last Saturday. (We spotted crocuses in Andes two weeks ago. But it wasn’t enough to keep the snows away.)

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Lee Hoiby, a reclusive Catskills-loving composer who adapted one of Tennessee Williams’ plays into an opera, died yesterday, according to the Times Herald-Record:

Lee Hoiby, a Sullivan County-based composer whose operas were performed everywhere from Carnegie Hall to Narrowsburg’s Tusten Theatre, died Monday. He was 85. The cause of death was cancer.

In the world of classical music, Hoiby was known as the composer of such lyrical works as “A Month in the Country,” his adaptation of Tennessee Williams’ “Summer and Smoke,” and “The Serpent,” made famous by the great Leontyne Price.

But in Sullivan, where he lived next to a waterfall and pond in Long Eddy with his partner, Mark Shulgasser, Hoiby was also known as a “gracious, lovely man” who lent his talent to local classical events like the Weekend of Chamber Music and the Delaware Valley Opera.  Read more

Martha Frankel, a Boiceville-based writer, artist and provocateur, shared some intimate memories of the late Elizabeth Taylor with the Daily Freeman this week. Frankel recalls that she met Taylor while strenuously trying not to offend her by making eye contact on the set of Sweet Bird of Youth in 1989:

After a while, though, Taylor must have noticed this woman who tried to not even look at her, because, Frankel said, “she finally came over to me and said, ‘OK, who are you?’”

Taylor then invited Frankel to her house for a party, where Frankel had a front-row seat as Taylor stayed up until 2am telling stories about her famous life and times:  Read more

In upstate New York, March is dreary season: a month made of mud, sleet, damp, and forlorn hopes for spring. In Brazil, March is Carnaval: riotous color, parades, wild costumes, and the infectious beat of the samba. After months of winter, it hardly seems fair.

In town to right the balance a little this Saturday, March 26, is Paprika, an all-woman band from Brooklyn that dishes out mighty helpings of Brazilian samba, Afro-Caribbean beats, and a pastiche of rump-shaking dance jams from around the globe. The band plays at the Roxbury Arts Center at 7:30pm, with a salsa lesson from Jacinto Jorge at 7.

Want a sneak preview? Here’s a clip of Paprika’s Vanessa Roe in Madison, Wisconsin — another locale that could use some spicing up — giving her all to “Nao Deixou a Samba Morrer.” (Translation: “I Won’t Let The Samba Die.” She won’t, either.)

  Read more

According to an article in the Patriot News last Thursday, the creekfront property that belongs to the family of anti-fracking crusader and filmmaker Josh Fox has been cited by Pennsylvania regulators for environmental violations. Fox is the director of Gasland, which was nominated for best documentary in this year’s Oscar race. 

The newspaper reports that Fox’s father allegedly burned a trailer on the property near a tributary of the Delaware River:

Fox, whose film “Gasland” suggests the natural gas drilling industry is a major threat to the environment, used the property in rural Damascus Township as a touchstone of unsullied natural beauty in his movie.

Citations from local and state officials suggest something a bit different.  Read more