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Julie Washington has devoted her career to leveling the playing field in America’s public education system — filling in the gaps that separate lower income, African American students from the academic achievements of their white counterparts.

Washington, professor and chair of the Department of Communications Sciences and Disorders at Georgia State University, will speak at 10:45 a.m. today, July 24, in the Amphitheater. Washington will continue Week Five’s theme, “The Life of the Spoken Word.”

Washington earned her doctorate in speech and language pathology from the University of Michigan in 1989.

At the time, Washington was interested in language and assessment, until she became concerned with the overrepresentation of African American children in special education programs.

In the City of Ann Arbor, Michigan, Washington said many students in the local school districts, special education or not, were “struggling” academically.

“Once I got into schools, I realized what a huge issue literacy was,” she said. “I got interested in how the dialect impacted these reading outcomes. It’s been an issue for them for a long time.”

But it wasn’t until Washington moved to Atlanta that she realized how large of a role dialect plays in academic struggles — and this holds true for students of all socioeconomic statuses.

“The biggest difference in Atlanta, is that there is so much dialect here to compare to Ann Arbor that it really helped us crystallize what it is about dialect that kids are having trouble with,” she said. “I always knew that the continuum of dialect use was important, but the kids at the bottom are having a lot of trouble, and the kids at the top are having a lot of trouble, too.”

Now, Washington is a principal investigator on the Georgia Learning Disabilities Research Innovation Hub, funded by the National Institutes of Health.

Last June, she completed a four-year study of 1,000 low-income elementary-school students in Atlanta, collecting data related to reading, language, writing and cognitive skills.

“The national statistics show that eight out of 10 are reading at a basic level or below, so it’s really hard in that community to identify kids who are reading not just because they are poor, but because they have disabilities that need targeted assistance,” she said. “The goal of the work we are doing now is to figure out how to identify those kids and where our instruments aren’t sensitive enough to tell the difference between poverty and disability.” 

She also discovered that African American students with the heaviest dialect — in other words, students whose home literate standard deviates the most from the academic literate standard — accounted for most of the state’s low test scores.

“One of the things we have learned is that not all kids from low-income backgrounds are going to have difficulties; it’s the kids for whom the distance between the language they use and the literate standard is the widest — those are the kids having trouble learning to read and write,” she said. “So, it’s not everybody, but those kids we call ‘high dialect’ users.”

Even though the statistics confirm what she has seen in classrooms from Michigan to Georgia, Washington said the results did not provide a plan to better the situation for high dialect users.

“I think what we have learned is that this is a major public health issue in communities,” Washington said. “We just don’t have access to adequate intervention and it’s not because the resources don’t exist, it’s because the ability to identify and diagnose is so poor. We have work to do, and in a country like ours where we really value literacy, that’s a real disadvantage.”

Washington hopes the racial divide in literacy issues becomes a more widely understood topic in the United States, which is why she is focusing her lecture at Chautauqua on the subject.

“I think it’s a real opportunity to reach a very different audience and to make people aware of some of the things we’re dealing with because the dialect, in particular, has a lot of stigma attached to it, and there has always been — it’s low prestige, people don’t understand it,” she said.

Ultimately, Washington’s message is this: Literacy issues are everyone’s issues.

“We can’t just talk about poverty and we can’t just talk about the variables that most of us don’t have the power or ability to do much about,” she said. “This is something we can do something about, and there are variables we should all be concerned about. This is not just a black problem, this is not just a poor problem, this is everybody’s responsibility.”

This week, Chautauquans suffering from summer-blockbuster burnout can look forward to a change of pace.

At 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, July 24 and 6 p.m. Thursday, July 25  at Chautauqua Cinema, Hrag Vartanian will screen and host discussions on two new wave documentaries, “Camera-
person” and “Wild Relatives.”

Vartanian is a core faculty member at the School of Art this season and the editor-in-chief and co-founder of the art and culture magazine Hyperallergic.

He said the films selected represent diverse perspectives and new movements in documentary filmmaking.

“I think both of these films are kind of unexpected because they’re telling stories that don’t often get told,” Vartanian said.

“Cameraperson,” screening today, is a film by award-winning documentary filmmaker Kirsten Johnson, which features unused footage from her many projects.

“Essentially, this is the material she thought would never be shown, and it’s also a way of revealing her own biases and bringing them into focus,” Vartanian said. “This is a very well-respected cinematographer and filmmaker who is showing the part of her life we don’t often really see.”

Vartanian hopes the film will kick off a discussion about the elements of filmmaking and photography that often go unseen and unquestioned.

“I want (viewers) to think critically about why they take photos,” he said. “I want them to think critically about why they share them.”

He said that “Wild Relatives,” screening Thursday, is “probably the most unlikely story most people will have heard about the Syrian Civil War.”

The film, by director Jumana Manna, follows efforts to protect and safeguard endangered seeds after an international seed bank in Aleppo is forced to relocate to Lebanon.

“It’s a commentary on globalism,” Vartanian said. “It’s a commentary on how the systems work and the fact that we’re all interrelated in ways that we have no idea about.”

He said that when watching the film, he wants Chautauquans to “think about the unintended consequences of (our) actions in the world today.”

“I think those are familiar to all of us,” he said.

Vartaninan said Chautauquans don’t need any background knowledge to understand the films and contribute to the discussion.

“I think people just need to bring their empathy and bring their own minds to (the screenings) and grapple with them, and not everyone has to like them,” he said. “The topics they raise are crucial, and they’re important in that they impact everyone in different ways.”

When it comes to religion, the Rev. Elaine Thomas wants people to think outside the box.

“I’d like my audience to take away more questions than they came with,” said Thomas, a spiritual counselor, medium and teacher, based in the Lily Dale Assembly in Western New York. “I also wish that I could give people some answers to questions that are grounded in this reality about the spiritual and intuitive aspects of our lives.”

At 2 p.m. today, July 24, in the Hall of Philosophy, Thomas will discuss “Spiritualism’s Role at Its Inception and Its Relevance Today,” as part of the Week Five interfaith theme, “Chautauqua: Rising from the Ashes of the Burned-Over District.”

Spiritualism is a religious movement based around the idea that the dead can and do commune with the living, often through mediums, people gifted with the ability to mediate communication between the spirits of the dead and the living.

“Chautauqua County has always had great diversity,” Thomas said. “From about the late 1840s on, Spiritualism provided hope and inspiration to people who had lost children and had family members die from disease.”

According to Thomas, the mainstream religions taught that life exists after death — but there was no evidence given to practitioners.

“What these mediums were doing was providing people with the kind of evidence that was healing,” she said. “They were giving people the chance to know that their loved ones were at peace, and that they were with God.”

Thomas works in the metaphysical field primarily in Lily Dale, New York, a hamlet that was incorporated in 1879 as a camp and meeting place for Spiritualists and Freethinkers.

“Lily Dale was created by a very eclectic group of people,” Thomas said. “There were theosophists, abolitionists and spiritualists all coming together to form a summer camp community. They studied philosophy and spirituality, as well as energy healing and mediumship.”

Thomas said that since the 1960s, “more and more of the population has questioned what some people have taken for granted.”

“Though faith is an active component of what I believe and what I do, questioning everything has become more and more the way people operate,” she said. “With all the questioning, people don’t just want to take things on faith. One of the gifts of mediumship is not to tell fortunes, but to bring comfort and upliftment to people who are in pain and grieving.”

According to Thomas, part of the reason mediums exist is because life is “noisy,” and not everyone “knows how, or remembers how” to commune with the dead.

“When I’m receiving information from somebody’s grandmother or child, I can see, hear or feel the information, or all of the above,” she said. “Sometimes I’ll hear a voice, and sometimes it’s an inner vision rather than a feeling that I get.”

But Thomas admits that there are those in the psychic community who may be predatory, instead of uplifting.

“Unfortunately, in any walk of life or profession there are people who are unscrupulous,” she said. “When people are in pain or in need, they’re not always thinking with all their brain cells. They can easily become a victim of people who are looking to be big shots, whether they’re psychics or in finance.”

For her lecture today, Thomas said she wants to open the door for her audience to question everything around them.

Young poets at Seville Intermediate School in Seville, Ohio, describe joy as “perfect,” “pouncing” and “purple.”

It’s just one example of the communal creative energy that fills the book, Speak a Powerful Magic — the CLSC Young Reader selection for Week Five, “The Life of the Spoken Word.”

The first poem in Speak a Powerful Magic is by Kate Walley’s third-grade class. An anthology of 10 years of the Traveling Stanzas Poetry Project from Kent State University’s Wick Poetry Center, the book also features poems by refugees, poet laureates and senior adults.

The product of a 2009 initiative between Wick Poetry Center and Kent State University Professor Valora Renicker’s visual communication students, Traveling Stanzas brings poetry to life through graphic design. Its poems have been translated and displayed internationally in events like the Tuscan AngloAmerican Festival in Florence, Italy, as well as a multinational war memorial in Lyon, France.

In conjunction with the book’s launch at 12:30 p.m. today, July 24, in the Ballroom of the Literary Arts Center at Alumni Hall, young readers will discuss the poems of Speak a Powerful Magic, as well as participate in prompted writing activities led by Charles Malone, program and outreach manager at Wick Poetry Center, and Sony Ton-Aime, Wick Poetry fellow. At 7 p.m. tonight in Room 101 of the Hultquist Center, poet-in-residence Shara McCallum will give a special evening lecture on “The Role of the Poet,” and then attendees will make their way to the Poetry Makerspace for a celebration in honor of Speak a Powerful Magic and its pursuit of poetry for all. 

“We want to democratize voice,” said David Hassler, director of the Wick Poetry Center. “Given the right conditions, we all have that capacity to make meaning with memorable language, to find some emotional truth, or to recall a memory that only we can tell.”

As part of an ongoing collaboration with Chautauqua Institution and the literary arts, Speak a Powerful Magic includes two community poems by students at Clymer Central School and Jamestown High School in Chautauqua County. This partnership was one of the reasons Atom Atkinson, director of literary arts, suggested the anthology when Karen Schiavone, manager of community education, asked about a poetry selection for the 2019 CLSC Young Reader season. Schiavone said the book is a wonderful and moving choice that fits beautifully with the theme of Week Five.

“I would think Speak a Powerful Magic is extraordinary and appropriate for Chautauqua regardless,” Atkinson said. “But especially because the Jamestown and Clymer students are in there, it’s really special for us. We’re really excited to be officially involved in its publication.”

For Hassler, the two Chautauqua County poems — “The Fields of Clymer” and “Finding the Poem in the World” — “beautifully exemplify the belief that we all have the capacity to find memorable language to capture our own stories, and that poetry can be a way in which communities reflect on themselves and their sense of belonging and connection to a larger world.”

Malone and Ton-Aime have led several workshops geared toward young poets, including an after school program with Urban Vision, a youth organization that services a primarily immigrant community in Akron, Ohio.

“Sometimes, what a fourth- or a fifth-grade student would write in one of our sessions was just so pure and beautiful and surprising that when I go back to those, I really, really still have a strong emotional reaction to them,” Malone said.

Young children write about what they see in the world, while adults write about the world inside of themselves, Ton-Aime noted.

“There is an innocence in the way (children) approach writing,” he said. “They are not into curating things like, ‘Everything should be perfect. Everything should rhyme.’ Every time they get a good line, they’re really excited about it and they’re shouting. You get some great poems, really great poems, from them because they are uninhibited. They can just write.”

This afternoon, Malone hopes to communicate a sense of “usefulness” — the idea that poetry “unlocks a way of thinking or of making sense of the world that we don’t often access.”

“Giving ourselves room to play with language, we give ourselves an opportunity to surprise ourselves and understand ourselves differently,” he said.

Hassler cited the poet Stanley Kunitz who, in his 90s, wrote, “He who has forgotten the child he was, is already too old for poetry.”

“It is easy to lose that sense of curiosity, awe and wonder that we have as children,” Hassler said. “Poetry can speak to parts of ourselves that are otherwise untouched or difficult to access. So long as we continue to be in conversation with the children we were, we are never too old, or too young, for poetry. We all have the capacity for the leaping thought of poetry, to rub two words together to make a spark — to speak a powerful magic.”

Staff writer Evan Dean contributed to this report.

“Controversial presidential actions frequently involve controversial legal advice,” William Casto writes in the introduction of his most recent book, Advising the President. “The two go hand in glove.”

Before he served as the U.S. Chief Prosecutor at the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg, Germany, and before he was appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court, Robert H. Jackson was the 57th Attorney General of the United States under President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Casto, an author and legal expert, will discuss “Attorney General Robert H. Jackson and Franklin D. Roosevelt” as part of the Oliver Archives Heritage Lecture Series at 3:30 p.m. Tuesday, July 23 in the Hall of Philosophy.

Casto is the Paul Whitfield Horn Professor of Law at Texas Tech University School of Law, and the author of Advising the President: Attorney General Robert H. Jackson & Franklin D. Roosevelt.

In addition to Advising the President, Casto has authored The Supreme Court in the Early Republic: the Chief Justiceships of John Jay and Oliver Ellsworth; Oliver Ellsworth and the Creation of the Federal Republic; and Foreign Affairs and the Constitution in the Age of Fighting Sail.

Casto has written extensively on judicial review, foreign policy, and the relationship between religion and public life in the Founding Era.

A member of the American Law Institute, Casto received his law degree from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville and a Doctor of the Science of Law degree from Columbia University. He joined the Texas Tech faculty in 1983 after practicing law for a number of years in Tennessee.

As a scholar, Casto has been frequently cited or relied upon by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Casto opens Advising the President with a quote from Jackson: “The Attorney General has a dual position.”

The book, Casto writes in the introduction, uses the story of Jackson and Roosevelt to “explore the problem of providing legal advice to the president.”

The book covers national security events on the eve of World War II — seemingly unrelated, Casto wrote, but “like pieces of a complex puzzle.”

“The puzzle is essentially historical, but Jackson’s travails also provide valuable insights into the advisory process some seventy years later in the twenty-first century,” he wrote. “The general ethics principles regarding a legal adviser’s obligations are essentially the same today as they were when Jackson advised his president.”

“Neighbor, oh neighbor, this is us,” said the Rev. Otis Moss III at the 9:15 a.m. Monday Ecumenical Service. He told the congregation to look at a neighbor and repeat the sentence. And they did.

Moss’s sermon title was “This Is Us, Part 1,” and the Scripture reading was Judges 11:1-6.

In the OM3 (Otis Moss III) reading of the text, Jephthah was a mighty warrior, the son of Gilead and a prostitute.

“She was a woman who was violated,” Moss said. “Jephthah’s brothers said, ‘You can’t have any of the trust fund because you are the son of another woman.’ ”

So Jephthah left and went to live in Tob with a group of riff-raff, or rebels, according to some translations. The elders of Gilead came to him and asked him to lead their troops against the Ammonites.

Jephthah looked at them and said, “Aren’t you the same guys who pushed me out, and now you want me back?” They answered him, “Yes, but we are going to make you the head of the nation.”

“This is us,” Moss said.

Moss is currently binge watching “This Is Us,” the television show endeared by many.

“I would come home late from church and (my wife) Monica would be crying,” Moss said. “I asked what it was, and she told me this show; her tears mixed joy with sorrow.”

“This Is Us” is the story of three siblings, Kate and Kevin, white twins, and their adopted black brother, Randall; all were born on the same day.

“The show reveals the joy and pain in life, how family can heal and hurt,” Moss said. “There are no villains or heroes. It draws on larger Biblical themes, like ‘Who am I,’ ‘What is my call,’ ‘Who is this person I love to hate and hate to love but just can’t live without.’ ”

Moss told the congregation: “We have horns and halos.”

“We praise God one moment, and curse a child of God the next,” Moss said. “We heap the residue of contradiction on our hearts. The knives carried by family are kept sharper and cut deeper than others.”

Jephthah was a mighty warrior and his father was Gilead, but his mother was not given a name or a connection. Jephthah lived in the purgatory of acceptance and rejection.

“Jephthah’s mother is called a prostitute, but she was a young girl that a man of stature took advantage of,” Moss said. “She was part of the #MeToo Movement before there was a movement.”

Jephthah lived between the pain and the promise. Moss said that was a dangerous place to be “because if you lean into the pain, you might forget the promise.”

Moss told the story of Dorothy Height, head of the National Council of Negro Women for 40 years.

“She had been called to preach, but men told her a woman could not preach,” Moss said. “So she found another way. She leaned into her promise, and when she preached at the Hampton University Ministers’ Conference, I was blown away. I am amazed that people are still saying that women cannot preach. Before Jesus could preach, Mary had to carry him.”

Moss cited a story by Fr. Greg Boyle, of Homeboy Industries, about a former gang member who had tattoos removed from his face. The man had a tear on his face for every person he had shot. He looked at his face after the tattoos were removed and saw the scars that were left.

“I will always remember the pain I caused,” the man said.

Jephthah was “in danger of defining his destiny by his deficits,” Moss said. His own blood was blocking his blessing, and they pushed him out of his own country and he found a home in Tob.

“There is something evil about shame, to be forced to live in the shadows,” Moss said. “There is danger when we are forced to live by someone else’s story. Our nation is allowing other people to shape the story of who we can be, a story of fear instead of possibility.”

Jephthah had great power and authority, and he was delivered because he took a hand in telling his own story.

“Deficit might be divine development,” Moss said. “The rebels in Tob were teaching Jephthah guerrilla warfare. In his exile, he developed into a leader. There is a synchronicity in this time and that allowed Jephthah to grow and be blessed.”

Without Jephthah and his willingness to learn how to fight, Moss said, “there would have been no Samson.”

“If there was no Samson, (there would have been) no Samuel, no Saul, no David, no Solomon, no Isaiah to say ‘unto us a child is born,’ ” he said. “If no Isaiah, then no Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, and we would never hear about Jesus and Calvary and the Resurrection. If there was no Pentecost, there would be no Peter to preach and no Saul to become Paul. And Paul would never have set up churches and there never would have been Origen and Augustine and Thomas Aquinas.”

Without them, Moss said, “there would never have been a Luther and no John Wesley and no Chautauqua and no Joan Brown Campbell, no Robert Franklin, no Gene Robinson, and I would not have been invited to preach.”

See the humor in the text, Moss told the congregation.

“Who came to bring Jephthah back? Moss asked. “The same people who put him out, “he said.” This is God’s divine development, holy mischief. We need to believe and hold tight because God will do great things. God will turn this hellish time into Heaven.”

Moss then turned to the song, “Amazing Grace.”

“Did you know (‘Amazing Grace’) is structured in a pentatonic scale, African music, with European words?” Moss asked. “If you look up the original manuscript in the Library of Congress, it says ‘words by John Newton; melody unknown.’ ”

Newton was a “peddler of human flesh,” Moss said. Newton’s ship was in the middle of a storm, and the story is told that he prayed the words of “Amazing Grace,” and the storm subsided.

“That is not what really happened,” Moss said.

The people in the hull were humming this tune, and the melody made its way up to Heaven. An angel leaned over the balcony of eternity to hear the melody and went and tapped God on the shoulder and said “You need to hear this.” God leaned over the balcony of eternity and quieted the storm to hear the melody better.

“This song is unique,” Moss said. “It came out of one of the most painful times of history. You can play the tune only on the black keys of the piano. You would have grace, but it would not be amazing.”

God still shows amazing grace, Moss told the congregation.

“We are building a generation that is not fearful, is not sexist, not based on white privilege; one that sees everyone as a child of God,” he said. “We have to believe in the power of what we can do when we lean into our pain and our promise.”

Moss blessed the congregation, saying, “May amazing grace bless you, keep you, hold you. Amazing grace will save us if we are willing to lean into the storm.”

The Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, vice president of religion and senior pastor, presided. The Rev. John Morgan, senior pastor of the Williamsburg Presbyterian Church in Williamsburg, Virginia, read the Scriptures. The Motet Choir sang “Bright Canaan,” arranged by Alice Parker and Robert Shaw. The Gladys R. Brasted and the Adair Brasted Gould Memorial Chaplaincy provides support for this week’s services.

Inventions like sound recording and the synthesized voice have changed human communication forever, and while advances in artificial intelligence are hinting toward an even greater transformation, Trevor Cox can’t help but notice the consequences of hearing more, amplified.   

Cox, author and professor of acoustic engineering at Salford University, gave his lecture, “Now You’re Talking,” at 10:45 a.m. Monday, July 22 in the Amphitheater, opening Week Five, “The Life of the Spoken Word.”

Cox started with a demonstration of how the human voice works. To begin, he had the audience put their hands on their throats and make two sounds: an “E” and an “S” sound. The “E” caused vibration, where the “S” did not. This is because with vowels, sound elongates in the larynx with one’s vocal folds.

“When you make the ‘E’ sound, you push air out of your lungs, and then you break that air up with the movement of the vocal folds,” Cox said. “That gives you variation and little pulses of pressure, and that’s what a sound wave is.”

Vocal folds can open and close up to 100 times a second.

“One of the remarkable things about the human voice is how robust it is,” he said. “Because we really hammer it, (the folds) have to be moving fast all the time.”

Vocal folds also determine pitch — the longer they are, the higher the pitch of sound. Lighter sounds have higher frequencies, so when a sound changes the length of the vocal folds, it is actually changing how much mass is moving.

However, on their own, the only sound vocal folds make is an incoherent, buzzing noise. Cox showed a video of the throat of an opera singer, observed with an MRI scanner, to stress the importance of other throat and mouth muscles, like the tongue, in making sound and forming diction.

“If I was to show you an MRI scan of you talking, you would look really similar,” he said. “You have the same amazing flexibility in your system.”

But when did humans evolve to have the ability to speak? Cox believes it began with Neanderthals, though it’s an assumption that is impossible to prove. Archaeology, which heavily relies on fossils, is not a resource for his research because the soft tissue in vocal anatomy doesn’t fossilize.

In an attempt to narrow down when speech began, Cox compared a chimpanzee, an animal that can’t speak, to humans — animals that can. In recent years, people have tried to teach chimpanzees to speak, but in the end, found that chimps could only use gestures to communicate.

What is stopping them? Cox said it is the anatomy of the larynx. In humans, the larynx sits lower than it does in chimpanzees.

“There is a lot of discussion around why it’s lower, but speaking fluidly is one reason why,” Cox said. “You saw that flexibility of the tongue. By moving the larynx out of the way, the tongue has a much greater ability to change the shape of the throat and the mouth and to speak more rapidly.”

William Fitch, an evolutionary biologist and cognitive scientist at the University of Vienna, studied chimpanzees and determined that the animals actually could speak if their brains could control their vocal anatomy.

“The conclusion of this paper is that probably, chimpanzees could speak; the vocal anatomy is not what’s limiting, it’s the brain that’s limiting,” Cox said.

Unfortunately, the brain doesn’t fossilize either, so Fitch’s findings don’t transfer to Neanderthals. Cox said the only other resource is symbolic thought. For Neanderthals, symbolic thought was displayed through cave paintings.

“It seems that Neanderthals were making art, which means they were doing things beyond just surviving, which means they were thinking beyond just surviving, and that makes it more likely that Neanderthals talked,” he said.

Ancient acoustics were prevalent in monuments as well, such as Stonehenge in Wiltshire, England.

“If you think of any human ceremony you’ve been involved with, it involves singing, talking, music — it involves sound,” Cox said. “Therefore, the acoustics of old spaces would have been important to how they were used.”

Studying sound in Stonehenge was difficult because so many of the original stones are missing. To replicate how it used to sound, Cox created a computer model and a scale model of its earliest design. The scale model was tested two weeks ago, and Cox played two videos to show the difference in sound quality. The first video was an orchestral piece without any stones and the second was the same piece, with the stones. When the stones were added, the sound became “deeper and richer.”

Throughout history, Cox said the greatest developments in voice have coincided with developments in technology.

“Inventions like the phonograph, the microphone and the telephone changed our relationship to the voice and changed the human voice,” he said.

To convey the importance of the microphone, Cox played an example of Freddie Mercury and Montserrat Caballé singing “Barcelona.” Caballé was a professional opera singer trained to amplify her own sound with vocal techniques, where Mercury had always performed with the help of a microphone, making him far easier to be heard in larger venues.

“The reason we have such diverse, modern singing styles is because to sing to a large arena now, all you need to do is sing into a microphone (close) to your mouth, and the sounds can be amplified,” Cox said. “This means that Freddie Mercury can whisper, he can shout, or even talk-sing and all of that works. You can’t do that as an opera singer.”

Voices primarily change with age. Cox played an example of Queen Elizabeth II, comparing her first Christmas message in 1957 to her Christmas message in 2017. The recordings proved that her voice is now noticeably lower.

“That’s a natural aging process,” he said. “As females get older, their voices tend to slowly go down in pitch.”

Cox said deeper tones in females can also be due to cultural changes. In a study comparing the voices of women in the 1940s to women’s voices now, researchers concluded that women’s voices are deeper than they were before. Cox said this is because more women are in their “rightful leadership roles.”

“As they assume more leadership roles, their pitch is lowered and this is the sad thing: They have lowered their pitch to sound more like a man,” he said. “It’s sad because it’s basically based off the fact that your brain makes suggestions about who is likely to be a leader, and because we still have a bad gender imbalance, your brain guesses a man is more likely to be a leader.”

Cox used an example of Kim Kardashian, who speaks with vocal fry, the lowest register of one’s voice. Cox said Kardashian’s vocal fry annoys listeners, where the vocal fry of actor Vin Diesel does not.

“It’s an interesting and sexist way we respond to voices,” he said.

Although the voice is flexible and constantly changing, accents have remained the same through generations. Cox recalled a study in England which proved there is a north-south divide in the way people pronounce certain words. In the south, bath is pronounced “bah-th,” where in the north, it is pronounced “bath.” Cox said accents haven’t changed because they are “a part of identity.”

Cox concluded his lecture with a story of a woman named Eugenia whose husband passed away in a car accident. Eugenia uploaded their text messages into an artificial intelligence engine and made a “chat bot” so she could talk to him again. Cox finds this concept fascinating and a little “creepy,” but said it leads into his next point: Voice identity is under threat. Current artificial intelligence technology can use speech synthesis systems to mimic individual voices. According to Cox, this will be used to both “comic and ill effect.”

“We’ve all had emails pretending to be from a loved one who is lost and needs money transferred to a bank account and all that; we are going to start getting voice messages doing exactly the same,” he said. “Unfortunately, with all of these technologies, they get used for ill.”

But there is an advantage to the developing technology. For people who want to speak in their natural voice, but can’t due to medical reasons, speech synthesis provides sufficient personalization of artificial language.

“I can’t imagine anything more important than being able to say to your wife, your husband or your children that you love them, in your own voice,” Cox said.

Several student musicians will continue a decades-old tradition and partnership between the School of Music and the Hebrew Congregation of Chautauqua when they perform today.

At 3:15 p.m. Tuesday, July 23 in the Everett Jewish Life Center in Chautauqua, five students who received scholarships from the Hebrew Congregation will give a recital in gratitude. The recital is open to all and will take the place of the Hebrew Congregation’s usual Tuesday Conversations & Refreshments event.

The Hebrew Congregation of Chautauqua is a Jewish organization that intends to provide egalitarian worship opportunities to the Jewish community on the grounds, while also welcoming those from outside the faith who are curious about Judaism. The Hebrew Congregation has been on the grounds since 1960, and the scholarship program with the School of Music has existed for nearly as long.

“Shortly after (the founding), because of their commitment to supporting many facets of life at Chautauqua, they began giving these scholarships,” said Arthur Salz, historian and former president of the Hebrew Congregation. “It’s been a tradition that I don’t think has been broken in the 59 years (since), and we just are so pleased to be able to make this contribution to life in Chautauqua.”

The Hebrew Congregation of Chautauqua began with two Jewish women who were violinists at the School of Music and decided to arrange the first Jewish services on the grounds. Though no records directly connect the two violinists to the current scholarship program, it is possible they were the first link between the congregation and the School of Music.

“We did not find anything in the archives that said, ‘Oh, isn’t it terrific, it was two violinists (from the School of Music) who started this (congregation), so let’s continue contributing to the music school,’ ” Salz said, “But it’s very possible that the sentiment was there.”

The money for the scholarships comes from donations from the Hebrew Congregation community to the Chautauqua Foundation, that the School of Music then awards to students. The recipients do not have to be Jewish to receive one of the scholarships. Each year, five scholarships are awarded —  to three Instrumental Program students and two Voice Program students — totaling about $2,500.

“Every year, we like to share what we’ve earned with the Chautauqua community,” said Renee Andrews, School of Music liaison and former president of the Hebrew Congregation.

For the students, the scholarship provides support toward their enrollment at the School of Music. For members of the congregation, it is a chance to show support for Chautauqua’s young artists as they make strides in their professional careers.

“These are all very talented, very serious young musicians, who are on their way up,” Andrews said. “But no matter what discipline you’re in, it’s very competitive. So the fact that we can give this little bit of help is a feel-good for us, it’s helpful for them, and the fact that they come and play for us, which helps their career development and gives us an afternoon of pleasure — it’s truly a win-win.”

The students performing today are oboist Fernando Yanez, bassoonist Christopher Witt, flutist Jiyun Yi, mezzo-soprano Sarah Zieba and baritone Evan Lazdowski. All except Zieba will be joined by one of three members of the School of Music faculty — Akiko Konishi, Shannon Hesse or Donna Gill — on the piano.

In total, the program will feature nine pieces by eight different composers, giving attendees a varied and diverse listening experience.

When he was a “squirmy, shouty” grade school student, Abraham Smith entered an environmental speech contest.

“I’ve always been a performative person,” Smith said. “I think I frightened some of the older farmers who thought I was possessed.”

After completing his undergraduate program in archaeology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Smith would later move to Austin, Texas, to “pursue the ghost of (singer-songwriter) John Townes Van Zandt,” his “patron saint.”

It was there that he encountered the open mic and poetry slam scene — and the idea that “one should read a poem with all manner of decorum … as if I was running for mayor in a suburb.” 

But Smith wanted his slam performance to mirror the “riotness” and excitement he felt writing a poem; he wanted to move his body like his favorite musicians — to let loose a “coyote of a person.”

“I have been shouting and hopping and bellyaching ever since,” Smith said.

A poet and musician, Smith is the author of five poetry collections, most recently Destruction of Man, a book about a small-scale farming family from Third Man Books, the publishing imprint of Jack White’s Third Man Records.

The Week Five poet-in-residence at the Chautauqua Writers’ Center brings his passion for nature and music to his Brown Bag lecture, “Poeming is Farming,” at 12:15 p.m. Tuesday, July 23 on the porch of the Literary Arts Center at Alumni Hall. Smith described his talk as “elegiac … a bucolic or pastoral meditation upon what farming does to the Earth and what farming does to the human body.”

“At the end of the day, farmers complain that they’re landlocked and have no vacation, that they’re welded to the land and to the animals that one stewards,” he said. “Poets speak of a feeling of failure if they’re not sitting down to write every day, or engaging in the creative act of making poems in every day.

Instead of focusing on the “numbing sense of rote duty,” Smith hopes to engage “the beautiful and dynamic ritual at play in both (farming and writing poems).”

He’s intimately familiar with both acts. Raised by public school teachers in the rural counties of Rusk and Taylor, Wisconsin, Smith grew up surrounded by farms. He then worked on his family’s farm, returning from school during winter and summer breaks to chop wood or clear orchards. Over the years, he’s watched farms, including his own, fade and die away.

“I identify foremost as a rural person and someone who identifies strongly with the around-the-year farmer,” he said.

Immersed, and often alone, in the natural world as a self-proclaimed “wildly unpopular human being,” Smith grew up “deeply touched” and “haunted” by the sounds of wind and crows. Now, as a published poet, Smith holds with him the “romantic notion that the miraculous is found in common things” within a sometimes dismal world — a hawk on top of a bike pole in Nashville, or the “feral” greenness of the South “inchworming up everything.”

“I see something that shakes me up a bit and I’m back to the keyboard,” he said. “I let it percolate around in my imagination. I’m moved by the world every day. I’m moved to write it down in a sonically nuanced way.”

Devoted to the oral poetic tradition and the song qualities of a poem, Smith writes poems that lend themselves to “loud and rhythmical performances.”

“Poems don’t necessarily cohere to a narrative thread,” he said. “I pledge allegiance to where the sound will take me.”

His next project is a poetic manuscript about cranes, the long-legged and long-necked birds. Nature will always find a way to sneak into his work.

“I want to write so carelessly that everything that is not green dies,” he said.

Hillsdale College houses statues of many great minds from the 19th and 20th centuries on its “Liberty Walk”: Abraham Lincoln, Margaret Thatcher, C.S. Lewis, Frederick Douglass and Ronald Reagan. Larry P. Arnn has studied them all.

Arnn — the 12th president of Hillsdale and professor of politics and history, teaching courses on Aristotle, Winston Churchill and the U.S. Constitution — will deliver the morning lecture at 10:45 a.m. Tuesday, July 23 in the Amphitheater, continuing Week Five’s theme, “The Life of the Spoken Word.”

“As Aristotle observes, man is a rational animal — it is his capacity for reason that separates him from the beasts,” Arnn said. “Because he has reason, he can deliberate upon what is just and unjust, what is good and evil. Further, reason makes him capable of speech, through which he deliberates on these same questions with his fellow men.”

Hillsdale is a traditionally conservative institution in southern Michigan that “believes an educated citizenry can be a powerful force for honoring, understanding and defending America’s founding principles,” according to the college’s website. It was founded by abolitionists in the Civil War era, and was progressive for its time, opening its doors to women and black students in the mid-1800s.

Hillsdale forgoes federal or state funding, and is — as U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas described it — a “shining city on a hill” for conservatives. Thomas gave Hillsdale’s 2016 commencement address; Vice President Mike Pence delivered the 2018 address.

“It is through reasoned argument and learning that the student discovers what is good and true and rises to virtue and self-government,” Arnn said. “The turmoil seen on college campuses over the past decade indicates that this purpose is nearly forgotten. Colleges and students alike have stifled free speech and deliberation for the sake of ideology or security, and they have often done so violently. This is dangerous, both to the student and to the nation.”

Arnn made national headlines in 2016 when he publicly endorsed then-presidential candidate Donald Trump; Arnn was later considered for Trump’s secretary of education, but he was ultimately passed over for Betsy DeVos. 

“People said to me, ‘You love Abraham Lincoln and Winston Churchill, how can you support Trump?’ I said, ‘I didn’t know they were in the race,’ ” Arnn said in a 2017 interview with The New York Times.

In his capacity as president, Arnn has launched several new initiatives at Hillsdale and brought in leading scholars and public figures through a distinguished visiting fellowship program.

Prior to Hillsdale, Arnn was president of the Claremont Institute, a conversative think tank, and currently serves on the Heritage Foundation’s board of directors. He also lived and studied in England, working as the director of research for the late official biographer of Churchill, Sir Martin Gilbert.

Arnn is the editor of The Churchill Documents, a sub-series of Churchill’s official biography; under Arnn’s direction it will grow to a total of 31 volumes. He has authored three books.

To Patrick Mason, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the most prominent religious tradition to come out of the Burned-over District.

“I’ll be talking about the transformation of Mormonism from very humble origins in Western New York in the 1820s, to the worldwide religion that it is today,” said Mason, an author, historian and Leonard J. Arrington Endowed Chair of Mormon History and Culture at Utah State University. “I hope people gain an appreciation for this really surprising religious movement that starts with a farm boy in New York.”

At 2 p.m. Tuesday, July 23 in the Hall of Philosophy, Mason will discuss “Mormonism: From the Burned-Over District to a New World Religion” as part of the Week Five interfaith theme, “Chautauqua: Rising from the Ashes of the Burned-Over District.”

The Burned-over District refers to western regions of New York State that, in the 19th century, experienced religious revivals and movements of the Second Great Awakening.

Mason said that while the Mormon church had a relatively modest effect in the Burned-over District itself, it quickly gained traction and moved west to Utah.

“I think it’s emblematic of the Burned-over District — it comes out of that milieu,” he said. “But it doesn’t have the same transformational effect on the Burned-over District as other forms of evangelical Protestantism. It comes out of that environment, and has the Burned-over District stamped all over it in terms of its origins.”

According to Mason, the Mormon church began when a young farmer named Joseph Smith, as he described it, saw the “first vision” of God.

“He organized his church in 1830, but a year after that the church moved out of New York to a new home in Ohio and Missouri,” Mason said. “And it’s because Joseph Smith didn’t feel safe (in New York). He and the other converts were being persecuted and receiving threats of violence that had happened ever since he reported his initial visions.”

Mason said it was ironic Smith was forced to leave Western New York because of religious persecution, since the western part of the state was populated by people who left eastern New York and New York City to find more religious freedom.

“Another irony is that Joseph Smith and the early Mormons felt like they were trying to settle the religious debate,” he said. “The religion came about because there was a cacophony of religious voices in the region. Smith wanted to settle the problem once and for all by an appeal to revelation and heaven itself, and of course all he does is create yet another religion that added to the cacophony, rather than muting it.”

The very existence of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is fascinating to Mason, a fascination he said he wants to share with his lecture audience.

“For me, it’s one of the surprises of history,” he said. “I think about just how dynamic and formative the Burned-over District was and continues to be, even 200 years later.”

In the blistering summer heat, the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra and the School of Dance will welcome the holidays (just a few months early) with candy canes and marzipan.

At 8:15 p.m. Tuesday, July 23 in the Amphitheater, the CSO will perform the Act II score of Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker, for the collaborative concert “Nutcracker in July.” School of Dance students will present five divertissements, also from the second act, when Clara and her Nutcracker prince are welcomed into the Sugar Plum Fairy’s Land of Sweets. 

“The Nutcracker doesn’t need much in the way of introduction,” said CSO Conductor and Music Director Rossen Milanov. “For Americans, it is one of the most popular Christmas stories.”

The Nutcracker debuted in the late 1800s in Russia, with underwhelming success; however in the last century, the classic Christmas tale has experienced a revival, with American choreographer George Balanchine’s 1950s adaptation.

It was an American blockbuster of a performance: a gargantuan Christmas tree that grew onstage, indoor snow, and elaborate costumes. And the tradition continues; according to The New York Times, the New York City Ballet — Balanchine’s company — earns about 40% of its yearly revenue from The Nutcracker.

“It’s an American tradition, but in Europe, there’s no tradition,” said Jean-Pierre Bonnefoux, the School of Dance’s artistic director. “We’d perform The Nutcracker, but it had nothing to do with the time of the year. It’s just a story, but not just for kids.”

School of Dance Festival and Apprentice dancers will perform the “Spanish Chocolate,” “Arabian Coffee,” “Chinese Tea,” “Candy Cane” and “Marzipan” dances — all characters from the Sugar Plum Fairy’s Land of Sweets.

The choreography is a Bonnefoux-original, which premiered with Charlotte Ballet; the costumes featured at tonight’s concert are also from Charlotte Ballet. All the divertissements will be performed en pointe.

The concert will open with Russian composer Igor Stravinsky’s “Divertimento” from Le baiser de la fée. The “Divertimento” is a concert suite for orchestra that Stravinsky wrote based on music from one of his own ballets, Le baiser de la fée (The Fairy’s Kiss). The ballet, which draws influence from Russian fairy tales, tells the story of a young man spirited away from his village and fiancée by a powerful fairy.

Stravinsky, a towering figure of 20th-century music, was inspired as a child by a production of Tchaikovsky’s The Sleeping Beauty and dedicated this score to “the memory of Pyotr Tchaikovsky.”

“It’s going to be nice to hear the wonderful music of Tchaikovsky that the symphony is going to play,” Bonnefoux said. “It’s just wonderful to be working on the Amphitheater with the symphony. That’s really a treat.”

Story by Maggie Prosser and Val Lick.

For Week Four’s Interfaith Friday in the Hall of Philosophy, the Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, vice president of religion and senior pastor, posed a series of questions to Rabbi Deborah Waxman, who spoke on behalf of reconstructionist Judaism.

The first woman rabbi to head a Jewish seminary and congregational union, Waxman is the Aaron and Marjorie Ziegelman Presidential Professor and president of Reconstructing Judaism, a rabbinical college and the central organization of the Jewish reconstructionist movement. Under her leadership, the college has been able to develop a new curriculum.

Waxman has also written for publications such as the The Forward, The Times of Israel, The Philadelphia Inquirer and Huffington Post.

What follows is an abridged version of Waxman’s conversation. Waxman and Robinson’s remarks have been condensed for clarity.

Robinson: You talked about how religion is evolving. I actually happen to agree with that, but what does that do to the notion of eternal truths?

Waxman: When Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan proposed his way of understanding Judaism — and he really wanted it to be vitalizing for all of Judaism and for all progressive religions — the first thing he suggested was to look at the breadth of Jewish life and see that religion was at the center of it. It was an animating impetus to create a whole, rich civilization. … The continuity was not any particular understanding of God or any particular core beliefs, but in fact the ongoing existence of the Jewish people wrestling with God at all times, open to other influences … and also reactive to things that were thrust upon us, like the destruction of the temple or the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in the 15th century.

And, it was the persistence of the Jewish people and our connection to the divine that led to Jewish existence. As self-conscious moderns aware of history and how things changed, if we insisted on any one understanding of God or other eternal truths, it’s likely that the Jewish people and the Jewish civilization would have disappeared. Israelite rite was based around animal sacrifice at a central location in Judaism. Had there not been some way to re-imagine another way of approaching and experiencing the divine, the Israelite people and the nascent Jewish religion would have disappeared.

The ancient rabbis didn’t think that they were breaking with what came beyond; they were seeking some kind of continuity. In the Talmud, they were seeking to weave together continuities, but they also were introducing radical change that ended up being continuous rather than disruptive. So, what this means is that we are constantly seeking after the divine and seeking after eternal truths, but we do it with a sense of humility and with a sense of recognition of how much Jewish thought and Jewish life has changed. This ideally should inoculate us against fundamentalism and against too much certainty. We liberal Jews do it with an understanding that (is represented) here at Chautauqua Institution — that we can learn deeply from other traditions. So Kaplan himself read the Christian theologians who were putting forward process theology with great interest and was deeply informed by their insights, even as he Judaized them. What it means, I think, is a lot of work and a lot of wrestling and not a lot of certainty. I think that is an apt religious stance for our time.

When we think of Job and this incredibly manipulative sport between God and the devil — which it just seems unbelievably cruel — what are your thoughts?

Satan’s a conundrum because I believe the Book of Job is the only time that Satan appears in the Hebrew Bible. So, it’s an outlier character, and God responds, so it’s not like you can just put this off. It is a conundrum, though, because here we have this incredible book of not just theology, but the odyssey of divine justice with this character who makes a brief appearance and doesn’t really return again. That’s its own subject of discussion. But, it’s clear that Job emerges from a large philosophical and religious conversation happening among faith traditions in the time. And, we see evidence of that throughout the Hebrew Bible, of other traditions winning their way in. But, you’re right about the cruelty in the Book of Job. I do not turn to Job for comfort myself. I know that there are many rabbis who feel like it is the greatest source of poetry in the Hebrew Bible. I am deeply pained by that.

Do you suppose that Satan … figured more heavily in the millennium before Job, that Job was sort of the tail end of that?

What I feel convinced of is that we humans have been asking these questions about why some evil people are rewarded and some good people suffer so terribly. … It’s an abiding impulse to say all of this is embedded in … a God who is co-equal to the divine or subordinate. … I find that that’s a slippery slope, and it is too easy to turn it into some othering that I think lets us off the hook too much. And I don’t really want to be let off the hook. I want to be called every single day to try to make manifest godliness in the world.

In terms of not positing a personal God that you can snuggle up to and have a chat with, what does that do for prayer? Does prayer then just become a stylized, liturgical act?

One of my teachers, Rabbi Jacob Staub, has a really powerful article titled “Building a Personal Relationship with a Nonpersonal God.” Even as there is rich imagery and tremendous poetry for names of God, a lot of the liturgy really does address a personal God. When I pray, it is something much more than a stylized exercise. One thing I know that I’m doing is I’m joining in the hopes, the aspirations and the pain of thousands of years of my ancestors before me, and putting forward my own expression of those. There is certainly a practice of individual prayer in Judaism, but overwhelmingly, we come together in a group of at least 10 in a quorum, and we’re praying from a set liturgy. At all times, prayer is an act of humility. Prayer is about remembering that the universe and the world is much larger than just myself. And so, I cannot know who the address is. I’m very happy to use sometimes the traditional liturgy, sometimes more contemporary liturgy. But that said, I’ll tell you two quick stories.

Our sister-in-law died of metastatic breast cancer at the age of 36, after a valiant four-year battle, and I was incredibly angry at a God I didn’t believe in. And every day, my brother asked me to say the mourner’s meditation because he was parenting a 4-year-old child. Every single day, I would cry and ask “Why?” and my answer is this: My pain was the pain of why. Eventually, it was the community that held me and supported me and brought me back around. And the pain lessened but didn’t disappear.

I’ll tell you another story. There’s a line from the Psalms that says: “From a narrow place, I crawled out to God, and he answered me and brought me into a wide open space.” And, any number of times where I just feel so constrained and so uptight and so miserable, all I have said is “help” and … just in that action of turning to something that is larger than myself, I can breathe more freely and the space is wider. I do not know who or what the address is, but I know it is something beyond myself.

Richard Rohr said there are some things that we can’t resolve; we just have to hold them. Does this sound right to you?

I think that’s right. I don’t think that my theology needs to be systematic and comprehensive and complete. I have two different images that work really well for me. One is poetry. For me, theology is evocative and what works in the moment. And sometimes, it is very traditional and sometimes it is just the help. Then, I think the way I piece it together is much more like a quilt than it is a blanket. And, I love the seams (because) the seams are part of my own story and help me remember how I went from a place of suffering to a place of greater peace.

Would you describe to us what godliness looks like? How will we know it when we see it?

What is true for one person may not be true for others.  … I’ll tell you another story. I came to visit my brother and sister-in-law. … Right as (my brother) arrived home from work, someone from their synagogue came and delivered the shabbos meal for us, the meal for Friday night. She arrived just as my brother and I were greeting each other — and it was an emotional greeting — and she just handed over the package and left. My brother had a kind of arrested look on his face as she left. He turned to me and said, “I have no idea who that was.” I tell that story as … an example of godliness. … If we exercise and hone ourselves to be attuned to godliness, then we will know it when we see it, and we will be inclined to see it often.

Alisha Jones grew up in Washington D.C. surrounded by art and creativity.

“The creative spirit was always around and encouraged,” she said.

Music quickly became an integral part of her life, as she attended popular youth enrichment camps in Washington D.C., auditioned with the Washington Performing Arts society and attended Duke Ellington School of the Arts, a performing arts high school.

“It was (at Duke Ellington) that I learned not only about musicianship, but I was able to explore black art song and folk music of African Americans,” Jones said.

From German art song to Italian art song, she found music made an intense impact, not only on society, but also the performers themselves.

With a lasting passion for music, Jones said she continues to use her musical skills to “bolster her research” in the field of ethnomusicology, the study of music in different cultures.

At 3:30 p.m. today, July 22, in the Hall of Philosophy, Jones will give her lecture “Are You Familiar with N.W.A.? ­— Deciphering Musical Grievances Against Law Enforcement in African-American Hip-hop,” which is the latest installment in the African American Heritage House Speaker Series.

Jones is an assistant professor of ethnomusicology at Indiana University Bloomington in the Department of Folklore and Ethnomusicology.

As her students consume more music written by African American’s, it provokes lively conversation in class, she said.

“Often, the students request that I talk about the sentiments that rappers have had and recorded in their music,” Jones said.

For her Chautauqua lecture, she said her goal is to explore the origins of the tumultuous relationship between popular African American music artists and the law.   

“My goal is to kind of walk through the genealogy of these grievances, particularly the tensions that are at the root of these sentiments and how law has been used to control the music that is being made,” Jones said.    

Her music background, coupled with her family’s involvement in the police force, sparked her interest, and especially directed her attention to the daily challenges facing police.

“Law enforcement tends to get critiqued nationally,” she said. “So, I focus on this as a person whose family members are service people, both men and women.”

Jones said this relationship between African American popular artists and police is not new. She will highlight the songs written by popular artists like Cardi B, N.W.A., Kanye West and many others.

“I would like for them to know that African American music — as exemplified through rock music and hip-hop — is commodity,” Jones said. “As we think about rap music, I want to challenge attendees to really think about the stereotypes that are furthered through the music.”

Jones said she hopes her lecture will generate further interest in African American music.

“My hope is that they will continue to learn more about the stories and the styles of black music culture,” Jones said.

For those seeking a day of levity, an afternoon escape or simply looking to laugh, the National Comedy Center is now providing an additional option to the lecture platforms, arts and entertainment offered at Chautauqua Institution. On July 8, the Comedy Center launched a free shuttle service to and from the Institution.

The shuttle runs every day starting at 9:30 a.m. and will pick up guests at the Athenaeum Hotel, as well as the Main Gate Welcome Center, before heading to the museum. It will continue to pick up guests from the Institution until 1:40 p.m., and will continue to make rounds to drop visitors off from the Comedy Center until 6:10 p.m.

In total, the shuttle will make three trips to the Institution to pick up guests and four return trips from the museum to drop people off. For more information or to reserve a seat on any shuttle, guests can visit
comedycenter.org/chqshuttle/.

Gary Hahn, director of marketing and communications for the Comedy Center, said he knows the difficulties of driving on and off the grounds, and that he hopes the shuttle helps take some of the burden off guests.

“We know a lot of guests at Chautauqua park for the week, and don’t necessarily want to go back into their cars during what might be their vacation week,” Hahn said. “We just want to make it really easy and convenient for anyone who wants to visit us to make the trip.”

Hahn said the National Comedy Center provides an entertaining and engaging experience for visitors of all ages. Because the center is something that everyone can enjoy, Hahn said it’s a perfect destination for Chautauquans of all ages. 

“The National Comedy Center is fantastic for the entire family,” Hahn said. “It’s a highly engaging, state-of-the-art space with some immersive, interactive exhibits and something that everyone can enjoy.”

According to Hahn, when visitors arrive at the museum, their experience is tailored to their individual sense of humor. Through kiosks at the entrance, visitors create a humor profile that then shapes their experience throughout the rest of the museum.

For those looking to make a trip to the Comedy Center, the shuttle will continue to run throughout the entire season.

The service is a continuation of the partnership between the Institution and the National Comedy Center, program partners for the upcoming Week Six theme, “What’s Funny?”

“We value our partnership with the Institution greatly,” Hahn said. “We’re looking forward to comedy week and we know that Chautauquans love to laugh. So for anyone looking for one off-campus experience before, during or after comedy week, we wanted to make that option as accessible as possible.”

As the School of Music Piano Program enters its penultimate week, piano students have the chance to put their skills to the test in the annual piano competition. The preliminary round will begin at 9:30 a.m. Monday, July 22 in Sherwood-Marsh Studios and continue throughout most of the day.

Though the competition is not mandatory for the Piano Program students, it is strongly encouraged that all students participate, and usually they all do. It is the second piano competition of the season; in Week One, students competed in the Sigma Alpha Iota Competition, which rotates each year between the School of Music’s Voice, Instrumental and Piano Programs. This week’s competition, on the other hand, happens in the Piano Program each year.

While the SAI Competition was done in concerto style — where students played a single piece with accompaniment by a second piano — in this competition the students play solo. They must play two contrasting pieces, from memory, to give the judges an idea of the breadth of their skills. There are no restrictions to the repertoire that the students may choose from.

“I think all things being equal, the judges would rather hear a pianist who plays a more varied program than one who plays a more uniform program, in terms of style,” said John Milbauer, co-chair of the Piano Program.

There are three judges for the preliminary round and three different ones for the final. All are from outside of the Piano Program. They will judge the students on a number of criteria including the cleanness of the playing, timing, pedaling, the shape of the musical phrases, the balance between the use of both hands and other musicianship skills.

“That’s maybe the primary consideration, but the superseding one is: Are they making something beautiful?” Milbauer said. “Are they conveying the music in a way that is most resonant or most compelling and most beautiful? That’s where we rely on the judges, because that’s very subjective.”

There are usually four to five students who move on to the final round, which will take place at 1 p.m. Thursday in Fletcher Music Hall. Finalists will get to play either several new pieces, or they may play the full version of what they chose for the preliminary round. First, second and third place will then be awarded.

The winners will receive a three-part prize: a cash prize — usually around $1,000 or $2,000 — an offer to return to Chautauqua next year on a full scholarship and a place in the winners’ recital at 4 p.m. Friday in Fletcher. The money for the prizes comes from donations from the community and supporters of the Piano Program. The second and third place winners will play the first half of the recital, while the first place winner will be given the entire second half of the recital to perform.

This competition always takes place during Week Five, which is typically the final week of the Piano Program. Usually, it is the culmination of all that the students have learned over the summer, meant to be one last exhibition before they leave the grounds.

“It focuses their energy, and you hear the results in their playing,” Milbauer said. “It’s a great showcase for that.”

This year, the program will continue for one extra week, giving students time to wind down from the pressures of the competition and continue learning and performing at Chautauqua for a while longer.