Twenty Summers Expands Its Space and Season
Every spring, the Twenty Summers cultural program extends over five weeks in Provincetown. This year, it seems program director Alice Gong doesn’t want to waste a minute of that time: the current 11th season has twice as many events as in 2023 — and Gong was still adding to the schedule as of late April.
Programs featuring visual art, music, film, books, and architecture, along with a first-time dance residency, begin on Wednesday, May 15 and run until Tuesday, June 11. Gong says that she and producer Cecilia Parker are aiming to maximize use of the historic Hawthorne Barn (29 Miller Hill Road, Provincetown) and that some events may take place outside.
“I can’t help myself. I love the excitement and energy,” Gong says. “The barn is so wonderful that I want as many opportunities for people to come as possible and to engage a variety of audiences.” Gong is collaborating with the organization’s new executive director, Bill Riehl, who began work in late April.
Events including an opening party and a preview of Twenty Summers’ first documentary project will introduce the organization’s new 20S Annex at 494 Commercial St. While Gong says that more detailed plans for the new space will be announced postseason, the annex will serve as an art-and-ideas “incubator” for year-round programming.
The Hawthorne Barn will be the venue for presentations by resident artists — including movement group Synchronous and opera singer JU-EH — plus visiting artists. Other events include concerts by musicians Jake Blount, Bermuda Search Party, May Erlewine, Kioea, and others; chats with authors Isle McElroy and Rebecca Orchant; and a “Nettle Fest” for exploring that plant as food.
A new partnership with the publication Atmos will bring a series of conversations on environment issues and activism to the schedule as well as a concert and sound bath. Gong says the organizations’ missions are closely aligned.
“Especially living in Provincetown, we need to face the future optimistically and actively engage in these conversations,” she says. “We hope through art and creativity, it’s not such doom and gloom. It’s reality, so let’s start talking about solutions.”
See 20summers.org for a complete schedule and more information. —Kathi Scrizzi Driscoll
Gabriella Simpkins Comes Into Her Own
May 1 marked four years since singer, songwriter, and composer Gabriella Simpkins decided to become a professional musician. During the early months of the pandemic, “music was really the only thing I wanted to get out of bed for,” she says. Simpkins, who grew up in Hyannis and started writing songs when she was 13, will perform in the final show of the Winter Music Series at the Truro Public Library (7 Standish Way) on Saturday, May 11 at 2 p.m.
Her music follows the lineage of Nick Drake, Elliot Smith, and Joni Mitchell, whom she counts as formative influences. On guitar, Simpkins threads simple, ruminating chord progressions that accompany intensely personal lyrics.
“Flooded with emotion, somehow still full of devotion, to a picture of us I meticulously paint,” she sings in a song called “No Regard.” “No matter how hard I try, you have no regard, no taste in art, so don’t try to explain it….”
The phrases bleed into each other, barely leaving space for breath, and resemble in theme and structure the intoxication of falling in love. Yet there is an emotional distance in the song’s arrangement and production, which Simpkins says she recently approached after she reflected on what she had learned from the relationship.
Her debut album, which she hopes to release in the next year, delivers shades of hope and heartbreak, resurrecting the phantom of that first love. “At its core, it’s folk music, but there are a lot of influences from classical to jazz to rock,” says Simpkins. “Finishing this project is almost like a coming-of-age moment for me. I’ve finally come into my own.”
The performance is free. See trurolibrary.org for information. —Aden Choate
Every Town Has a Story
Jim Coogan is 80 years old, and except for his time in the Navy during the Vietnam War, he has lived on Cape Cod his whole life. He grew up in Brewster, graduated from Dennis-Yarmouth Regional High School, where he also worked as a history teacher for 30 years, and now lives in Sandwich.
“Every town on the Cape has a story,” he says. In his time here, Coogan has researched hundreds of them. He is the coauthor of the 1999 Cape Cod Companion: The History and Mystery of Old Cape Cod and the 2001 Cape Cod Voyage: A Journey Through Cape Cod’s History and Lore, which together recount stories about “seafaring, local industries, unusual characters, wartime experiences, shipwrecks, and more,” he says.
In partnership with the Wellfleet Historical Society and Museum, Coogan will be telling stories related to the Outer Cape at the Wellfleet Public Library (55 West Main St.) on Wednesday, May 15 at 7 p.m. “I’m not sure exactly what stories I’ll tell just yet,” he says. “I like to play it by ear and assess the crowd. I can tell how much of a hit a story is by how much the audience is squirming in their seats.”
Some candidates include stories about Provincetown’s “East Enders and Harry Kemp and Eugene O’Neil” and Wellfleet’s Lorenzo Dow Baker, the American entrepreneur whose trip to Jamaica was responsible for the U.S. banana industry. “The stories are all based in fact and in my research,” he says, “but I try to tell them with lots of humor.”
The event is free. See wellfleetlibrary.org. —Paul Sullivan
Here’s to You, Stormy
“How could you not roast Stormy Mayo?” says Laura Stinson, assistant development director at the Center for Coastal Studies. She’s referring to the Friday, May 10 event at Provincetown Town Hall (260 Commercial St.) at 7 p.m., at which the community will celebrate the career and retirement of Charles “Stormy” Mayo, CCS cofounder and director of its Right Whale Ecology Program.
“It’s going to be a casual and fun night,” Stinson says. “We’re gathering a lot of Stormy’s colleagues and old friends. People are going to toast Stormy, but we’re also going to have a few people come up and roast him.” A roast, of course, is a speech when the guest of honor is teased and spoofed in good humor.
“I think it’s really important to honor Stormy and his vision and dedication to the environment and also honor the community around the organization he founded,” says Stinson.
The Independent reported on Mayo’s retirement in January. He will be succeeded by Daniel Palacios, an endowed associate professor in whale habitats in Oregon State University’s Dept. of Fisheries, Wildlife, and Conservation Sciences.
Mayo founded the Center for Coastal Studies in 1976 with scientist Graham Giese and his wife at the time, the late Barbara Shuler Mayo. In 1986, Mayo came upon the first known winter right whale in Cape Cod Bay and, since then, the right whale has been one of the center’s focuses. Mayo’s research, alongside his CCS staff, is credited with advancing Cape Cod Bay’s conservation laws and the establishment of the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary. “It’s really important to have all that recognized,” Stinson says.
The event is free to the public, but registration is required at coastalstudies.org. —Paul Sullivan
