SARANAC LAKE — Lake Flower Landing recently received an arts grant award from the 2025 Statewide Community Regrant program to support continuing weekly drawing sessions and a fall concert series. At their studio gallery, Lake Flower Landing, Peter Seward and Ren Davidson Seward host film screenings, literary events and community meetings in addition to these special offerings.
Non-instructional drawing sessions will resume at Lake Flower Landing on Tuesday evenings from 6 to 9 p.m. Poses by clothed models range from 5 to 25 minutes. Participation in a supportive environment encourages development, and all are welcome to participate.
The fall music series “Cello-Palooza” features five women cellists over three Sunday afternoon concerts at 4 p.m. Even when coming out of a solid foundation of classical training, each performer brings a unique perspective to their instrument. Some use advanced technology to “loop” — record and repeat a rhythmic line– and alter the “voice” of the instrument.
The first of these concerts is Sunday, Sept. 21. Belgian-born Helen Gillet will present a unique mix of texture and rhythm using an acoustic cello in service to her songs. Her solo performances are enigmatic and innovative as she fabricates each song with true mastery of live looping technology. Percussive rhythms emerge by bowing, plucking, rubbing and slapping on the body of the cello. Enhanced melodies are played or sung in her haunting alto. Her mixed repertoire is commensurate with her disparate travels — French chanson of the 1940s, Belgian folk tunes sung in Walloon, a mix of rock and punk from the likes of PJ Harvey and X-Ray Spex, and her own affecting originals, which she developed since living in New Orleans.
The second concert is Sunday, Oct. 26. Three cellists from New York state come together in a new music program: Esther Baker, Patricia Santos and Tara Hannish. Baker will share two original pieces using pre-recorded audio with her acoustic cello. One work is inspired by cellist Eugene Friesen who focuses on meditation and improvisation. The original concept for the second piece is artist Sterz Imrie who monitored his own brain tumor with magnetic resonance imaging — MRI — to create a score for three cellos, with projections by artist Roseminna Watson. Esther lived in Saranac Lake, Keene Valley and now Rochester. With her husband, Gene Baker, they presented the Bakery Concert Series at Lake Flower Landing in 2017.
Santos describes herself as a singing cellist and songwriter. Lucid Culture magazine called her a “dark, diverse cello rocker.” With classical training, she melds the cello with non-classical styles and exploratory techniques for blues, rock, folk and pop. Santos is half of the duo Petty Larceny, and in the parlor rock big band Kotorino. She has worked with Hurray for the Riff Raff, Martha Redbone, Charming Disaster and The Orange Peels, among others. She serves on the board of directors of the New Directions Cello Association, an alternative-style cello festival.
Hannish’s interest in multiple genres took her cello career from orchestral and traditional chamber music to theater and new music chamber groups to supporting artists like the Foo Fighters and Kanye West. She writes and records string arrangements for various musical projects. Hannish and Santos are also present as a singing cello duo, The Whiskey Girls.
Finally, on Sunday, Nov. 9, New York City-based cellist Clare Monfredo will be featured in a solo concert. She studied in Leipzig, Germany on a Fulbright Scholarship with cellist Peter Bruns. She appeared in numerous festivals including Chamber Music Northwest, Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, Piatigorsky International Cello Festival, Tanglewood Music Center, and Music Academy of the West. Monfredo currently teaches cello at Hunter College in New York and is a member of the Sprechgesang Institute multi-disciplinary artist collective. She integrates traditional composers like Debussy and Rachmaninoff, with contemporary ones like Caroline Shaw.
Additionally, two other concerts will be on Fridays in October and November at 8 p.m.
Iva Bittova, an internationally-celebrated Czech-based violin/vocalist, will perform on Friday, Oct. 3. She describes her approach as her “own personal folk music” combining improvisation and extended vocal techniques that are based in European-folk and classical music. Bittova is a performer connected to nature, to her body and to the space she performs in, using the acoustics of a given space to her advantage. Bittova performs widely with her violin and is a featured vocalist with the Prague Philharmonic, with her European ensemble; Cikora, her American ensemble; and Eviyan, the Calder and Skampa String Quartets. She collaborates with jazz and avant-garde luminaries. A special guest will open the evening.
On Friday, Nov. 21, The Bills open for Casey Neill’s return to Lake Flower Landing. American roots and Scots/Irish-folk influences underscore Neill’s songwriting and solo material. His Pogues-styled rocking song, “Hurray for the Riff Raff,” is a favorite bar band cover. He attests to randomly hearing it played at clubs with no awareness that the author is in the audience. A band even claimed his title for their name. Neill tours the U.S., Japan and Europe, and has performed at Town Hall in New York City, Bumbershoot in Washington state and the Newport Folk Festival. His latest release as a bandleader of the Norway Rats, “Sending Up Flares,” features songs that evoke the cinematic sweep of golden-era U2 and the dark, complex alt-rock of PJ Harvey. Casey’s collaborators include Jenny Conlee of The Decemberists, Corin Tucker of Sleater-Kinney and Peter Buck of R.E.M.
Saranac Lake’s own Billy Allen, founder of The Waterhole, opens the evening with songs he’s crafted with humility, wisdom and introspection. Supported by Shamim Allen of The Dustbunnies and Bill Chamberlain of High on the Hog, The Bills premiered Billy’s recent songs at Lake Flower Landing to an overflow crowd in 2024, and he hasn’t stopped writing and performing new ones ever since.
For more information or to make a reservation for the concerts, email lakeflowerlanding@gmail.com, text 917-887-7149 or visit lakeflowerlanding.com. Lake Flower Landing is located at 421 Lake Flower Ave. in Saranac Lake.