The Library will be closed on the morning of Thursday, June 13, for an all staff training. We will open at 1pm on that day. Thank you for your understanding.
Jul
13
Thu
Adult Songwriting with Lisa
Jul 13 @ 3:30 pm – 4:30 pm
Adult Songwriting with Lisa

Attend one or both! Please RSVP at tinyurl.com/epl-adult-songwriting so we have an idea of how many folks will be attending. Recommended but not required.

Participants will listen to a few classic examples of powerfully vivid songwriting, and will generate ideas for new songs using a variety of writing exercises. No songwriting experience is required. Participants will be invited to share songs in process, time permitting.

Lisa Bastoni is a Northampton, MA-based singer-songwriter who has enjoyed a longtime presence in the northeast folk/Americana scene. She is a 2021 New England Music Award nominee (Roots), 2020 & 2019 Boston Music Award Nominee (Folk) and winner of 2019 New Folk at the esteemed Kerrville Folk Festival. In addition to her work in music, Lisa Bastoni is an accomplished visual artist and teacher, and mother to two young children. For more info, visit www.lisabastoni.com

Find Your Voice is sponsored by the Easthampton Public Library, Emily’s Friends of the Library, the Massachusetts Library System, the Boston Bruins, and the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners.

Jul
20
Thu
Adult Songwriting with Lisa
Jul 20 @ 12:30 pm – 1:30 pm
Adult Songwriting with Lisa

Please RSVP at tinyurl.com/epl-adult-songwriting so we have an idea of how many folks will be attending. Recommended but not required.

Participants will listen to a few classic examples of powerfully vivid songwriting, and will generate ideas for new songs using a variety of writing exercises. No songwriting experience is required. Participants will be invited to share songs in process, time permitting.

Lisa Bastoni is a Northampton, MA-based singer-songwriter who has enjoyed a longtime presence in the northeast folk/Americana scene. She is a 2021 New England Music Award nominee (Roots), 2020 & 2019 Boston Music Award Nominee (Folk) and winner of 2019 New Folk at the esteemed Kerrville Folk Festival. In addition to her work in music, Lisa Bastoni is an accomplished visual artist and teacher, and mother to two young children. For more info, visit www.lisabastoni.com

Find Your Voice is sponsored by the Easthampton Public Library, Emily’s Friends of the Library, the Massachusetts Library System, the Boston Bruins, and the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners.

Youth Songwriting with Lisa
Jul 20 @ 2:00 pm – 3:00 pm

During this special four week workshop designed for youth ages 9 and up, participants will join Lisa Bastoni, award-winning folk singer and songwriter, to learn about a variety of song forms and elements, and work collaboratively and individually to turn their own experiences into songs! Participants should register in advance, planning to come to each of the four weekly sessions: Sign up at the library in person or by calling us at 413-527-1031 or emailing us at youthdept@ewmlibrary.org.

Feb
27
Tue
Poetry & Practice: A Presentation by Easthampton’s Poet Laureate Carolyn A. Cushing
Feb 27 @ 6:00 pm – 7:00 pm
Poetry & Practice: A Presentation by Easthampton’s Poet Laureate Carolyn A. Cushing

One day last February Carolyn woke up with these words in her head: What if I listened to the landscape and wrote what I heard?

So she did. She pulled on her boots, gathered a 5 x 7 notebook and a pen, and set off on her usual Easthampton walk: past the library, cutting through the football field, over the bike path, by the factory, and into the cemetery by the pond. Nothing usual happened but she listened and looked and wrote as she walked. Her perception widened. The everyday happenings of our small city became extraordinary in their aliveness and in their reflection of our changing climate.

Carolyn will read poems written on these walks and talk about her inspirations and creative practice.

This presentation will inaugurate a series of Walking and Writing sessions with Carolyn on Saturday mornings leaving from the library at 8:30am and convening back there at 9:30 am to share what the landscape said to us.

Mar
2
Sat
Walking & Writing Sessions with Carolyn Cushing, Easthampton’s Poet Laureate
Mar 2 @ 8:30 am
Walking & Writing Sessions with Carolyn Cushing, Easthampton’s Poet Laureate

Three Saturdays, March 2nd, 9th and 23rd, 8:30am meet outside the library to begin walk, 9:30am reconvene inside the library.

Meet on the steps of the library at 8:30am. A map of the “official route” will be provided that you may follow or adapt to your own needs and interests. Our time of walking and writing is followed by a library meet up with this structure:

9:30-9:45 am: Chat about how the writing and walking went

At 9:45am: Anyone who wants to read from their notebook for up to 3 minutes may

Closing: A go around where people are invited to voice an intention about further developing or sharing their writing from the walk

All of these activities are optional. People who have walked at other points in the week are welcome to join for the sharing.

This event is weather dependent. If it is too wet for our notebooks (i.e. steady rain or snow) we will not go. If it is too icy to walk we will not go.

Mar
9
Sat
Walking & Writing Sessions with Carolyn Cushing, Easthampton’s Poet Laureate
Mar 9 @ 8:30 am
Walking & Writing Sessions with Carolyn Cushing, Easthampton’s Poet Laureate

Three Saturdays, March 2nd, 9th and 23rd, 8:30am meet outside the library to begin walk, 9:30am reconvene inside the library.

Meet on the steps of the library at 8:30am. A map of the “official route” will be provided that you may follow or adapt to your own needs and interests. Our time of walking and writing is followed by a library meet up with this structure:

9:30-9:45 am: Chat about how the writing and walking went

At 9:45am: Anyone who wants to read from their notebook for up to 3 minutes may

Closing: A go around where people are invited to voice an intention about further developing or sharing their writing from the walk

All of these activities are optional. People who have walked at other points in the week are welcome to join for the sharing.

This event is weather dependent. If it is too wet for our notebooks (i.e. steady rain or snow) we will not go. If it is too icy to walk we will not go.

Mar
23
Sat
CANCELLED: Walking & Writing Sessions with Carolyn Cushing, Easthampton’s Poet Laureate
Mar 23 @ 8:30 am
CANCELLED: Walking & Writing Sessions with Carolyn Cushing, Easthampton’s Poet Laureate

Due to forecasted weather, this is cancelled.

Three Saturdays, March 2nd, 9th and 23rd, 8:30am meet outside the library to begin walk, 9:30am reconvene inside the library.

Meet on the steps of the library at 8:30am. A map of the “official route” will be provided that you may follow or adapt to your own needs and interests. Our time of walking and writing is followed by a library meet up with this structure:

9:30-9:45 am: Chat about how the writing and walking went

At 9:45am: Anyone who wants to read from their notebook for up to 3 minutes may

Closing: A go around where people are invited to voice an intention about further developing or sharing their writing from the walk

All of these activities are optional. People who have walked at other points in the week are welcome to join for the sharing.

This event is weather dependent. If it is too wet for our notebooks (i.e. steady rain or snow) we will not go. If it is too icy to walk we will not go.