Providence Journal did a roundup of New Year’s Eve Festivals in the area– Bright Night, Newport, Westerly, and Fall River.

Got everything mostly right, (spelled Marvin Novogrodski’s name with a Y and at one point called our festival wristbands “First Night wristbands”)

At least they didn’t publish my home phone number (as they did one year!)

The article in the paper had some great photos of the event from previous years, some that I’d never seen before. And featured a lot of our performers. Definitely worth picking up. Photographs of vendors, of Chris Carbone, Davey the Clown, Keith Munslow, Bill Harley, and the Banished Fools.

To make it easier to forward, I created a tinyurl of the article:

http://tinyurl.com/brightnight-projo

Feel free to forward the url to your friends!

Remember, the discount for tickets ($10 instead of $15 ends on Tuesday!)

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By Richard Salit

Journal Staff Writer

Performers converged Tuesday on Providence City Hall for the mayor’s announcement of Bright Night festivities. Among them, Big Nazo, Snow Queen (Clare Vadeboncoeur), Mark Kohler and Marvelous Marvin Novogrodsky. In front is Bright Night director Adam Gertsacov.

The Providence Journal / Sandor Bodo

The Scrooge-like economy may be forcing some communities to scale back their New Year’s Eve celebrations, but revelers in Providence, Newport, Fall River and Westerly will still be treated to everything from fireworks to the Friars, music to magicians and storytellers to sword swallowers.

Budget shortages threatened to snuff out Newport’s annual pyrotechnics display and the rest of the City-by-the-Sea’s celebration, but First Night Newport survived and will go off as planned, complete with fireworks over the harbor.

While Bright Night Providence had to cancel its fireworks — out of safety concerns, not financial problems — the city will replace it with a laser show. In addition, for the second year in a row, the festival has teamed up with the Providence College Friars men’s basketball squad, which will be playing Big East rival St. John’s University at the Dunkin’ Donuts Center during Bright Night festivities.

“The big thing is for everyone to gather together and ring in the New Year right,” said Adam Gertsacov, director of Bright Night Providence, the artist-run, nonprofit group that has organized the New Year’s Eve celebration in the capital city for the past six years.

While Bright Night’s budget this year is “slightly smaller,” Gertsacov said it will still feature close to 160 performers in 22 venues.

“The big focus of our event has always been the performers. We want to celebrate Rhode Island’s most important asset — its performers,” Gertsacov said.

Every year, Bright Night selects a different act to take center stage in the event. This year, the featured group is the Nerveless Nocks, a family of daredevil circus acrobats. The ninth generation family, which was formed in Switzerland and used to perform during the summers at the now-defunct Rocky Point Amusement Park, will give three shows at Rhode Island Convention Center.

In one act, Michelangelo Nock will climb a 20-foot-tall tower of chairs and do handstands on top. The troupe will also use a pendulum to perform leaps and somersaults.

“You definitely don’t want to miss this, but you definitely don’t want to try it at home,” said Gertsacov. “These guys are courageous and virtuosos at what they do. They’ve performed for kings and queens, on television and for the Super Bowl.”

Admission to the Nerveless Nocks is guaranteed with the purchase of a First Night wristband, which designates which of the three shows, either 6, 8 or 10 p.m., its holder may attend.

Wristbands, which provide free admission to all of the Bright Night venues, cost $10 in advance and $15 on the day of the event (when a family four-pack may be purchased for $50). They are for sale at BankRI locations, OOP! Stores, the East Side Marketplace and ArtTixRI, 155 Westminster St. They may also be bought online at www.brightnight.org or by calling (401) 621-6123.

The first 3,000 people with wristbands to go to the Dunkin’ Donuts center will get free tickets to see the Friars game. Tip-off is at 4 p.m.

Like the fireworks display (which fire officials said could not continue for lack of a safe location to shoot them off), the laser show will begin at midnight. It will last nearly 20 minutes and feature music.

“That’s one thing we were never able to do with the fireworks was coordinate sound and music,” Gertsacov said.

Among the other performers are the Big Nazo Puppets, bebop artist Greg Abate and Grammy winning storyteller and singer Bill Harley.

In Newport, the grand event of the family-oriented New Year festivities is a fireworks display that you don’t have to wait until midnight to see. The pyrotechnics begin at 9:15, shortly after a parade from Thompson Middle School, on Broadway, ends at the harbor.

The Brazilian Capoeira Dancers will give three 45-minute shows––at 6, 7 and 8 p.m.—in the cafeteria of the middle school. Downstairs, in the gym, there will also be face painting, balloon sculpture, a kids bounce and slide, a clown, a magician and dancing for kids.

Next door, at City Hall, folk performers will turn the council chambers into a concert venue featuring Ed McGuirl and Mike Fischmen, The Remnants and Leroy White. Bluegrass music will be played live at the Florence Murray Judicial Complex.

Other venues include the Newport Marriott, the Gateway Visitors Center, and the Jane Pickens Theater.

Buttons cost $10 and may be purchased online at www.firstnightnewport.org. Children under age 5 may enter venues at no charge. Buttons may also be purchased at the Gateway Visitors Center and the Music Box, 160 Thames St., in Jamestown at Baker’s Pharmacy, in Portsmouth at Clements’ Marketplace and in Middletown at AAA of Southern New England.

Fireworks will also be shot off as part of First Night Westerly. In the past, there would be one pyrotechnics display early in the evening and one at midnight. This year, however, there will be just one show, at 9 p.m., a time meant to accommodate families, and that will conclude the evening.

“It’s a simpler event,” said organizer Ray Jones, pastor of the Lighthouse Community Baptist Church. “Basically what we did was we looked at the economy and we looked at our community and we just decided we were going to tailor our event to young families and just make it really cost-effective.”

Last year for example, American Idol contestant Chris Sligh performed.at First Night Westerly. This year, there will be no such headliner and there will be fewer venues for a shorter period of time. The price is $5, down from $13 last year.

But children’s activities will abound. At the library and YMCA, there will be arts and crafts, a mime, face painting and inflatable toys, while teen activities will take place at the Armory. Jazz and big band drummer Bobby Selvidio will perform on High Street. The best place to watch the fireworks will be from the YMCA parking lot, Jones said.

“It’s a nice wholesome time for people with their kids and teens. What our event is tailored around is providing a substance-free New Year’s Eve,” he said.

Buttons for First Night Westerly may be purchased on the day of the event at theYMCA or in advance at NewportFed and Washington Trust. For more information, go to www.firstnightwesterly.com.

Fall River also has downsized its celebration. The city announced that it would not be able to finance another First Night Fall River, but then community activists stepped up and produced a more modest replacement event, which they have dubbed “Back to Main Street: New Year’s Eve in the Neighborhood.”

“It’s an old-fashioned block party,” said Patrice Cloutier, the city’s director of cultural development and tourism, who with businessman Jerry Donovan, led the effort to rescue Fall River’s celebration .

The event, as always, will be free. It will feature horse and carriage rides as well as trolley tours, in addition to a variety of street performers, including jugglers and stilt walkers. A children’s venue, with arts and crafts, will be set up in a vacant storefront at 25 North Main St.

One of the highlights of the event will be a 7:30 p.m. performance by the Chinese Folk Troupe at the Eagle Performing Arts Center, 33 North Main St. There will be a dragon dance, a lion dance, umbrella dancing and drumming, said Cloutier. Seating for the nearly 1 ½-hour performance will be on a first-come, first-served basis. Bonaparte, a Boston magician, will take the stage afterward.

In the past, Fall River would bring in the New Year with the dropping of a ball from the Armory. This year, with the events taking place in just a one-block area, the ball will be dropped at midnight from Government Center.

“It’s really a community event put together with a lot of heart and private donations,” Cloutier said. “It really brings you back to Main Street. It’s about quality and simplicity at the same time.”

For more information, go to www.fallriverma.org.

rsalit@projo.com

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Fireworks display is part of First Night Boston.

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MetroWesters looking for New Year’s Eve fun can choose from three distinct choices to welcome 2009, all less than an hour’s drive away.

First Night Boston 2009, the granddaddy of all New Year’s festivals, is throwing the biggest bash of all with arts and activities spread across Bean Town.

With size come innovative opportunities, hot acts and complications, including parking hassles, packed public transportation and crowds reminiscent of Shanghai.

Throwing its 27th party, First Night Worcester 2009 provides accessible and varied family fun.
Rising to the challenge after economic woes ended First Night activities in Providence, area artists have been throwing their own party called Bright Night Providence since 2003.

Intimate, eclectic and an obvious labor of love, this festival provides a perfect example of committed artists sharing their passion with the public.
You can’t lose with this trifecta.

WORCESTER: Just up the Pike:
Just a short hop from MetroWest, First Night Worcester 2009 lets revelers greet the New Year with a mixed bag of arts activities from a multicultural Global Village to indoor kite flying, from comedian Casey Carle’s soapy “Bubblemania” to two Á count ’em Á fireworks displays.

Executive Director Joyce Kressler promised, “We’ve got something for everybody, for every taste and for every interest.

“Every year we make sure 80 percent of our performances and activities are new so nobody can say `I’m not going. I saw that last year,” she said. “This year we’ve got probably more than 500 artists and performers participating in about 120 acts and activities at 20 venues.”

While most events take place at indoor venues clustered around downtown Main Street, Kressler said several first-time sites like the New Hanover Theatre near the center and off-site events at Mass. College of Pharmacy, Worcester Craft Center and the EcoTarium provide more seats and larger stages for new performances.

Worcester’s First Night is an affiliate of the nonprofit group which organized the first such festival in Boston in 1976 for the bicentennial. Kressler said the Worcester group “was born in 1981 for 1982.”{ is hosting its 27th First Night this week.-said this in intro}
“Each First Night is like a snowflake,” she said. “At first they look alike but under a microscope, each is different in its own special way.”

Events kick off at 3 p.m. with a scavenger hunt, music, magic, storytelling and more at several sites and concludes from 11:30 p.m. to midnight with a Nipmuk Unity Circle and fireworks at Lincoln Square.

Over the last several years, Kressler said, attendance has been “good and pretty stable” ranging between 30,000 and 40,000 annually.

Visitors can attend any event, providing there’s room, by purchasing a First Night Worcester 2009 button. Buttons sold for $10 before Christmas, and are $12 until Dec. 31 and $15 at the gate. Children under 10 are free. If a group purchases more than 50 buttons in advance, the price is reduced to $8 for each.

BOSTON: The first and fabulous First Night

First Night Boston is thriving, offering even more events this year than last.

The arts celebration promises not just a good time, but a way to enjoy the city’s music, theater, dance and cultural destinations for less money. That’s because the $18 First Night Button offers entry to scores of performances, not just on New Year’s Eve, but during the afternoon of Dec. 31 and through January.

“People come and do the free stuff, but I don’t think a lot of them understand what the button is,” said Geri Guardino, executive director of the 33rd First Night. “It’s really a great value not just for the night. There’s more programming this year in the afternoon, and if you hold onto the button, you get a lot of benefits.”

As in past years, the button gives you access to performances by the city’s leading arts groups, as well as cutting edge talent from afar. It’s a massive undertaking by a staff who work year-round turning a budget of about $1.3 million and in kind contributions of about $850,000 into a celebration that attracts about 1 million people.

Traditionally, the afternoon programming has been for children, with a Family Festival packed with stunt teams, magicians, puppeteers, singers and more. This year, there’s also a non-stop lineup of classical and jazz singers and musicians at St. Paul’s Cathedral and music at The Mary Baker Eddy Library. A festival of short international films runs all afternoon at the Museum of Fine Arts. And free admission is available all day to the Institute of Contemporary Art and the Mapparium at the Mary Baker Eddy Library, and in the morning to the New England Aquarium.

But First Night goes into full gear in the evening, starting with the Grand Procession, where giant puppets, festive bands, colorful floats and hundreds of costumed revelers parade down Boylston Street.

Commonwealth Shakespeare, Opera Boston and the dance company Monkeyhouse are among the local performers. A highlight is the jazz phenomenon Hiromi and her group, Sonicbloom. Her concert, which includes students and alumni from Berklee College of Music, will be broadcast live nationwide by WGBH radio as part of National Public Radio’s new year’s celebration, “A Toast to the Nation,” a first for First Night.

“She is just such fun to watch and has fabulous musicians playing with her,” Guardino said. “She’s renowned, and it’s very exciting for us that it will be broadcast live across the nation.”

Guardino also is looking forward to sound artist Sxip Shirey, who has performed at Symphony Hall.

“Sxip sets up a landscape of sound and visuals that’s really cool and a bit like performance art,” Guardino said. “It’s fun for us to have some fringe stuff.”

Guitar buffs may want to catch the West African guitarist and drummer Mamaou Diop, who blends samba, salsa and reggae with Senegalese rhythms, and the Nashville group Scissormen, who play slide guitar blues.

You can find the humor in tough times when comedians Tony V and Kenny Rogerson take on the economy in “700 Billion Laughs: A Bailout of Humor From Some Serious Stupidity.” And be part of the humor in the sketches of ImprovBoston and Improv Asylum.

Of course, New Year’s Eve is a party and you can celebrate by dancing with the Fulani Haynes and the Jazz Collaborative or the Swingin’ Eve Dance Party with Marie Lawlor, who instructs at the top of each set.

Even without a button, there’s plenty of opportunity to dance. Two high-energy bands, Downbeat 5 and Black Taxi, play on Boston Common, and DJs host a dance party in Copley Square with a laser and light show. Take a break from dancing, and admire the massive ice sculptures on the Common and in Copley Square.

A short round of fireworks starts at 7 p.m. over Boston Common, and the midnight grand finale is over the waterfront. For the first time, you can see the fireworks from a harbor cruise, part of First Night’s new collaboration with the Boston Harbor Association. During the day on the waterfront, you also can tour pilot, fire and Coast Guard boats and ride the trolley from Christopher Columbus Park to the Boston Children’s Museum and the ICA.

“The waterfront is a great part of town, and we want to send people down there and use more of the city,” Guardino said.

On New Year’s Day, the button gives free admission to a child to the Boston Children’s Museum. Through January, you can bring a child to the New England Aquarium for free, receive a 30 percent discount to the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and get $10 off each ticket to “The Seagull” at the American Repertory Theatre. And that’s just a sample.
“We want to give value to the First Night button,” she said.

First Night Boston buttons are $18 at Shaw’s and other outlets and at First Night. Children under age 4 are free. Complete schedules and descriptions can be downloaded. For more information, go to www.firstnight.org.

PROVIDENCE: Let there be `Bright Night’
Facing the prospect of New Year’s Eve without a citywide celebration, Rhode Island artists created their own festival — Bright Night Providence.

Since 2003 about 100 artists, led by Adam Gertsacov, have combined their talents and passions to organize a new “family-friendly tradition” offering arts and activities at 22 venues within walking distance of downtown Providence.

More than 150 performers will be brightening this year’s last night with an eclectic mix of dance and music, martial arts and an international circus act, and ending with an 11:45 p.m. laser show at Kennedy Plaza.

Talk about a potpourri! From noon to midnight, visitors can enjoy an improvisational accordionist, the larger-than-life-sized puppets of Big Nazo, Grammy award-winning storyteller Bill Harley, slam poetry, Clare Vadeboncoeur’s “Snow Queen” and lots more.
For a bouncy first time event, the “first 3,000 people” at the door can watch the Providence College Friars play Saint John’s College.

“When First Night Providence canceled for financial reasons, local artists got together and decided `Instead of a dark night, we’ll give the public a bright night,” said Gertsacov, P.T. Barnum impersonator, flea circus impresario, and Clown Laureate of Greenbelt, Md., when he’s not Festival Director for Bright Night.

Preparing for his sixth festival, Gertsacov said organizers don’t exclude any Rhode Island artists but tend to hire performers from the capital area. To balance the emphasis on homegrown talent, he said, each year the show features “one big out-of-town act” with major name recognition.

For this year’s showcase performance, the Nerveless Nocks Daredevil Thrill Show will give 6, 8 and 10 p.m. shows at the Rhode Island Convention Center. Billed as the “world’s greatest stuntman,” family patriarch Michaelangelo Nock will thrill the audience performing daredevil stunts on the Wheel of Destiny, Aerial Fabric and Tower of Chairs.

Late night owls can choose between a 10 p.m. Swing Dance Blues Bash at the Beneficent Roundtop Center or an 11 p.m. candlelight service of holy communion at Grace Church.
While exact figures aren’t available, Gertsacov said attendance has been rising over the last several years to an estimated 20,000 visitors annually.

Rather than using buttons, Bright Night Providence uses wristbands for admission to all venues, space allowing. Wristbands cost $10 when purchased in advance and $15 at the event. A family 4-pack sells for $50.

“Times are tough because of the economy. But so far, so great,” said Gertsacov. “We’ve got some things in common with other First Nights but we’ve got our own special things. Bright Night Providence is about local artists saving a festival for Providence.”
To see the schedule for Bright Night Providence, visit www.brightnight.org.

After the press conference, projo blogged about us:

http://newsblog.projo.com/2008/12/bright-night-or.html#432361

By Richard Salit
Journal staff writer

PROVIDENCE — Since the city hadn’t levied a new tax on costumes, there had to be another reason for the boisterous gathering at City Hall of the Snow Queen, Casey Jones and several Big Nazo characters

And indeed there was.

The group assembled inside on the grand staircase to publicize Bright Night Providence, the sixth annual New Year’s Eve celebration put on in the Capitol City by a non-profit, artist-run organization. Still, it was hard to keep the rowdy characters focused on that.

“Many politicians have thrown themselves under my train,” quipped the Casey Jones character getting caught up in the City Hall scene.

This year’s event replaces fireworks with a midnight laser show, headlines an acrobatic act called the Nerveless Nocks and features 160 performers at 22 venues. It also incorporates a Providence Friars basketball game at the Dunkin’ Donuts Center. The first 3,000 people with Bright Night wristbands may enter the game versus St. John’s University for free.

Tickets to Bright Night are $10 in advance, $15 on the day of the event (when a family four-pack may be purchased for $50). Tickets are on sale online at www.brightnight.org, by calling (401) 621-6123 or by visiting ArtTixRI, on Westminster Street, any BankRI location, all OOP! locations and the East Side Marketplace.

For more information, including the schedule of Bright Night events, visit www.brightnight.org.

Posted Jan. 14, 2008

newsmakers

Clowning is a serious business for this entrepreneur

By Natalie Myers
PBN Staff Writer

Adam Gertsacov likes to call himself the most educated clown in America, excluding certain elected officials. As a performer, he understands the important role the arts and artists play in the world. He saw the need to preserve that five years ago when First Night Providence, a franchise of First Night International, which provides guidelines and discounts for the branded New Year’s Eve celebrations across the country, went bankrupt.

He and a few other artists in the city banded together to save the New Year’s Eve festival from extinction and they created Bright Night Providence. This year was the festival’s sixth year. In a recent interview with Providence Business News, Gertsacov discussed how the festival fared this year compared with previous years and what the plans are for its future.

PBN: How well did the festival do this year with ticket sales?

GERTSACOV: We sold 6,800 to 7,000 tickets, which is a little bit less than last year [when 7,500 tickets were sold] and I attribute it to a couple of things. Number one: last year [the festival] was on a Sunday. This year it was on a Monday. The weekend is traditionally a little bit better for a festival. And last year our big act of the year was a circus … This year our main act was a high-energy, drum-band spectacular [called SLAMM!] … which is much harder to explain than a circus. … We took a bit of a risk and went a little bit older on our main show. We may have lost a few customers because of it. … [And] last year was 48 degrees and this year was 32.

PBN: What is the festival’s financial status as of right now?

GERTSACOV: We definitely have broken even. Last year was a completely banner year. The best year we’ve had so far. And if last year didn’t exist this year would be a banner year by far. It could be that I need to produce a circus every year. It’s hard to say.

PBN: Why don’t you produce a circus every year if it increases profit margins?

GERTSACOV: I wouldn’t want to do that. … My goal is not to sell the most amount of tickets. My goal is to create the best community celebration possible. And that means not repeating the things that work every year. … For me that doesn’t bode for success.

PBN: So this year you decided to do a slightly more mature main show and have a Bright Night Kids Fair to appeal to younger children?

GERTSACOV: This is the first time that we’ve done that. It was very successful … we had nearly 1,000 people come to [the kids fair]. And this year we also had the PC Friars game. It went pretty well. We had almost 200 people show up for it. It would have been amazing if we had 1,000 people. … If I could have something for everyone I would. It’s a question of resources.

PBN: If you had the financial and technical resources, how big would you grow the festival?

GERTSACOV: My goal for the festival is to do exactly what we’re doing, to [grow] very slow and organically … I think the 9,000-ticket cap is about the right number. Above that we don’t really have the capacity to allow everybody to have a great time.

PBN: How does the festival contribute to the creative economy?

GERTSACOV: About 80 percent of the artists we contract are repeats. They’re not the same [artists] every year, but most of them have worked with us before. … The reason why is, No. 1, they’re local. … From an economic perspective … if the festival does better than expected every artist will receive a bonus … Last year it was a $200 bonus [per performer or act] … in the last four years, not including this year, our pay out was $25,000 in artist bonuses.

PBN: Why is it important to you to take care of these artists in this way?

GERTSACOV: Number one, I’m an artist … I think that’s one of our most important cultural assets. But I’ve performed at a lot of festivals. I’m a clown. I’ve toured around the country, around the world. I’ve been treated great, and I’ve been treated poorly. And running my own festival I want to treat people great.

PBN: Bright Night gets 60 percent of its budget from ticket sales and 40 percent from donations and corporate sponsors. How do you build the sponsorships to keep the festival going?

GERTSACOV: I would love to know. From my perspective, I don’t see why every business in Rhode Island doesn’t give us $100 at the minimum. … Bright Night Providence is something that really enhances the value of the city, of living in the city, and that in turn enhances that value of every business in the city and the state.

PBN: If you did get $100 per business, what would you use it for?

GERTSACOV: I think we’d do more advertising, we’d give out more free tickets … to low-income communities. … We do that now, but on a limited basis. … There’s at least one more venue I’m not using, the Veteran’s Memorial Auditorium, which I can’t afford.

PBN: If you don’t want the festival to get too big, why is increased sponsorship important?

GERTSACOV: It’s important so that we’re less reliant on weather. … We need to grow … to ensure the continuity of the festival. One of the things we’ll be doing in the next couple years is to figure out how to ensure the continuity of the festival, whether it’s a fund at the Rhode Island Foundation or our own fund, to do a fundraising effort … If I raise $2 million … that would be enough to ensure the festival lived forever. ·

INTERVIEW: Adam Gertsacov

POSITION: Executive director of the What Cheer Art Company, festival director of Bright Night Providence.

BACKGROUND: Gertsacov started his career as a young actor at Trinity Repertory Company in the late 1980s. He left after a year because he didn’t want to work the 10 to 15 years it takes professional actors to gain recognition in the industry. Instead he went to the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Clown College in Sarasota, Fla. Afterward he studied physical comedy at Dell’Arte International in Blue Lake, Calif., and then he went to the Czech Republic to study under the famous mime artist, Ctibor Turba, He became festival director of Bright Night Providence in 2003 hoping to save the New Year’s Eve celebration from extinction.

EDUCATION: B.A. in theoretical communications, 1986, University of Pennsylvania; studied acting, 1988, Trinity Repertory Conservatory; M.A. in theater and group psychology, 1990, Rhode Island College

RESIDENCE: Providence

Age: 43