If you’ve been following 3 a.m. tweets, you won’t have any problem rising early for the birdsongs of the Indian River Birding Festival this weekend. Based at the beautiful lagoon-front Environmental Learning Center off the Wabasso Causeway, the festival’s accompanying art show includes a plein-air paint-out and art sale, plus an exhibit of nature-themed paintings and sculpture with a number of local artists contributing.
Friday from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. artists will fan out over the oak-studded grounds and set up their easels to paint the lush grounds. That’s followed by a reception and lecture Friday night on Blue Cypress Lake, one of the largest osprey breeding grounds in the world.
On the birdwatching side, there’s a 6:45 p.m. Owl Prowl at the ELC with bird-call genius David Simpson and his wife, Dee, also a major birder. Saturday morning at 7 a.m. there’s a carpool from the ELC to the Sebastian Inlet for a look at the shorebirds there and along Jungle Trail. Or you can drive yourself to the Wabasso County Park to tour the Wabasso Scrub Jay Conservation Area. These birds make a terrific introduction to bird-watching; big, nervy and curious, these brilliant blue birds will scope you out before you even see them. They also have a fascinating story: They grow up and never leave home, helping their parents raise other babies and guarding their territory as a clan.
The notion of a birding festival here was born a few years back and struggled to get off the ground. One lingering problems seems to be putting enough info out there. A complicated schedule with a lot of activity options seems only available on the festival’s Facebook page – and you have to have the eyes of a hawk to read it. And the contact link doesn’t work, nor does the link to the Pelican Island Preservation Society, the organizer of the event along with the ELC. The number there is 772- 589-5050, but the center was closed for hurricane clean-up through Oct 18. Best of luck!
With lechery in the news these days, the Metropolitan Opera gives us a timely selection in “Don Giovanni,” simulcast at Vero’s Majestic 11 Theatre Saturday with the 57-year-old Simon Keenlyside making his first Met appearance in the role of the legendary letch.
Keenlyside was sidelined last year by thyroid surgery; the year before he’d had to leave the stage in Vienna mid-performance with a vocal cord injury.
This is a revival of theatrical director Michael Grandage’s 2011 production. Set in 18th century Seville, Mozart’s masterpiece is conducted by Fabio Luisi. The Met Live in HD transmissions are now in 2,000 theaters around the world. In Vero, the opera begins at 12:55 p.m. and is repeated Tuesday at 7 p.m.
Also at the Majestic at the same hour Tuesday, you can watch a repeat of the wonderful Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller alternating roles as Victor Frankenstein and his creation in the 2011 production of “Frankenstein,” directed by the Oscar-winning Danny Boyle.
Cumberbatch, whom you hopefully have seen in BBC’s “Sherlock,” and Miller, who was directed by Boyle in the movie “Trainspotting,” shared 2012’s Olivier Award for Best Actor for this play. The show’s run was a sell-out at London’s National Theatre. The blurb on the NTLive website warns it is “deeply disturbing.”
Thursday marks the resumption of the Concert in the Park series at the Vero Beach Museum of Art, with Mark Green and the Rowdy Roosters starting off the season. Green, a native New Yorker, has played trumpet on Broadway, at Lincoln Center and in Carnegie Hall. When he moved to Florida in 1988, he formed his New Orleans-style jazz band. He regularly plays at the Sunrise Theatre’s Black Box stage and is on the board of the Treasure Coast Jazz Society.
The museum gathering begins at 5 p.m.
If you’re curious about a worldwide craze of, of all things, mini-power point presentations, it’s PechaKucha night Friday in Orlando Friday. The events, started in Tokyo and now in 900 cities, celebrate concise, 20-image presentations on any imaginable topic that only last 20 seconds. The Facebook page says topics for this event include cops and kids, violence against women, and the shooting at the Pulse nightclub. Orlando’s Dr. Phillips Center hosts several PechaKuchas a year since 2010. Shows last an hour, and are at 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. in the 160-seat Pugh Theatre.