Sound Shore

Classical pianists are coming to the Harrison library next month. 

Friends of the Harrison Public Library will present Piano Duo Extravaganza with Svitlana Syrtsova and Sergey Krivonos on Wednesday, March 7, 2012 at 7:30 p.m. 

The program includes all-time favorites including: Schubert’s Fantasy, excerpts from Grieg’s Peer Gynt, Camille Saint-Saens’ Carnival of the Animals and Aram Khachaturian’s Masquerade. 

The library is located downtown at 2 Bruce Ave. For more information call the library at 914-835-0324.

Harrison firefighters put a small house fire within minutes of responding this afternoon.

The blaze ignited in a crawl space on Pleasant Ridge Road around 6 p.m.

Firefighters from the downtown precinct responded and put it out before the home was severely damaged. Officials said no one was hurt and the house is still inhabitable.

Mamaroneck, Pelham, Harrison and New Rochelle have all had reports of armed robberies in recent weeks near local train stations. Rye police sent out an alert today telling residents to be on the lookout, though no such incident has been reported there.

Theresa Juva-Brown reports on LoHud.com today:

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Police are warning commuters to watch out for an armed mugger who robbed two men, injuring one of them, in separate incidents as they walked from the Mamaroneck and Harrison train stations on Thursday.

A 59-year-old Mamaroneck village man told police he was walking from the Metro-North train station at 8 p.m. near Stanley Avenue when a man came up behind him with a gun and demanded his property. The robber fled on foot with undisclosed property.

An hour later, as a man walked from the train station near South Road and the Interstate 95 bridge in Harrison, he was struck in the head with a blunt object. The mugger then took his cell phone at gunpoint. The victim was taken to White Plains Hospital with a head injury.

Investigators believe the two incidents are connected and said the robber may have taken the train between robberies.

The suspect is approximately 5 feet 10 and weighs 180 to 200 pounds. He was last seen wearing a black hooded sweatshirt, blue jeans, and a light-colored bandanna or mask. He was carrying a silver or black handgun, police said.

Anyone with information should call Harrison police at 914-967-5111, Ext. 1, or Mamaroneck village police at 914-825-8541.

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Crime Stoppers had an alert earlier this month:

Want to be freezin’ for a reason? The South East Consortium for Special Services Inc. will be the beneficiary of a “Leprechaun Leap” into Long Island Sound on March 10 at noon in Mamaroneck. The festivities are set for Harbor Island Park; registration begins at 10 a.m. and there will also be refreshments and entertainment.

The consortium is a not-for-profit group dedicated to providing therapeutic recreation services, leisure-related programs and respite opportunities to over 350 children and adults with special needs who reside in southeast Westchester County.

For more information, contact Jerry Peters at 698-5232, by email at jpeters@secrec.org or go to http://www.secrec.org.

On March 6, the Jewish Studies Program at Purchase College SUNY will present Israeli filmmaker Avner Faingulernt who will discuss and screen portions of his riveting films “War Matador” and “Fishermen’s Diary.”

“War Matador” explores the curious phenomenon of “war tourism” which flourished during the 2009 conflict that took place on the Israeli-Gaza border.  People from all over the region swarmed to the border to observe the shelling of Gaza.

Faingulernt’s 2005 film, “Fishermen’s Diary: Men on the Edge,” will also be partially screened.  It  tells the story of four fishermen – two Israelis and two Palestinians – who work together on a small beach wedged between Israel and Gaza, and how they form a delicate working relationship despite political tensions.

“Bringing huge, seemingly intractable issues to an interpersonal level is an essential step in addressing conflict. It makes the complexity understandable,” said Christopher Robbins, an Art & Design School professor at Purchase College whose work includes think tanks working in Israel, the Gaza Strip, Serbia and Kosovo.

Rye Country Day School held its annual Festival Chorus Concert Sunday with 175 voices and a full orchestra at Purchase College Performing Arts Center.

The 17th annual concert was titled “I’ll Fly Away.” The chorus performed quite a range of music: the Fauré Requiem, Beethoven’s Hallelujah from Christ on the Mount of Olives, and some traditional folk tunes, backed by a Bluegrass band. The Festival Chorus features the Upper School Concert Choir and a choir of alumni, current and past parents, faculty, and friends.

(Photo: Todd Shapera Photography)

Harrison High School senior Zoe Stein recently worked with a squad of volunteers and the Harrison Recreation Department to organize a community-wide “I Made a Difference Charity Wellness Festival.”

The festival, which included information about how animals are abused and killed for food in the U.S., raised more than $700 for peta2, PETA’s youth division—and for her efforts, Stein has received a Star Street Teamer Award from the group.

“Zoe Stein has worked hard to make sure that her friends, family, and community all know about the benefits of healthy vegan eating,” peta2 Division Manager Marta Holmberg said in a press release. “The compassion, energy, and dedication it took to organize a community-wide event sets a great example not just for young activists but for anyone who wants to make a difference for animals.”

peta2’s Street Team is a group of young activists dedicated to helping animals through in-person events, online campaigns, and social media. Stein, who also serves on peta2’s Youth Advisory Board, will receive a framed certificate and a letter signed by peta2 staffers.

She said she plans to keep the event going annually.

The New York Yankees manager Joe Girardi is doing his part to help the Harrison Public Library.

Girardi, a former Yankee catcher, will be signing autographs and taking pictures with fans and library supporters from noon to 1 p.m. Sunday at the library, 2 Bruce Ave.

The fundraiser has two parts:

• An MVP reception which includes two guest passes for $225. This portion is from noon to 12:20 p.m.


• An autograph session from 12:20 to 1 p.m., where Girardi will sign a card or photo for $35, a baseball or bat for $50 and a uniform or other item for $100.

I was over at Purchase College’s Performing Arts Center today as contestants rehearsed for the Miss New York USA pageant this weekend. Runway coach Lu Sierra was giving pointers to the sash-wearing teens and women: Smile! Don’t rush the lady in front of you! Don’t run, Tribeca, don’t run!”

I spoke with Laura Hajek, whose video for a “people’s choice” award is going viral, and posted this on LoHud.com:

With her own viral video and a comedic take on beauty pageants, contestant Laura Hajek seems to embody the personality of this weekend’s Miss New York pageant at Purchase College.

Hajek is a Purchase College literature student who loves Dante, Chaucer and the Beat poets. She entered the pageant on a lark and made the video over Christmas break with friends in her hometown of Glens Falls. In the clip, puppet Sheldon Crest interviews Hajek as she shamelessly plugs New York, dressed in sash and tiara.

“This has been outrageously fun,” she said from a seat inside the Performing Arts Center as fellow contestants clicked across the stage in heels Friday in a practice for the swimsuit competition. “I feel like all of the cells in my body are moving at once.”

John Gitlitz is being honored Wednesday with a Martin Luther King Jr. award for his efforts in Mamaroneck, helping to address the clash over immigrant laborers and their right to seek work from street corners. He is a familiar face locally on the board of the Hispanic Resource Center, which it established a dedicated hiring site for laborers in the wake of a federal lawsuit. In speaking to him this month I learned about Gitlitz’s primary pursuit over the years—to research and document a complex issue of conflict and justice in rural Peru.

Gitlitz is an associate professor of Latin American studies, immigration and human rights at Purchase College. In northern Peru, he explained, cattle are essentially a family’s bank account, an asset that can be sold for cash in case of emergency. Theft of cattle, therefore, is a serious threat. After a wave of cattle rustling in the ‘70s, peasants, facing inaction by police and an ineffective legal structure, organized their own system of justice—“the Peruvian equivalent of the Guardian Angels.” By 2000 there were 250,000 people involved in the patrols, he said.

Gitlitz is researching this alternative system of justice and the political and legal arguments over it. The issue intersects with human rights, indigenous rights, the exploitation of natural resources, and other areas of tension. He spoke recently at a gathering attended by Peruvian government officials on this issue of “informal justice.”

“It’s a small issue, but for a lot of people, an important one,” he said.

To explore his experiences in Peru – legal issues, profiles, patron saint festivals and the culinary use of guinea pigs – see his blog, Wandering the Andes.