Construction to begin today on $19.5 million facility and Veterans Plaza in downtown Silver Spring
by Jason Tomassini | Staff Writer | Tuesday, Sept. 9, 2008
Construction will officially begin today on the Silver Spring Civic Building and Veterans Plaza project at the corner of Fenton Street and Ellsworth Drive in Silver Spring.
A ceremony will be held 10:30 a.m. with Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett (D) and other county and community officials on hand. To enter the site where the groundbreaking ceremony will be, go down the steps leading from the parking lot behind Whole Foods at 833 Wayne Ave.
Construction on the project is expected to be completed by late fall of 2009. The county is targeting Nov. 11, 2009, Veteran's Day, for the official opening of Veterans Plaza, said Gary Stith, director of the Silver Spring Regional Center.
"It's a momentous occasion because we have been working on the civic building for a long time," Stith said Monday at the monthly Silver Spring Citizens' Advisory Board meeting.
When construction is completed, the 42,000-square-foot civic building will be accompanied by Veterans Plaza, which is nearly an acre of green space to be programmed for outdoor events and will also commemorate the service of veterans from Silver Spring and Montgomery County. The plaza also will include a pavilion and will be converted to an ice rink between November and March.
The entire site for the project is about 1.5 acres.
Estimated cost for the civic building is $19.7 million, including $2.5 million approved by Montgomery County Council in July. Construction on the building is expected to be finished after Veterans Plaza is completed, Stith said.
The civic building is expected to be the center of community activities in Silver Spring and will include meeting rooms, gallery space, the relocated Silver Spring Regional Center, currently at 8435 Georgia Ave., and space for the Round House Theater School.
Stith said the artificial turf field, which previously occupied the plaza site, has been removed and the site is ready for construction. A "farewell party" for the turf was held July 25.
The civic building has been planned since 1998 when the Silver Spring Armory was demolished. Last year's Silver Spring Jazz Festival was held at the artificial turf field and this year's event, 2 p.m. to 10 p.m. Saturday, will be held in the parking lot behind the Lee Building at the corner of Georgia Avenue and Colesville Road.
Darian Unger, chairman of the Silver Spring Citizens' Advisory Board, said the civic building project shows a strong county investment in Silver Spring, along with the planned $91 million Paul S. Sarbanes Silver Spring Transit Center, which will break ground Sept. 28, and the new Silver Spring library, which is still in the design stages.
"It's good to get the private stuff and the public stuff united," Unger said Monday. "We need to get some public projects following all the private projects [in downtown Silver Spring]."
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Weekend events bring a marriage of jazz and folk - Gazette
Annual concerts in Silver Spring and Takoma Park expected to draw thousands
by Jeremy Arias | Staff Writer | Tuesday, Sept. 9, 2008
A weekend of music, food and fun is ahead with the 5th annual Silver Spring Jazz Festival on Saturday and the 31st Takoma Park Folk Festival on Sunday.
The jazz festival, with a new location behind the Lee Building at the intersection of Georgia Avenue and Colesville Road, seeks to bring both entertainment and economic benefits to Silver Spring, while Takoma's folk festival is being billed as a more environmentally conscious celebration this year.
Jazz festival spokeswoman Susan Hoffman expects about 25,000 to attend the event, which will feature local talent like Gail Shipp of Washington, D.C., and Marcus Johnson of Silver Spring. This year's headliner is the Mingus Big Band out of New York.
Downtown businesses are excited by the sales opportunity thousands of visitors will bring.
"It brings in people who might not have been to Silver Spring before," said Jane Redicker, president of the Greater Silver Spring Chamber of Commerce. "It introduces them to the area and we want them to come back. We look at the jazz festival as both a fabulous arts an entertainment event but also as an economic development stimulus."
The Takoma Park Folk Festival is once again expanding its green footprint. This year, Pepco will distribute several thousand free energy-saving compact fluorescent light bulbs. In previous years, the event has targeted increasing the recycling of vendor cooking oil and waste products, according to festival Chairman Kevin Adler.
"We're just taking advantage of more and more people being aware of these issues and with their help we're able to do more about it," Adler said.
The folk festival will also provide a free shuttle bus service from the Takoma Park Metro station and Montgomery College parking garage.
There will also be a benefit to using public transportation to get to the jazz festival, Hoffman said.
"We are urging people to take the Metro," she said, noting that while there are nearby parking garages, it is not uncommon for festival-goers to experience delays when they're ready to leave. "I've always encouraged people to look around and maybe park a few blocks away … they might have to walk a little bit, but it can take so much longer to get out of a garage."
by Jeremy Arias | Staff Writer | Tuesday, Sept. 9, 2008
A weekend of music, food and fun is ahead with the 5th annual Silver Spring Jazz Festival on Saturday and the 31st Takoma Park Folk Festival on Sunday.
The jazz festival, with a new location behind the Lee Building at the intersection of Georgia Avenue and Colesville Road, seeks to bring both entertainment and economic benefits to Silver Spring, while Takoma's folk festival is being billed as a more environmentally conscious celebration this year.
Jazz festival spokeswoman Susan Hoffman expects about 25,000 to attend the event, which will feature local talent like Gail Shipp of Washington, D.C., and Marcus Johnson of Silver Spring. This year's headliner is the Mingus Big Band out of New York.
Downtown businesses are excited by the sales opportunity thousands of visitors will bring.
"It brings in people who might not have been to Silver Spring before," said Jane Redicker, president of the Greater Silver Spring Chamber of Commerce. "It introduces them to the area and we want them to come back. We look at the jazz festival as both a fabulous arts an entertainment event but also as an economic development stimulus."
The Takoma Park Folk Festival is once again expanding its green footprint. This year, Pepco will distribute several thousand free energy-saving compact fluorescent light bulbs. In previous years, the event has targeted increasing the recycling of vendor cooking oil and waste products, according to festival Chairman Kevin Adler.
"We're just taking advantage of more and more people being aware of these issues and with their help we're able to do more about it," Adler said.
The folk festival will also provide a free shuttle bus service from the Takoma Park Metro station and Montgomery College parking garage.
There will also be a benefit to using public transportation to get to the jazz festival, Hoffman said.
"We are urging people to take the Metro," she said, noting that while there are nearby parking garages, it is not uncommon for festival-goers to experience delays when they're ready to leave. "I've always encouraged people to look around and maybe park a few blocks away … they might have to walk a little bit, but it can take so much longer to get out of a garage."
Saturday, September 6, 2008
Groundbreaking Ceremony for Silver Spring Civic Building and Veterans Plaza - Wednesday, September 10th at 10:30 am
Wednesday, September 10, 2008 at 10:30 am
Project Construction Site
Corner of Ellsworth Dr. and Fenton St.,
Silver Spring
Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett will be joined by County and community officials to break ground for the Veteran’s Plaza/Civic Building project in downtown Silver Spring.
When construction is completed the 1.5 acre site will contain the new 42,000 square-foot Civic Building that will be fronted by the three-quarter acre Veterans Plaza, featuring a brick surface surrounded by grass and trees.
It will be the site of a memorial to veterans of all wars and host year-round activities from concerts, markets and festivals and be converted to an ice rink from November through March.
Entry to the groundbreaking site will be down the steps leading from the parking lot behind Whole Foods.
Project Construction Site
Corner of Ellsworth Dr. and Fenton St.,
Silver Spring
Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett will be joined by County and community officials to break ground for the Veteran’s Plaza/Civic Building project in downtown Silver Spring.
When construction is completed the 1.5 acre site will contain the new 42,000 square-foot Civic Building that will be fronted by the three-quarter acre Veterans Plaza, featuring a brick surface surrounded by grass and trees.
It will be the site of a memorial to veterans of all wars and host year-round activities from concerts, markets and festivals and be converted to an ice rink from November through March.
Entry to the groundbreaking site will be down the steps leading from the parking lot behind Whole Foods.
Silver Spring Jazz Festival - Saturday, September 13, 2008 - 2 pm to 10:30 pm
Silver Spring's Biggest Event of the Year!
This year's Headliner is the Mingus Big Band!
The Mingus Big Band was created to celebrate the music of the composer and bassist, Charles Mingus, who died of ALS in 1979. Under the artistic direction of Sue Mingus, the band tours extensively in the United States and abroad, headlining all the major jazz festivals and, since 1991, holding a weekly residency in New York City. In 2007, musicians from the Mingus Big Band participated in a presentation of Charles Mingus’s masterwork Epitaph, conducted by Gunther Schuller, which will be broadcast on NPR this year. With nine recordings to its credit – six of which have been nominated for Grammy Awards – the Mingus Big Band is keeping Mingus music alive and vibrant for future generations.
Because Charles Mingus left such a large legacy of composition, the Mingus Big Band selects a concert program that offers an overview of the variety and breadth of his repertoire and his many influences, including Latin, folk, and classical forms. A concert will typically include ballads, blues, extended through-composed pieces, arrangements for vocalists, and selections from Epitaph.
The musicians in the Mingus Big Band are the finest in jazz and bring their unique style and personality to the music.
Charles Mingus left behind one of the largest legacies of composition in 20th century American music. At the 1997 Grammy Awards ceremony, he posthumously received NARAS's Lifetime Achievement Award. In 1993, his entire catalog of work—scores, recording tapes, correspondence, photographs, memorabilia and writings—were acquired by the Library of Congress, a first for jazz, and he was honored with a U.S. postage stamp. The recent release of the 1964 concert at Cornell University on Blue Note made the 2007 Top 10 lists of many prestigious publications.
“The best jazz orchestra in the world bears the name of the Mingus Big Band… a remarkable high standard of musicianship, energy and consistency."
-Geoffrey Himes of The Washington Post
Marcus Johnson
Marcus Johnson is an extraordinary jazz keyboardist and composer, as well as a successful businessman with his Three Keys Music label, headquartered in Silver Spring's downtown. He began playing the piano at age nine, and from there, he wanted to “create classics, not just hit songs.”
Marcus has done the amazing by launching a highly successful record label and releasing seven albums since 1997. Catch this shooting star with his newest Top 10 Billboard Charting CD “The Phoenix” to know he’s the real deal…playing with passionate grooves and soul-stirring beats…hot and sexy!
Gail Shipp
Gail is a native Washingtonian who grew up listening to jazz greats such as Sarah Vaughn, Ella Fitzgerald, Nancy Wilson, Carmen McCrae, and Gloria Lynne. Gail’s performance credits include Blues Alley, Takoma Station night club and the Washington Area Music Industry Awards.
She has performed with R&B artists Johnny Gill, Stacey Lattisaw, and Kenny Lattisaw. She also recorded with notable jazz recording artist Roy Ayers, and has appeared at D.C.’s Lisner Auditorium on the same stage with jazz diva Shirley Horn.
This is Gail’s first appearance at the Silver Spring Jazz Festival, and she is particularly thrilled, since she now resides in Silver Spring. Gail is here today performing with the Wes Biles Quartet featuring Wes Biles on bass, Vince Smith on keyboards, Dohn Nunley on sax, and Ron Compton on drums.
Samambaia
Have you heard the phrase “the CHEMISTRY” has to be right…This is also true in music!
Samambaia is a rare and beautiful flower that grows in the jungles of Brazil. This band’s music is as powerful as this exotic flower, and mixed care by its outstanding musicians. Argentinean-born guitar virtuoso, Dani Cortaza leads the band into creative breaks, rhythms and melodies that virtually float on air. In 2007, his CD “Expressions” was nominated for best CD in the Latin music category in the Washington D.C. area. This year, he was the recipient of a Maryland State Arts Council Individual Artist Award for artistic excellence in guitar performance and composition.
It is here in the Washington DC area where Dani Cortaza would form Samambaia and find the perfect musicians for the vision of this band. The musicians include Alejandro Lucini on drums, Didier Prossaird on piano and keyboards, Alfredo Mojica, Jr., on vocals and percussion, and Steve Sachse on bass. These first-class musicians have honed their skills locally, nationally and internationally.
Yaron Elyashiv
For a long time modern jazz has been misrepresented to the public as music for musicians. With a fresh sound and a different approach to jazz than his contemporaries, saxophone player and composer Yaron Elyashiv stays true to traditions as he keeps looking forward into the future.
After only two years in New York, Yaron has been making a name for himself at such spots as Minton’s Playhouse, Saint Nick’s Pub, Fat Cat, and the CUNY Jazz Festival. A native of Israel, Yaron was an important part of that jazz scene before coming to the U.S. His recently-recorded debut album “I Remember You” has already received great reviews from eJazzNews and Dan Karcher of WBGO radio.
TAKE METROBUS OR METRORAIL to the Silver Spring station, or ride bus routes 70, S2 and S4
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Folk festival keeps crowds, performers coming back - Gazette
Annual music, community event returns Sept. 14
by Jeremy Arias | Staff Writer | Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2008
Bill Williams is a folk festival regular. A Takoma Park resident for the past 17 years, Williams has either attended or performed in the city's annual music and crafts event, the Takoma Park Folk Festival, since 1999.
"I've seen some very good arts and crafts people selling stuff there, and I like that they've got a lot of stands set up for community service booths," he said. "They've got it pretty well down."
Williams and his newest band, the Jelly Roll Mortals, are one of 50 musical groups or performers that will take the stage Sept. 14 for the 31st annual Takoma Park Folk Festival to be held 11 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. at the Takoma Park Middle School.
Williams and the Jelly Roll Mortals will perform from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. on the 7th Heaven stage, mixing well-known covers with their own distinct folk-rock acoustic songs.
The festival also will feature space for 45 arts and craft booths, community service booths and, of course, food vendors of all types. Shuttle buses will run from the Montgomery College parking garage and the Takoma Metro station to the event throughout the day free of charge, and walking routes to the festival will be clearly marked. Admission will be free.
"We're telling people don't park in the neighborhood because there's not enough space," cautioned event spokeswoman Nancy Nickell.
Nickell, who has been working with the festival since 2000, said the event draws about 4,000 attendees each year. As many as 300 volunteers lend a hand the day of the festival, she said.
"We're actually able to put on a very large event with very little money because the labor is all volunteer," Nickell said, adding that it is not too late to volunteer for this year's event. Those interested can visit the festival Web site, www.tpff.org.
Nickell has a more personal connection with the festival; she credits the event with her decision to move back to Takoma Park after she and her husband passed a house for sale following the 1999 folk fest. They eventually bought the house.
"A neighbor told me a couple months later that, well, if you owe your house to the festival then you should volunteer for the festival!" Nickell said with a laugh. She is not alone among residents who find themselves drawn back to the festival.
Performer Spencer Bates also will return after his debut performance at last year's celebration. Bates, a self-taught pianist and singer, won the festival's prize for local talent last year and will play an hour-long set of his uniquely-interpreted tributes and some of his favorite songs from his two recent albums.
"The folk festival heavily values originality, artistry, nuance, creativity; all that stuff," he said. "At a folk festival, the people are there to experience culture. It's sort of the perfect venue for what I've been looking for."
Bates will perform 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. on the 7th Heaven stage space, and again along with a Bob Dylan tribute group performing later in the festival.
A complete listing of the various performances on the seven stages, food stalls, crafts and entertainment information can be found on the festival's Web site along with volunteer information and directions to the event.
The website is www.tpff.org
by Jeremy Arias | Staff Writer | Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2008
Bill Williams is a folk festival regular. A Takoma Park resident for the past 17 years, Williams has either attended or performed in the city's annual music and crafts event, the Takoma Park Folk Festival, since 1999.
"I've seen some very good arts and crafts people selling stuff there, and I like that they've got a lot of stands set up for community service booths," he said. "They've got it pretty well down."
Williams and his newest band, the Jelly Roll Mortals, are one of 50 musical groups or performers that will take the stage Sept. 14 for the 31st annual Takoma Park Folk Festival to be held 11 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. at the Takoma Park Middle School.
Williams and the Jelly Roll Mortals will perform from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. on the 7th Heaven stage, mixing well-known covers with their own distinct folk-rock acoustic songs.
The festival also will feature space for 45 arts and craft booths, community service booths and, of course, food vendors of all types. Shuttle buses will run from the Montgomery College parking garage and the Takoma Metro station to the event throughout the day free of charge, and walking routes to the festival will be clearly marked. Admission will be free.
"We're telling people don't park in the neighborhood because there's not enough space," cautioned event spokeswoman Nancy Nickell.
Nickell, who has been working with the festival since 2000, said the event draws about 4,000 attendees each year. As many as 300 volunteers lend a hand the day of the festival, she said.
"We're actually able to put on a very large event with very little money because the labor is all volunteer," Nickell said, adding that it is not too late to volunteer for this year's event. Those interested can visit the festival Web site, www.tpff.org.
Nickell has a more personal connection with the festival; she credits the event with her decision to move back to Takoma Park after she and her husband passed a house for sale following the 1999 folk fest. They eventually bought the house.
"A neighbor told me a couple months later that, well, if you owe your house to the festival then you should volunteer for the festival!" Nickell said with a laugh. She is not alone among residents who find themselves drawn back to the festival.
Performer Spencer Bates also will return after his debut performance at last year's celebration. Bates, a self-taught pianist and singer, won the festival's prize for local talent last year and will play an hour-long set of his uniquely-interpreted tributes and some of his favorite songs from his two recent albums.
"The folk festival heavily values originality, artistry, nuance, creativity; all that stuff," he said. "At a folk festival, the people are there to experience culture. It's sort of the perfect venue for what I've been looking for."
Bates will perform 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. on the 7th Heaven stage space, and again along with a Bob Dylan tribute group performing later in the festival.
A complete listing of the various performances on the seven stages, food stalls, crafts and entertainment information can be found on the festival's Web site along with volunteer information and directions to the event.
The website is www.tpff.org
Monday, August 25, 2008
Developing Dissonance - Washington Post
Music Hall Planned In Silver Spring Stuck On a Note of Discord
By Ann E. Marimow
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, August 25, 2008; B01
If any family can be considered the founding family of Silver Spring, it is the Lees.
Bruce and Blair Lee's great-great-great-grandfather bought the land that is now South Silver Spring before the Civil War and built a summer home there that he named Silver Spring. The family's real estate business went on to develop nearby apartments, a shopping center and Lee Plaza, the art deco-style office building that towers over the corner of Colesville Road and Georgia Avenue.
Yet the Lees find themselves caught in a political struggle, involving the very place where their roots run so deep, over Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett's (D) high-profile redevelopment proposal to bring a live music venue to downtown Silver Spring.
Leggett's plan to open one of Live Nation's Fillmore music halls at the site of an old J.C. Penney store depends on $8 million in taxpayer funds -- and the donation of land by the Lee Development Group. In exchange, the Lees want a measure of protection to ensure that the county's project does not interfere with an adjacent development they are considering.
To the county's chief planner, Royce Hanson, the protection the Lees are seeking would give them a "blank check." To the Lees and Leggett, the family is giving up valuable land and needs assurances that Montgomery's development rules will not change midcourse. By their own account, the Lees run a conservative, risk-averse and closely held family operation.
"My relatives understand that this county is crazy. None of them trust the county," said Bruce Lee, the company's president, who shares that mistrust.
Cousins Bruce and Blair took on leading roles at Lee Development Group after the death in 2003 of another cousin, E. Brooke Lee, who had led the company for more than two decades.
Blair Lee, 63, is the hyper-political Gazette newspaper columnist and WBAL (1090 AM) radio commentator, who works behind the scenes providing strategic advice. His father, the late Blair Lee III, was the Maryland lieutenant governor who finished out the gubernatorial term of Marvin Mandel after Mandel was convicted of mail fraud and racketeering.
Bruce Lee, 44, is the music hall project's genial, boyish public face, who makes the rounds at the County Council. He joined the company after college, working the hands-on property management side of the business and delving into Silver Spring's revitalization debates.
"If you're talking to Bruce, you are talking to Blair and vice versa," said longtime friend Kevin Maloney, who runs a commercial real estate firm in Bethesda. "Their styles are different and their responsibilities are different, but they are working for the same end result."
There was Bruce Lee last month, flustered, his head shaking after county planners unanimously panned the land-use proposals that supporters say are needed to make the music hall a reality. Planning Board members, while supportive of the project, said Leggett's deal with the Lees would wipe out their leverage to negotiate for public space and potentially delay other construction projects for up to 15 years. Board member John M. Robinson, who counts Bruce Lee as a good friend, called the county's case for the land-use measures a "charade" that would give the Lees "privileged status."
It is unclear how the board's recommendation will influence the council when it takes up the measures next month. Leggett said last week he has "strong support" on the nine-member council, in addition to backing from a long list of business and community leaders, but he could not say whether he has five votes.
At home in Kensington, Bruce Lee has for six years kept a yellow sticky note on his bathroom mirror to remind him that the family will not be forced into building on its surrounding property until market conditions are ripe. The note reads, "Remember: This is a Montgomery County economic development initiative and the county came to you."
To understand his caution, it helps to know the history of Lee Plaza. The building opened in the late 1980s, just as a real estate recession hit. For three years, the $21.5 million building was 80 to 85 percent vacant.
Still, it has been 18 years since the Lees demolished the J.C. Penney building now slated for the Fillmore, leaving the prime property fallow across the street from the American Film Institute's Silver Theater. Some developers privately ask what the Lees were waiting for, while others say the family was wise not to get out in front.
Developer Lloyd Moore, a veteran of the Silver Spring redevelopment wars, said there was so much bitterness and controversy at the time, "I don't see why anyone would participate in that environment."
The path to building the Fillmore is unprecedented in local land-use history because the music hall, which would count as the Lee group's public amenity and public-use space, would be built before the Lees commit to an adjacent project.
"He's kind of handing off his bargaining chip before he knows what he's going to need to strike a deal," Silver Spring developer Bryant Foulger said of the risk to the Lees.
Though they are not risk-taking developers, the Lees know how to play hardball. Leggett and the Lees pulled the plug on an earlier deal with the Alexandria-based Birchmere Music Hall after it had been in the works for five years under former county executive Douglas M. Duncan. They got spooked in part when the Birchmere began talking about opening a restaurant and club in Loudoun County. Bruce Lee moved quickly to line up Live Nation. Birchmere representatives declined to comment for this article.
The politically prominent Lee family name turned out to be a surprising liability when Leggett went searching for state money for the music hall. The cousins' grandfather, Col. E. Brooke Lee, was speaker of the Maryland House of Delegates and in 1913 their great-grandfather became the first popularly elected U.S. senator. Blair Lee ran his father's unsuccessful campaign for governor in the 1970s, and then was Montgomery's lobbyist in Annapolis.
But for years, Blair Lee has taken shots at state legislators in his weekly column, deriding Montgomery's delegation for being disorganized, weak and a laughingstock at the State House.
"Until MoCo stands up on its hind legs, it will always be shortchanged, double-crossed and pushed around," Blair Lee wrote in his assessment of the 2008 legislative session.
"I'm sure that it wasn't a plus," Del. Sheila Hixson (D), a friend and neighbor, said of the project's connection to the Lees.
In a column this month, Blair Lee blasted Baltimore's plans to use state dollars to pay for a new $400 million sports arena: "If you need a big new arena to assuage your inferiority complex, pay for it yourself. Don't pass me the tab."
Couldn't the same be said about spending state money on Montgomery's music hall? The difference, Blair Lee said, is that the Fillmore has already signed up as a tenant, will make money for the county and relies on only $4 million in state funds.
After six years in the works, the family could still pull out of the music hall, Blair Lee said. "But if we walk away, we lose, the county loses and Silver Spring loses."
By Ann E. Marimow
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, August 25, 2008; B01
If any family can be considered the founding family of Silver Spring, it is the Lees.
Bruce and Blair Lee's great-great-great-grandfather bought the land that is now South Silver Spring before the Civil War and built a summer home there that he named Silver Spring. The family's real estate business went on to develop nearby apartments, a shopping center and Lee Plaza, the art deco-style office building that towers over the corner of Colesville Road and Georgia Avenue.
Yet the Lees find themselves caught in a political struggle, involving the very place where their roots run so deep, over Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett's (D) high-profile redevelopment proposal to bring a live music venue to downtown Silver Spring.
Leggett's plan to open one of Live Nation's Fillmore music halls at the site of an old J.C. Penney store depends on $8 million in taxpayer funds -- and the donation of land by the Lee Development Group. In exchange, the Lees want a measure of protection to ensure that the county's project does not interfere with an adjacent development they are considering.
To the county's chief planner, Royce Hanson, the protection the Lees are seeking would give them a "blank check." To the Lees and Leggett, the family is giving up valuable land and needs assurances that Montgomery's development rules will not change midcourse. By their own account, the Lees run a conservative, risk-averse and closely held family operation.
"My relatives understand that this county is crazy. None of them trust the county," said Bruce Lee, the company's president, who shares that mistrust.
Cousins Bruce and Blair took on leading roles at Lee Development Group after the death in 2003 of another cousin, E. Brooke Lee, who had led the company for more than two decades.
Blair Lee, 63, is the hyper-political Gazette newspaper columnist and WBAL (1090 AM) radio commentator, who works behind the scenes providing strategic advice. His father, the late Blair Lee III, was the Maryland lieutenant governor who finished out the gubernatorial term of Marvin Mandel after Mandel was convicted of mail fraud and racketeering.
Bruce Lee, 44, is the music hall project's genial, boyish public face, who makes the rounds at the County Council. He joined the company after college, working the hands-on property management side of the business and delving into Silver Spring's revitalization debates.
"If you're talking to Bruce, you are talking to Blair and vice versa," said longtime friend Kevin Maloney, who runs a commercial real estate firm in Bethesda. "Their styles are different and their responsibilities are different, but they are working for the same end result."
There was Bruce Lee last month, flustered, his head shaking after county planners unanimously panned the land-use proposals that supporters say are needed to make the music hall a reality. Planning Board members, while supportive of the project, said Leggett's deal with the Lees would wipe out their leverage to negotiate for public space and potentially delay other construction projects for up to 15 years. Board member John M. Robinson, who counts Bruce Lee as a good friend, called the county's case for the land-use measures a "charade" that would give the Lees "privileged status."
It is unclear how the board's recommendation will influence the council when it takes up the measures next month. Leggett said last week he has "strong support" on the nine-member council, in addition to backing from a long list of business and community leaders, but he could not say whether he has five votes.
At home in Kensington, Bruce Lee has for six years kept a yellow sticky note on his bathroom mirror to remind him that the family will not be forced into building on its surrounding property until market conditions are ripe. The note reads, "Remember: This is a Montgomery County economic development initiative and the county came to you."
To understand his caution, it helps to know the history of Lee Plaza. The building opened in the late 1980s, just as a real estate recession hit. For three years, the $21.5 million building was 80 to 85 percent vacant.
Still, it has been 18 years since the Lees demolished the J.C. Penney building now slated for the Fillmore, leaving the prime property fallow across the street from the American Film Institute's Silver Theater. Some developers privately ask what the Lees were waiting for, while others say the family was wise not to get out in front.
Developer Lloyd Moore, a veteran of the Silver Spring redevelopment wars, said there was so much bitterness and controversy at the time, "I don't see why anyone would participate in that environment."
The path to building the Fillmore is unprecedented in local land-use history because the music hall, which would count as the Lee group's public amenity and public-use space, would be built before the Lees commit to an adjacent project.
"He's kind of handing off his bargaining chip before he knows what he's going to need to strike a deal," Silver Spring developer Bryant Foulger said of the risk to the Lees.
Though they are not risk-taking developers, the Lees know how to play hardball. Leggett and the Lees pulled the plug on an earlier deal with the Alexandria-based Birchmere Music Hall after it had been in the works for five years under former county executive Douglas M. Duncan. They got spooked in part when the Birchmere began talking about opening a restaurant and club in Loudoun County. Bruce Lee moved quickly to line up Live Nation. Birchmere representatives declined to comment for this article.
The politically prominent Lee family name turned out to be a surprising liability when Leggett went searching for state money for the music hall. The cousins' grandfather, Col. E. Brooke Lee, was speaker of the Maryland House of Delegates and in 1913 their great-grandfather became the first popularly elected U.S. senator. Blair Lee ran his father's unsuccessful campaign for governor in the 1970s, and then was Montgomery's lobbyist in Annapolis.
But for years, Blair Lee has taken shots at state legislators in his weekly column, deriding Montgomery's delegation for being disorganized, weak and a laughingstock at the State House.
"Until MoCo stands up on its hind legs, it will always be shortchanged, double-crossed and pushed around," Blair Lee wrote in his assessment of the 2008 legislative session.
"I'm sure that it wasn't a plus," Del. Sheila Hixson (D), a friend and neighbor, said of the project's connection to the Lees.
In a column this month, Blair Lee blasted Baltimore's plans to use state dollars to pay for a new $400 million sports arena: "If you need a big new arena to assuage your inferiority complex, pay for it yourself. Don't pass me the tab."
Couldn't the same be said about spending state money on Montgomery's music hall? The difference, Blair Lee said, is that the Fillmore has already signed up as a tenant, will make money for the county and relies on only $4 million in state funds.
After six years in the works, the family could still pull out of the music hall, Blair Lee said. "But if we walk away, we lose, the county loses and Silver Spring loses."
Sunday, August 24, 2008
Area artists mix media to create ‘Image Word' exhibit - Gazette
Takoma Park event pairs artists, poets, improv dancers, musicians for unique results
by Jamie Rosen | Special to The Gazette |Wednesday, Aug. 20, 2008
"To go across, you have to crawl on your hands and knees," a poet chants to meditative flute and percussion. Four dancers painstakingly creep across the floor in front of eight consecutive panels of poetry and photography floating on spacious white paper.
"Perhaps your heart opens," the poet continues, then pauses as the dancers crawl past the series of photographs of poet Anne Dykers' face and hands in front of a tree. "And the world, on its perfect axis, becomes itself."
The dancers complete their journey and kneel before the poet, looking finally at peace.
Dykers read her work and watched it come to life at the Thursday closing of Image Word, an exhibit at the Takoma Park Community Center that paired seven poets each with a visual artist to create single works combining both media. The exhibit followed last year's artist-poet collaboration, Inspired Results, in which artists and poets reacted to each others' pieces.
Dykers produced her piece with visual artist Margot Neuhaus after the two were paired by Anne Becker, poet laureate of Takoma Park and co-curator of the exhibit. Becker felt they shared a motif in their work.
"What I said to both of them was in their work, in Anne's poetry, in Margot's visual art, that they have a very similar connection with silence," Becker said.
After agreeing to collaborate, Dykers and Neuhaus shared the process of selecting the final poem from words Dykers composed. Together, they cropped the photographs Neuhaus took of Dykers reenacting the dream that inspired her poem, in which she crossed a trestle over a river gorge, and produced the piece, "With Silence."
Collaborating with another artist was a new experience for Neuhaus.
"To be part of a shared work and a community has been very satisfying to me as artist," she said. "I put in words a process that is subconscious or unconscious. I think becoming aware of my process by sharing it with Anne, that was very rich for me."
"Through the whole exhibit, what was really interesting to me was the process, whereby your techniques, your feelings, your experiences are enlarged by working with other artists in various formats," said Becker, who also participated as poet and dancer.
The theme of the show, "creation," played out both in the awareness artists developed of their creative processes and the themes inherent in their work.
"[The exhibit] was pretty matronly," said Eric Rydzewski, who came to the exhibit with his aunt. "There were lots of references to flowers and rebirth [in the poetry], and I felt that way about the artwork as well."
One of the more abstract pieces incorporated 2,000 plastic eggs arranged in a circle of stacks with additional stacks in the middle, accompanied by a series of haiku involving themes of creation from the perspective of a single woman. The piece, "In the Garden," was created by visual artist Jim Landry and poet Greta Ehrig.
"Jim and I would describe our working process as sort of a ping pong match, bouncing ideas off each other," Ehrig said. She added that the collaboration was exciting, "but at the same time there's a certain giving up of control that happens and a certain unexpectedness of it all."
David Fogel, co-curator and visual arts coordinator for the Takoma Park Community Center, said he wanted the show to bring artists out of their niches, but he agreed that collaborative exhibits can produce some trepidation.
"When you curate a typical show, you know what you're going to get," he said. "This exhibit was: Let's just believe in the creative process, believe in the talents [of the artists], that what's going to be produced is going to be inspiring and insightful and thought-provoking and hopefully emotional, too, all the things that great art should be."
For Dykers and others, trust in the process paid off.
"It was a really wonderful experience," she said. "We really did the piece together. … [And] I felt like the musicians and the movers and the poem were working very well with each other, like there was a real responsiveness, a real interplay between the movers, the music and the poem."
Fogel and Becker plan to host another poet-artist collaboration in 2009. They also plan to move a reworked version of the current exhibit to Space 88 in Silver Spring in mid- to late October.
by Jamie Rosen | Special to The Gazette |Wednesday, Aug. 20, 2008
"To go across, you have to crawl on your hands and knees," a poet chants to meditative flute and percussion. Four dancers painstakingly creep across the floor in front of eight consecutive panels of poetry and photography floating on spacious white paper.
"Perhaps your heart opens," the poet continues, then pauses as the dancers crawl past the series of photographs of poet Anne Dykers' face and hands in front of a tree. "And the world, on its perfect axis, becomes itself."
The dancers complete their journey and kneel before the poet, looking finally at peace.
Dykers read her work and watched it come to life at the Thursday closing of Image Word, an exhibit at the Takoma Park Community Center that paired seven poets each with a visual artist to create single works combining both media. The exhibit followed last year's artist-poet collaboration, Inspired Results, in which artists and poets reacted to each others' pieces.
Dykers produced her piece with visual artist Margot Neuhaus after the two were paired by Anne Becker, poet laureate of Takoma Park and co-curator of the exhibit. Becker felt they shared a motif in their work.
"What I said to both of them was in their work, in Anne's poetry, in Margot's visual art, that they have a very similar connection with silence," Becker said.
After agreeing to collaborate, Dykers and Neuhaus shared the process of selecting the final poem from words Dykers composed. Together, they cropped the photographs Neuhaus took of Dykers reenacting the dream that inspired her poem, in which she crossed a trestle over a river gorge, and produced the piece, "With Silence."
Collaborating with another artist was a new experience for Neuhaus.
"To be part of a shared work and a community has been very satisfying to me as artist," she said. "I put in words a process that is subconscious or unconscious. I think becoming aware of my process by sharing it with Anne, that was very rich for me."
"Through the whole exhibit, what was really interesting to me was the process, whereby your techniques, your feelings, your experiences are enlarged by working with other artists in various formats," said Becker, who also participated as poet and dancer.
The theme of the show, "creation," played out both in the awareness artists developed of their creative processes and the themes inherent in their work.
"[The exhibit] was pretty matronly," said Eric Rydzewski, who came to the exhibit with his aunt. "There were lots of references to flowers and rebirth [in the poetry], and I felt that way about the artwork as well."
One of the more abstract pieces incorporated 2,000 plastic eggs arranged in a circle of stacks with additional stacks in the middle, accompanied by a series of haiku involving themes of creation from the perspective of a single woman. The piece, "In the Garden," was created by visual artist Jim Landry and poet Greta Ehrig.
"Jim and I would describe our working process as sort of a ping pong match, bouncing ideas off each other," Ehrig said. She added that the collaboration was exciting, "but at the same time there's a certain giving up of control that happens and a certain unexpectedness of it all."
David Fogel, co-curator and visual arts coordinator for the Takoma Park Community Center, said he wanted the show to bring artists out of their niches, but he agreed that collaborative exhibits can produce some trepidation.
"When you curate a typical show, you know what you're going to get," he said. "This exhibit was: Let's just believe in the creative process, believe in the talents [of the artists], that what's going to be produced is going to be inspiring and insightful and thought-provoking and hopefully emotional, too, all the things that great art should be."
For Dykers and others, trust in the process paid off.
"It was a really wonderful experience," she said. "We really did the piece together. … [And] I felt like the musicians and the movers and the poem were working very well with each other, like there was a real responsiveness, a real interplay between the movers, the music and the poem."
Fogel and Becker plan to host another poet-artist collaboration in 2009. They also plan to move a reworked version of the current exhibit to Space 88 in Silver Spring in mid- to late October.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
Silver Spring Jazz Festival back for fifth year - Gazette
Mike Meno and Jason Tomassini | Talk of the Town | August 20, 2008
The Silver Spring Jazz Festival will return to the downtown in September for its fifth year, but in a new location and with some help from music promoter Live Nation to book the headliner: The Mingus Big Band.
This year's festival, 2 p.m. to 10 p.m. Sept. 13, will be held in the parking lot behind the Lee Building at the corner of Georgia Avenue and Colesville Road in downtown Silver Spring.
"We needed a site that's a big open space and were desperate to have something right downtown," said Susan Hoffmann, marketing and special events manager with the Silver Spring Regional Center.
Last year's event was held at the artificial turf field at the corner of Fenton Street and Ellsworth Drive, the site for a new civic center, which will be under construction this fall.
This year's headlining act is The Mingus Big Band, a Grammy-nominated, 14-piece ensemble. Last year's headliner was Latin trumpet player Arturo Sandoval.
Los Angeles-based Live Nation, which plans to open The Fillmore music hall on Colesville Road in 2010, contacted The Mingus Big Band to play this year's festival. Hoffmann said the assistance could provide the basis for a strong partnership between the county and the promoter in the future.
"I'd like to partner with Live Nation when the Fillmore opens," said Hoffmann, who has produced the Jazz Festival for the past five years.
Other performers include Marcus Johnson, a former graduate of Montgomery Blair High School who runs the Three Keys record label and recording studio at 8121 Georgia Ave. and has performed at each jazz festival in Silver Spring. Also performing will be Israeli-born saxophone player Yaron Elyashiv as part of the Yaron Elyashiv Quintet, Silver Spring vocalist Gail Shipp and the Samambaya Quintet.
There also will be a New Orleans-style parade of youth jazz musicians called the Jazz Ensemble Caravan, which will kick off the event at 2 p.m. Three youth jazz ensembles will compete for the Silver Spring Jazz Festival Trophy, awarded annually to the best performance. Ensembles competing this year include James Hubert Blake High School in Silver Spring, The Jazz Academy of Music in Silver Spring and defending champion Albert Einstein High School in Kensington.
Hoffmann said she expects a crowd of about 25,000.
The Silver Spring Jazz Festival will return to the downtown in September for its fifth year, but in a new location and with some help from music promoter Live Nation to book the headliner: The Mingus Big Band.
This year's festival, 2 p.m. to 10 p.m. Sept. 13, will be held in the parking lot behind the Lee Building at the corner of Georgia Avenue and Colesville Road in downtown Silver Spring.
"We needed a site that's a big open space and were desperate to have something right downtown," said Susan Hoffmann, marketing and special events manager with the Silver Spring Regional Center.
Last year's event was held at the artificial turf field at the corner of Fenton Street and Ellsworth Drive, the site for a new civic center, which will be under construction this fall.
This year's headlining act is The Mingus Big Band, a Grammy-nominated, 14-piece ensemble. Last year's headliner was Latin trumpet player Arturo Sandoval.
Los Angeles-based Live Nation, which plans to open The Fillmore music hall on Colesville Road in 2010, contacted The Mingus Big Band to play this year's festival. Hoffmann said the assistance could provide the basis for a strong partnership between the county and the promoter in the future.
"I'd like to partner with Live Nation when the Fillmore opens," said Hoffmann, who has produced the Jazz Festival for the past five years.
Other performers include Marcus Johnson, a former graduate of Montgomery Blair High School who runs the Three Keys record label and recording studio at 8121 Georgia Ave. and has performed at each jazz festival in Silver Spring. Also performing will be Israeli-born saxophone player Yaron Elyashiv as part of the Yaron Elyashiv Quintet, Silver Spring vocalist Gail Shipp and the Samambaya Quintet.
There also will be a New Orleans-style parade of youth jazz musicians called the Jazz Ensemble Caravan, which will kick off the event at 2 p.m. Three youth jazz ensembles will compete for the Silver Spring Jazz Festival Trophy, awarded annually to the best performance. Ensembles competing this year include James Hubert Blake High School in Silver Spring, The Jazz Academy of Music in Silver Spring and defending champion Albert Einstein High School in Kensington.
Hoffmann said she expects a crowd of about 25,000.
Friday, August 15, 2008
Montgomery Blair performer leads class for Long Branch youngsters - Gazette
by Mike Meno | Staff Writer | Wednesday, July 23, 2008
It was not a typical theater setting, but the young actors preparing to perform at the Long Branch Community Center received serious stage direction last week from youthful leaders.
‘‘Speak slowly and enunciate your words,” the head instructor, Adam Carey, 16, told the middle-school-age class of six girls and one boy in a meeting room at the Silver Spring center. ‘‘Make sure you’re looking at each other so it looks like you’re talking to each other.”
The students are summer campers who have opted for an alternative to the standard activities, such as swimming and basketball, offered at the center on Piney Branch Road.
Carey, a former Long Branch camper himself, has returned this summer to offer youngsters a chance to do something different.
Growing up in Long Branch, Carey said, he spent most of his time at the center swimming and playing kickball. It wasn’t until eighth grade that he discovered his true passion: acting in front of an audience.
In Long Branch, ‘‘there weren’t a lot of theater opportunities, and so I wanted to give some of those opportunities to kids who live in the area,” said Carey, who will be a senior at Montgomery Blair High School. He has become a regular performer in the school’s theater program, with roles in recent productions of ‘‘The Comedy of Errors” and ‘‘Beauty and the Beast.”
The camp’s theater class, which doubled as Carey’s Eagle Scout project, was part of the community center’s Summer Fun Center. It was taught for one hour every weekday for six weeks and culminated in Friday’s performance in front of the entire camp.
Carey’s friends and schoolmates Kaycee Tucker and Laura Boyer served as co-instructors in the class and helped him and the middle-schoolers write a play, ‘‘The Pajama Party,” the story of a missing teddy bear at a sleepover.
At the last rehearsal, Carey and Tucker gave performance tips to the young actors: Keep your body facing the audience. Improvise dialogue if you forget your lines. Never break character.
‘‘They try to get us excited for it,” said Silver Spring resident Priscilla Perez, 11. ‘‘That way, we won’t be nervous.”
Tucker, 17, who graduated from Blair in the spring, spent the first few minutes of a recent class leading the students through physical and verbal warm-up exercises, including jumping jacks and tongue twisters.
‘‘The whole point is to have fun,” Tucker said. ‘‘That’s why Adam and I do theater in school, because it’s fun.”
Silver Spring resident Lisa Jobe, 11, said she signed up for the class because she is interested in acting. ‘‘It’s fun to act like somebody else for a while,” she said.
Jocara Knight, director of the Summer Fun Center, said he was happy with the way the class worked out.
‘‘He did a very good job,” Knight said of Carey. ‘‘He seemed like he was a very good positive role model. I’m getting a very good reaction from the kids, and they seem to very much enjoy it.” Knight said he is considering including the class in the camp’s activities again next year, and possibly expanding it.
Carey said part of the reason he proposed the program for Long Branch was because of recent crimes in the area that he worries have tarnished the neighborhood’s image. With programs such as his theater camp, he hopes more positive stories will come out of the neighborhood.
‘‘I live right down the street,” he said. ‘‘This is my community.”
Knight said the class was an example for the entire camp. More than 70 youngsters watched the theater group’s performance Friday.
‘‘It’s very important to see someone doing something positive,” he said.
It was not a typical theater setting, but the young actors preparing to perform at the Long Branch Community Center received serious stage direction last week from youthful leaders.
‘‘Speak slowly and enunciate your words,” the head instructor, Adam Carey, 16, told the middle-school-age class of six girls and one boy in a meeting room at the Silver Spring center. ‘‘Make sure you’re looking at each other so it looks like you’re talking to each other.”
The students are summer campers who have opted for an alternative to the standard activities, such as swimming and basketball, offered at the center on Piney Branch Road.
Carey, a former Long Branch camper himself, has returned this summer to offer youngsters a chance to do something different.
Growing up in Long Branch, Carey said, he spent most of his time at the center swimming and playing kickball. It wasn’t until eighth grade that he discovered his true passion: acting in front of an audience.
In Long Branch, ‘‘there weren’t a lot of theater opportunities, and so I wanted to give some of those opportunities to kids who live in the area,” said Carey, who will be a senior at Montgomery Blair High School. He has become a regular performer in the school’s theater program, with roles in recent productions of ‘‘The Comedy of Errors” and ‘‘Beauty and the Beast.”
The camp’s theater class, which doubled as Carey’s Eagle Scout project, was part of the community center’s Summer Fun Center. It was taught for one hour every weekday for six weeks and culminated in Friday’s performance in front of the entire camp.
Carey’s friends and schoolmates Kaycee Tucker and Laura Boyer served as co-instructors in the class and helped him and the middle-schoolers write a play, ‘‘The Pajama Party,” the story of a missing teddy bear at a sleepover.
At the last rehearsal, Carey and Tucker gave performance tips to the young actors: Keep your body facing the audience. Improvise dialogue if you forget your lines. Never break character.
‘‘They try to get us excited for it,” said Silver Spring resident Priscilla Perez, 11. ‘‘That way, we won’t be nervous.”
Tucker, 17, who graduated from Blair in the spring, spent the first few minutes of a recent class leading the students through physical and verbal warm-up exercises, including jumping jacks and tongue twisters.
‘‘The whole point is to have fun,” Tucker said. ‘‘That’s why Adam and I do theater in school, because it’s fun.”
Silver Spring resident Lisa Jobe, 11, said she signed up for the class because she is interested in acting. ‘‘It’s fun to act like somebody else for a while,” she said.
Jocara Knight, director of the Summer Fun Center, said he was happy with the way the class worked out.
‘‘He did a very good job,” Knight said of Carey. ‘‘He seemed like he was a very good positive role model. I’m getting a very good reaction from the kids, and they seem to very much enjoy it.” Knight said he is considering including the class in the camp’s activities again next year, and possibly expanding it.
Carey said part of the reason he proposed the program for Long Branch was because of recent crimes in the area that he worries have tarnished the neighborhood’s image. With programs such as his theater camp, he hopes more positive stories will come out of the neighborhood.
‘‘I live right down the street,” he said. ‘‘This is my community.”
Knight said the class was an example for the entire camp. More than 70 youngsters watched the theater group’s performance Friday.
‘‘It’s very important to see someone doing something positive,” he said.
Saturday, August 9, 2008
An Evening of Jazz at Mayorga Coffee Factory
An Evening of Jazz at Mayorga Coffee Factory
8040 Georgia Ave., Silver Spring
Thursday, August 14
7:30 – 9:30 p.m.
Featuring college-bound Silver Spring musicians…
--Michael Harlen (NYU '12 – Jazz Performance) on guitar
--Michael Siegel (Tufts University '12) on bass
--Elijah Jamal Balbed (Howard University `12 – Jazz Performance) on saxophone
--Andrew Bort (Washington University) on drums
No cover
Half-price wine and appetizers
Free valet parking
This is a benefit concert to support the rebuilding efforts in St.
Bernard Parish, LA
Donations (checks and cash) for the St. Bernard Project
(www.stbernardproject.org) are welcome and appreciated.
A family-friendly event!
You won't want to miss it
8040 Georgia Ave., Silver Spring
Thursday, August 14
7:30 – 9:30 p.m.
Featuring college-bound Silver Spring musicians…
--Michael Harlen (NYU '12 – Jazz Performance) on guitar
--Michael Siegel (Tufts University '12) on bass
--Elijah Jamal Balbed (Howard University `12 – Jazz Performance) on saxophone
--Andrew Bort (Washington University) on drums
No cover
Half-price wine and appetizers
Free valet parking
This is a benefit concert to support the rebuilding efforts in St.
Bernard Parish, LA
Donations (checks and cash) for the St. Bernard Project
(www.stbernardproject.org) are welcome and appreciated.
A family-friendly event!
You won't want to miss it
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