The Opera-Musical Theatre Special Interest Group
of



Leonard Lehrman, Director
Helene Williams, Asst. Director
33 Court St., Valley Stream NY 11580
Email: ljlehrmandma@gmail.com


"a whale of a show!"
--Bob Sherman
, 6/7/07


"TNS's Opera-Musical Theatre SIG continues to perform opera, musicals,
and theatrical pieces at naturist events in the first decade[s] of the 2000s.
Lehrman is an accomplished and respected composer, performer, and director
who has moved naturist groups in the 21st century toward
an ever widening array of musical and theatrical endeavors.
"

--Mark Storey, Theatre au Naturel, Ancaster, Ontario, Canada:
Heureka Productions, 2005, p. 16

For the latest, fullest articles on the group,
scroll down to near the bottom of the page.

Many of our performances on video may be viewed here.

Our Most Recent Naturist CD:
Songs for Naturists:
Live from the Naked Front


performed by

Helene Williams & Leonard Lehrman

with Cary Bair

was produced with the kind assistance of
The Naturist Education Foundation

"inventive, funny, engaging, and absurd, sometimes all at once...
compiles material recorded in several places, including
The Naturist Society's Eastern Gathering and Northeast Festival....
Some of the fun lies in Lehrman's explanations to the crowd.
He is a born raconteur as well as composer, pianist, conductor, stage director, producer, and critic.
Did you know he has written over 175 compositions [253, to date!], from one-minute songs to over a dozen operas and musicals?
Among those is a Requiem for Hiroshima, with words by Lee Baxandall, the founder of The Naturist Society!

The music offered here, by many composers, moves amongst three themes:
nudity, Judaism, and politics. Sometimes naturism shows up in unexpected guises,
like songs to words by the Irish poet William Butler Yeats
and the American actor Marlon Brando.
It may even be mixed with politics, as in a song about the possibilities of
peace through nudity. That one [by Mark Levy] offers such immortal lines as
'Take off your clothes to those you oppose' and
'Here's the surest way to end a running feud:
simply approach your adversary in the nude.'

How's that for subversive!

Further impishness inhabits Tom Lehrer's 'Chanukkah in Santa Monica,'
with uproarious rhymes for quirky places to hold Jewish holidays.
Noticing that Lehrer omitted many, Leonard wrote his own
addendum, globally dislocating a bunch more holidays....
The highlight is three songs from The Booby Trap, an extended,
in-progress musical with words by Sydney Ross Singer (author of
Dressed to Kill, an extended argument against wearing bras) and
music by Leonard Lehrman. In these songs we get an extended invitation
into a fine musical mind--of a composer of songs in the tradition
of Kurt Weill, Marc Blitzstein, and Leonard Bernstein,
all of whose music Leonard Lehrman knows well.

The star performer is Helene Williams.
A fine singer, she masters a variety of styles with colour, finesse, and substantial theatricality....
Naturist Cary Bair sings a few numbers too, clearly and valiantly....
Where else will you hear 'The Little Jewish Ladies for Buchanan' or 'The Naturist Anthem'?
The latter uses the tune 'Simple Gifts.'
That melody became well known in Aaron Copland's music for the ballet
Appalachian Spring. Leonard's own superb text deserves equal fame:
he's as talented a wordsmith as he is a composer."

--Paul Rapoport, Going Natural


===========================================================================================================================

History of the SIG

Performances thru 2021


1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th & 5th International Naturist Opera Workshops 7/89, '90, '92, '94, '96
Domaine Naturiste de Bélézy - Bédoin, France [7/89 with Judy Morris & Bill Reynolds;
first four with chorale & instrumentalists; first three with water ballet]
incl. Mermaid Operas of Dvorak, Dargomyzhsky (Eng. tr. Lehrman),
and Elie Siegmeister (adaptation L.Lehrman) (French premiere)

Sydney Naturally (Sydney, Australia) 1/19/02 An Australian Odyssey (excerpts) (+ Naked Verses)
(partially broadcast on Australian National Radio, 2/02)

Concerts, Plays & Operas at Eastern (U.S.) Naturist Gatherings, Festivals & Resorts

6/20/92 Tom Cushing's Barely Proper (adaptation L.Lehrman), Camp Barrett, The Poconos (PA)
[with Barry Plaxen, Diane Reese, Peter Kacalanos,
Cary Bair, Lois Horowitz, Tracy Philipps, John Cobb]
& 7/6/92 WBAI-FM (NY) [w/Plaxen, Philipps, Kacalanos, Bair, Horowitz, Cobb, Don Bensen]

8/21/93 Potpourri, The Phoenix, Greenwich NY
[w/Kacalanos, Bair, Reynolds, Amy Vail, et al]

1/9/94 Naturist Cabaret, Cypress Cove, Kissimmee FL

8/20/94 John Bramhall's Stark (adaptation L.Lehrman), Empire Haven, Moravia NY
[w/Bair, Vail, Reynolds, Lenora Eve]

6/24/95 Stark and Adam & Lilith & Eve by L.Lehrman, after Manya Pruzhanskaya Lackow & Jacques Drouet,
Bucksteep Manor, Washington MA
[w/Kacalanos, Bair, Jill Salazar, Eve, Reynolds, Vail, Reese, Pacer & Perkins Families]

7/5/97 The Creation & Other Pieces, Camp Ramblewood, Darlington, MD
[w/Kacalanos + Rosanna Prothro]

6/24/98 A Faun in the Forest by Gerald Cockschott, Eastover, Lenox MA
[w/Kacalanos, John Holly]

6/24/99 Potpourri, Eastover, Lenox MA [w/Kacalanos, Bair, Carla Tarantola]
excpts, 12/98 Golden Fleece Square One [w/Kacalanos, Bair]

6/21/00 Tom Lehrer Song Festival, Eastover, Lenox MA [w/Kacalanos, Bair, Sarvamangala]

..............
8/23/01 The Booby Trap of Off Our Chests by Leonard Lehrman & Sydney Ross Singer + Naked Verses
(on poems by Lois Ann Horowitz, Stephen Van Eck, Gene Peacock, Jr., and Melissa Pinol)
Eastover, Lenox MA;
--excerpts from The Booby Trap also performed
5/13/01 Golden Fleece Square One* [w/Kacalanos, Bair, Sarva] and telecast
2/02 Manhattan Neighborhood Network Ch. 34 2/22/02 2:10-2:30pm, 2/26/02 7:40-8pm
8/11/05 Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY [w/Susan Blake]

and as part of "Prevention Is the Cure" Week:
5/19/06 PeaceSmiths Forum, Amityville NY [w/Susan Blake & Cary Bair]
5/19/06 First United Methodist Church, Islip NY [also w/Blake & Bair, complete!]

additional performances
8/10/07 7pm Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY
8/25/07 8pm Custer Institute, Southold (Long Island) NY

and, with KathrynWieckhorst, in memory of Susan Blake (1953-2007):
5/17/08 2:00PM
Womanspace, at Great Neck Senior Center, 80 Grace Ave., Great Neck NY
as part of "Prevention Is the Cure" Week; featured speaker: LIU Prof. Scott Carlin

and as part of Breast Cancer Awareness Month:
10/19/08 4:00PM
Puffin Cultural Forum, 20 E. Oakdene Ave., Teaneck NJ
featured speaker: Dr. Jeff Kopelson of the Schachter Institute
............

8/22/02 Naked Klezmer, incl. Jewish Haiku, Eastover, Lenox MA
[w/Bair, Kathleen Rooney, Bob Salzman]

12/31/02 Happy Nude Year Cabaret, Sunsport, Loxahatchee FL

8/8/03 Songs for Naturists, Empire Haven, Moravia NY [w/Sarva, Ed Thibault, Bob Salzman]

1/9/04 Songs for Naturists, incl. "A Coat," Sunsport, Loxahatchee FL

8/7/04 More Songs for Naturists, incl. "Brando Credo," Empire Haven, Moravia NY

1/21/05 Naturist Cabaret, Sunsport, Loxahatchee FL

Naturist Songs "en franglais"
8/11/06 Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY
8/18/06 Canadian Naturist Festival, La Pommerie, QuŽbec
8/17/07 Canadian Naturist Festival, (with the Chorale of) La Pommerie, QuŽbec
8/6/09 Canadian Naturist Festival, Bare Oaks, Ontario

2 Nudecades of Great Performances - with Cary Bair
8/8/08 Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY

Carried Away ~ In the Nude (Celebrating Anne Fisher's Birthday)
2/28/09 Sunsport, Loxahatchee FL

"Free Your Voice" workshop
and 20th Anniversary Naturist Concert Extravaganza
honoring the Elie Siegmeister Centennial and the memory of Lee Baxandall

8/8/09 Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY

3/20/10 First Day of Spring Cabaret
Sunsport, Loxahatchee FL

6/19/10 Return to Eastern Naturist Gathering, Camp Westmont, Poyntelle PA

8/6/10 Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY

3/11/11 The Broadway You Know & Don't Know, Sunsport, Loxahatchee FL

6/15/11 The Broadway You Know & Don't Know, Eastern Naturist Gathering,
Camp Westmont, Poyntelle, PA

8/4/11 Leonard & Helene play leads in, and Leonard directs,
radio play production of his adaptation of the Naturist classic
Barely Proper by Tom Cushing
at the Eastern Canadian Naturist Festival, Bare Oaks, Ontario
Hear the podcast by clicking here.

8/5/11 Songs of Broadway, Naturism & Protest
Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY

8/1/12 A Naturist CaBAREt,
Eastern Canadian Naturist Festival, La Pommerie, Quebec

8/3/12 A Naturist CaBAREt,
Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY

3/8/13 A Naturist CaBAREt,
Sunsport, Loxahatchee FL

8/1/13 A Naturist CaBAREt,
Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY

3/7/14 A Naturist CaBAREt,
Sunsport, Loxahatchee FL

7/31/14 A Naturist CaBAREt & Video Memorial Tribute to Cary Bair,
Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY

2/13-15/15 Midwinter Naturist Festival, Sunsport, Loxahatchee FL
2/13 Screening of 1995 video Adam & Lilith & Eve
2/14 Play reading of Adam & Lilith & Eve
2/15 "Free Your Voice" Workshop; A Naturist CaBAREt

7/28-31/15 Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY

2/14/16 Valentine's Day Naturist CaBAREt, Midwinter Naturist Festival, Sunsport, Loxahatchee FL

8/4-5/16 Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY
8/4/16 Readings of Stark and The Vagina Monologues
8/5/16 Russian Naturist CaBAREt

8/3/17 A Naturist CaBAREt, Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY
with LaDonna & Bill Pacer, Stephen Van Eck, Helene & Leonard
in works by Tom Lehrer, Lou & Peter Berryman, and excerpts from Oklahoma!

2/18/18 Leonard Bernstein Centenary Naturist CaBAREt, Midwinter Naturist Festival, Sunsport, Loxahatchee FL

8/2/18 Leonard Bernstein Centenary Naturist CaBAREt, Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, Moravia NY

2/15/19 Naturist CABAREt at Sunsport Gardens, Loxahatchee, FL
Midwinter Naturist Festival, with LaDonna Allison & Bill Pacer

8/2/19 Naturist CABAREt at Empire Haven, Moravia, NY
Midwinter Naturist Festival, with LaDonna Allison & Bill Pacer

2/14/20 Valentine's Day Naturist CaBAREt at Sunsport Gardens, Loxahatchee, FL
Midwinter Naturist Festival, with LaDonna Allison & Bill Pacer
in memory of Nathaniel S. Lehrman,
including premiere of Lehrman's 5 Romanian Songs [in English]

2/14/21 Valentine's Day Naturist CaBAREt at Sunsport Gardens, Loxahatchee, FL
including the Shatzky-Mayer-Lehrman Damn! That Apple!
and excerpts from Lehrman's Superspy!: The S-e-c-r-e-t Musical
in memory of librettist Joel Shatzky (Nov. 30, 1943-Apr. 3, 2020)
and composer Lutz Mayer (Dec. 14, 1934-Nov. 18, 2020)
on Zoom with LaDonna Allison & Bill Pacer LIVE.
8/14&15/2021 at Center for the Arts in Homer, NY,
with Pamela Poulin, Jack Carr, Steve Wilson, Bill, LaDonna, Helene & Leonard
in excerpts fromÊSuperspy!: The S-e-c-r-e-t MusicalÊandÊMadame RÊand the completeÊDamn! That Apple!Ê
Sat. 7:30pm perf Age-Restricted [due to Nudity]
Sun. 2:00pm Unrestricted
also at Solair in Woodstock, CT, Aug. 19, 2021



PRESS

*reviewed in New Music Connoisseur 9:2 p16 "Dicks, Bras, Bars, and Other 'Disordered' Subjects"
by Barry L. Cohen, Linda Pehrson & Mark Greenfest:
"a musical which, for the first time in the history of medicine and theater,
deals with bras as the major cause of breast cancer....
We heard the earnest cast of Helene Williams, Peter Kacalanos, Sarvamangala, and Cary Bair
(with Lehrman at the keyboard) sing eight of the songs, all cleverly ironic little gems, entitled
'Barbie Blues,' 'Baby Breasts,' 'Boobs Blues,' 'Silicone Sal,'
'Breast Play,' 'The Test,' 'Working It Out,' 'Stuffed Bras.'"

+letter from Leonard Lehrman to Aufbau, 8/8/02 68:16 p18 "Clothing Optionality"
- on FKK, TNS, NAC, etc. http://LeonardJLehrman.com/articles/aufbau110.html


Documentation in N Magazine

6/14/89 9:1 p49 "REVIEWS OPERA: RASPUTIN... NY City Opera" 9/88 by Leonard Lehrman;
blurb: "LEONARD LEHRMAN is a naturist and well-known younger composer and conductor of operas."

10/5/89 9:2 p69-73 "UPDATES FRANCE Opera & BŽlŽzy" by George McCormick & Lee Baxandall

Judy Morris, Helene Williams, Bill Reynolds; Leonard Lehrman, pno/cond.
with water ballet dir. by Olivier, in MERMAID OPERAS:
Rusalka excerpts by Dvorak (in Fr.) and Dargomyzhsky (in Eng.) + The Mermaid in Lock No. 7
music by Elie Siegmeister, text by Edward Mabley, adapted by L. Lehrman
4-pg. 17-(color)photo spread by Lee Baxandall & Johanna Moore;
interviews with Siegmeister & Opera News Editor Marylis Gonzaga

[articles also in Tillsammans by Erik Holm on "BƒLƒZY 1-7 juli 1990" with cartoon, and in
Opera Monthly 2:12 4/90 p33-35 "OPERA TRENDS: Mermaid Operas Au Naturel" by Leonard Lehrman:
"Apparently the first instance in history of 'mermaid operas' being presented with appropriate costuming...
or lack thereof, at the First International Naturist Opera Workshop."]

6/28/90 10.1 p97 1st publication of photo of Kurt Weill skinnydipping

1/16/92 11.2 p8-9 "Deja Vu Barely Proper" rehearsals, performance & broadcast announced -
with Barry Plaxen, Diane Reese, Helene Williams, Peter Kacalanos; Leonard Lehrman, dir.

5/1/92 11.3 p37-39 "NUDE IN TV AD LAND" "HELENE WILLIAMS AND LEONARD LEHRMAN
are the musicians you saw featured in an opera production in France in N 9.2.
Here they lend themselves to a TV spot ad for insurance 'coverage.'
This is how they looked on Boston television."
"Couple's Feelings Are Mixed On How They Fared In TV Commercial"

12/26/92 12.2 p104 photo includes SIG members

3/29/93 12.3 p7 & 24 repeat of above photo;
p24 "EASTERN NATURIST GATHERING '92 : CAMP BARRETT, THE POCONOS, JUNE 19-21, 1992":
"Leonard Lehrman produced a splendid performance of 'Barely Proper,' the classic Naturist comedy.
The first-time cast was sparked by long-time 'Barely Proper' performer and producer Barry Plaxen
and experienced ingenue Diane Reese [photo p25] A knowing audience responded with cheers and bravos."
photos after p72:
"Leonard Lehrman, American composer, conducts a song from his opera
about Christopher Columbus's men in armor and the naked natives."
"Leonard Lehrman and BŽlŽzy owner Gerard Leclerc."

6/10/93 12.4 p49-53 "NUDITY IN OPERA" by Leonard Lehrman - incl. photos [of]
Moses und Aron, Susannah, Fiery Angel, New World (previewed, BŽlŽzy 1990)

9/20/93 13.1 p101 "A Great Gathering" by Marilyn R. Lovell on Northeastern Naturist Gathering at The Phoenix: "
Leonard Lehrman's talented group of professionals gave us a grand evening of good music and great fun."

5/23/94 13.4 p93 "How Good It Was" by Marilyn Lovell, Syracuse Naturist Gazette:
"Leonard Lehrman and The Opera-Musical Theatre Special Interest Group of the Naturist Society
outdid themselves Saturday evening with a potpourri of light opera and musical theater.
Not only was the audience nude, the singers were, too! Such fun, such talent!"
p91 photo: Cary Bair, Leonard Lehrman, Helene Williams, Bill Reynolds, Amy Vail, et al

2/8/96 15.3 p31 "EASTERN GATHERING '95 BUCKSTEEP MANOR
IN THE BERKSHIRE MOUNTAINS, MASSACHUSETTS, JUNE 21-25, 1995"
by Camilla Van Sickle & Bill Pennington: "
The TNS Opera-Musical Theater SIG led by Leonard Lehrman offered 'Adam & Lilith & Eve',
an entertainment based in part on Genesis. This was hugely popular, standing room only."
1-page 7-(color)photo spread after p.32.
p27 captions: "Leonard Lehrman conducts his musical comedy as
Serpent (Bill Reynolds) induces Eve (Lenora Eve) to offer the apple to Adam (Cary Bair);
Reynolds and Diane Reese;
Lilith (Jill Salazar) dismisses angels Charlie, Gregory and Philip Perkins ([photo by Mark] Orpen);
Finale with Amy Vail seated (Orpen);
Finale with adults Salazar, Helene Williams, Bill Pacer, Peter Kacalanos (God), Eve
and one Perkins and two Pacer kids;
the angels are harsh with a figged Adam (Orpen)."

5/20/97 16.4 p10 A Naturist Anthem, Words: Leonard Lehrman, Copyright 1993 Music: "Simple Gifts"

9/3/97 17.1 p17 Barcelona nude statue photos by Helene Williams

11/20/97 17.2 p1 "The Eastern Naturist Fair 1998 At Eastover Resort, Lenox, Massachusetts June 22-29, 1998:"
"The Naturist Society's traditional Gathering program begins on Wednesday, June 24 with a day trip to Vermont's Ledges
and an evening performance by the Naturist Opera-Musical Theater...."

2/27/98 Spring 1998 17.3 p91 "EASTERN GATHERING 1997
July 3-6, 1997 at Camp Ramblewood, Darlington, Maryland" by Judi Ditzler:
"A terrific performance was given by Leonard Lehrman and the TNS Opera-Musical Theater Saturday evening,
featuring Lehrman's satirical take on the Genesis story in a piece called 'The Creation And Other Stories.'
This talented group is well-loved by Naturists, and its shows are always a highlight of Gathering weekends."
p94 photo of Peter Kacalanos juggling

11/16/98 Winter 1998 18.2 p96 "EASTERN NATURIST GATHERING 1998 -
International Perspectives - A British View" by Roger and Vena Wright:
"...a most entertaining night at the nude opera performed by the TNS Opera-Musical Theatre SIG..."
(color) photo by Mark Orpen after p. 104 [of John Holly & Helene Williams in A Faun in the Forest]

8/31/99 Autumn 1999 19.1 p78-80 "TNS SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS" by Mark Storey with Nicky Hoffman:
"Opera-Musical Theatre SIG : Raw Performance With A Smile"
"...the Opera-Musical Theatre SIG has been staging productions at TNS Eastern Naturist Gatherings and abroad.
They have only missed one Eastern Gathering (1996), and have also staged 10 productions in France....
Anyone who has seen one of the O-MT SIG's Naturist performances knows that these folks are definitely having fun."
Captions to photos by Lee Baxandall and Ron Marsh:
"NATURIST GATHERINGS often set the stage for Opera-Musical Theatre SIG performances.
Top: 'The Mermaid Operas' were directed by Leonard Lehrman
and sung by the Naturist Opera Workshop singers at Bélézy Resort, France, 1989.
Middle: The O-MT SIG takes a bow after its rendition of Adam & Lilith & Eve at the 1995 Eastern Gathering.
Bottom: Lehrman and Helene Williams perform at Eastover during the 1999 ENG [in 'Anything You Can Do']."

11/15/99 Winter 1999 19.2 p31
"1999 EASTERN NATURIST GATHERING WAS TERRIFIC!" by Mark Storey:
"Leonard Lehrman and the Opera-Musical Theatre SIG presented an evening of song and humorous skits."
p121 "Opera-Musical Theatre SIG" letter by Leonard Lehrman, correcting "a few minor errors" in 19.1.

11/3/00 Winter 2000 20.2 p20 "A Jewish Take on Eden" letter by Leonard Lehrman
"concerning interpretations of the Genesis story (N 20.1, pp. 49-54, and others).
What you're missing is a Jewish perspective...."
p27 & 30 photos by Ron Marsh of Leonard Lehrman, Peter Kacalanos, Carla Tarantola

Winter 2001 21.2 p63 & 65
"Naked in the Berkshires: The 2001 Eastern Naturist Gathering" by Christopher Rowland:
"A world premiere graced the Tally Ho stage the next night, when
The Opera/Musical Theatre Special Interest Group presented
The Booby Trap by Leonard Lehrman and Sydney Ross Singer.
This short play is based on a book by Singer and his wife Soma Grismaijer titled
Get It Off!, which discusses the theoretical link between bra wearing and breast cancer.
A large, appreciative audience laughed and cheered,
as the talented performers carried us through the humorous, touching, poignant material."

Spring 2002 21.3 p82-89 "NATURIST HISTORY 'Nudism with a Social Conscience':
Circle H Ranch helped set the stage for modern naturism in America" by Carl Hild [on Barely Proper]

Summer 2002 21.4
p44 "Naturist Opera Down Under:
Naturist Special Interest Group Performs First Concert At Sydney Naturally"
by Bob Reed, incl. photo of Jeff & Karolyn Dunlop, Leonard Lehrman & Helene Williams
p99 "REVIEWS BOOKS Nude Poets Society" review of Naked Verses, ed., Bern Loibl,
by Leonard Lehrman, with references to Lois Ann Horowitz, Stephen Van Eck, Syd Singer,
Gene Peacock, Jr., G. Elton Warrick, Don Bensen, Rebecca S. Terrible, L.K. Twaddle, Janet L. Tawalkana.

Summer 2005 24.4
p49-52 "Barely Proper: For Nudists, This Play's the Thing," by Mark Storey -
"abridged extract" from introduction to Theatre au Naturel,
Ancaster, Ontario, Canada: Heureka Productions, 2005,
mentions (on p.52) our 1992 production and broadcast.
Full text of the description in his book (p.16):
"TNS's Opera-Musical Theatre SIG continues to perform opera, musicals,
and theatrical pieces at naturist events in the first decade of the 2000s.
Lehrman is an accomplished and respected composer, performer, and director
who has moved naturist groups in the 21st century toward
an ever widening array of musical and theatrical endeavors."

Winter 2008 28.2
p41 "Northeast Naturist Festival" by Barbara Crumb -
"Evening concerts were offered by our friends Helene Williams,
Leonard Lehrman, and Cary Bair from the TNS Musical SIG"

Spring 2009 28.3
p26 "The History of The Naturist Society" by Mark Storey
mentions opera SIG and prints sidebar:
The best tribute any Naturist could
give Lee Baxandall would be to
think: "What would Lee do?"
and then act accordingly. With
his considerable theatrical back-
ground, Lee knowingly brought
the Opera/Musical Theatre SIG
to the ENG every year he could,
overcoming any obstacles, ami-
cably solving any problems.
That's what Lee did.

Leonard J. Lehrman
Founder/Director, The Opera/Musical Theatre Special Interest Group of The Naturist Society


Winter 2009 29.2
p44-45 "Northeast Festival" by Stina Sieg -
"rich performance of exuberant show tunes by musicians Leonard Lehrman and Helene Williams"

Spring 2012 31.3
p74 "Leonard Lehrman, Opera-Musical Theater SIG, celebrates his birthday in style at Lighthouse Beach surrounded by friends."
[photo by Helene Williams]

...................

Winter 2012 32.2 p65-67 "The Music and Naturism of Leonard Lehrman and Helene Williams" by Joel Simpson:
"The 2012 Northeast Naturist Festival at Empire Haven in New York
was impressive in the range of professions and interests represented,
with every night featuring an artistic performance. Meriting special note
were two world-class performers in the opera/cabaret genre:
the husband-and-wife team of Leonard Lehrman and Helene Williams.
They have performed all over North America, Europe, Israel and Australia.
Lehrman, a classical pianist/organist and cabaretist, served as Assistant Chorus Master
of the Metropolitan Opera and Chief Coach/Conductor at Theater des Westens in Berlin.
Williams, an opera-trained soprano, co-founded the Bronx Opera.
In 1986, after both their [first] marriages had broken up,
Helene played the role of The Rabbi's Wife in Neil Diamond's "Coming to America,"
part of the Liberty Weekend celebration of the Statue of Liberty's Centennial
on national and international TV. When Leonard advertised for an
Emma Goldman in his new musical about the Russian-American Jewish Anarchist,
she figured she'd have a chance at the lead,
given her prior as a Jewish character in "Coming to America."
On January 7, 1987, she walked into the audition and "walked off with the part, and the composer."
Since then, they've done 51 productions of that show together, in 5 countries.
[See http://LeonardJLehrman.com/EG.html].
A protege of Leonard Bernstein, Lehrman was also a close friend of Lee Baxandall (1935-2009),
editor [and translator] of Wilhelm Reich, Marx and Engels, and founder of TNS.
Lehrman had known him in the 1970s as a fellow Brecht translator.
He rediscovered him as a naturist enthusiast when he bought Baxandall's
World Guide to Nude Beaches and Recreation (at a PX in Germany).
They reconnected over this shared passion, leading to musical collaborations,
including the founding of the Opera/Musical Theatre Special Interest Group in 1989,
and A Requiem for Hiroshima at Riverside Church in 1990.
Their Empire Haven program featured a thematic medley on flowers,
including Lehrman's charming setting of Robert Herrick's "Gather Ye Rosebuds,"
Neil Diamond's classic "You Don't Bring Me Flowers,"
and Pete Seeger's perennial anthem, a jaunty and modulating "Where Have All the Flowers Gone,"
which the audience chimed in on. In tribute to Claude Debussy's sesquicentennial (1862-1918),
Lehrman and Williams included a good dose of French music,
including Jacques Brel's "Les Bourgeois" and one of the evening's many high points,
a choreographed pas de deux by Festival attendees Arlene Delleur and Dennis Cullen
to Lehrman's synthesizer rendition of Debussy's Clair de lune. (See http://youtu.be/Wfm8bFjzJ0g.)
From these ethereal realms Williams and Lehrman brought us back down to realities on the political ground,
but with a parachute of rich humor, including "No Radiation without Representation" (by Susan Beckhorn),
"The Man Who Controls the Drones," "Politicians Polka,"
and "The One Percent," the last three being Lehrman originals or collaborations.
The performance concluded with Mark Levy's music hall romp "Take Off Your Clothes,"
followed by "The Naturist Anthem"(to the tune "Simple Gifts") which they performed gloriously in the nude.
Helene Williams' voice is a[n absolute] joy in any setting. It is most at home in the classical sphere,
but I couldn't help thinking of Teresa Stratas's sterling renditions of Kurt Weill when Helene delivered her popular numbers.
Two days before arriving in Empire Haven, Leonard and Helene had performed a similar concert
(with appropriate language changes) at La Pommerie outside Montreal, for the Federation of Canadian Naturists.
The program was their "Naturist Cabaret," where they brought out their repertoire of pop music in English, and French,
as well as folk music, political satire, and naturist-themed numbers--many of which they've written themselves.
They also extended the reach of selected classical pieces into nude dance productions and tableaux vivants,
which look both very avant-garde and wonderfully reminiscent of the radical experimentalism of pre-World War I Europe.
If you think Isadora Duncan nude (which she did), you won't be far off,
especially in their choreographic staging of Debussy's "Chansons de Bilitis," available for private viewing.
Leonard first experienced political/social nudity at Harvard, 1968-71.
On Election Day, 1968, at the end of a protest march, The Living Theatre staged Paradise Now, and tore off all their clothes,
as did many in the audience. A year and a half later, in protest against the killing of students at Kent State,
Leonard music-directed a special performance of a production of Marat/Sade at Adams House,
where the swimming pool had been traditionally nude (male only),
then became clothed when women started living there (legally),
and then, after protests, became "clothing optional."
(2012 Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein was the skinnydipping Charlotte Corday in that production.)
The experience of swimming nude there, in mixed company,
staging a couple of operas involving nudity in Lowell House, and at the Reservoir in Ithaca,
when he attended graduate school at Cornell (1972-77), he describes as "extremely liberating."
Helene's first experience skinnydipping was at Menges' Lakeside in the 1970s, during the new moon,
with her mother-in-law, and a bunch of the waitstaff.
(Her then-husband didn't want to go.) She went with Leonard (having met him in January 1976)
to the Reservoir in Ithaca and other places in upstate New York,
but "felt very self-conscious because all of those college kids there were half my age!"
but was "willing to try it in more secluded areas."
In the summer of 1988, using Baxandall's World Guide, they found a beach in Wells, Maine, where,
unbeknownst to them, parking was forbidden anywhere in the town.
They got a ticket, refused to pay it, writing to the town in protest, cc-ing Baxandall.
The town never followed up, but Lee did, inviting them to consider leading a nude opera workshop.
That was the beginning of the Opera/Musical Theatre SIG--in 1989.
Baxandall invited them to perform that summer in France at the Domaine Naturiste de BŽlŽzy in Provence,
a resort with a tradition of both naturism and serious chamber music.
Along with three other U.S. naturists, they put on three concerts,
[including] one program of "Mermaid Operas":
Excerpts from Rusalka by Antonin Dvorak, in French,
and another opera of the same name by Alexander Dargomyzhsky (based on Pushkin),
which Leonard had translated into English for the Bel Canto Opera,
but which has yet to be produced.
The third opera was the French premiere of the complete one-act opera
The Mermaid in Lock No. 7 by Leonard's teacher Elie Siegmeister,
who loved the photos in N, exclaiming:
"Lenushka! This is the definitive production! This is the way the opera should always be done!"
"Before we got to BŽlŽzy," Helene recalls, "we visited and performed in several other places in Europe
where Leonard had lived and worked during the seven years he was employed there (1979-1986):
Amsterdam, East and West Berlin, Dresden, Paris-and I had nightmares for weeks
about being nude among so many other nude people.
But once we got there and I took off my clothes, I felt as though I never wanted to put them on again!
And unlike my experience with the college crowd at The Reservoir, there were all ages and body types (of course!)."
The next summer featured "The Nudity Chorus" from Leonard's
New World: An Opera About What Columbus Did to the "Indians",
and the SIG held workshops at BŽlŽzy, with their nude water ballet and nude chorale,
every other year thereafter, in 1992, 1994, and 1996.
"On my birthday, for my birthday, Aug. 20, 1990," Leonard remembers, "I managed to persuade Helene
to accompany me to our first American naturist gathering,
which proved to be a lovely experience. We were hired there to do a nude commercial
at Brooklyn Botanic Gardens by a Harvard insurance company,
and were thrilled by a couple from North Carolina who performed Shakespeare--
excerpts from Taming of the Shrew-in the nude,
to an audience that appreciated every double entendre embodied in the text and onstage.
It inspired us to believe that there would be an appreciative Naturist audience for us here in our own country too."
In 1991, they had a reading, and then in 1992 a fully staged production,
of the 1930s naturist classic Barely Proper by Tom Cushing.
Leonard adapted it from several versions made available by Barry Plaxen,
who starred in it. Helene played Aunt Minna, then also took over the role of the maid Katinka at the last minute
As a radio play it was broadcast by WBAI, where she took on a third role as well, Mitzi,
using different voices for each character. She finally got to play the ingenue years later,
first in a reading at Empire Haven (where Leonard jumped into the lead role of Derek at the last minute)
and then in a radio play (with Leonard as the Professor) outside Toronto,
at Bare Oaks, which podcast the production, produced by Stephane Deschenes,
still available at http://www.naturistliving.bareoaks.ca/2011/08/barely-proper.html.
In 1994-1995 they staged a delightful four-character one-act play, Stark, by John Bramhall,
at Empire Haven and Bucksteep Manor, where they also produced a spectacular Adam & Lilith & Eve,
complete with music and flying angels and "The Naturist Anthem" as finale,
first published by the Canadian magazine Going Natural, then N.
In later years, the Canadians also published a French translation by Michel Vais & Diane Archambault
and a German one (by Leonard with Claudia Kellersch), which was also pulished by Der Naturist.
In 1998 came another one-act opera, Gerald Cockschott's The Faun in the Forest, at Eastover
- also the site of one of their most fondly remembered programs, the 2000 Tom Lehrer Songfest,
incorporating as never before the nudity contained in their songbook illustrations.
When Lehrer saw the video he wrote: "Just when one thinks one has seen everything..."
"The Vatican Rag" without a stitch on became their finale by popular demand for years.
In 2000-2001, they traveled to Hawaii, guests of medical researchers/writers Syd Singer
and his wife Soma Grijsmaier, and wrote a musical with them:
The Booby Trap or Off Our Chests,
about the statistical correlation between bras and breast cancer,
including 9 numbers performed in New York City and Eastover in 2001.
In 2002 they performed "Naked Klezmer" there, as well as a program for Naturist Sydney in Australia.
Premiered were Leonard's settings of five "Naked Verses," ten "Jewish Haiku,"
and Michael Cooney's poem "Why I Choose Nude Recreation" - written for Cary Bair, who premiered it -
see http://youtu.be/T7yjtbg_s6k.
In 2003 they returned to Empire Haven, where they've been performing every summer since then,
thanks to Morley Schloss, who also sponsors their performances at Sunsport each March.
(They also performed at TNS' ENG [in Westmont] in 2010-11.)
In 2005, they met the activist Susan Blake,
took her to her first naturist beach and festivals,
expanded The Booby Trap with her to 18 songs,
and performed with her at numerous venues
[See http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmhHI8m9j-XtqhrkUuMhGrWpFZ97F-3bx.
Since her death from breast cancer in Oct. 2007, they continue to perform the work, in her memory."

...................

Fall 2014 34.1
p24[-25] Tribute to Cary Bair
"...the assembly watched Leonard J. Lehrman's video tribute to Cary Bair
singing, acting, and dancing in past performances of the Opera/Musical Theatre SIG of TNS,
including some from far enough back that he had no grey hair.
The video was much enjoyed by all. The people who knew Cary closely,
as well as the ones who would have gladly gotten to know him better with some more time,
are all united in missing him greatly."

p[32-]33
What is the Meaning of the Northeast Naturist Festival? [by] Charles Myers
"The free evening concerts are beyond compare. The musicians who provide music, for free,
are really sharing their talents and a joy of life with an appreciative audience....
Leonard Lehrman and Helene Williams, who are accomplished opera performers in New York,
presented an entire evening 'CaBAREt' where they both dramatically took off all their clothes
and threw them to the side of the room.
"

...................

Spring 2016 35.3 pp. 45-47
Opera-Musical Theatre Special Interest Group
Leonard Lehrman and Helene Williams

The Naturist Society's Opera-Musical Theatre Special Interest Group
continues to build on traditions and grow from roots planted and fostered
with the spirit and encouragement of TNS founder Lee Baxandall.
It was Baxandall who made possible the first Naturist Opera Workshops at BŽlŽzy in Provence, France, in July 1989,
which lasted biannually through 1996, and regularly featured the nude chorus and water ballet of mermaids
from the classic Russian opera, Rusalka (The Mermaid), by Alexander Dargomyzhsky.
It was sung there for the first time anywhere in English,
in a translation that Leonard and his mother Emily Lehrman had written in 1986 for the Bel Canto Opera Company,
which ceased operation a few years later without having produced it.
Following Emily's death January 13, 2015, the piece finally had its first complete performance,
in her memory, in English at Queens College November 22, 2016.
The occasion was marked by a special issue of The Naked Truth Newdsletter July 14, 2015,
featuring photos from BŽlŽzy and the annual Mermaid Parade in Brooklyn.
Other press coverage included a glowing review in the Queens Chronicle
and an interview on Russia Channel One, broadcast internationally on December 6.
Both are accessible, along with production photos, a complete video of the performance,
and a lecture on mermaids, at http://tinyurl.com/DargoRusalkaEng.
Many of the cast members will also be singing the premiere of Leonard Lehrman's latest opera,
The Triangle Fire, September 4 in Haledon, New Jersey and September 11 in Teaneck, New Jersey.
The libretto, by Ellen Frankel, is a socially-conscious work Lee Baxandall would have appreciated,
as it deals with the abuses of labor under voraciously unregulated capitalism, a subject dear to his heart.
Prior to that, the SIG will be at the annual Northeast Festival at Empire Haven,
where Lehrman and Williams have performed each year since 2002.
(Many of those performances, including some nude ones, are posted on YouTube, best accessed at
http://LeonardJLehrman.com/ljlehrmancabaretvideos.html.)

Photo by Lee Baxandall: Bill Pacer and his children plus Charles Perkins and his sons all as angels
with Jill Salazar as Lilith in Adam & Lilith & Eve, at Bucksteep, June 1995.

Actually, the SIG's first performance there in 1994 involved the world premiere
of the delightful naturist play Stark by Texan/New Mexican John Bramhall.
The production starred Cary Bair, Lenora Eve, Bill Reynolds, and Amy Vail
(replaced by Diane Reese in the work's revival at Bucksteep the following year),
and climaxed an evening of skits and a cappella numbers.
There is a public video of several excerpts from that 1994 concert,
including Leonard's reading of correspondence with the playwright, John Bramhall, at youtube//eNL2KX_zHTg.
Bramhall had hoped to attend the performance, but was unable to.

Photo by Lee Baxandall: Nude mermaids chorus, with nude water ballet, from Dargomyzhsky's Rusalka at BŽlŽzy, July 1989

On a visit to Atlanta this past December, Lehrman and Williams reconnected with Bill Pacer
(who had performed with them at Bucksteep) and his wife LaDonna),
who told of recently appearing with John Bramhall in a California production of a play of their own.
Lehrman and Williams then spoke on the phone with him
and read through his play at the Pacers' home. The Pacers and Bramhall then
eagerly made plans to join the SIG at the Midwinter Festival in February 2016,
plans which unfortunately had to be cancelled when the Pacers were
broadsided in their car by another car near their home.
Both were hospitalized with broken ribs, which kept them from travelling so soon.
Both have been recovering nicely and plan to come to the Northeastern Festival in August 2016
to participate in a reading of Star. The SIG hopes that Bramhall will be able to join them as well.
Members of the SIG enjoyed their second Midwinter Festival,
which was their 12th year in a row performing at Florida's Sunsport Gardens.
This was their first naturist concert on Valentine's Day,
so they concentrated on the theme of love for their performance.
Songs included Amanda McBroom's "The Rose" and two songs in memory of Cary Bair,
which he had sung so beautifully with the SIG before: "Shouldn't I Be Less in Love with You?"
(answered with a plaintive, loving "No"!) and his own gorgeous duet, "Take Me for Loving."
The SIG was gratified to have one of Bair's dearest friends, Kath Rooney,
also a former performing member of the SIG, in the audience for that.

Photo: Bill and LaDonna Pacer, Helene Williams and Leonard Lehrman, reunited in Atlanta, December 2015.

The SIG's program also included two numbers from their Tom Lehrer Songfest of 2000,
two by their self-styled "greatest fans in Dairyland,"
Lou and Peter Berryman of Madison, Wisconsin,
and the premiere of a duet from Lehrman's new Triangle Fire opera.

Photo by Joel Simpson: Helene and Leonard taking a curtain call at Empire Haven, August 2013.

They concluded with two Comden and Green duets, one written with Cy Coleman,
the other with Leonard Bernstein. The former, "Simplified Language,"
humorously explores the quest for gender neutrality:

They used to call those organs a 'penis,' a 'vagina';
those words are out of date now
we call it a 'penina'!
"Show me yours,
I'll show you mine-ah!"

Lehrman's YouTube videos may be the only footage of that song anywhere.
The latter, "Carried Away," from On the Town, involves the loss of inhibitions,
and in the SIG's version (as well as in the most recent Broadway revival,
though in that case semi-off-stage), the tearing off of clothes.
This prepared the performers well for the concluding Naturist Anthem,
a mainstay of their performances since 1991, set to the Shaker hymn, "Simple Gifts":

Freedom means standing proud and tall,
Wear what you like, or nothing at all!
The right to be natural, the right to be free,
Is the right to clothing optionality.

...................

Fall 2017 37.1 p.18
[in] memoriam Dr. Johanna Moore-Baxandall (nŽe Steigleder)
...
Lee Baxandall was blessed with two wonderful
wives, both of whom we came to know & love,
Rosalyn Fraad Baxandall (June 12, 1939-October 13, 2015)
and Johanna Steigleder-Moore Baxandall
(February 7, 1928-August 11, 2017).
Ros's father was a professional associate and
acquaintance of Leonard's father's. He taught
his daughters to enjoy skinnydipping.
Ros taught Lee and the rest is naturist history.
Ros also had tremendous influence on the leftward
bent of Lee's politics. (She introduced Leonard personally
to Alger Hiss and to the poetry of Elizabeth Gurley Flynn,
which he set to music in a cycle for Helene
that last January was reissued on a Ravello CD entitled
"Harmonize Your Spirit With My Calm" -
an E.G. Flynn phrase that could have applied to both Baxandall marriages!
That led Lee to the study (and translation) of Bertolt Brecht and German literature
(through whom he first met Leonard, in April 1971),
and eventually to Johanna, a native German speaker who was also a very fine photographer.
The photos that both Lee and Johanna took of our productions,
in France and the U.S., were magnificent
and a continuing source of inspiration for us and many others.
They shall all be missed, and fondly remembered.
Leonard J. Lehrman & Helene Williams Spierman Lehrman
The Opera-Musical Theatre Special Interest Group of
The Naturist Society (founded 1989)


Fall 2017 37.1 pp.26-27
The Opera-Musical Theatre SIG
Profiles in Music for 2016

Leonard Lehrman and Helene Williams
[Passages in brackets were cut from printed version.]

As Morley Schloss introduced The Naturist Society's Opera-Musical Theatre Special Interest Group of (founded 1989)
in its 16th appearance at the 2017 Northeast Naturist Festival, he noted that the organization has now set a record
for groups returning to perform at the Festival, beginning in 1994 and then every year from 2003.
In 2016, the group reunited with Bill Pacer (who had last performed with them in the fully staged
Adam & Lilith & Eve at Bucksteep in 1995) and his new wife, LaDonna Allison, who premiered her song "A Little Time for Me,"
and performed with Helene Williams and Gwen Bradshaw in an August 4 reading of Eve Ensler's Vagina Monologues
directed by Leonard Lehrman (see tinyurl.com/160804VaginaMonologues).
Photo by Leonard Lehrman: Vagina Monologues performed at teh Northeast Naturist Festival by
LaDonna Allison, Helene Williams, and Gwen Bradshaw.

Earlier that same day, in a reading of John Bramhall's four-character 1993 play Stark, Bradshaw coupled with Bill as experienced naturists,
while LaDonna and Lehrman played a novice couple marooned by a car breakdown at what they think is a Dude Ranch,
only to find to their shock that's it's actually a Nude Ranch.
The play was fully produced, directed by Lehrman, at Empire Haven in 1994 and Bucksteep in 1995,
and the video has been viewed in naturist contexts many times, but only privately, as per the wishes of one of the actresses.
This new, nude, August 4, 2016 reading of Stark is posted at youtu.be/6dni3r0fKpo [and (by LaDonna) on Vimeo],
and has already been viewed over 40,000 times, as have the SIG's previous nude pas de deux and pas de trois
to Debussy's "Clair de Lune," from 2012 and 2013, respectively.
YouTube has tagged all three of these videos as "Age-Restricted,"
something it did not do with the July 30, 2015 reading of Adam & Lilith & Eve,
which starred Bradshaw as Eve and Morley Schloss as God (replaced by Vera Scroggins part way through).
That reading had over 8000 views but the playlist for it was removed by YouTube April 30, 2018.
It can still be viewed, segment by segment, as follows:
Cast
Sc.1
Sc.2
Sc.3-8
Leo Kraft: Adam in Eden (as duet)
Sc.9
Sc.10
Sc.11-12
Sc.13+NaturistAnthem

The Naturist CaBAREt program of August 5, 2016 has also been posted, best accessed at tinyurl.com/160805Playlist.
It includes songs sung by Williams and Lehrman on their two concert tours of Russia (St. Petersburg & Moscow) and Belarus (Minsk, Bobruisk, and Vitebsk)
in June-July & September-October 2016. The song most significant from a naturist point of view is Lehrman's setting
(in Russian, and in his own (c)1985 English translation) of the revolutionary poem, "Me & Russia," by symbolist Velemir Khlebnikov (1885-1922):

Fair Russia's granted us freedom a thousand times over.
Isn't that something!
Good cause to reflect on a long time.
But I took my shirt off
and every glinting hair of mine glowed like a skyscraper,
every pore of the whole body politic was greeting the news,
displaying shining red carpets.

All mankind and womankind who lay in my power,
exercised with thousands of snares, now stormed to the windows,
Igors and Olgas without prior orders,
seeking the sunlight, they see through the skin.

The dungeon of the shirt has fallen!
And I - I just took my shirt off!
I gave to my people the sun!
Naked I stood, stood by the ocean:
Thus did I grant the people their freedom:
I tanned the masses.

The song was one of Lehrman's Eight Russian Songs recorded in St. Petersburg, Russia in July 2016 by Parma
and released on Ravello's CD Harmonize Your Spirit With My Calm, January 13, 2017.
[Please visit .http://www.ravellorecords.com/catalog/rr7951/. Online CD cover is included in printed article.]
The CD's title derives from one of the other songs on it, Lehrman's musical setting
(sung by Williams) of a poem by Elizabeth Gurley Flynn (1890-1964).
Flynn was a great labor organizer whose first biography, Words on Fire, was written by Rosalyn Fraad Baxandall,
the first wife of TNS Founder Lee Baxandall. Lee credited Ros with having first introduced him to
skinnydipping, which she and her sister had learned from her liberated father, Dr. Lew Fraad.
In the online Notes to the CD, one reads that the Khlebnikov song
"received its English-language premiere 8/5/2016 at a naturist festival,
fittingly enough since it utilizes the metaphor of nudity as freedom."
The reader is referred by hypertext to the video of that performance, posted at https://youtu.be/ExoyLRlumlg
[and then to view "a playlist of publicly viewable YouTube videos on that theme,"
which was posted at https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmhHI8m9j-XvNoHB9ExFiUoo74o5ug6WR.
Unfortunately, after just a few months, YouTube apparently took it down. One now reads there:
"The playlist does not exist."
The SIG is contemplating remounting it on Vimeo]...


Winter 2018 37.2
The Opera-Musical Theatre SIG: Profiles in Music for 2017
Leonard Lehrman and Helene Williams

Building on the successes of previous years, including Adam & Lilith & Eve (1995 and readings in 2015), Stark (1994-5, and a widely-viewed reading of 2016), and Vagina Monologues (2016), TNS' Opera-Musical Theatre SIG returned to Empire Haven August 3, 2017, for a record-breaking 16th time, in its 15th consecutive year, to present Naturist CaBAREt. This year the SIG featured songs by Tom Lehrer, excerpts from Oklahoma!, and the work of three couples: co-directors Leonard and Helene Lehrman, performers LaDonna and Bill Pacer (returning for the second consecutive year), and songwriters Lou and Peter Berryman.

Videos of the Opera-Musical Theatre SIG's 2017 "Naturist CaBAREt" program are found at tinyurl.com/170803Playlist. Featured are five excerpts from Oklahoma!, in which the burlesque dancer described in "Kansas City" is vividly embodied by LaDonna (see youtu.be/1Lh725aMBjY); six songs by Tom Lehrer, including "The Wiener Schnitzel Waltz" graphically danced by LaDonna and Bill Pacer (posted at http://youtu.be/xYSnLtssmlM but deleted by YouTube!); and six by Lou and Peter Berryman, whose words inspired Lehrman's song, "The Hereafter," premiered at the concert (see youtu.be/peZ9GWbJfzg) and appropriately published for the first time here, as it satirically proceeds logically from Judaism to Buddhism to nudism.

The story of the interaction of the Berrymans and the Lehrmans is one of mutual admiration and inspiration. All four are on their second marriages, but in opposite directions, so to speak.

Leonard Lehrman first met Helene Williams Spierman in January 1977, auditioning as a potential stage director for The Bronx Opera, which she had co-founded in 1967 with her first husband, Michael Spierman. In January 1987, both of Leonard's and Helene's first marriages had broken up, and they met again when Helene auditioned for the role of Emma Goldman in Lehrman's E.G.: A Musical Portrait of Emma Goldman. Lehrman likes to say that she "walked off with the part and the composer." Collaborating on over 600 performances to date, including 143 pieces Leonard wrote for Helene, they were married July 14, 2002.

Wisconsinites Peter Berryman and Lou Noffke met when they attended Appleton High School. Both came from musical families, and both had fathers who worked for the paper companies in the area. After forming a folk group in 1964, they matriculated at the University of Wisconsin together in 1966, and married in 1967. Both opposed the Vietnam War, and when Peter was drafted they left for Canada, returning to Madison in 1973, when Peter was no longer in legal peril. 1980 saw the issuance of their first album, and their divorce. A couple of years later Peter married Kristi Seifert; Lou married Mark Hodgson. But she kept Peter's surname and they continued to write and perform together prolifically, much like Betty Comden and Adolph Green, who were each married to other spouses. The Berrymans, however, didn't just write lyrics (mostly Peter's job), but also the music (mostly Lou's); moreover, they usually accompanied themselves on guitar and accordion.

A mutual fan sent the Lehrmans a tape of Berryman songs approximately 14 years ago, and they described themselves as "hooked immediately" on the wonderfully satirical "Your State's Name Here," among other songs. Having loved and performed songs by Tom Lehrer and Tom Paxton for over half a century, the Lehrmans were not surprised to read Tom Paxton's encomium:

"When it comes to being funny, I think I've spent the first 30 years trying to be as funny as Tom Lehrer and the last part will be trying to be as funny as the Berrymans. They don't come any funnier than that."

The two duos first met at a 2003 Berryman concert that was part of the Huntington, Long Island folk festival. The following year, when the Lehrmans trekked west to Wisconsin so Leonard could finish his bio-bibliography of Marc Blitzstein (whose archives are housed in Madison), the Berrymans found them the loveliest of concert venues to perform in-a Unitarian Church designed by Frank Lloyd Wright-and helped run the sound system for them there.

Subsequent warm, affectionate encounters occurred at Berryman concerts in White Plains, Cornelia Street Cafe in Greenwich Village, Princeton, New Jersey, and finally on Peter's 70th birthday April 7, 2017 at Community Church of New York. They dedicated their song "Red Kimono" to Helene, who, recovering from chemotherapy, was unable to attend with Leonard.

The Berrymans refer to themselves as the Lehrmans' "greatest fans in Dairyland." While Leonard's songs number 256 to date (along with 11 operas and 7 musicals), mostly on others' texts, the Berrymans' number over 200, all on original texts. The Lehrmans have performed over a dozen of them, some of them several times, and have posted their renditions on YouTube, best accessed at tinyurl.com/LehrmansSingBerrymans.

Of particular interest to naturists are the numbers "Naked & Nude" -- "I was in the kitchen, and you were in the nude!"--which the Lehrmans do with ukeleles; "Talkin' at the Same Time" with mention of "canuding"; "Uncle Dave's Grace," which sees the only alternative to destroying the environment on Thanksgiving as living "without food, in the nude, in a cave"; "I Don't Get It," with its verse on nude dancing (which Peter says was inspired by the Lehrmans' naturism), and "Glorious Prediction," about being disturbed in the shower, nude, by Jehovah''s Witnesses. This last song, and another entitled "After Life Goes By," inspired Lehrman's song "The Hereafter," which actually began life as additional verses to the latter Berryman song. Lehrman recalls, "I had written an extra verse to Lou and Peter's 'Cockroach Christmas' song about an Atlantic City bus that was infested with and disabled by them. They had accepted it, so I made so bold as to offer some new verses to 'After Life Goes By,' only this time Peter objected, suggesting, 'Why don't you write your own song?' So I did, adding another verse-the first one being Jewish, the second Buddhist, and the last one nudist-which we were all very happy about!"

As for practicing naturism, at Mazo Beach for example, as the Lehrmans did in 2004 (until the flies chased everyone away), the Berrymans say no. "We're certainly not against nudity," Peter writes, "but we're shy." The Lehrmans and Pacers are not. For their penultimate cabaret number, August 3, 2017, those two couples joined naturist poet Stephen Van Eck, the group's technical director/videographer at Empire Haven since 2003, appearing for the first time in front of the camera as well, in the nude 'Vatican Rag' of Tom Lehrer. For the first time ever, they also performed it clothed (see youtu.be/SVkRklUhe90), so it could be included in the public playlist of videos.



For more information on the Berrymans, see louandpeter.com. For more information about the Opera-Musical Theatre SIG, see LeonardJLehrman.com/OMTSIGofTNS'History.html, or access their videos at LeonardJLehrman.com/ljlehrmancabaretvideos.html.

Photos:
Composite self-portrait of Lou and Peter Berryman "in nature" (by lake, fully clothed)
Three couples take a Naturist CaBAREt bow, August 3, 2017: Anne Fischer and Morley
Schloss, Bill Pacer and LaDonna Allison, Helene Williams and Leonard Lehrman


Fall 2018 38.1 p.34
27th Annual Northeast Naturist Festival
by Patrick Lewis

A Naturist Cabaret
Helene Williams and Leonard Lehrman presented A Centenary
Tribute to Leonard Bernstein. Most of the songs the songs the couple sang
and played were written or co-written by Leonard Bernstein.
LaDonna Allison sang "A Little Bit in Love" and Bill Pacer
sang "Pass the Football."


Fall 2019 39.1 pp.57-59
The Opera-Musical Theatre SIG:
Profiles in Music for 2019

photos by Carl Szablak
Leonard Lehrman and Helene Williams

In conjunction with the 50th anniversary of the first moonwalk, TNS' Opera-Musical Theatre SIG featured two numbers with reference to the moon in their Naturist CaBAREt August 2, 2019, at the Northeast Naturist Festival at Empire Haven. Returning for an 18th time, and 17th consecutive year, they once again broke their own attendance record there, or streak, as it were.

First was Lou and Peter Berryman's beloved "Good Night, Everybody," marveling how the astronauts' footsteps on the moon "are still there right now." Second was Leonard Lehrman's version of the song "Croon/Spoon," changing the title words to "Moon." This was part of Lehrman's 1969 adaptation at the Loeb Experimental Theater of Marc Blitzstein's The Cradle Will Rock, Harvard's second production of the work, 30 years after Leonard Bernstein had conducted it there. The new words read:

O the mooner dreams about fornication
He opiates the population
For when poverty and war are distressin' the nation
Then to moon is grand as a sublimation
You moon & moon & never go wrong!
And it's nice in July to get as spaced as a station
Like you're Buzz Aldrin & I'm Nealy Armstrong!



The words that conclude the Blitzstein song, virtually unchanged by Lehrman, seem particularly appropriate for naturists:

Even the poor are not immune
If they're without a suit
They shouldn't give a hoot
They have a substitute
When they can all have the
MOON!



Photo: Pacers and Lehrmans reunion in Atlanta, 2015.

The August 2, 2019 audience was treated to a graphic demonstration of this by LaDonna Allison and Barefoot Bill Pacer, who have been performing with Lehrman and Williams since 2016 at Empire Haven and Sunsport festivals. Bill was also in their 1995 production of Adam & Lilith & Eve at Bucksteep. The two couples re-connected, in the nude, in Atlanta, in 2015. Bill and LaDonna also illustrated a new setting by Lehrman, sung by Williams, of a poem by Mary Stewart Hammond that appeared in the New Yorker about skinnydipping off the coast of Massachusetts. That of course is where Lee Baxandall first experienced and then advanced the practice of naturism. The Pacers repeated their acting-out of Lehrman's song, "The Hereafter," on the progress from Judaism to Buddhism to Nudism, inspired by the Berrymans' "After Life Goes By," as reported in a 2017 N update.

On June 28, 2019, the Lehrmans had the pleasure of performing that number and several Berryman songs in a concert at First Unitarian Society of Madison, Wisconsin for an audience that included the Berrymans, James Dickey, and a number of local naturists. Again, no nudity, but lots of discussion of how the long-awaited demise of Governor Scott Walker might facilitate the revival of the much-missed clothing optionality at Mazo Beach.

Lehrman's November 1969 Harvard production of Blitzstein's work led to a triple-bill the following fall at Harvard's Lowell House, which Leonard Bernstein attended and where he was heard to yell "Bravo!" several times. The December 1970 evening was originally to include three one-act operas, each involving nudity: The Mermaid in Lock #7 by Elie Siegmeister and Edward Mabley; The Harpies by Marc Blitzstein; and Bernstein's Trouble in Tahiti, dedicated to Blitzstein. But Mabley balked at Lehrman's feminist adaptation of his work, so the evening became a memorial to Blitzstein, with his radio play I've Got the Tune staged instead of Mermaid.

Photo by Lee Baxandall: Mermaids' Chorus at BŽlŽzy, July 1989

Meanwhile, Hair had been banned and then un-banned in Boston, when Alan Dershowitz took the case to the Supreme Court and won. But the Harvard Blitzstein-Bernstein production had professional union-member singers performing without fee under assumed names, and could not afford even the possibility of an arrest. Dershowitz came to a rehearsal, requested that he be shown "the good parts," then went home and called the District Attorney, reporting back to Lehrman: "I'd say there's about an 8% chance of a bust, but we'd win on appeal!" That was, however, too high a risk; so, notwithstanding the theater games and rehearsals that had taken place in the nude with no outside objections, for the performances the harpies were compelled to wear underwear under their transparent costumes, and the Tahitian maiden "in her inch or two of sarong" had to cover her nipples with lei.

Trouble in Tahiti, despite its many productions, has seldom, if ever, been staged topfree. The Harpies had a Canadian premiere in 2012, for which Lehrman and Williams were hired as consultants, but nudity was never even considered. The Siegmeister opera, however, did have its French premiere (after Mabley's death) in Lehrman's adaptation, around a swimming pool in July 1989, when Lee Baxandall proposed that Lehrman and Williams conduct a Naturist Opera Workshop at BŽlŽzy in southern France, encompassing three concerts, including one devoted to "Mermaid Operas": two operas named Rusalka by Dvor‡k (in French) and Dargomyzhsky (in English), and the complete Mermaid in Lock #7. The resulting photos appeared in N, Opera Monthly, and-almost-in Opera News, the board of which voted "narrowly" against them. Siegmeister's reaction was: "Lenushka! This is the way the opera should always be done!" The Opera/Musical Theatre SIG is thus 30 years old this year.

The English translation of Dargomyzhsky's Rusalka, written by Lehrman and his mother Emily R. Lehrman, also had a delayed full premiere, in her memory, at Queens College November 22, 2015. (See helenewilliamsspierman.homestead.com/Rusalka_Index.html). Again, no nudity, but lots of amusement on the part of performers viewing the 1989 N photos.
And Lee Baxandall, whose 1959 Requiem for Hiroshima was set to music by Lehrman for a Riverside Church premiere in 1990, will be memorialized next year, the 75th anniversary of the bombing, with performances in New York and Japan of Lehrman's just-completed "Seven Meditations on Hiroshima" for solo clarinetist Thomas Piercy, inspired by Baxandall's words.
Other repertoire newly added to the Naturist CaBAREt program included Lehrman's setting of the poem "The Rainbow Shards" by his Harvard classmate and longtime friend, the social activist Jane Sass Collins, a veteran of the nude rehearsals and skinny-dipping at Adams House for the December 1970 production. There was also an excerpt from Lehrman's latest opera, A Loveletter from Rosa Luxemburg, written for & premiered by Helene in January; it will open the 2019 LŸneburg New Music Festival on October 10.

Photo: Helene Williams and Leonard Lehrman in Rosa Luxemburg-Leon Jogiches Duet at Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, New York, 2019.

In addition to the perennial (by popular demand) "Take Off Your Clothes" by Mark Levy, another song of his seemed particularly relevant in the current battle over fetal personhood: "Not Ev'ry Sperm Deserves A Name."
And remembering Pete Seeger on his centennial, the Lehrmans revived "The Ballad of Zoe Joyner," based on a song by Bob Bossin that Pete had covered, about a high school girl at a beauty pageant in California who approached the principal with a ruler and a tape-measure, requesting that he "Show us the length of your..."

3 photos: The Vatican Rag with Stephen Van Eck [as The Priest] at the Northeast Naturist Festival, Empire Haven, New York, August 2019. Bottom photo in 2017.

And of course the concert closed with the nude "Vatican Rag" of Tom Lehrer, joined by camerman/tech director/naturist poet Stephen Van Eck, followed by The Naturist Anthem, now available not only in English, French, and German, but also (courtesy of Ramiro Bejarano) in Spanish!


Summer/Fall 2020 39.4/40.1 pp. 95-97

The Opera-Musical Theatre SIG: Profiles in Music for 2020
[by] Leonard Lehrman and Helene Williams; photos by David Lewis

Photo: Leonard Lehrman and Helene Williams

The Northeast Naturist Festival at Empire Haven, to which the Opera/Musical Theatre Special Interest Group of The Naturist Society Foundation has returned as guests of Morley Schloss a record-breaking 18 times, including every summer since 2003, was the focus of last yearÕs report.
This year's report concentrates on the SIG's performances at Sunsport Gardens, their 14th & 15th, the last six as part of MorleyÕs annual Midwinter Naturist Festival in February. Those 2019 and 2020 performances were made possible, respectively, by the much appreciated loan of keyboards from Armand & Angelina and Bill Cannon; excerpts are viewable on YouTube at tinyurl.com/15Feb2019 and tinyurl.com/14Feb2020 , including a few nude selections, though most of those are available only for private viewing.
For a number of years now, the group has enjoyed opening for the talented singer/songwriter Fairie Elaine Silver, who has generously loaned one of her music stands and patiently stood by as the SIGÕs program sometimes ran a bit over. On February 15, 2019, she also graciously joined in, singing and playing guitar, for the performance of Pat LamanaÕs "The Wind," an ecologically updated version of Bob DylanÕs "Blowin' in the Wind." Included in that concert as well was the world premiere of Paul Rapaport's topically updated version of a Gilbert & Sullivan classic: "I am the very model of a modern major criminal," also known as the current Oval Office Occupant.
COVID-19 has resulted in numerous temporary postponements, which one only hopes will not be permanent, including New York City concerts in March and April, festivals in Bucharest and San Diego, and plans for performances in New York and Japan of Lehrman's "Seven Meditations on Hiroshima" for solo clarinetist, inspired by the words of Lee Baxandall.
The 2020 Valentine's Day CaBAREt was dedicated to the memory of Leonard's father, Nat Lehrman (May 26, 1923-Jan. 19, 2020), and featured the world premiere, in English, of Leonard's newest composition for Helene, a song cycle on 5 poems by two Romanian poets: Mihai Eminescu (1850-1889) and Zygmund Tauberg (b. 1927); Leonard & Helene met the latter in Bucharest, researching Helene's father's roots, on Oct. 25, 2019. Helene's first performance of one of the two Tauberg songs, "Love," on Jan. 12, 2020 was posted on YouTube and immediately shown, to great acclaim, to the Jewish Community of Bucharest the next day.

Photos:
Performers and audience: Rich Pasco and Morley Schloss in front row.
LaDonn Allison, appropriately topfree, in "Adventure."

The final song of the cycle, "Adventure," about a moon creature who comes to explore the earth and decides to return to the moon, was danced at Sunsport by Bill Pacer and LaDonna Allison, and was also shown in Bucharest, to an audience not at all fazed by LaDonna's being appropriately topfree for part of it. A premiere of the song in Romanian was immediately planned (though without the staging) and announced for inclusion in an International Astronomy Conference Concert in Bucharest April 10, 2020. That conference has however been postponed, we hope not indefinitely, following the declaration of a national emergency in the country.

Photos:
Bill Pacer and LaDonna, appropriately nude, in "The Big Fish."
Curtain call.

"Adventure" was followed at Sunsport by a reprise of "The Big Fish," LehrmanÕs setting of a 2006 poem, published in The New Yorker, by Mary Stewart Hammond on skinnydipping, with the dancing Pacers entirely nude and the singing Lehrmans joining them, bottomfree, for the curtain call and group hug.
A group hug was also enjoyed by Helene & Leonard with Claudia Kellersch, who joined in singing "The Naturist Anthem" in English, a German translation (by Claudia & Leonard), and a new Spanish translation by Ramiro Bejarano Ð edited by Claudia. The French (Canadian) version of the "Hymne naturiste" extolls the liberty to be nude. The German version praises the tradition of Free-Body-Bulture (Freikoerperkultur or FKK). The new Spanish version trumpets "Our Free Nudism" ("Nuestro Nudismo Libero"). Next we'd love to see translations into Chinese, Russian, Yiddish, Hebrew, and Arabic. Imagine singing the anthem, along with "Take Off Your Clothes," on the West Bank, ina combination of those languages!

Other Sunsport participants captured on camera singing the anthem were host Morley Schloss and loyal friend & follower Rich Pasco, whose passing just weeks later is sorely mourned. May his legacy be a blessing for all naturists, and all those who knew and loved him.



For more information about the Opera-Musical Theatre SIG,
see http://LeonardJLehrman.com/OMTSIGofTNS'History.html
or access their videos at LeonardJLehrman.com/ljlehrmancabaretvideos.html.
Talented performers who can act, sing, or dance are welcome to join the SIG in future performances.
Please write to the Opera-Musical Theatre SIG at 33 Court Street, Valley Stream, NY 11580.


For a clothed(!) performance of The Naturist Anthem, recorded June 4, 2017, go to
https://youtu.be/_rWUD1Exn3s.