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VOLUME ONE-HUNDRED EIGHT
PM40011853 R08546
NUMBER TWENTY-ONE
STETTLER, ALBERTA
May 21, 2014
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ROBIN TARNOWETZKI/Independent reporter
The audience “ahhh”d as the Tiny Gracenotes sang and danced at the spring recital on Monday, May 19.
Gracenotes choir wow packed auditorium with spring recital ROBIN TARNOWETZKI Independent reporter Stettler’s Gracenotes choir combined singing, dancing, and acting in its last recital of the season on Monday and Tuesday. The four groups – Gracenotes, Rhapsody Girls, Tiny Tenors, and Tiny Gracenotes – performed pieces they began preparing for music festival in January. The Gracenotes choir also added in several more concert pieces within the last two weeks.
“I thought they did great,” said choir director Rhonda Sylvester. There was a full house for the recital and a standing ovation at the end after all four groups and Sylvester joined forces to perform their final song. As the Gracenotes performed some songs while standing in rows like a traditional choir, they also had props (like suitcases in their rendition of “Chatanooga Choo Choo”) costumes (chicken costumes, to be precise) and lines (while they acted the part of the stereotypical angsty teen with “Teenager in Love.”)
Stettler seniors dance the night away ROBIN TARNOWETZKI Independent reporter Stettler seniors cut a rug at the monthly Old Tyme Dance at the Hub in the Stettler Recreation Centre on Thursday, May 15. The evening started off with a dinner put on by Catering by Sarah, which has been serving the seniors in Stettler for five years. Attendees had roast pork and vegetables, and then hit the dance floor from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. Each dance had a different band to entertain the attendees. “I’m totally sold,” said Terry Crisp, president of the Stettler Old Tyme Dance Club. “I’ve been a dancer, so I’m totally sold that dancing is the thing.” He pointed out to an 85-year-old woman
on the dance floor who never missed a dance. The participants seemed younger as they waltzed on the full dance floor. Previously, the dances were held in the legion hall, but the dance floor was very small, so Crisp is very happy with the new space. “Everybody is amazed at the facility,” he said. “The facility is fantastic. The Hub is a great name for it.” Crisp added that the organizers are trying to get younger people involved, although it’s difficult to get events in the Hub to appeal to younger people. “As soon as you put ‘seniors’ on it, they say “Well, I’m not a senior,” so we’re trying to get away from the stigma,” he said. The dances are held on the third Thursday of every month, except for July and August.
ROBIN TARNOWETZKI/ Independent reporter
Stettler seniors get on the dance floor at the monthly Old Tyme Dance at the Hub in the Stettler Recreation Centre.
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Sylvester and the choirs come up with the choreography themselves, and she says that the Gracenotes get more leeway with choreography so that they’ll remember it better. “It’s just to get the creative juices flowing,” she said. She added that the choirs are all very good at remembering the songs and choreoraphy. “They’re amazing,” she said. “They catch on in a way that adults don’t. They’re like little sponges.” The Gracenotes choirs start rehearsals again in September for the new season.
Late start to seeding unlikely to affect crops, says county STACEY LAVALLIE Independent reporter Spring has been a slow time coming, but now that it’s here, farmers are out seeding their fields, working at times around the clock just so they can have a bit of breathing time before starting on weed control. Farmers usually want to start seeing in the last weeks of April or the very start of May, according to Jay Byer, assistant director of Agricultural Services at the County of Stettler. The snow needs to be gone and temperatures at a certain point, and the longer farmers have to wait, the bigger the chances there are of a decreased yield during harvest. It’s impossible to say exactly how the late spring and the delay in seeding will affect farmers because the rest of the season has a large impact. A late seeding with last
year’s long, hot and dry summer could still see above-average yields, while an early seeding but wet summer could see below-average takes, Byer said. According to Byer, the late seeding mostly turns the season into a neverending grind. Seeding flows directly into weed control which flows directly into pest control which flows directly into harvest, never giving the county farmers a chance to relax and catch their breath. “That’s really rough on our farmers,” he said. The longer the wait to seed, the higher the chances of a “perfect storm” of factors that could decrease yields, Byer noted. Plants maturing later, due to a late seeding, may grow into the most appealing stages of growth at the same time pest levels become highest, and hungriest. When seeding
can start early, these stages of plant and pest growth don’t always meet up at the same time – plants are more mature than the insects or diseases like at the time they’re most likely to affect the crop. The early coolerseason crops, like spring peas, and early wheat and hay are going into the ground now, Byer said, since temperatures are regularly staying above three degrees Celsius. Quinton Beaumont, director of Agricultural Services with the County, said most farmers have, by now, begun seeding and have used the past few dry, warmer weeks to play catch-up. He estimates that as of last week, about a third of the seeding was done. So long as the weather holds, he said he doesn’t think the late start in seeding will affect farmers – though at this point, he’s hoping for a bit of rain as things continue to remain quite dry.
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