It may be 142 years old, but the Wednesday Club for the Performing Arts is as energetic as ever.
Just ask Norma Swain, the nonprofit musical performance organization’s executive director.
“We present concerts by classical musicians, but since all are so talented and multifaceted musicians, we almost always have another genre of music in our concerts,” said Swain of Camp Hill. “Show tunes, ragtime, folk, etc. We’ve even presented Irish step dancers on one of our concerts and have had jazz bands from area high schools participate.”
The group is scheduled to continue its 2023-24 concert series this month with a performance at the Art Association of Harrisburg on March 10.
“This provides the community a chance to see some wonderful performers,” said Frank Rapisarda, the club’s new president. “I enjoy getting together with other people who enjoy classical music. I’m also totally impressed when I see young people perform in the art.”
David Morrison, Historic Harrisburg Association’s executive director, has been involved with the Wednesday Club for about 40 years, once serving on its board of directors. His involvement with the club came about in a roundabout way through a job assignment at the Forum while employed by the state Department of General Services.
“Next thing I knew, I was on the Wednesday Club’s board of directors and doing fundraising,” he recounted with a laugh.
Morrison’s interest in the Wednesday Club is fueled not only by a love of music but by the group’s “tie into history,” he noted.
“The Wednesday Club goes back to the 1800s,” he said. “It was founded by a lot of our community’s leaders of that century and has lots of rich history. That was as much of an interest to me as the music.”
Growing Club
The Wednesday Club actually didn’t originate from music. It began as a 19th-century ladies’ group sharing the fruits of their kitchen skills, according to the club’s printed history, “Wednesday Club Hi-Notes.”
The history states that around 15 “prominent young women of the Harrisburg area” pooled their talents into forming a cooking club, the Hungry Lunch Belles. The group soon tired of cooking, however, and began to perform music together.
The music club’s first regular performance took place on May 17, 1882, at a member’s Front Street home. Performances that day kicked off with a piano recital of Franz Liszt’s “Hungarian Rhapsody.” Following that, the initial 25-member club met every other Wednesday.
In 1915, the growing club was incorporated exclusively for “charitable and educational purposes” and expanded to include men. In 1931, the club held the Forum’s first-ever public event, the Don Cossacks Russian Orchestra. In 1939, the organization presented groundbreaking Black contralto Marian Anderson at the Forum immediately prior to her historic performance for 75,000 in Washington, D.C.
“Marian Anderson was treated to a tea at the (Harrisburg) Civic Club before her concert at the Forum,” Swain said. “We have always been about music and promoting classical music without discrimination.”
The Wednesday Club was also “instrumental in the vision of a performing arts center in Harrisburg,” according to Swain, which eventually led to the opening of Whitaker Center for Science and the Arts in 1999. The club remained a resident company there for 13 years.
Today, the nonprofit organization stands as one of the world’s oldest continuously operating music clubs and still abides by its original mission, “to stimulate interest in classical music and to develop and promote the musical talents of its performing members through concerts and educational activities.”
“We no longer present concerts on Wednesdays,” Swain said. “Since I’ve been involved these many years, we moved from Tuesday evenings to weekends. We now only present concerts on Saturdays, or mostly on Sunday afternoons, avoiding all the other presenters in the region.”
The club is supported through grants, member dues, community donations, program ads and various foundations.
The organization currently offers around 10 concerts per season, featuring performances by members and guest musicians from throughout the region. Auditioned performance categories include Resident Professional Concert Artist, Collegiate Concert Artist, Young Concert Artist and Ensemble Concert Artist. Performers range from elementary-level students to adult professionals.
“I love classical music,” Rapisarda said. “My mission as board president is to get the word out about our organization to (performing) students and professionals.”
For more information on the Wednesday Club for the Performing Arts, visit www.wednesdayclub.org, or their Facebook page or call 717-571-5189.
Catch a Show
The Wednesday Club has numerous performances in the coming months. These include:
- March 10, 3 p.m., Art Association of Harrisburg, 21 N. Front St., Harrisburg. Young Pianists in Concert
- April 14, 4 p.m., Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church, 509 Hummel Ave., Lemoyne. Dr. Elizabeth Etnoyer, pianist, and other featured artists
- May 5, 4 p.m., Zion Lutheran Church, 15 S. 4th St., Harrisburg. Daniel Stokes, organist, and instrumental and vocal ensembles
- May 25 to 27, Artsfest Five-concert series at Art Association of Harrisburg, 21 N. Front St., Harrisburg
- June to August. Three-concert summer series, to be announced.
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