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 $10,000 gift kicks off spring, concert series If the 60 degree weather hasn’t convinced you yet of spring’s return, the Chestnut Hill Community Association is kicking-off the 62nd season of the Pastorius Park Concert Series with a $10,000 donation from Chestnut Hill Health System. At a check presentation ceremony on Monday, Chief Executive Officer Brooks Turkel said the concert series is a community staple. “It’s something we all love,” he said. This is the hospital’s third straight year supporting the Pastorius Park concert series at the $10,000 level. The hospital, which recreated the popular Main Street Fair last year, seeks to support events that provide an opportunity for the community to come together. The concert series is such an event. “It’s a great opportunity to be out and about with folks in Chestnut Hill,” Turkel said. The Pastorius Park Concert Series has been around since the late 1940s. Every Wednesday the park welcomes a different act and thousands of residents, children and pets in tow. Music acts ranging from local musicians, The Philadelphia Blues Messengers, to singer-songwriter John Conahan, have graced the makeshift stage to the delight of generations of Hillers. On Monday, Stan Moat, trustee for the Chestnut Hill Community Fund, Jane Piotrowksi, vice president of operations for the CHCA and Walter Sullivan, president of the CHCA joined Turkel outside the hospital’s main entrance. Doning instruments, the quartet spoke about the concert series importance to the CHCA’s slate of community events. “It’s the most community oriented event,” Piotrowski said. “It brings everyone together.” Sullivan echoed her sentiments, praising the park concerts for managing to avoid controversy and remain a positive contribution to the community. “If these concerts were ever to stop, there would be such an outcry,” said Sullivan, underlining the concert’s popularity. From June to August, every Wednesday, Pastorius Park, with its bucolic setting, man-made pond and treeshaded pavilion, is turned into a music arena. Residents bring blankets, picnics, babies in strollers, dogs with toys and children run freely to the sounds of local and national musicians. In recent years Pastorius Park welcomed acts such as Melody Gardot, The Allentown band Buckwheat Zydeco, Jim Dragoni, The Cat’s Pajamas, Katie Eagleson and the Hot Club of Philadelphia to name a few. Pastorius Park is located at the intersection of Abington Avenue, Roanoke and Millman streets.
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