Project Atrium to mark 30 years with ’50s ball

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Project Atrium is celebrating 30 years of assisting young people in overcoming substance abuse and mental health difficulties.

As part of that celebration, Project Atrium invites the public to attend its 30th Anniversary Mardi Gras Charity Ball at 8 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 7, in the G. Peirce Webber Campus Center at Peabody Hall on the Husson College campus in Bangor.

The theme is “The Fifties,” and attendees are encouraged to dress in costume or eveningwear.

Tickets are $50 per person, and reservations must be made by Friday, Jan. 16, by calling Project Atrium at 941-2825.

Finance and administrative manager Leslie Poake reports many changes have taken place during the past several years, “including changing to gender-specific homes that treat dually-diagnosed teenagers from all over Maine,” she wrote.

To obtain the services of Project Atrium, she told me, young people between the ages of 13 and 17 must be diagnosed “with drug and alcohol problems as well as with mental health issues.”

Project Atrium now has two “gender-specific sites,” she added. One houses six girls, and the other houses seven boys.

“Many people and communities in Maine and across the country have seen troubled youth on the streets, and the issues that they create,” she added.

“Project Atrium is part of the solution.

“We operate these homes while engaging our residents in their struggles to lead more productive lives, moving them toward living more independently and improving their education levels and job skills, enabling them to become productive community members.”

Poake said the staff’s plans for this anniversary year include making the organization move visible in the community.

The group will host an open house in the near future, where the public will be able to visit the Project Atrium sites.

But, first, it’s time to celebrate this significant anniversary in style, so dig out those ’50s clothes, practice your old dance steps for the dance contest, and see if you can find a hula hoop so you can enter that contest, too!

The Bangor Symphony Orchestra Concert Coach, which brings concertgoers to BSO classical concerts at Maine Center for the Arts in Orono, continues to run through the concert season.

And the BSO recently announced that the Ellsworth Party Coach also would be available for the BSO Chinese New Year Celebration.

Maestro Xiao-Lu Li and members of the BSO board invite you to “Celebrate the Year of the Monkey” from 7 p.m. to midnight Friday, Jan 23, at the Bangor Civic Center.

The cost is $35 per person for tables of eight, and the event features a cash bar and door prizes.

The evening will include authentic Chinese New Year hors d’oeuvres from area restaurants, a Chinese Dragon Dance by members of the Robinson Ballet Company, Bangor High School students performing “Tale of the Monkey King” and Brian Nadeau’s Big Band providing dancing music.

Reservations must be made by Monday, Jan. 19, with the BSO at (800) 639-3221 or 942-5555.

The additional charge to ride the Ellsworth Party Coach is $15 per person, and reservations must be made in advance.

The coach departs at 5 p.m. from Parker Ridge in Blue Hill; at 5:15 p.m. from George Stevens Academy in Blue Hill; at 5:30 p.m., from the post office in Surry; and at 5:45 p.m. from the Mill Mall in Ellsworth. The coach leaves at the conclusion of the festivities from the Bangor Civic Center.

Before the next classical concert, which is Sunday, Feb. 1, I’ll have more information on the three Concert Coach routes.

This is a morning full of Bangor Symphony Orchestra news.

The public is invited to attend the 22nd annual BSO Maine High School Concerto Competition at 1:30 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 17, in Minsky Recital Hall in the Class of 1944 Hall on the University of Maine campus in Orono.

The snow date is Saturday, Jan. 24.

This free event affords you the opportunity to enjoy the talents of young Maine musicians and, this year, Maestro Xiao-Lu Li has invited the winner to perform at the BSO Classical Concert on Sunday, May 16.

A reception in honor of the participants follows the competition.

For more information, call the BSO box office at the above numbers.

Joni Averill, Bangor Daily News, P.O. Box 1329, Bangor 04402; 990-8288.