Musicians 16 feet up: Belwin Conservancy to host ‘Music in the Trees’

Jennifer Leonard, Pioneer Press
·4 min read

Stage fright? Imagine performing from treetop perches 16 feet in the air.

A variety of musical artists will perform on platforms suspended from the trees at Belwin Conservancy’s Music in the Trees event in August. Their goal is to bring attention to red pine restoration efforts.

16 feet up a tree

The musicians will perform in simple metal tree stands 16 feet in the air. The stands rest against the trees and are accessible via a ladder.

Cellist Rebecca Merblum, who will play at this August’s event, visited Belwin in June to test the stand for herself. There was some fear involved, she admitted.

“Trying to get into the tree stand was fabulous and a little disorienting, but in a great way,” Merblum said.

Once the musicians have settled themselves into the stands, Belwin program director Susan Haugh climbs the ladder and hands them their instruments. “They usually bring their less expensive instruments,” Haugh said with a chuckle.

Some musicians get creative with how they orient themselves in the trees. In 2019, Gerrelle Barton played the Guzheng, a Chinese multi-stringed instrument that’s placed across the lap. According to Haugh, Barton used bungee cords to secure the instrument to the stand.

Last year, Munir Kahar strapped his percussion instruments to himself before climbing up the ladder.

‘A conversation with the trees’

Music in the Trees features a variety of musical genres. Ritika Ganguly and Shinjan Sengupta played Bengali folk music in 2021. Ganguly said performing folk music outside, as it was intended, helped her rediscover a genre she had grown up with. Ganguly, who sings and plays a shruti box, improvised much of the music.

“It almost felt like the tops of the trees were responding to the music and we were in conversation,” she said.

Merblum also plans to improvise on the cello this August, alongside pieces by Pablo Casals, Dvorak and Chippewa composer Jared Tate. “I was talking back and forth with the birds and improvising,” she said.

Merblum said she enjoys challenging the idea that music must be heard in a concert hall.

“Concert halls create massive obstacles and come with a false narrative about what people think is expected of them,” she said. “Music in the Trees brings music into the natural environment and welcomes people to sit and be a part of all of it.”

Music in the Trees has featured music ranging from Appalachian banjo to classical European, to Yiddish klezmer, rock and roll and more.

Along with Ganguly, Sengupta and Merblum, music this year will include a guitar and vocal performance by Hannah Lou Woods, Nathan Hanson on the saxophone and Chris Bates playing bass, Steve Clark and Laurie Knutson on wooden flutes, Tom and Mira Kehoe, Scott Nieman playing the 10-string cittern, and C.B. James playing cello with Daniel Lentz on violin.

“The point is to have a good time in nature and this is a cool way to do it and highlight the reason that Belwin exists,” Haugh said.

Red pines

Since its foundation as a nonprofit partner of St. Paul Public Schools in 1970, Belwin Conservancy has taken pride in its unique grove of red pines. According Haugh, the Washington County Soil Conservation District planted the red pines in the 1940s and ’50s in an effort to counteract soil erosion caused by deforestation and row-crop agriculture.

Red pines are not native to the climate of central Minnesota, however, and they were planted too closely together, creating an area with little ecological diversity. As a result, in 2018 and 2019, Belwin was forced to remove multiple pine trees due to disease spread by engraver beetles.

Belwin conservationists replaced the trees with native plants and trees. Haugh predicts that continuing to intersperse native plants with the red pines will eventually mitigate the effects of the engraver beetles and allow the remaining red pines to live their natural lifespans.

Looking up

Haugh saw the tree removal as an opportunity to educate people about why the pines were there in the first place and what Belwin is doing to bring the area back to a healthy ecosystem.

“My goal is to bring people into the trees and have them stay there,” she said. Haugh came up with the idea to have musicians play from treestands, so that when people looked up to see the musicians, their attention would be drawn to the pines.

The first Music in the Trees event, held in 2019, was a success, Haugh said. People who had hiked in Belwin for years commented that they had never before taken the time to sit in the forest and enjoy the trees.

“This is all part of the Belwin mission,” Haugh said, “to protect wildspaces and connect people to nature.” This August will be the fourth annual Music in the Trees.

‘Music in the Trees’

  • When: August 19-20, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. daily

  • Where: The pine grove near Belwin Education Center, 1553 Stagecoach Trail S., Afton

  • Tickets: $10 per car (dogs are not allowed)

  • Capsule: Musicians suspended in red pines create a one-of-a-kind event; visitors are encouraged to bring picnic blankets, hammocks, and camp chairs.

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