The North Shore has hosted some famous artists over the years, from painters like Winslow Homer and Edward Hopper, to musicians like Duke Ellington. One need not look backward, however, to experience the art created and inspired by the region, which remains today fertile ground for a new crop of painters, performers, and creatives of all kinds.
ANDREA LEBLANC
When Newburyport native Andrea LeBlanc was in high school, she was already an accomplished flutist, on track to apply to top conservatories like Juilliard. However, the rigorous schedule of lessons and rehearsals that came with being a top musician had her burning out and questioning her future. Then one day, she picked up a friend’s baroque flute—a wooden instrument, simpler in form than a modern flute—and the moment transformed her relationship with her music. “I said, ‘This feels like me, this feels like my voice,’” she says. “I started playing old instruments and that’s what got me through that scary period.”
That first encounter ignited in LeBlanc a passion for playing historical instruments that has stayed with her and guided her professional life ever since. After studying at the New England Conservatory, she launched a freelance career, but continued pursuing her interest. In 2022, she and a colleague founded the Arpeggione Ensemble, a group dedicated to performing chamber music on instruments authentic to the time the pieces were written, from the Baroque era up to the mid-20th century. Ensemble members play flute, clarinet, violin, viola, cello, bass, piano, and harmonium, an organ-like instrument.
“Our mission statement is to build community through joyful, accessible, and immersive chamber music performances,” LeBlanc says. “It doesn’t feel at all like what you would expect a classical music concert to be.” The use of historically accurate instruments brings something unique and tangible to the music, something that helps the audience connect with the material being played, she says. Listeners who may think they know little about classical music can hear and feel an almost physical difference in the sound; spotting this quality can give audience members a point of entry into a new musical experience. “There is a real directness of emotion and expression,” LeBlanc says.
The ensemble plays in a variety of unconventional venues chosen to enrich the musical experience or make the experience more accessible. In the fall, the group provided live accompaniment to the classic vampire film Nosferatu at the Peabody Essex Museum. Other shows have taken place in churches, historic homes, and senior centers. This spring, performances are scheduled for the Crane Estate in Ipswich and Parker River National Wildlife Refuge in Newbury.
To expand its work reaching out to new audiences, the ensemble has also received a Mass Cultural Council grant to support an ongoing project: A children’s operetta based on the story of Shoebert, the seal that made national headlines in 2022 when it settled down in the pond next to Beverly’s Cummings Center, the site of a former shoe factory. The piece is built around the compositions of the seal’s namesake Franz Schubert, who, aptly enough, wrote extensively about mills, water, and going on journeys, LeBlanc says. The final piece will debut in October as part of Beverly’s 440th anniversary celebration.
Increasingly, the group also incorporates visual arts into its performances. Past shows have included an artist painting abstract interpretations of the music as the ensemble played, or had the musicians improvise music in response to work created live by a deaf artist. Performances this spring will include collaborations with artists doing line drawings and silk painting. “Of course, the music can stand on its own, but we really like to make it a larger artistic community experience,” LeBlanc says. “It’s not just that we’re playing music and you’re absorbing it: You’re part of the music, you’re part of the experience.”
ALLIE DEL FRANCO
Allie Del Franco’s story sounds an awful lot like the premise of a sitcom: Girl goes through breakup and decides to shake up her life. Girl moves from New York City to quirky, out-of-the-way town and encounters colorful locals. Girl tries to make her mark, and hijinks ensue. Indeed, the tale sounded so much like a TV show, that Del Franco decided to turn it into one. So she wrote and produced a pilot episode of “Witch City,” which follows the life of an aspiring comic who relocates from the big city to Salem. Interested viewers can check out the pilot at a screening on May 7 at Cinema Salem, and whet their appetite for more.
“I am going to make it into a whole series,” Del Franco says. “I’m going to make it where I live, because, to me, Salem is just a film set in its own right.” While the latest chapter of Del Franco’s story is playing out on the North Shore, the plot begins in California, where she studied television and advertising before pursuing work writing and directing for TV. When she moved to New York, her former classmate and professional mentor Ilana Glazer, known for the comedy series “Broad City,” ad – vised her to give stand-up a try as a way to hone her craft and get her name out there. Del Franco—who describes her style of comedy as “honest and dark”— was hooked.
So when she came to Salem six years ago, she set about not just performing but trying to build up the comedy scene in her new town. Along the way, as she was promoting a show to passersby, the owner of a tour company approached her and asked if she’d be interested in doing tours of the city. She said yes, and started bringing fellow comics on board as well, a dynamic she wrote into “Witch City” as well.
Today, when she’s not leading tours, Del Franco produces—and often hosts or performs in—some 250 shows a year in the city, as well as events like murder mysteries and singles nights that incorporate a comedy element. The shows include local up-and-comers, performers from Boston, and a steady stream of comics from New York. Del Franco handles talent recruitment, venue bookings, and promotions. “We’ve built a scene,” she says. “It’s basically my life.”
And while the work is, well, a lot, she has no intention of slowing down on an enterprise that means so much to her. “I have what feels like a purpose,” she says. “I want to put as much happiness into the world as possible.”
AMANDA BEARD GARCIA
What kind of artist is Amanda Beard Garcia? Depends what day you ask. Sometimes you’ll find her in her studio, painting portraits that explore her Chinese-American heritage. Other days she’ll be deep in designing murals in collaboration with small businesses or cultural institutions, or planning arts workshops led by creators from the Asian American and Pacific Islander community. “My workload and my day-to-day changes constantly throughout the year,” she says.
Art has been important to Garcia since she was a child growing up in Beverly, and her parents always encouraged her. After high school, she studied illustration at the Rhode Island School of Design, then jumped into freelance life, taking just about any art-related work she could find, from business marketing materials to commissioned pet portraits.
In 2019, she, along with partner and fellow RISD grad Jacob Garcia, rebranded her business as Likemind Design, with a focus on working with local small businesses and organizations on branding and promotions. The creative studio works with clients big and small —from local favorites like Atomic Coffee Roasters, to regional powerhouses like the Boston Celtics—on logo design, social media content, signage, graphic design, and more.
Garcia’s favorite projects, though, are the murals she works on with her small business clients. There’s the cheese-themed design she executed for Peabody gourmet shop Edex Provisions, for example, or the produce decked photo backdrop she created for Dracut’s Farmer Dave’s.
In 2024, looking to share her love of art and connection to her heritage even further, Garcia founded Lucky Knot Arts, a collective that hosts events centering the creative work of people of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander descent. Early on, the organization mainly hosted pop-up art workshops with topics like painted ornaments and Chinese paper cutting. More recently, the offerings have expanded to include a book club and mahjong classes.
The organization is also partnering with Salem’s Punto Urban Art Museum on an exhibition that will be on display from April 18 to June 6, overlapping with the third annual Lucky Knot Mini Market, a celebration of AANHPI creators and culture.
When she is not busy with Likemind Design or Lucky Knot, Garcia also finds time to work on personal art projects in her studio. Lately, she says, she has been enjoying portraiture that delves into her family history. Her style can vary widely, she says, from painterly and realistic to more illustrative. “I am really interested in bold and colorful work,” she says. “Playful and joyful, I think, are my ultimate goals.”
The throughline that runs through her personal and professional work, however, is the way art can join people together as something bigger than themselves. “Ultimately, I think it boils down to the enjoyment of creating, of making something,” Garcia says. “The point of it all is just to make impactful connections with other people in the community.”