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Press release:

As we watch our favorite films, it is often the music that brings to life what we see on the screen. A soundtrack can tug at your heartstrings, incite a fit of giggles, bring tears to your eyes, or put you on the edge of your seat. Ric Jones, musical director of the Genesee Chorale, has created a performance that takes those moments off the screen and brings them to a live audience.

The Genesee Chorale invites the community to "Meet Me at the Movies"! This performance will feature a multimedia presentation of movie clips followed by a live performance of featured songs by individual singers, small ensembles, and the entire 60-member Genesee Chorale.

Song selections will come from some of your favorite movies, including "Grease," "The Bodyguard," "O Brother, Where Art Thou?," and many more. This performance will also feature the Genesee Children’s Chorus, directed by founder Heather Lovelace. The Children’s Chorus will be performing songs from "The Sound of Music" and Disney Pixar’s "Brave."

“The last time the Chorale performed 'Meet Me at the Movies!' the event sold out,” Jones said. “The community’s response was overwhelming and we have so much great music to choose from in films, we couldn’t resist doing a second performance!”

This exciting event will take place at 4 p.m. on Sunday, June 5, at Northgate Free Methodist Church, North Campus. It is located at 8160 Bank Street Road in Batavia.

Refreshments will be available for purchase by concertgoers at the concession stand. Presale tickets cost $8 and can be purchased from any Chorale member or online at www.geneseechorale.com. Tickets will also be available at the door for $10.

Members of the Batavia City Firefighters from IAFF Local 896 will fan out across the streets with boots in hand for this year’s drive on Friday, June 3rd.

Batavia’s Fill the Boot drive is organized by firefighter Chris Morasco. 

“In 2015, our members with the generous help of the community were able to raise $7,523 for the MDA! We are going to try our best to top the $10,000 mark for this great cause," Morasco said.

The event is from 8 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Main Street and Court Street and at Ellicott Street and Court Street.

Pictured with city firefighters are Patti Arroyo and her daughter Zoey.

They are a local family that has been touched by the MDA directly. They met with firefighters to explain how the MDA has helped them. 

"It was a great opportunity to put a face to the cause and see that our efforts are truly making a difference and changing lives," Morasco said.

James "Jim" Fullington, better known by his professional wrestling ring name, "The Sandman," hams it up with Bill Hume, owner of Foxprowl on Ellicott Street, Batavia, during a visit to the store, where he met with fans yesterday.

It was a long journey for James and Jessica Maskell and their two young children, Bailey and Sophie, to finally get to the day where they could move into their new home on Pearl Street.

The journey started long before the Maskells even knew they would get a home through Habitat for Humanity, when City Manager Jason Molino guided Habitat's Jessica Maguire-Tomidy and P.J. Riner through the house and Riner argued against Habitat taking on the project. 

The house was such a mess, but according to Riner's account, Molino pressed the issue and Maguire-Tomidy agreed they should give it a try.

"The city is instrumental in its vision in developing these homes and these neighborhoods," Riner said. "Jason has brought that vision to fruition here in this home. He walked us through and I said, 'no.' I think it was the first time I ever said no to a house. This house looked terrible, but after we got started on this house, we found there was much here to be saved."

He said the house has a great floor plan, had a solid structure and turned out to be worth saving.

"I actually like doing these rehabs more than the new builds," he said. "These houses have more character and more space."

The long journey included hundreds of hours of volunteer labor from people throughout the community and students from RIT and thousands of dollars in donated material from area businesses.

"We after week, they show up when it's raining, it's snowing, it's cold, it's hot and they do the hard and very important work of building the actual house," Maguire-Tomidy said.

James Maskell said he and his wife were so grateful to all the volunteers and the donors that made their new home possible.  

"We really didn't expect this to happen," Maskell said. "When we first signed up, we thought, why not give it a chance, and now, here we are."

Like all new Habitat homeowners, James and Jessica also pitched in on the rehab effort as their down payment on their mortgage.

"When we hand over a project like this that's complete, we feel like we've made a difference not only the in lives of the family but in the community we live in, Maguire-Tomidy said.

Somebody vandalized and stole items from a growing community memorial at 8157 State Street Road, Batavia, the site of Friday's fire that claimed the lives of 2-year-old twins Michael J. Gard and Micah G. Gard.

The Sheriff's Office is investigating the crime and are asking for the public's assistance in identifying the perpetrator.

Stolen were a decorative fire extinguisher, a teddy bear and a white cross, approximately two feet high.

The cross and teddy bear were placed there Saturday by Richard Frazier, who said the cross had been a temporary marker on his grandmother's grave and the teddy bear had belonged to his grandmother.

Other memorial items were located strewn along the shoulder of State Street Road, indicating the person or persons responsible for the theft departed on foot south, toward the City of Batavia.

There was a memorial service at the site last night and the theft was discovered this morning.

Anyone with information should contact the Sheriff's Office at (585) 343-5000.

UPDATE 2:45 p.m.: The Sheriff's Office released the following statement:

The family reports that the cross and teddy bear have been returned to the memorial. They were taken by another family member to add some additional decoration and were not, in fact, stolen. The affected family is satisfied with these circumstances and consider the matter resolved, and is grateful for the assistance of the public in this matter.

Previously:

• Working house fire reported on State Street Road
• Two small children die in house fire on State Street Road, Batavia
• Investigation continues into the death of two little boys in house fire
• Children in State Street Road fire died of smoke inhalation, believed home alone at time

A brush fire reported along the Thruway in the area of mile marker 390, on the eastbound side.

Dispatchers say they've received numerous calls with size estimates ranging from two feet by two feet up to 20 feet wide.

East Pembroke fire is responding.

UPDATE 10:17 a.m.: A retired trooper who lives in the area has told dispatchers that the only thing he is seeing is a large tractor kicking up dust.

UPDATE 10:20 a.m.: A chief on scene says there was a small fire, but it's out. Somebody put it out with a fire extinguisher.

Notre Dame beat Honeoye 3-2 yesterday at Dwyer Stadium to advance to the semifinals of the Class D1 Section V playoff.

The Fighting Irish will play Lyndonville on Tuesday at GCC at 4:30 p.m.

Also, Friday, Oakfield beat Keshegua, 6-2, and will play Geneseo at 7 p.m., Tuesday, at Dwyer Stadium in a Class C2 playoff.

Alexander beat Williamson 7-5 will play Avon at 4:30 p.m., Tuesday, at Dwyer in the Class C1 semifinal.

Batavia beat Geneva, 3-2.

Le Roy lost to Holley, 4-3 and Pembroke lost to Avon, 11-5.

In girls softball, Batavia plays Aquinas at 5 p.m., Tuesday, in Brockport. Le Roy plays Wayland-Cohocton at 4 p.m., Monday, in Canandaigua. Oakfield-Alabama plays Geneseo at 5 p.m., Monday, at GCC. 

The man and woman accused of attempted robbery at the Smoke Rings Smokeshop early Friday morning were arrested today in Johnstown based on a tipster who saw a picture of the male suspect online.

They were arraigned in Alabama Town Court this evening, each on one count of attempted robbery in the second degree, and both were ordered held without bail pending court appearances at 2 p.m., Thursday, June 2.

Charged were Jeremy J. Reynolds, 34, of Johnstown, and Mitsydawn Souza, 26, of St. Johnsville.

Sitting in court awaiting their arraignment before Justice John Tauscher, Reynolds and Souza discussed the case and Souza made several statements about her own personal situation.

They spoke openly, even after Tauscher advised them that everything they said in the courtroom was being digitally recorded by an audio recorder and a video recorder and that their statements could be used as evidence against them.

Souza cried during the entire conversation and made declarations to a deputy about how she couldn't read the court documents, that she had learning disabilities and mental and physical health problems. Reynolds read portions of the documents to her.

She cried several times that she had never been arrested before, that she had never been in any kind of trouble.

"I've never even stolen a candy bar before," she said. "Now I'm in so much trouble."

When Reynolds read the part of the charge that said they demanded nothing, she said, "I didn't demand anything," and he said, "I didn't demand anything either."

She said, "you told me you just wanted to scare a friend," and he said he didn't tell her that, but that he intended to get shot.

When he was arraigned, he interrupted Tauscher several times, trying Tauscher's patience. Once he said he needed a court-appointed attorney, Tauscher said the arraignment was over, and Reynolds said he wanted to proceed with the arraignment. Tauscher said once he asked for an attorney, the arraignment was over.

Reynolds wanted to know if he could get bail, but Tauscher said that because Reynolds allegedly has two prior felony convictions, he couldn't grant bail in any amount even if the D.A. wasn't requesting Reynolds be held without bail.

Reynolds walked into court carrying his crutches and with his left leg in a cast. He was apparently injured in the scuffle at the smoke shop.

Both Reynolds and Souza were provided with witness statements of the two smoke shop employees who were working when they reportedly entered the store.

As Reynold's read the statement, he told Souza that one statement didn't say the same thing as a statement he claimed to have read earlier. He said he had seen another statement and the person making the statement, "said I had blond hair and blue eyes."

He asked Tauscher if he could get a copy of that statement and Tauscher told him that was an issue to take up with his attorney.

The two store employees, one a Batavia resident and the other an Alabama resident, provided deputies with mostly similar statements about the events that started at 2:42 a.m., Friday.

Two people, both wearing camouflage entered the store, with the man carrying a rifle that may have looked like an M-16, and the woman carrying a pistol. They pointed the guns at one clerk (the other was in a back room) and yelled, "freeze mother (bleep)" (the same term of endearment Reynolds directed at a photographer this evening outside the courthouse).

The couple pushed the first clerk into a back room and tied his hands with zip ties. Then the second clerk came up behind the male suspect and grabbed him and a fight ensued. The red wig he was wearing fell off and the gun he was carrying dropped to the ground, at which point both clerks realized the gun was a fake.

The woman ran from the store, and the clerk with his hands tied, tried to chase her, and during the chase managed to free himself.

The woman got away and he returned to find the male suspect hitting the other clerk in the head with the butt end of the fake M-16. He put the suspect in a choke hold, then when he was indicating he couldn't breathe, the other clerk told him to let him go.

They wrestled him into a chair.

He jumped up and ran into a window. One account says the window broke, the other says he bounced off it. After getting him back in the chair, the suspect again bolted for the window. This time, he made it partially out the window and the two men held him dangling by his legs. The suspect, they said, produced a knife and tried to cut them, so they let him go.

One of the clerks tried to chase the suspect, but he ran into the woods and got away.

When Reynolds and Sousa were discussing the statements, Sousa said investigators had shown her a video of the alleged attempted robbery, but Reynolds said he hadn't seen the video.

"It shows that I did it," she said.

A vehicle has reportedly struck a building at 6946 Weatherwax Road, Elba.

A propane tank is leaking.

No injuries are reported. 

Elba fire and Mercy EMS dispatched.

An autopsy conducted this morning on the twin 2-year-olds who died last night in a fire at 8157 State Street Road, Batavia, indicate the boys died of smoke inhalation.

The Sheriff's Office also announced investigators believe the children were home alone at the time.

Last night witnesses, including the landlord, said the mother is believed to have left the house to go to the store for milk.

The boys are identified as Michael J. Gard and Micah G. Gard. The name of the mother has not been released.

The fire was reported at 9:59 p.m. when a resident of the upstairs apartment returned home and saw smoke and flames coming from the rear of the structure.

The boys were in a first-floor bedroom at the back of the house.

The Sheriff's Office said deputies were the first on scene but were unable to enter the structure because of heat and flames.

Firefighters arrived soon afternoon, knocked back the fire quickly, and located the boys, who were already deceased. 

The cause of the fire has not been determined and the investigation is ongoing.

The investigation is being conducted by the Office of Emergency Management, Town of Batavia Fire Department and the Sheriff's Office.

The Sheriff's Office reports that more information will be released as it becomes available.

Previously:

• Working house fire reported on State Street Road
• Two small children die in house fire on State Street Road, Batavia
• Investigation continues into the death of two little boys in house fire

A Friday evening fundraiser organized by the Le Roy Rotary Club was also the opening of a new events center at Mercy Grove, the former priests home on a large estate at 7758 E. Main Road.

Owner James Gomborone has been renovating the facility for months and was finally ready to give it a first public showing for the Rotary event.

Mercy Grove will be a location for upscale weddings, community events, corporate retreats, retirement parties and rehearsal dinners, said manager Barbie Gozelski.

By next year, renovations on the second floor should be completed, and those rooms will be guest rooms and serve as a possible setting for a bed and breakfast.  Cabins on the 53-acre property will serve, when renovated, as bridal suites or guest rooms. 

The facility is just across the road from the Le Roy Country Club, which Gomborone also owns.

"Graze to Raise" was hosted by Le Roy Rotary as a fundraiser for the R.E.A. Milne Scholarship Fund.

Turning onto Simonds Road in Darien yesterday, I saw big flag waving from a building that said, "OPEN," and a smaller sign that said "old tractor parts for sale."  

That looked interesting. It had never caught my eye before, so thinking it was a new business, stopped.

Turns out, Ron and Margie Rupp are now in their third year of business. Only the flag is new.

And it's not just old tractor parts they sell. They can get new and old parts for every make and model of tractor as well as all other farm equipment.

"It doesn't matter if it's green, blue or yellow," Ron said.

Ron Rupp said he represents five different parts dealers.

"If it's available, we can get it," he said.

He started the business in part to keep him busy in retirement, but over the last year or so, it has really started to pick up, he said.

Besides selling parts out of a trailer on their property, or ordering whatever a customer needs, they also travel around to tractor and steam shows. That keeps them busy during the summer months.

Richard Frazier places a cross with a bear and flowers next to a tree outside 8157 State Street Road, Batavia, where two little boys died in a fire last night.

Frazier, who has a 4-year-old daughter himself, doesn't know the family but said he was heartbroken by the tragedy.

"As a parent, I could not imagine what it would be like if something like this happened to my child," Frazier said. "It's just insane to think that we just live life every day, taking life for granted and at any point, it can all be done."

Investigators were on scene last night until nearly 4 a.m. and then went home to get some much-needed rest and to be able to return in the daylight. They started arriving again about noon. It will likely be several hours before their work is complete. Until this phase of the investigation is done, we're not likely to hear more about the potential cause of the fire and other circumstances surrounding last night's events.

The names of the children or mother have not yet been officially released.

UPDATE 3:40 p.m.: Investigators have less than an hours work to do, but sources on scene say it is unlikely there will be any announcement today about the cause.  There is more work to do away from the scene and that could take a couple of days.  There should be a press release coming out this afternoon from the Sheriff's Office that will contain names.

UPDATE: Press release from the American Red Cross:

Volunteers from the American Red Cross responded to a fire on State Street Road in Batavia early Saturday morning, providing immediate emergency assistance for two adults and two children. Red Cross assistance typically includes vouchers for temporary housing, food and clothing as needed, and Disaster Mental Health volunteers are available to help with the emotional aspect of disaster. Those affected will meet with caseworkers in the coming days to work on a longer-term recovery plan.

Disaster Action Team (DAT) volunteers Suzanne Kowalcyk and James McMoil responded to the scene of this fire. The Red Cross would like to express its sympathies to everyone affected by this tragedy.

Two young children died in a house fire at 8157 State Street Road, Batavia, late Friday night, at a time when their mother was not home.

It's unclear if any adults were in the apartment at the time of the fire, said Chief Deputy Jerome Brewster, Sheriff's Office, which is leading the investigation into the fire.

The cause has yet to be determined, but it started in the bottom apartment in the back of the residence.

The bodies of the children, both age 2, were found in that same location.

Brewster said he couldn't say for sure if the mother left the children with an adult to supervise them, or if she left them alone while she went to the store.

"I don't know and we're going to get to the bottom of that," Brewster said. "That's why we're going to talk with the mother."

The mother was in no condition to be interviewed tonight, Brewster said.

The fire was reported just before 10 p.m. when the upstairs resident returned home and spotted the fire. He called 9-1-1.

Town of Batavia arrived on scene quickly and fire chiefs were told there was a possibility of people trapped in the residence, so Deputy Chief Dan Coffey said he quickly sounded a second alarm.

The back of the house was fully involved at that point. The first firefighters on scene made entry and located the deceased children.

Asked if the evidence was pointing toward a fire deliberately set or accidental, Brewster said investigators are leaning toward accidental.

"That's why we have fire service here, to investigate that," Brewster said. "Right now, I'm not sure. It doesn't look like anything other than that -- accidental -- that's why they are here and that's what their job is. They will go through and make a thorough investigation."

About 10 minutes after firefighters arrived on the scene, two women ran up to the house and had to be restrained as they tried to enter it. Over the course of the next half hour, more people arrived who seemed to be friends or family members and there were women wailing and yelling. Troopers, deputies and Batavia PD officers did their best to assist them.

The two apartments were occupied by members of the same family, and members of that family also lived in a neighboring house. At one point, neighbors thought three children died in the fire, but that third child was in the neighboring house, according to landlord Joe Burke.

"It's my understanding that the mother went out to get milk for her little kids," Burke said.

Yellow tape was put around the scene at one point during the night and criminal investigators were called in once the fire was out and entry was safe for them.

But both Coffey and Brewster said the appearance of a criminal investigation doesn't necessarily mean a crime is suspected.

"It's a crime scene until proven otherwise," Coffey said, who besides being a volunteer firefighter is a Batavia police officer. "Obviously, we have two fatalities, so we're erring on the side of cause. We're treating it as a crime until proven different, but that's not indicative of any sort of information that we know at this point. It is how we would normally handle a call like this."

The location is the same as a reported hit-and-run accident April 1 in which resident Brian Ace suffered injuries and had to be taken by Mercy Flight to an area hospital. Ace declined to press charges in that case.

Investigators, at this point, don't seem to believe there is any connection between that incident and the fire.

There were no fatal fires in the Town of Batavia Fire District from 2008 until this year. This is the second fatal fire for Town volunteers in less than a month. On April 30, a fire at a residence on Oak Orchard Road claimed the life of Roger Saile, age 90.

"Obviously, it's been a tough stretch for us," Coffey said. "This one, obviously, is going to hurt. Just two weeks ago, three weeks ago, we also had that other one, so we're going ot make sure that we take care of our members, but it's going to be a difficult time for us."

Police are looking for a vehicle, possibly a blue Honda, that fled the scene of a reported fight at 7-Eleven on East Main Street as soon as police arrived.

There may also be subjects who might have been involved walking on Elm Street.

The initial report was of five people fighting at the 7-Eleven.

When GS-39 called in "out of service" at 3 p.m. today, the dispatcher thanked him for his 30 years of service to the people of Genesee County.

Sgt. Jim Meier said during an interview that morning that there is a bit of sadness that comes with drawing the curtain on his career in law enforcement. He's enjoyed the work and the people he worked with.

"I knew the day was coming sooner or later, but it's been 30 years and I feel like it was just yesterday when I started," Meier said. "I really do."

Meier began his career at the Sheriff's Office in 1986, working the jail for a year before moving into patrol work, after earning his degree in criminal justice from Genesee Community College.

He's a graduate of Pembroke High School.

"I don't know if there is anything specific (that inspired the career choice)," he said. "I looked at things I thought I was good at and went into criminal justice and I found it interesting and it just kind of progressed from there."

He never found the job particularly hard, he said.

"I mean, there are some things that we do, like when we're at the death of family members, it can be a bit taxing, but I never found anything difficult," he said. "It all came pretty naturally."

Asked for a key memory from 30 years with the Sherriff's Office, the first thing that came to mind was the passenger train derailment in Batavia in 1994.

"I think I was a week out of supervisor school and I can remember it like it was yesterday," Meier said. "It's amazing that nobody died in that derailment, but it was the most eerie thing in the world when you go to the scene and you don't know what to expect and all of the sudden you see the twisted metal all over the place. It was unbelievable."

There are a lot of young guys in local law enforcement now, and Meier encourages them to stick with it, even when the hours are long and the sacrifices pile up. It's worth it, he said.

"The advice I give all the young guys is this, when you start this job, you have to come in and do it with eyes wide open, meaning you're going to have to work midnights, you're going to have to work holidays, you're going to have to work weekends," Meier said. "You're going to have to sacrifice some things you may not want to sacrifice, but there's a lot of good things that you get from making those sacrifices."

Darien Lake Theme Park unveiled its newest water ride today, RipCurl Racer, a 24-second roaring slide through curling tubs before splashing down in the pool at the bottom of the ride.

The Neid Marcucci family of Batavia was officially the first riders of RipCurl.

The ride is part of a $1.5-million capital investment in the park and was previewed today for the season.

“Bringing in RipCurl Racer, the third new thrill ride to join the park’s lineup over the past year, is really exciting for us,” said Chris Thorpe, general manager at Darien Lake. “The continued growth and expansion at Darien Lake is a testament to our dedication to providing guests with the best entertainment value in the region.”

The growth of the state's largest seasonal employer is a continued benefit to the local economy, said GC Chamber of Commerce President Tom Turnbull.

“With the addition of RipCurl Racer, Darien Lake continues to invest in Genesee County and solidify its position as one of the top family entertainment destinations in Western New York and the entire Northeast,” Turnbull said. “Not only does Darien Lake provide a premier entertainment venue, but they also are the leading provider of seasonal jobs that are vital to our local economy.”

Local law enforcement is looking for two people who entered the Smoke Rings Smokeshop on Shanks Road, Tonawanda Indian Reservation, shortly after 2:30 a.m. and attempted to rob it.

Employees fought back, and although the suspects managed to escape, leaving one employee with cuts on his head caused by the butt of the suspect's rifle, the melee helped produce some evidence investigators hope will lead to an arrest.

Including the face of a suspect exposed for the closed-circuit cameras in the store.

The suspects are described as a white female and white male. Both came in wearing camouflage-colored clothing, face masks and carrying guns, according to Sheriff's Investigator Kris Kautz.  

In the struggle, the white male also lost the red wig he was wearing. Kautz recovered both the mask and wig during his investigation at the scene.

An employee who was injured was transported to an area hospital and required stitches, but the injuries were not life threatening.

When the would-be robbers entered, they grabbed one employee and took him to a back room and tried to restrain him with plastic ties. He managed to escape. The perpetrators did not realize another employee was in the store, apparently. A struggle then ensued. The female suspect fled immediately, but the male fought and was subdued. He was restrained in a back room while awaiting the arrival of law enforcement but managed to escape through a back window.

It's believed he managed to go to a get-away vehicle, possibly a white or light-colored or small SUV, such as an Equinox or Trail Blazer. 

The would-be robbers left empty-handed.

It would probably be a stretch to say that S. Shade Zajac knew from an early age he wanted to be a symphony orchestra conductor. Like every young person, he explored lots of interests growing up.

But then, there was that time his grandfather gave him a baton and he took it to kindergarten for show and tell.

"My mom got a note from my teacher saying, 'We understand that Shade really likes his baton, but some of the other kids are not mature enough to handle sharp, pointing sticks. So, we would ask you kindly not to bring it in anymore,' " Zajac recalled with a chuckle.

Zajac's obvious passion for music, his love of leading an orchestra and his sheer talent are why, at 22, fresh from earning his Bachelor of Music in Music Performance from Nazareth College, Zajac is the new conductor of the Genesee Symphony Orchestra.

He was selected by the GSO Board of Directors after a season in which he and three other conductor candidates each took turns leading the orchestra for one performance. All four shows were well attended and well received, but it was Zajac who was selected to lead the orchestra as it enters its 70th year.

Not too many young conductors get the opportunity to lead a symphony orchestra right out of college and Zajac is thrilled by the opportunity.

"It's an unbelievable experience and an unbelievable opportunity," Zajac said. "There's no substitute for having living people in an ensemble for you to work with. And not just for you to experiment and fail and to grow, but to learn from them and to learn 'okay, what works? What doesn't work? There's a problem. We're not playing this. It's not gelling yet. Why? How can I fix that?' There's only so much you can do on your own, just looking at the music."

It was Zajac's professor at Nazareth, Nancy P. Strelau, who told him about the opening with the GSO, but she warned him not to get his hopes up. His resume would arrive amongst other candidates with doctorate degrees and decades of experience.

"She told me, 'It's going to be really good for you to go through this process. Let's take a look at your resume, and you know, you won't get asked for an interview,' " Zajac recalled.

Then he got an e-mail inviting him to an interview, and he thought that was great, but "they're not going to ask me to do a concert because I'm 21 years old."

In truth, Zajac said, throughout the process, with the search committee, the board, the orchestra, he never felt like his age was an issue.

"I didn't feel like they're not taking me seriously because I'm so young," Zajac said. "They're just looking at me as a musician."

He admits he was nervous at that first rehearsal. Even for conductors in their 40s, he said, orchestras can look at a new conductor like, "Ok, who is this guy?"

"There's always going to be people who don't think I know what they're talking about or 'what is this?' " Zajac said. "They think, 'I can do better than this jerk here.' And I never, through this whole process, I never felt that. I think I said at the concert that I could have been working with these people for 40 years. It just felt, you know, we could get time to work, we could have a laugh, and we could make music, which is what we're supposed to do."

Zajac grew up in Ovid surrounded by music.

His grandparents were musicians and one of his earliest memories is being at their house and hearing Ravel's "Bolero." He was captivated.

"Just about every string player in the world, and probably other orchestra musicians, hate it because it's 15 minutes of the same thing," Zajac said laughing. "I'm probably the only person who loves it."

His next musical stepping stone was Yanni.

"My grandmother had a VHS -- whatever those are -- of 'Yanni Live at the Acropolis,' " Zajac said. "Say what you will about the man and his music but it was very helpful. It taught me that if you're going to be a cool drummer you need to have a lot of drums," which Zajac laughs at now. "So I actually really first started kind of drumming, and I was banging on pots and pans to Yanni. It sounds cliche, but I'm told it's true, and I was given a toy drum set when I was 2 or 3."

His grandfather taught in the Ithaca College School of Music and at his grandparent's house were more than Yanni -- there was Beethoven and Bach, too.

His father was a rock musician, playing guitar in bands, so he also heard a lot of Led Zeppelin, AC/DC and Rush.

"So I had these two very different musical paths and all of which I enjoyed," Zajac said. "Very rarely do I find something I don't like. When I was, I think, 3, my grandfather took me to my first orchestra concert at Ithaca College, and I barely remember it. It was the Stravinsky 'Firebird Suite' and apparently I went home and I just was all about, 'Oh, the timpani was so loud. I love that cello thing.' And I kept talking about the cello and I really wanted to play it, I guess. I started taking lessons when I was 3 or 4."

There was no string program at his middle school, so Zajac started studying with professors in Ithaca, but that duel interest in classical and rock came up again in seventh grade when some other boys asked him to be the drummer in their rock band, and they played together for several years.

"It's amazing how everyone always would freak out," Zajac said. "They only knew me as a cellist, classical music. 'You like rock music? You like jazz?' Absolutely. And it helps me so much with classical music, especially because playing in the rock band was, in a weird way, my first form of chamber music."

Nazareth College was a natural pick for Shade, both because he wanted to study under Nancy Strelau and it's perhaps the only college in the nation that allows undergraduates to conduct. As a result, he's already conducted a few symphony and chamber performance, including the Nazareth College Symphony Orchestra and the Chamber Orchestra, the Finger Lakes Summer Festival Orchestra and the Greater Rochester Women's Philharmonic. He's also participated in workshops, master classes and apprenticeships with the Baltimore Chamber Orchestra and the Northwest Symphony Orchestra.

"All throughout high school, I had other interests," Zajac said. "I enjoy reading, and probably in another lifetime, I would fancy myself a writer, or a painter, but I have always known that somehow I wanted to do music for my life, whatever that meant. If that meant being a rock drummer and touring the world, or being an orchestral musician, or being a conductor. If any of those things happened, I would be happy.

"Conducting," he added, "what really drew me to conducting, I think is, for one, there's so much music in the world, that even if I listened to something new, if I just spent each day for the rest of my life listening to something new, I probably wouldn't begin to scratch everything that's out there. I didn't want to just limit myself to say, just the cello solo repertoire or the quartet repertoire because that is just a skin cell in a body of music that I'm sure is out there."

That vast body of music -- centuries of composers from all seven continents -- will give Zajac much to choose from as he begins to chart out each season of GSO's four performances. He must balance each performance to ensure the pieces work together, that there is the right mixture of audience-pleasing hits as well as new, challenging or unfamiliar works to help spark exploration and interest. That's important both for the audience and the orchestra members, who can grow even more bored than the audience if the same pieces are performed year-after-year.

He knows he's gotten into something special with the GSO, an orchestra that consistently performs at the highest levels and attracts talent from throughout the region, something rare for the few small community orchestras that still survive. He wants to cherish that and nurture it, providing pieces that both please and challenge orchestra members, but not take them further than they're able to go.

"Me and Professor Strelau sat down and said, 'Well, what's good for this orchestra?' And what I chose was a little risky to do. Capriccio Espagnol and Polovtsian Dances. They're meaty pieces. And, quite frankly, they played the hell out of them. And it has nothing whatsoever to do with me. I mean I can only do so much. The conductor is there to inspire and to guide, but they do all the hard work. I just wave my hands. You have to have good players, and then you have to pick a smart repertoire, an engaging repertoire. I think it's a great group."

So good, in fact, that Zajac went through, after the performance last fall, a spell of "post-concert depression." It's a real thing most conductor's experience, he said, because there is so much work and anticipation that go into preparing for a performance, and then just like that, it's over. It's done.

"You're on cloud nine for a little while if it went really well, and then the next day you go, 'Ugh. When do I get to do another one?' And I have not experienced such post-concert depression as after the concert in September. Not only because it was such a great experience, and I felt such a connection, and they played so well, and I thought, 'Even if I get this, I have to wait so long before I get to work with them again.'"

The ideas of what to perform in the coming seasons are already running through his head. Perhaps a whole show of orchestral pieces from movies.

"John Williams is obvious, but Bernard Herrmann is one of my favorite composers," Zajac said. "He did most of the Alfred Hitchcock movies. "Psycho' is obviously the one you think about, but "North By Northwest" and "Marnie" and "Vertigo," they have really stunning music."

He's also interested in exploring local composers.

"Dana Wilson, for example," he said. "I guess he just retired this year, actually, from Ithaca College. Very important composer, relatively local, in the area, and he wrote some really phenomenal stuff. One is called, "Shortcut Home." It's a three or four-minute overture that's vibrant. It's got some jazz influence in it and I think the orchestra would really like it, and it's exciting as a listener. Even for someone who's not into classical music, it's cool. There are trumpets with plungers."

Perhaps, someday, the GSO will even perform one of his own compositions. He wrote his first piece in seventh grade. But he isn't considering that any time, soon, he said. The performances should be about the music and the orchestra, and he's afraid that if he programs one of his own compositions, it will look like it's about him.

There's also a very good chance one of the professors from Nazareth, a world-renowned pianist, will perform Brahms Piano Concerto No. 1. The pianist was in Batavia for Zajac's performance with the GSO and was impressed with the orchestra. He said if Zajac got the job, he would perform.

At 22, with his first appointment as conductor for a symphony orchestra, it's hard not to think the GSO could be just a stepping stone for a young, passionate and talented musician, but Zajac said he doesn't look at it that way. He doesn't even like the term "stepping stone," he said. Maybe there will be opportunities down the road that are too good to pass up, but he said he's committed to helping the GSO grow and thrive, if not for the sake of the GSO, just for the sake of his own enjoyment of music.

"As long as I'm working with musicians who want to be working, and who are just as passionate as I am about what we're doing, I could be conducting the Berlin Philharmonic or I could be conducting the East Podunk Orchestra with five people in it," Zajac said. "My goals are just to make music every single day until I physically can't or die. I think it's very easy to set these goals, like, 'I want to be the new conductor of the Rochester Philharmonic or the Berlin Philharmonic,' and although they're really wonderful names, the name is not what's most important.

"I'm convinced that I can experience just as beautiful of an experience at the GSO or another orchestra."

DISCLOSURE: Howard Owens is a member of the Board of Directors for the Genesee Symphony Orchestra.