Music tuned by illness

Her hair has grown back, her health has returned, and her tumor is no more. But the aftereffects of Akiko Enoki Sato's battle with breast cancer remain with her in unexpected ways.

For one, her husband, Toshi , who shaved his head in solidarity, is still bald. ``He kept it because he likes it that way," she laughed.

Then, there's the matter of the golfing. ``I never, ever thought I would like golf, but I need the exercise now, and I really like it," she said.

But most important, her music has changed. She now plays with more gusto than ever before. ``I feel and appreciate everything more than before. It changed my playing very much. I play with so much more energy now," said Sato, who performs a free concert at The Morse Institute Library in her hometown of Natick this Sunday.

On the program is music from the court of King Louis XIV, which Sato will play on a reproduction French double harpsichord, accompanied by Justin Haynes of Belmont on viola de gamba.

``The flair of French baroque music is just so fantastic. So I want people to hear it," said Sato, who, with a group of five other musicians, passionately promotes early music through a local and international concert series called Les Bostonades.

The concert is, however, no triumphant return to performing for Sato. She played straight through nearly two years of cancer treatment that included chemotherapy, radiation, and, ultimately, a double mastectomy.

``My surgeon organized my surgeries around my schedule. I did one side, played a concert, and then did the other side," said Sato. ``Having the responsibility of having to play made it easier to keep going. . . . You need energy to create music, and I believe this helped me maintain my energy level and kept me from sinking into a depression as so many cancer patients do."

Not that it was easy. Beside the usual fatigue, the chemo caused her to lose sensation in her fingertips, a big problem for a harpsichordist. But Sato, who began studying piano at age 3 at her home in Japan, remained at the keys. ``I just had to really increase my focus while I was playing."

That newfound intensity remains, as well as a fervor that she said comes from facing death. Sato is playing more concerts, and accompanying more student performances at Longy School of Music and Boston University, where she works. And for the Natick show, she chose what she calls ``one of the most technically difficult pieces from the French baroque period."

``I just wanted the challenge," she said. ``I want to make use of all of my time. I want to do as much as I can."

That difficult piece is two suites by Antoine Forqueray (1672-1745). ``Everybody knows Bach from that time, but not Forqueray. But he was a prodigy just like Mozart. He could play everything from a very young age, and Louis XIV discovered him when he was 5 and made him a court musician," said Sato.

``Later, he composed some very tough pieces," continued Sato. ``Everybody wants to try them, but not everyone can play them. We have been rehearsing for two months."

As at all Les Bostonades concerts, the music can be heard on the instruments it was actually written for. ``People don't get to hear these instruments much. But if I played this piece on a piano, it's a completely different sound," said Sato.

Sato and Haynes perform from 2 to 3 p.m. Sunday at The Morse Institute Library, 14 East Central St., Natick. Free. Instrument show-and-tell follows the performance. Call 508-647-6520. For more info, visit www.bostonades.org.

SOUL SANCTUARY -- Calm hands grip a pew. A bride and groom link together in a dramatic embrace. Ladies in their Sunday best meet over a dainty repast.

For 10 years, Jason Miccolo Johnson quietly took his flashless camera into countless African-American churches nationwide. He went to inner-city sanctums, suburban megachurches, and storefront worship sessions. He attended weddings, funerals, baptisms, and church suppers. And always he kept his camera pointed, taking 15,000 photographs in all.

Now, 165 of these striking black-and-white images appear in his new book ``Soul Sanctuary: Images of the African American Worship Experience," (Bulfinch, 2006) and 48 of them in their large-silver-gelatin-print splendor are going on national tour, with the first stop at Panopticon Gallery in Waltham. The fine art photography gallery and photo lab, which also represents mountaineer/photographer Bradford Washburn and civil rights photographer Ernest C. Withers, was chosen to print the images for the show and thus to host its debut.

``Johnson's pictures create an experience. You can feel the experience at these churches from both the social and the spiritual side," said gallery manager Micah Mayes .

The photographs, though of many denominations from many places, nonetheless create a whole. By focusing on the moments that bind, such as serving up dinner at a church supper or passing out fans at a hot Sunday service, Johnson captures the small moments that make a greater community.

Johnson, a former photo editor at USA Today's Sports Weekly , went freelance in 1989. Since then, his work has made the pages of numerous books and national magazines as well as museum walls, including those of the Smithsonian Institution.

Scenes from Boston area churches are featured in the book and gallery show as well.

``Soul Sanctuary" runs through June 10 at Panopticon Gallery, 435 Moody St., Waltham. Hours: weekdays 10 a.m.-6 p.m., Saturday 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Call 781-647-0100 or visit www.panopt.com or www.blackchurchphotos.com.

READY, SET, ACT -- At EMACT, theater sets go up almost faster than you can say what this acronym is short for: The Eastern Massachusetts Association of Community Theatres, which is preparing for its annual Community Theatre Drama Festival.

In this always exciting competition, troupes from the area bring a 60-minute portion from their best production to Babson College in Wellesley. But the fun is not just in watching the cream of the local community theater crop perform. You get to marvel at the wondrous, high-speed set changes.

Each troupe gets just 10 minutes to build an entire set and then another 10 to strike it. There are no excuses, no extensions, no tearing up for the judges. Either the set goes up and down in the allotted time or you're out.

``It's an art form in itself," said Hovey Players of Waltham member Michelle Aguillon. ``You literally stand behind a line with your actors, your set, your costume, your props -- everything that goes into that production -- and they say `Go!' and you're on a timer."

Some sets remain legendary, like the entire house Vokes Players of Wayland wheeled onto the stage. ``A caster broke, but they managed to get it on in time anyway," said Aguillon.

Entertainment extras also come at the end of the performances. After all three productions for a day are complete, the three festival judges hold forth for five minutes each on what worked and what didn't.

Troupes from the western suburbs performing include Hovey Players (``Les Liaisons Dangereuses" ), Needham Community Theatre (``Anne of the Thousand Days") , Washington Street Players of Holliston (``The Illusion") , Vokes Players (``Hidden in this Picture") , Wellesley Players (``Graceland"), and last year's EMACT and New England regionals winner, Acme Theater of Maynard (``Brilliant Traces").

The winner out of the nine troupes competing will go on to the New England regionals -- and the regional winner is off to the nationals in June 2007.

EMACT's competition runs June 1-4 at Babson College's Sorenson Center for the Arts in Wellesley. Directions at www.babson.edu. Session times: 6 p.m. June 1 and 2, 3 p.m. June 3 and 4 . Three shows per session. Tickets $20 per session, $10 students/seniors. Festival pass $60, $30 students/seniors. Call 978-772-2545. For a schedule, visit www.emact.org.

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