5 Things: Teaching Nature With Stories, Music; 'Water Music' 296 Years Young

1. The Belmont Public Library presents storyteller Davis Bates and musician Roger Tincknell who will be weaving tales of the natural world for kids in the Assembly Room from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. 

2. The Belmont Book Discussion group will discuss "Silent House" by Orhan Pamuk in the Flett Room of the Belmont Public Library at 3 p.m.  Everyone is welcome to attend.  Copies of the book can be requested through the library catalog or call the library Reference staff for assistance at 617-993-2870. 

3. Insituform Technologies will be performing sewer and drain work along Trapelo Road while sewer lining will be performed on Oxford Avenue. 

4. Do you have a question about using your new digital device or are just befuddled by the wealth of functions it can perform? Help is here. Belmont High School's Teen Techs are at the Belmont Public Library this July to help patrons with e-readers, accessing the digital catalog, basic Internet help, Facebook and much more. One hour individual one-on-one sessions are scheduled for Monday and Wednesday from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. Registration is required, and is available online or by calling 617-993-2870. 

5. On this day in 1717, George Frideric Handel's "Water Music" is premiered on a barge in the middle of the Thames River as the composer and 50 musicians followed King George I and several aristocrats traveling on the royal barge for an opulent River Party with hundreds of boats heading to and then back from Chelsea. The king enjoyed the new work so much he requested it played both up and down the river so that the music – the type which had never been heard before in England – could be heard by the thousands on the shore. Watch Hervé Niquet lead Le Concert Spirituel in the Prélude from Handel's Water Music Suite No 2 in D Major.