Noise

A dream had carried the boys so far from home, some 5,000 miles across the ocean to a cramped and dingy apartment in Philadelphia: a hope that ice hockey could change their lives. Ivan Pravilov could fulfill that dream, they were told. He could take them from the daily grind of post-communist Ukraine to the gleaming ice of the NHL. He'd done it before. He'd done if for Andrei Zyuzin, who went on to play for six NHL teams. He'd done it for Konstantin Kalmikov, a third-round draft pick of the Toronto Maple Leafs in 1996.

The parking problems that plagued the residential neighborhood around Boomerang's nightclub on the Delaware River have almost vanished, Commissioner Thomas J. Giancristoforo reported. But the noise level outside the 2-month-old club is still too high despite the club's addition of sound barriers and the rearrangement of stereo speakers, he said at Monday night's board meeting. Since portions of five roads near the club were restricted to residential- permit parking at the end of last month, Giancristoforo said he had received few complaints of neighbors unable to park.

THE CITY'S new agreement with Ride the Ducks that will return the boats to the Delaware River seems to address the safety failures that led to the tourist boat ride's fatal accident last summer. And a new provision will keep the duck boats quieter: "Quackers," those annoying sound-makers that riders use to bleat through the streets, will now be given out at the end of the tours instead of the beginning. We're not sure what this has to do with safety, but it has a lot to do with sanity.

Residents of Kings Road in Plymouth Township have been complaining since the Blue Route opened in December that the dirt berm behind their homes was not sufficient to block out traffic noise. So 10 homeowners have been asking officials of the state Department of Transportation to construct a sound barrier. PennDot hasn't decided. Now, the Plymouth Township Council and Richard Tilghman, the state senator from the 17th District, plan to get involved. Tilghman and two members of the Township Council are trying to set up a meeting with a PennDot sound barrier expert to address the concerns of their constituents.

While officials at Memorial Hospital of Burlington County in Mount Holly say their new Mobile Magnetic Resonance Imaging unit provides a community service, residents of the neighborhood surrounding the hospital complain that it keeps them awake at night. Madison Avenue resident Stephanie Wingett complained to the Mount Holly Township Council on June 10 that the large truck tractor that delivers the mobile-unit trailer to the hospital on a rotating schedule during odd hours of the late night and early morning is disturbing the usually quiet neighborhood.

A new ordinance aimed at controlling excessive noise from televisions and stereos in Lumberton Township also focuses on noise generated by the construction of new homes. Members of the Township Committee unanimously approved the ordinance at their Dec. 16 meeting after a public hearing in which several farmers voiced fear they would be affected by the measure. But the township's clerk and administrator, Patricia Rainear, said farmers would be protected by the state Right to Farm Act. "This ordinance really is a guideline for the Police Department to follow when they receive a noise complaint," Rainear said.

The sounds of Montego Bay at the Woodbine Inn will not keep Cinnaminson residents awake this summer, but the residents did not keep the Woodbine from renewing its liquor license. A two-hour hearing last night drew a dozen disgruntled Cinnaminson residents and their township solicitor, all protesting what they say has been excessive noise created by live music, DJs and patrons at the outdoor nightclub during the last two summers. The outdoor area of the nightclub on Route 73 has been silent since last August, when Burlington County Judge John A. Sweeney ordered it closed until general manager Nick Kouvatas and Woodbine officials can prove they have reduced the noise, which carries quickly over the Pennsauken Creek to homes in the Glen Meade section of the neighboring township.

Year-round, but in the winter especially, the northeast wind carries the rumbling, clattering noises from the Cinnaminson Industrial Park straight to the rooftops of homes in the small Rolling Greens neighborhood. Those noises shook houses and kept people up at night, residents said. The trees that had afforded a modest sound barrier were being chopped down to accommodate the expansion of various companies in the park. Morton Raphelson, with 29 years of residency on Winding Way, said he remembers when the industrial park, just north of Rolling Greens along River Road, was only woods.

Memorial Hospital of Burlington County in Mount Holly is being as cooperative as possible in satisfying neighbors who have been disturbed by the facility's new mobile magnetic resonance imaging unit, hospital officials say. After Madison Avenue residents complained to the Township Council in June about noise generated by a tractor-trailer that delivers the mobile unit to the hospital late at night and early in the morning, hospital officials said...

A Satiesque piano wafts through space. A Technicolor orchestra creeps behind, entering from stage left. An actor, John Hurt, is introduced. "When Debussy died on March the 25th, 1918, in Paris, it was being bombarded by the Germans. And it was raining," he announces, then clears the stage, leaving an opera diva's wail, wah-wah guitars, bulbous synth-bass, and a rush of soft jungle rhythm in his wake. "It's weeping in my heart like it's raining in the town," Hurt whispers in a deeply sensual burr from the wings.

PRINCETON — Conductor Rossen Milanov has been making the Philadelphia version of the Grand Tour: Last week was Symphony in C in Camden, Friday was the Curtis (his alma mater) Symphony Orchestra at the Mann Center, and Sunday — most notably — was his end-of-season Princeton Symphony Orchestra concert at Richardson Auditorium here. In a program featuring Brahms' Symphony No. 4 and a new work by Princeton composer Sarah Kirkland Snider, Milanov stepped out from behind his image as dependable, congenial Rossen to become a conductor who wields demonic power.

RANDOLPH Nero Mills was the kind of grandfather every kid should have. He had nine grandkids and attended just about every event they were involved in. Not only that, but he made all of his grandchildren feel like his favorite. And he traveled as far as it took to be with them. Randolph Mills, who was an insurance-claims administrator for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for 29 years and who supplemented his income with various part-time jobs, including as night watchman at a funeral home, died April 10. He would have been 82 on May 28. He was a longtime resident of the Germantown/Mount Airy neighborhood.

OYFUL NOISE," sort of a "Glee!"-meets-gospel-music choral-competition musical, makes a pleasant-enough racket. A cheerful, not-quite-off-color crowd-pleaser that rarely breaks formula, it's the big-screen equivalent of a sloppy smooch from your overaffectionate aunt over the holidays. You grimace. You stand there and take it. And you don't let anybody see you grin afterward. Writer-director Todd Graff, who specializes in this sort of cheerful, campy musical ("Bandslam," "Camp")

As music neared our modernity, it lost much of the earthy joy in the sounds of Christmas. Holiday music pulled on the robes of solemnity, or it bathed in nostalgia and sentiments gone threadbare. All that served to magnify Piffaro's celebration of Advent and Hanukkah, which portrayed the early-music ensemble's turf, the 17th century, as a time to celebrate the winter holidays with unabashed joy and dash. In weekend concerts in Philadelphia and, Sunday, in Wilmington, the ensemble, with soprano Julianne Baird, showered the season with boldly imagined performances that could only have been an accurate translation of the solstice mood 400 years ago. Texts drawn from psalms must have invited lusty dancing, and sacred texts, as sung by the soprano, drew images of almost boisterous celebration.

DEAR ABBY : My son invited two friends to our home for the weekend. We had never met them before, but they seemed nice. At bedtime, the young man was on the couch and the girl was in our spare bedroom. In the middle of the night, I was awakened to loud lovemaking noises. They grew louder and louder, and the headboard was banging against our bedroom wall. My husband and I were mortified. Finally, I banged on the wall and it stopped. We couldn't believe these kids would act that way in someone's home.

NEW YORK - Fed up with petty crime, the all-night racket of beating drums, the smell of human waste, and the sight of trampled flowers and grass, police and neighbors are losing patience with some of the anti-Wall Street demonstrations around the United States. In Oakland, Calif., police in riot gear fired tear gas and bean bags before daybreak Tuesday to disperse about 170 protesters who had been camping in front of City Hall for the last two weeks, and 75 people were arrested.

Take a bow, Tony Romo . The NFL's most criticized quarterback managed to overcome six fumbles and a total lack of communication with center Phil Costa on Monday night to win a game in which Dallas didn't reach the end zone. The Cowboys (2-1) may not be back after the 18-16 scramble past Washington, but they're not going 6-10 this season, either. Romo - playing in a military-style Kevlar flak jacket to protect a broken rib - made the play of the game in the fourth quarter, converting a third-and-21 situation by hitting Dez Bryant for 30 yards to set up Dan Bailey's game-winning, sixth field goal with two minutes to play.

Penn State wide receiver Derek Moye is tall, fast, and relatively quiet. He likes to do his talking on the field and prefers to lead the wideouts and the rest of the offense by example. The Nittany Lions appreciate what Moye brings to the team, though, and last week they voted the fifth-year senior one of four captains for the 2011 football team. "I definitely was surprised," Moye said this week. "I think I'm kind of a quiet-type person, and I thought they were only going to name two people.

RESIDENTS of the 100 block of Fairmount Avenue in Northern Liberties have one noisy beeping neighbor: A Greyhound bus- maintenance facility. They say they're driven to distraction by the incessant, piercing beep of buses in reverse, the shrill ring of a telephone broadcast over a loudspeaker and some strange noise that sounds like "100,000 vacuum cleaners strapped together," said neighbor David Witz. There's activity past midnight or at dawn. "That's always a nice way to start the day," said neighbor Debbie Rudman.

Pennsylvania restaurant says no kids under age 6 allowed. . . . McDain's Restaurant and Golf Center in Monroeville says the new policy will take effect July 16. - Associated Press, July 9 Probably half the adults who hear this news will say: "Great idea! Where is that restaurant? I'd love to eat a nice dinner knowing it won't be disrupted by a screaming toddler. " The other half probably think: "That's appalling! How can they get away with banning kids from their restaurant?