Culture

The experts disagree about Riders in the Sky. Do they offer "the loving re-creation and perpetuation of a myth," as country-music historian extraordinaire Bill C. Malone opines in his liner notes for the album...

When you head out for a night of live music, sometimes you want to be challenged by new bands and cutting-edge sounds; other times you simply want the relaxing comfort of familiar tunes and dependable talent. Laith Al-Saadi...

Based on Petru Dumitriu's short story "La Salade," Lucian Pintilie's 1994 film An Unforgettable Summer evokes the insanity and moral outrage of war, Balkan style, from the perspective of an officer's wife....

There's a new film group on campus — thank god — that calls itself Projectorhead. On Halloween, at the Modern Languages Building, it will screen the 1942 Jacques Tourneur classic Cat People. Simone Simon stars as...

During the swing era the clarinet was king in the public eye, but during the postwar years, as small combos took over in jazz, it was eclipsed by the louder saxophones and trumpets in the front line. The instrument may have lost...

Building a private mental greenhouse of growth and respite amid a daily blizzard of dirty dishes, half-done homework, unpaid bills, and questions that begin, “Honey, where’s my . . .” takes determination. The...

The Ann Arbor District Library begins its Downtown Sounds series on Thursday, October 24, with an energetic headliner: local pianist Tom Loncaric and his big band. Decades younger than the generation of music they represent,...

I am no fan of the piano playing of Garrick Ohlsson. I admit that he has astounding technique, amazing stamina, and great taste in what he plays. And I acknowledge that he is admired and even adored by Ann Arbor audiences. But I...

Poet Philip Levine left Detroit almost fifty years ago, when he was twenty-six. He had been born and educated in the city, part of the immigrant Jewish working class; his father died when he was five, leaving his mother to raise...

The shadows are long. The leaves are falling. My four-year-old is smacking the daylights out of every ball I throw to him. He straightens from his stance and asks, "What's that?" I, too, stop and listen. At first,...

When looking for a new music director, the Cleveland Orchestra has a tradition of favoring people who might politely be called “strict disciplinarians”: Artur Rodzinski (1933-1943) supposedly carried a revolver to...