Cleopatra Mathis
In her new collection of poems, White Sea, Cleopatra Mathis writes, "I have lost my killer instinct / for beauty, for embellishing and relishing / the art of it." She has come to this place — the one where she...
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Landscapes of Longing
Aggressive kimonoed Japanese waitresses grab passing travelers to yank them into their teahouses, scholars lounge in rural Chinese retreats, Angkor Wat broods in mist, and minimalistic seascapes glisten. Four exhibits of...
Read MoreGeorge Cables
Jazz pianists are often judged by the company they keep. Some eventually become soloists and front their own groups, but most have to make their living as accompanists and collaborators, venturing out sporadically for solo or...
Read MoreLee Knight
It's said that when Willie Sutton was asked why he robbed banks, he replied, "Because that's where the money is." Clearly, that was not Lee Knight's motivation when he chose to make his life's work the...
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Mozart Comes to Ann Arbor
Let’s face it, classical music faces tough competition when vying for the attention, and affection, of kids. No, I’m not about to head off on a tirade about the respective worths of classical and popular music....
Read MoreLeif Ove Andsnes
A late starter, Leif Ove Andsnes entered the Bergen Conservatory when he was a comparatively old sixteen. Andsnes made up for it by making his American and British debuts and his first recording — a coruscating Prokofiev Third...
Read MoreZbigniew Libera
The controversial forty-six-year-old Polish pop artist Zbigniew Libera alters and mimics commercial products ranging from toys to exercise equipment in ways that raise caustic questions about social norms and conditioning and...
Read MoreLyle Lovett Trio
People struggle to describe Lyle Lovett's music. He started out as a country singer, and plenty of fiddles and steel guitars still propel many of his albums. But Nashville doesn't know what to make of him any more than...
Read MoreThe Maypops
F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, "There are no second acts in American lives." Possibly that's true for some lives, but fortunately not for all. Ann Arbor's Khalid Hanifi recently opened — more accurately,...
Read MoreBettye LaVette
Do you have any idea how lucky we are that Bettye LaVette is playing the Ark on Wednesday, December 7? Do you? I didn't think so. All fall, this extraordinary, criminally unknown soul singer has been on tour in support of...
Read MoreBrandon Wiard
I have enough respect for the word genius not to toss it out casually when talking about local bands. Ray Charles was a genius, and so was John Lennon, and maybe Phil Spector was during the golden age of 1960s three-minute pop...
Read MoreDrivin’ Sideways
In 1986 “Rocky,” then manager of the Blind Pig, was going to ditch its Friday afternoon happy hour. “Pontiac” Pete Ferguson told him, “Give us fifty bucks and let us pass the pitcher a couple of...
Read MoreIn Drought Time
I'll tell you right up front: a little poem of mine appears in this new anthology, In Drought Time: Scenes from Rural and Small Town Life, edited by Douglas Smith, Melody Vassoff, and Karen Woollams. My Observer editor tells...
Read More“Christmas on the Farm”
The Waterloo Area Farm Museum's "Christmas on the Farm" offers a mesmerizing blend of historical hogwash, patinated beauty, and just enough ghosts under the eaves — like a wooden wheelchair in the attic that...
Read MoreJoel Hastings plays Chopin
Some folks can't stand the sound of fingernails on blackboards. Others can't stand the sound of breaking glass. Me, I can't stand the sound of the music of Franz Liszt. Take away its superhuman difficulty and...
Read MoreThe Glass Menagerie
Tennessee Williams is one of the few real proofs we have that life has improved in the last fifty years. He viewed the world through a lens of high Freudianism where not too many people could expect to escape a good warping from...
Read MoreThe Trinidad Tripoli Steelband
Not many people in Ann Arbor know the history of the steel drums (or steel pans) that have sounded through half a dozen Jimmy Buffett records and countless tropical vacations. And still fewer know that Washtenaw County is home...
Read MoreAlways looking forward
The tension between spontaneity and established routine creates challenges for any musical group, but it is all the more problematical in jazz, where improvisation plays a critical role. Successful combos often lose their spark,...
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