The Moth Michigan GrandSLAM. All-star storytelling showdown, featuring the winners of the last ten Ann Arbor Storyslams – monthly open mike storytelling competitions sponsored by The Moth, the NYC-based nonprofit storytelling organization that also produces a weekly public radio show. This year’s theme: “Breaking Ground.” Wednesday, May 24 at 8 p.m. at The Ark, 316 S. Main in Ann Arbor. Tickets cost $25, available in advance at themoth.org.

Sonic Lunch. Everyone’s favorite free, outdoor lunch concert series is back, with Ann Arbor’s own Laith Al-Saadi kicking things off on Thursday, June 1 (with special guest Phillip-Michael Scales) at 11:30 a.m. in Liberty Park Plaza. Other SL shows in June, at noon on Thursdays, will feature LP on June 8; Tuxedo – featuring another Ann Arborite, Mayer Hawthorne, with Jake One – on June 15; Michigan’s own The Accidentals (“Michigan and Again”) play June 22; and U-M grad Theo Katzman plays June 29. READ THE REST HERE

Yale ornithology professor Richard Prum did his graduate work at U-M in the 1980s, but the two places where he spent much of his leisure time no longer exist.

“The Del Rio was a great place,” Prum said of the beloved bar that stood at Ashley and Washington for more than 30 years. “And I went to Borders, back when it was the only one in the whole world. It was such a great bookstore. I remember going to Borders and deliberately leaving my wallet in my office. Not that I ever had much money in it, anyway, but I didn’t want to be tempted.”

Temptation, as it happens, plays no small role in the former MacArthur “genius” fellow’s new book, The Evolution of Beauty: How Darwin’s Forgotten Theory of Mate Choice Shapes the Animal World — and Us, which he will discuss at the Ann Arbor District Library Downtown Branch on Thursday, May 18, at 7 pm. The book argues that mate choice in the natural world is often driven by a subjective desire for beauty instead of more pragmatic considerations, thereby complicating the long-held notion that natural selection explains every branch on the tree of life.

“Many of my colleagues are resistant to these ideas,” said Prum. “One guy said, ‘But that’s nihilism.’ So here I am, getting goosebumps from thinking about how beauty evolves in the wild, while he sees a theory so bleak that he can barely get up in the morning. … That’s when I decided, ‘Wow, I have to embrace aesthetic Darwinian language and focus on what makes this worldview a productive and interesting mode of expression.’” READ THE REST HERE

When the first novel you write in your genre of choice becomes the best-selling fiction book of its release year, how do you transcend the pressure to follow it with another literary home run?

If you’re “The Girl on the Train” author Paula Hawkins, who will appear Wednesday evening at Nicola’s Books in Ann Arbor,  you start writing your next novel, “Into the Water,” before the book that would go on to become a smash hit even hits the shelves.

“I was really keen to get back to writing,” said Hawkins. “Once ‘Girl on the Train’ was published, I knew I’d have lots of distractions, though, of course, I had no idea how crazy things would get. … It’s definitely been a different process writing (‘Into the Water’). I haven’t been able to totally immerse myself in the book and shut the world out in quite the same way.” READ THE REST HERE

ANN ARBOR, MI – Amy Nesbitt will be stepping down from her role as the Executive and Artistic Director of the Ann Arbor Summer Festival (A2SF). After presenting the 2017 festival season, she will be transitioning in late summer to a new post in Arizona as the Director of Performing Arts for the nonprofit Scottsdale Arts.

Nesbitt was recruited for the position after a nationwide search by Scottsdale Arts, which oversees the Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts, the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (SMoCA), and Scottsdale Public Art. In her new role, she will oversee programming for the Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts’ year-round season and outdoor performances.

Festival board chair Wendy Lawrence notes, “The Summer Festival has been so fortunate to have had Amy’s talents and skills for the past 11 seasons. During Amy’s tenure, the Festival has significantly broadened its programming and increased its reach into our community. With an outstanding staff and a talented, diverse and enthusiastic board, we’re in a strong position to begin this new chapter in our history. This is an exciting opportunity for Amy professionally, and it builds on her A2SF considerable experience with the festival, four seasons of which she has served as the festival director.” Continue reading →

Journalist/author Jas Obrecht will discuss his new book, “Talking Guitar,” at Nicola’s Books on Saturday, May 13 at 3 pm. (Photo by Saroyan Humphrey)

Longtime professional music journalist Jas Obrecht regularly tells his Washtenaw Community College creative writing students a story from early in his career.

Obrecht was sent by Guitar Player magazine to a music festival to interview Canadian rock guitarist Pat Travers, who, flanked by two young women while snorting cocaine off a mirror in his dressing room, sent Obrecht away. Obrecht stumbled upon a basketball hoop and ball, and after a few minutes of taking shots, a wiry young guy approached and asked to play.

That guy was Eddie Van Halen, who’d recently released Van Halen’s debut, self-titled album; and Obrecht found a new subject for his article.

“The story tells students that if you’re passionate about a subject, no matter what it is, there’s a good chance that others share that passion, and if you know the fundamentals of good writing, you can get paid to write about your own experiences, or about a subject you love,” said Obrecht, who’s also written for Rolling Stone, among other publications. “I did it with music, but you can do it with other things, too, like travel or history.”

More tales are in Obrecht’s newest book, Talking Guitar: Conversations with Musicians Who Shaped Twentieth Century American Music, which he’ll discuss at Nicola’s Books on Saturday at 3 p.m. READ THE REST HERE

U-M professor Henry (“Hank”) Greenspan likes to talk — and thank goodness for that.

Greenspan has spent 40 years interviewing (and re-interviewing) Holocaust survivors, and from that trove of oral histories he compiled a radio-play-turned-one-man-show called Remnants, which he’ll perform on Monday, May 8, at the downtown library. He put together the radio play in the early ’90s, using material he first started collecting for his dissertation in the 1970s.

“The first thing I did was call rabbis who had congregations in the Southeast Michigan and Toledo area,” said Greenspan, who noted that doing survivor interviews was an uncommon practice at that time. “They’d tell people, ‘This guy from U of M wants to interview survivors.’ So initially I’d used the rabbis as matchmakers, but that quickly became unnecessary because things snowballed. People would say to me, in the middle of an interview, ‘You have to talk to my friend Zoli.’ … So I’d make an appointment to talk with Zoli, and one person led to another.”

This provided the foundation for Greenspan’s academic project, but it wasn’t until U-M’s now-defunct Talk to Us Theater Troupe asked Greenspan if he’d write something for them to perform at Hillel’s Holocaust conference that he considered taking the material in a new direction. READ THE REST HERE

Simon (Eddie Rothermel) and Grusha (Lucy Price) in Ellipsis Theatre Company’s The Caucasian Chalk Circle.

Bertolt Brecht’s canonical 1944 text The Caucasian Chalk Circle is the kind of play that many of us read in a college course but rarely see produced.

So it’s worth noting that locals will have the opportunity to see Circle on the stage when Ellipsis Theatre Company presents it at the Yellow Barn from May 4-21.

“Ellipsis is always very interested in the act of storytelling … so the fact that it’s so explicit in this play was appealing to us,” said Ellipsis co-founder Joanna Hastings, who’s both playing a role in and co-directing Circle with Scott Screws. “Plus, (Circle’s) so flexible. You can do it in all sorts of ways.”

Circle begins with a prologue. In the wake of a Soviet delegate settling a World War II-era dispute over land, a storyteller steps forward to tell what happens when a Caucasian city’s political revolution ends with a poor kitchen maid (Grusha) fleeing a castle with the assassinated governor’s new baby (Michael). Grusha makes tough sacrifices to keep Michael hidden and safe, but when the war ends and those who previously held power are restored, the baby’s mother comes for her son. She needs him to claim the former governor’s estate, but Grusha has come to love the boy, and the situation leads a similarly beleaguered, war-tested judge to stage a custody test involving a chalk circle. READ THE REST HERE

Now that we’re all out and about, after a long winter of hibernation, and local college students are wrapping up another semester of classes, it’s time to take a breath and check out what cultural and community opportunities await you in May. Here’s a list of some upcoming local event highlights. READ THE REST HERE

Let me say this up front: although I was a U-M student at exactly the right time (1989-1993), I did not see Nirvana play the Blind Pig either time – opening for the Flaming Lips in October 1989, or headlining in April 1990. Nor did I see Smashing Pumpkins in 1991, Pearl Jam that same year, or Dave Matthews in 1994.

So who did I see at the Pig back in the day? His Name is Alive, Crossed Wire (multiple times), Toad the Wet Sprocket, and Map of the World. (Possibly Throwing Muses too, though my memory’s hazy on this point.) I saw bands that had found some success, and regularly drew young fans and crowds to the then-smoky club, but weren’t fated to ever land on the cover of Rolling Stone.

That’s OK. I still had a great time. I remember asking HNIA’s former frontwoman Karin Oliver, seated at the Pig’s bar between sets, to sign my red flyer for the show. (She seemed surprised but delighted by my request.) During Crossed Wire shows, I danced up a storm while jockeying for position, hoping to catch lead singer Chris Moore’s eye. And I shamelessly belted my favorite Toad tunes, closing my eyes while harmonizing with Glen Phillips.

Lots of locals have been revisiting their personal history with the Pig lately, since Swisher Commercial listed the building for sale in February. Though whoever buys it may choose to keep the space a music venue and bar, the Pig’s location within Ann Arbor’s exploding downtown business district makes it a hot prospect for a broad range of potential buyers.

No one knows what the future holds for the Pig. But we can know its history, how its identity has changed over time, and the place it’s held – for years and years – in Ann Arbor’s live music scene. READ THE REST HERE