“What scenarios have I absorbed from the media or books {…} that have led me to assume that poverty and misfortune will always bring out the worst in people?” -Julia Alvarez The first in my series of literary connections goes all the way back to the beginning of my 100

The journey all started with a goal of reading 100 books in a year. After graduating from college and finding my first full-time desk job, I felt the need to continue some sort of study outside of work. As taxing as the 9 to 5 can be, it felt important

Fusion is still in. Like a kimchi Reuben or steak sushi, Tortoise + Minneapolis Jazz All-Stars merged two disparate groups of musicians from two different cities (Chicago and Minneapolis) into one large superband last weekend for a special performance at the Walker Art Center. The idea sprouted from a similar

Evil Queen Patrizia Telleschi brought a dominatrix stomp to her dances, dragging Snow White by the mouth with her poisoned apple and piercing the rest of the cast with her clawed gloves and stiletto heels. Image credit: JC Carbonne One of the hardest parts of writing reviews is seeing a

Michael Christie is the definition of Wunderkind. At 37, his biography reads like a who’s-who of the classical music world. From the New York Philharmonic to the Zurich Opera, he has directed some of the world’s most prestigious orchestras. So the announcement that he would be joining the Minnesota Opera

Under-40 music fans intimidated by opera no longer have any excuse to avoid it. Tempo, the Minnesota Opera’s hip, young fan group, provides wonderful preview events to help patrons understand each opera of the season, as well as connect with fellow opera lovers and the Twin Cities arts community. Their

“I’m not here as the college-educated white girl who saved hip-hop,” Doomtree MC and poet Dessa said in opening her recent presentation at the Nobel Peace Prize Forum, “Ethics and Hip-Hop. “I learned all of this from the practitioners already doing it.” She need not be so modest. The only

According to common myth, pirates are ruthless, evil, greedy, uncompromising souls. My piratic knowledge, like many, expanded little beyond Johnny Depp’s turn as Captain Jack Sparrow. So I expected a childish display upholding this myth at the Science Museum’s new special exhibition, Real Pirates: The Untold Story of the Whydah from Slave Ship