Sarah LaDuke

  Day after day: The Diaristic Impulse is the exhibition currently on display at the University Art Museum at the State University of New York University at Albany. The show explores the obsessive desire to record day-to-day activities, document private worlds, or chart the passage of time.

Corinna Ripps Schaming is the Associate Director and Curator at the University Art Museum. Here she takes us on a tour of the show and speak about some of the work on display.

    James Dean walks down a drizzly street in Manhattan with his coat collar up against the wind and the rain. It’s an iconic image, captured by photographer, Dennis Stock.

Stock’s photographs of movie stars, jazz musicians, hippies, architecture, landscapes, and nature are such a part of the story of America in the 20th century that even if you've never heard his name - you have seen some of his work.

Beyond Iconic is a documentary film about Dennis Stock directed by Hanna Sawka. The film is screening this Sunday at 1:30pm at Upstate Films in Woodstock, NY. Hanna Sawka will be at the screening for a Q&A following, and then musicians Teri Roiger and John Menegon - who scored the film - will perform down the street at Center for Photography Woodstock.

Hanna Sawka joins us to talk about the film.

    The Vassar Repertory Dance Theatre's annual gala performances at The Bardavon is in its 31st year. The events celebrate both brand new and classic works by a very talented company of dancers.

There will be two performances at The Bardavon this weekend, one at 8pm on Saturday and one at 3pm on Sunday.

    Tonight at 7:30 PM in their Club B10, MASS MoCA will screen Brooklyn Castle as part of their Winter/Spring 2013 documentary film series, Compete!, celebrating films about winning, losing, and how you play the game.

Brooklyn Castle is an engaging and heartwarming doc about the championship winning chess team at IS 318 - a below-the-poverty-line public school in Brooklyn. The film focuses on 5 incredible kids and their coaches and teachers as they battle their opponents as well as recessionary budget cuts that threaten all extracurricular activities at their school.

The film won an Audience Award at last year’s South by Southwest Film 2012 Documentary Spotlight and was one of the top 10 Audience Favourites at the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival.

Filmmaker, Katie Dellamaggiore, will do a Q&A via Skype after the screening of Brooklyn Castle tonight at MASS MoCA and she joins us to talk about the film.

  Lucius is Brooklyn based quintet – dually fronted by Jess Wolfe and Holly Leassig. It was announced last week that Lucius is playing the Solid Sound Festival at MASS MoCA in North Adams, MA this coming June – but we’ll have a chance to see them in the region before then. Jess and Holly – along with bandmates Dan Molad, Peter Lalish, and Andrew Burrl are playing at The BSP Lounge in Kingston, NY this Thursday; The Outer Space in Hamden, CT on Friday, and The Log in Williamstown, MA on Saturday. (The Williamstown show is sold out. )

The New York Times referred to Lucius’ music as “luscious, luminous, lilting lullabies” – that’s high praise (and a lot of alliteration) from The Grey Lady – and Paste Magazine says the rootsy female-driven dynamic is dangerously powerful.

    Born in Benin, Angélique Kidjo is a Grammy award-winning music recording artist deemed "Africa's premier diva" by Time and is the continent's most internationally celebrated female musical exponent.

The BBC has included Angélique Kidjo in its list of the "African continent's 50 most iconic figures". The Guardian has listed her as one of their "Top 100 Most Inspiring Women in the World" and Angelique is the first woman to be listed among "The 40 Most Powerful Celebrities In Africa" by Forbes Magazine.

Known for her dynamic and uplifting music, she has translated her distinctive work in the arts to that of philanthropy; by promoting education for girls in Africa through her foundation, Batonga and as a UNICEF Goodwill ambassador.

Angélique Kidjo will perform at The Mahaiwe in Great Barrington, MA this Saturday, Feb. 23rd at 8pm.

    Actor, musician (Note: and heckuva nice guy - Sarah), John Corbett will bring his band to Club Helsinki in Hudson, NY on Thursday, February 21st. 

Corbett - who you may recognize from Northern Exposure, Sex and the City, United States of Tara, Parenthood, or My Big Fat Greek Wedding - has recently released his second country music album, Leaving Nothin’ Behind. The album is produced by Jon Randall Stewart with 7 songs written or co-written by Stewart.

British comedian Eddie Izzard will bring his brilliant and unique form of stand-up comedy to the stage at The Bardavon in Poughkeepsie, New York this Saturday, February 16th (as of this posting, tickets are available for the 6pm show, available on The Bardavon website or by calling 845-473-2072).

Comedian, dramatic actor of stage and screen, activist, transvestite, marathon runner, any one descriptor (or even a bundle of them) applied to Izzard would fail to summarize his career or the man himself. Still - with his help - we try in this segment.

    About two years ago, singer-songwriter Josh Ritter’s heart was broken. He and his wife of a few years decided to separate and while writing and publishing a novel, keeping up a healthy touring schedule, and releasing an EP – Josh wrote new songs to help himself understand and heal.

The songs add up to his forthcoming album The Beast in its Tracks which is available for pre-order and will be released on March 5th. In a statement on his website announcing the record, Josh wrote: "All heartbreak is awful – my broken heart wasn’t unique. But writing these songs was helping me get through the night and I didn’t have the strength to care or question."

    Stand-up comedian, Marc Maron, kicks of his “Out of the Garage” Tour at The Egg in Albany, NY this Friday, February 1st.

The title of the show refers to the home-studio in his garage – the primary location used to record his very popular podcast “WTF with Marc Maron.” The podcast features perceptive stream-of-consciousness introductions and lengthy (usually one-on-one, occasionally one-on-two for example: Tenacious D) conversations with iconic entertainment personalities. The podcast premiered in 2009 and regularly hits #1 on iTunes and has been called a “must-listen” by Vanity Fair, The New York Times, and many other publications and entertainment websites.