If your organization is planning an event of any kind, please email Caitlin at crockett@boulderweekly.com.
EVENTS
SmithKlein Gallery presents New Works by Bruce Cascia. March 19-April 30, SmithKlein Gallery, 1116 Pearl St., Boulder, smithklein.com
Bruce Cascia’s recent focus has been on his Flatland series, which is a reflection on his central Illinois background. Atmosphere, lighting and scale all play important parts in these rural compositions.
Bruce D. Haynes: Judaism and the Black Experience — 2021 Sondra and Howard Bender Visiting Scholar. 7 p.m. Thursday, March 18. Free, but registration is required: bit.ly/38LFwW6
Bruce D. Haynes is a professor of sociology at the University of California, Davis, and a senior fellow in the Urban Ethnography Project at Yale University. His most recent book, The Soul of Judaism: Jews of African Descent in America, offers an exploration of the diversity of Black Jews, including bi-racial Jews of both matrilineal and patrilineal descent; adoptees; black converts to Judaism; and Black Hebrews and Israelites, who trace their Jewish roots to Africa and challenge the dominant Western paradigm of Jews as white and of European descent.
Agents of Change: A Conversation on Art and Social Justice. 7:30 p.m. Thursday, March 18. Livestreamed to Facebook, LongmontPublicMedia.org, and Local Comcast Channel 8/880.
Artists often play a major role in social movements. Through theater, dance, music and the visual arts, they challenge narratives, offer new perspectives and inspire in ways that traditional political methods rarely can. Join local creatives in a discussion of the power of art to make change.
Longmont Public Library presents Gardening Success! Growing Veggies. 7 p.m. Thursday, March 18. Registration: bit.ly/3bNznub
In this virtual session, Boulder County Master Gardeners will share their knowledge about planning, preparing for and growing a successful vegetable garden along the Front Range. This program is good for all ages and gardening skill levels, and will be recorded and available on Longmont Public Library’s YouTube playlist and Watch Recent Programs page a few weeks after the program’s date. Registration is required and limited to 100 participants. Once registered, you’ll receive an email confirmation with information on how to join the Webex meeting.
Jesters Dinner Theatre presents ‘Forever Plaid.’ March 19-May 16. Jesters Dinner Theatre, 224 Main St., Longmont, jesterstheatre.com
When four young singers are killed in a car crash, they posthumously take the stage for one final gig in this goofy, 1950s nostalgia trip.
Mason Jar Unpacked Volume #2 (Hybrid virtual event series). 7 p.m. Saturday, March 20. Tickets are $50-$99: bit.ly/3lsac3O
With food from River and Woods, drinks from Sanitas Brewery, music by David Johnston (from Yonder Mountain String Band) and goodies from Terrapin Care Station (featuring SUM Microdose, 1906 Dadirri Extracts and Keef Brands), the Mason Jar Unpacked event lets you enjoy some of the best local products Boulder County has to offer while actually chatting with the folks who make them. Included in the ticket price for each registered guest is a link to the evening’s entertainment, a menu with information to help guests enjoy a Mason Jar event at home, a Spotify playlist from DJ BisscaB to enjoy after the live content and instructions on how to win prizes from participating sponsors. Participants are able to pick up food and the goodie bag the day before the event.
David Barsamian and Maeve Conran present Media and Democracy. 7 p.m. Wednesday, March 24. More information and tickets ($5–15) are available via h-co.org/lectures and the event page at h-co.org/media.
According to research conducted by the Knight Foundation, Americans see increasing political bias in the news media, and most Americans suspect inaccuracies in news are intentional. Yet eight in 10 Americans also believe the news media is very important to democracy, and a majority believes the media can heal U.S. political divisions. Amid historic levels of media consumption, David Barsamian and Maeve Conran present Media and Democracy, a live, virtual event presented by History Colorado’s speaker series, This Is What Democracy Looks Like.
BMoCA Virtual Studio Tour: Kim Putnam. Noon. Thursday, March 25, via Instagram. Free, bmoca.org
Join Kim Putnam on a 30-minute interactive virtual tour of her studio. Putnam is a contemporary artist and adjunct professor at Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design. She considers herself a “media inclusive artist,” meaning she works in a variety of media depending on the concept. Through her art, Putnam explores current topics relating to identity and gender in our culture, including objectification, the male gaze, gender biases and voice as agency. To access the Virtual Studio Tours live, log into your Instagram account on the phone app or from a web browser, then navigate to BMoCA’s profile and click on the circular icon with BMoCA’s logo.
MUSIC NEWS
CU Boulder alum develops business aimed at helping musicians better navigate the industry
If you’ve never been on the business end of organizing a performance, you may not understand how taxing the process can be: booking the right talent, finding an appropriate venue, organizing services like insurance and merchandise sales. There can be weeks — or months — of back-and-forth emails and calls to settle on rates, times, places and general logistics.
But CU Boulder alumnus and violinist Tom Yaron and his business partner Trevor Bumgardner are out to change that with their organization Concertize, which uses a growing database of musicians, venues, arrangers, audio professionals and logistics providers from around the world to make booking your next gig a breeze.
“When musicians reach out to us, often it’s like, ‘I don’t know where I’m going to play,’ or ‘I don’t know what I’m going to record,’” Bumgardner, a composer who first met Yaron at Juilliard, says. “They don’t want to go through that process. So they just don’t go through it. And then what are they not doing? Performing.”
Yaron encountered this problem while he was playing on cruise ships for Holland America. He and members of his piano quintet would try to book shows at secondary venues (churches, schools) in port cities where the cruise stopped, but found communication slow and often lacking in critical information, like whether they had a tuned piano on site.
“It’s not that [these secondary venues are] not used to having performances,” Yaron says, it’s just that they don’t have consistent gigs. “But wait a minute: if someone just saves the data of [what this venue has to offer], like seating capacity, available equipment, then any group that wants to come and use the space should be able to use it with just clicking a button.”
Which is what Concertize aims to do. It’s just the beginning for Yaron and Bumgardener’s project, but with years of performance experience behind them and a network of music professionals at their fingertips, the two are building a global database of information that could make booking your next gig the easiest thing you’ve ever done.
Learn more about Concertize — and the events it hosts — at concertize.co.
MUSIC EVENTS
Syracuse, New York-native Martin Sexton got his start singing in the streets and subways of Boston in the early ’90s. Still fiercely independent and headlining venues like Carnegie Hall, his incendiary live show, honest lyrics and vocal prowess keep fans coming back for more.
Head for the Hills has turned dorm room jam sessions into a decade-plus career — from humble coffee shops to theaters, festivals, roadhouses and clubs across the country. With its blend of bluegrass and hip-hop, the band has made numerous festival appearances including Telluride, South by Southwest and more
Paul Cauthen first earned his reputation with the acclaimed roots rock band Sons of Fathers. But his 2016 solo debut, My Gospel, had Texas Monthly raving that Cauthen’s “got Willie’s phrasing, Johnny’s haggard quiver, Kristofferson’s knack for storytelling, and Waylon’s baritone.”
Ars Nova Singers Celebrate ‘Rebirth’ with Virtual Concert. 7:30 p.m. Saturday, March 20. While this performance is free to stream, listeners must RSVP to receive the link: arsnovasingers.org/rebirth. Donations are welcome.
Ars Nova Singers, Boulder’s acclaimed a cappella ensemble, is premiering its first virtual performance of 2021: Rebirth. The livestreaming event will feature newly recorded performances by guest artists Nicholas Phan (tenor) and Ann Marie Morgan (viola da gamba) and a selection of previous Ars Nova concert recordings.
ARISE presents Yaima, streaming from Colorado Sound Studios. 8 p.m. Thursday, March 25. Viewers are strongly encouraged to donate $10-$20, or an amount that feels comfortable.
ARISE continues to deliver the festival vibe with its high-quality online streaming experiences, this time with electronic music duo Yaima streaming live from Colorado Sound Studios. Taking the stage with Yaima is dancer Ventana Green. A portion of the proceeds will benefit One Tree Planted. By donating, you’ll also be entered to win official merchandise, future concert tickets and more.
BOOKS/WORDS
Discover the seven immutable laws of pleasure, and master the art of truly enjoying life. Drawing on penetrating insights from history, cutting-edge neuroscience and spiritual wisdom, Jia Gottlieb dispels 2,000 years of shared shame, guilt and ignorance to reclaim the wisdom of pleasure as the ultimate guide to a beautiful and fulfilling life.
The Buddha’s birth mother, Maya, died shortly after childbirth, and her sister Mahaprajapati took the infant to her breast, nurturing and raising him into adulthood. In this first full biography of Mahaprajapati, The Woman Who Raised the Buddha presents her life story, with attention to her early years as sister, queen, matriarch and mother, as well as her later years as a nun. Drawing from story fragments and canonical records, Wendy Garling reveals just how exceptional Mahaprajapati’s role was as leader of the first generation of Buddhist women, helping the Buddha establish an equal community of lay and monastic women and men.
