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Karen Ponzio |
Sep 11, 2023 8:43 am
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Karen Ponzio Photos.
Lara Herscovitch and The Highway Philosophers.
Lara Herscovitch sang through her sound check, making up lyrics apropos for the day and place: “We are not in a monsoon. It’s a beautiful day.”
Not a drop of rain was to be found on Saturday at the CT Folk Fest and Green Expo, though the heat and humidity was of the late summer variety. A full day and night of music and spoken word on two stages, as well as hourly activities for children and adults, food, drink, and a multitude of vendors awaited visitors behind the stone walls of Edgerton Park. This reporter took in a third of the acts that performed from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.
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Babz Rawls Ivy |
Sep 8, 2023 8:55 am
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Nina Westervelt -El Nino production photo
Julia Bullock.
The following writeup was submitted by Babz Rawls-Ivy, the host of WNHH’s morning radio show “LoveBabz LoveTalk” and the editor-in-chief of the Inner-City News.
Yale Schwarzman Center announced its 2023 – 24 season lineup featuring boundary-pushing artists and powerful performances. From Corinne Bailey Rae to Renée Fleming, attendees from the Yale and New Haven communities will experience deeply personal and culturally immersive performances.
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Brian Slattery |
Sep 7, 2023 8:30 am
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Brian Slattery photo
Artists at work on City-Wide's return.
In artist Oi Fortin’s studio in Erector Square, seven artists were taking old signs for City-Wide Open Studios, salvaged from Artspace’s basement before it closed, and rearranging and redecorating them for a new purpose: the return of City-Wide Open Studios to the Fair Haven arts complex on the weekend of Oct. 21 and 22.
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Karen Ponzio |
Sep 7, 2023 8:28 am
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Karen Ponzio Photos
David and Diego meet over ice cream in the film Strawberry & Chocolate.
Last Friday the New Haven Free Public Library decided to serve dessert first, as Strawberry & Chocolate was screened as the inaugural film in the Ives Branch’s September Free Friday film series. The 1993 Cuban film, directed by Tomás Gutiérrez Alea and Juan Carlos Tabio, was also the first of four films that will be screened every Friday in September at 2 p.m. in honor of Hispanic Heritage Month.
At "Rohn Lawrence Through the Decades" benefit concert.
Toad’s Place on York Street lit up as a cadre of jazz musicians gathered to pay homage to one of New Haven’s own axe men extraordinaire, Rohn Lawrence, and to raise money to help young guitarists follow in the late musical legend’s footsteps.
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Brian Slattery |
Sep 6, 2023 8:30 am
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Julie Smith, Best Video’s executive director, stood before the crowd of about 20 moviegoers who had assembled for the film and cultural center’s Tuesday night screening. “I know this film generally brings up a lot of conversation, so stick around,” she said. The film in question was Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver, kicking off Best Video’s series of screenings of movies by the acclaimed director, that proceeds every Tuesday of the month through Sept. 26.
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Karen Ponzio |
Sep 5, 2023 8:31 am
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Karen Ponzio Photos
Codefendants.
Sunday night was the hottest night of the week, literally and figuratively, as Space Ballroom hosted the first Northeast U.S. show featuring Codefendants, described as a “genre fluid musical collective” and comprised of three heavy musical hitters: Fat Mike, Sam King, and New Haven’s own Ceschi Ramos. The band released an album, Crime Wave, in March 2023 to much praise and adoration and have been spreading their words, music, and vibrancy with a variety of shows ranging from clubs to arenas across the country. But on this night, supported by friends and family, they hit one of hometown favorite Ramos’s original stomping grounds.
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Lucy Gellman, The Arts Paper |
Sep 4, 2023 8:58 am
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Lucy Gellman / Arts Paper photo
Co-Op student Tahzir Streater: "It's gonna take a lot of practice."
Harriett Alfred stepped forward, running her right hand alongside a piano that had sat silent all summer. She took a deep breath, her face glowing in the morning sunlight. In the second row, senior Jamie Harris lifted her Spongebob-patterned nails to the desk, knowing exactly what was coming next. It was her last first day of high school, and she was ready to lead the charge.
“Good mooor-ning!” Alfred belted. In a still-sleepy soprano, Harris answered, her voice blending with over a dozen for the first time in months. She was ready to be back.
When a friend told me about a conversation sponsored by Community Action Agency of New Haven’s Black Maternal Health Project on Wednesday, I changed my plans for the night, hopped in my pickup truck, and headed to Southern Connecticut State University’s campus. I wanted to see the film Aftershock and hear the panel of Black women health providers talk about it and the stories it tells — true stories of two families that lost their wives, moms, and daughters due to preventable birthing complications.
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Brian Slattery |
Aug 31, 2023 8:09 am
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Brian Slattery Photos
On one side of Hotchkiss Street at the intersection of Edgewood Avenue on Wednesday evening, along the side of the bookstore Possible Futures, a DJ on the corner pumped out irresistible grooves while friends greeted one another, browsed books, and snacked on empanadas and mimosas.
On the other side of the street was a cheerful sign that read “Happy 75th Birthday Fred!” with a timeline laid out beneath it. The Fred in question is none other than Fred Hampton, Black Panther Party leader and revolutionary.
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Brian Slattery |
Aug 30, 2023 9:10 am
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Brian Slattery photo
Tea Montgomery’s installation greets the visitor who enters the art show at the Lab at ConnCORP for 6th Dimension, an Afrofuturist festival running in New Haven and Hamden now through Oct. 21.
Its choice of materials, its structure, and its placement in the space create a combination of moods that clash against one another, whether it’s the soft drapery versus the raw pipes in the ceiling, the gauzy light from the windows versus the ripped fabric crawling across the floor, or the rattan chair, redolent of the famous photograph of Huey Newton, but empty now. Is it waiting for the next Huey? Who might that be? What future might they lead us into?
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Brian Slattery |
Aug 29, 2023 8:23 am
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Brian Slattery photo
Making a sailboat from the squiggly plastic of a 3D gun. Making even more complex objects from 3D printers. Exploring the open worlds of videogames. All of these and more — much more — happen at the Teen Center and Makerspace Drop-In, Monday through Thursday from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. at the Stetson Branch of the New Haven Free Public Library, located in the Q House at 197 Dixwell Ave. The event and the space are intended to help library patrons learn to create, explore the library more deeply, and have fun doing it.
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Karen Ponzio |
Aug 28, 2023 8:17 am
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Karen Ponzio Photos
Frank Critelli lends vocals to Big Fat Combo.
“I don’t know about you guys, but it’s been a Friday,” said Julie Smith as she introduced local favorites Big Fat Combo, who were performing their scheduled patio show indoors at Best Video due to rain. It was about to become even more of a Friday as technical issues turned into an opportunity for the local music community to step up, step in, and turn the venerable video store and performance space into a friendly singalong for a portion of the evening.
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Eleanor Polak |
Aug 25, 2023 9:08 am
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Yale University Art Gallery
In a New Light: Paintings from the Yale Center for British Art.
While the Yale Center for British Art (YCBA) undergoes renovations, the Yale University Art Gallery (YUAG) has volunteered to host a selection of their paintings in an exhibition entitled “In a New Light: Paintings from the Yale Center for British Art.” The show — running now through Dec. 3 — houses over 50 paintings, mainly from the 18th and 19th centuries, that attempt to capture the scope and breadth of British life at the time through a series of intimate glances into another country’s art and culture. “In a New Light” offers a glimpse into British painting with little explanation and few qualifiers, allowing viewers to simply view the artwork and draw their own conclusions.
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Brian Slattery |
Aug 24, 2023 9:09 am
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Brian Slattery Photos
Cabins, East!
On Wednesday three rock bands — Cabins, East!, Pyramid Rose Band, and headliner Laney Jones — brought loud guitars, driving drums, strong vocals, and a lot of heart to a rapturous audience at Cafe Nine, in a night that hearkened back to pre-pandemic days of casual abandon while adding a healthy dose of post-pandemic compassion and care.
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Eleanor Polak |
Aug 24, 2023 9:06 am
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Nick Aubin performs at Gather.
“Nice to see a lot of familiar faces, nicer to see the unfamiliar faces,” said Nick Aubin, the host of a weekly Open Mic Night at Gather, located at 952 State St. The coffee shop brimmed with faces, open and smiling, many of them ready to play multiple roles over the course of the evening: performer, fan, and friend. At their core, open mics form a hub for the community, a safe space for artists familiar and unfamiliar, veteran and newcomer, to showcase their creativity.
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Eleanor Polak |
Aug 23, 2023 8:24 am
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Eleanor Polak photo
Christina Duan, Jess X. Snow, Sheri, Sonja John, Aaron Jafferis, Sarah "TW" Tracy-Wanck, and Rheo June painting Possible Futures.
The outside wall of Possible Futures, the bookstore located at 318 Edgewood Ave., stood blank and dull against the street, devoid of inspiration and creativity. That was about to change.
Tuesday marked the beginning of a 10-day-long painting project to design a mural, a tribute to New Haven local and celebrated prison abolitionist Ruth Wilson Gilmore. The blank wall became a canvas, as muralists and community volunteers worked together to explore all the possible futures the space could hold.
Did any of you, dear readers, catch the appearance of Ron DeSantis just before opening night of the Shakespeare comedy, “The Merry Wives of Windsor,” at Edgerton Park?
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Brian Slattery |
Aug 22, 2023 8:46 am
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Brian Slattery Photo
Edmund B*Wak Comfort: "God left me just enough to get by."
New Haven artist and designer Edmund B*Wak Comfort faced a harrowing health crisis in the spring that saw him lose both of his legs below the knee as well as a few of his fingers. Now home from the hospital, he has found family and friends rallying to help him, including a performance from the Regicides improv comedy group this Saturday, Aug. 26 that will double as a fundraiser to help him meet living expenses while he recuperates.
“After the incident, I really appreciate being here,” Comfort said. “I realize how precious it is, all the things I took for granted. It is amazing that I still get an opportunity to be here.” He thinks of friends and family who have passed. “I was on the verge of being one of them,” he said, “missing all the beautiful things that life has to offer.”
The New Haven Green swarmed with tents. Music boomed from the loudspeakers, covering everything from “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” by Tears for Fears to “Waka Waka (This Time for Africa)” by Shakira. The air hung heavy and sweet with the scent of fried dough and freshly-applied sunscreen. The second annual Black Wall Street Festival had begun.
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Karen Ponzio |
Aug 21, 2023 8:53 am
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Karen Ponzio Photos.
That Virginia at Witch Bitch Thrift.
The Black Box at Witch Bitch Thrift echoed with music, laughter, and an ever-present sense of community as AcoustiQueers made its premiere at the event space on Saturday night. A series that — according to Witch Bitch’s social media post, “creates an intimate space to celebrate queer music and queer joy” — was started by artist Eli Wood in New York City in 2017. After playing one of those events, the store’s co-owner and musician Virginia Semighini received permission to bring the series to Connecticut, where it ran until 2018. With the evolution of the Whitney Avenue thrift store to now include an event space, the series is being revived and, on this evening, features Semeghini, the New Haven-based trio Untold Joys, and a solo performance by Olive Tiger.
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Eleanor Polak |
Aug 18, 2023 7:23 am
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Detail from promotional art for Merry Wives of Windsor.
“Here will be an old abusing of God’s patience and the King’s English,” says Mistress Quickly, played with cheeky humor by Martine Fleurisma in Elm Shakespeare Company’s production of one of the bard’s lesser-known works, The Merry Wives of Windsor. The production plays fast and loose with the audience’s expectations, but it never betrays their patience or wastes their time. Instead, The Merry Wives of Windsor — running now through Sept. 3 at Edgerton Park — provides exactly what it promises: wit, wiles, wanton scoundrels, and scheming wives. Most of all, it supplies the audience with over two hours of good, old-fashioned fun.
