One Friday a month, I don an American-flag cape, heart-shaped sunglasses, and a neon boa, then wait outside Baltimore Penn Station for rush-hour passengers to exit like kids on the last day of school. Music swells from speakers behind me, and signs held by our band of merry protestors proclaim what we dance for: More Boogie Less I.C.E. No Kings, No Wars, No Camps. Democracy: I Still Dig It.

Our group of 50 or so doesn’t resemble the image of angry protestors conveyed across the news and social media. Some carry tambourines or wear rainbow skirts. Others don inflatable costumes (my favorite is a hippo wearing a tutu) and one dancer always dresses as Lady Liberty. We aren’t afraid of becoming spectacles, because, the way we see it, joyfully expressing who we are and what we stand for is the strongest act of resistance against a world lurching toward tyranny.

My friend Sonia Shah and I came up with the idea for what we now call Pro-Democracy Dance Parties after the 2024 election. She and I met in a hip-hop dance class and bonded over our shared love of movement, which allowed us to release our rage and frustration in a country changing faster than we could keep up.

At other protests, I longed to process my emotions and express myself more than just holding a sign. So, when Sonia found a video of protestors line-dancing in Washington, D.C., we thought, “Why not?”

One year ago, we first took our positions on the concrete pedestal of the train station’s Male/Female Statue with a karaoke speaker and six-hour playlist, wondering if anyone would show up. We started with a few dancers who quickly became regulars and friends, including our resident DJs, Gonzostein and Tew Slim, who mix house music and dance favorites by artists like Daft Punk and Baltimore’s own Ultra Naté.

Now, every third Friday at 5:30 p.m., there are always new faces, including joggers midway through runs, ride-share drivers who leave their cars with emergency lights flashing, children who twirl in bubbles that waft from our pop-up DJ booth—even passengers who drop their suitcases, shed their inhibitions, and join us. At least once, hundreds of people stretched down Charles Street and circled the statue’s plinth in an hours-long conga line.

Along the way, we’ve unlocked an infectious expression of community that has bonded us as a group and to Baltimore, which embraces us for all our eccentricity. Like this town, our effort is unapologetically DIY. We bring extra signs and boas. Volunteers help cart DJ equipment up Charles Street. There are no instructions on our sign-up forms, but the people of Baltimore keep showing up with flying colors, dressed as Care Bears and Uncle Sams, lugging snare drums and cowbells.

Like this town, our effort is unapologetically DIY. We bring extra signs and boas. There are no instructions on our sign-up forms, but the people of Baltimore keep showing up with flying colors.

Others have shared how much they need our pro-democracy movement, too. A commuter who identified herself as an immigrant once teared up telling me what it meant to get off the train from her job in D.C. and encounter our unbridled joy. One regular relayed how our inclusive environment is the highlight of the month for her son with disabilities, who “just doesn’t want to be judged.” A friend who received good health news a few hours before coming to dance told me, “I just felt all the stress flow out of me.”

The dance parties encourage a reckless abandon, but there’s always a minute right before the music starts when I feel the sting of self-consciousness. I grimace, thinking of my awkward concentrating face that others will surely see. I ask myself, “If I get off rhythm, will I become an internet laughingstock? Do I look ridiculous?” “Yes, of course,” I remind myself. That realization and acceptance is part of the process.

I start to move while the sun begins its descent over I-83, the breeze twirling my cape. I join the steps of my fellow dancers, moving freely, in celebration of who we are and what we believe. That all are welcome. That having the freedom to embrace our uniqueness is what makes our country great. That we can resist with joy instead of anger. That we can stand, united, against hate.

I heave a sigh and let the bliss set in.

Visual Art

Phaan Howng’s The Succession of Nature
Opens Nov. 3, The Baltimore Museum of Art, 10 Art Museum Dr. The third iteration of the Commons Collaboration kicks off with an exciting project from Baltimore-based artist Phaan Howng in collaboration with Blue Water Baltimore. For this project, Best of Baltimore winner Howng creates an immersive environment with intense, unnatural colors inspired by toxic waste. Through her partnership with Blue Water Baltimore, Howng will highlight local environmental issues and create a space and suite of programs to raise awareness about Baltimore’s waterways. The opening takes place at Art After Hours, where guests can partake in after-hours access to the galleries, entertainment, and collaborate and create their own mini-masterpieces to take home. 

Structures at C. Grimaldis
Nov. 9-Dec. 23, 523 N. Charles St.  This exhibition of new photography by Ben Marcinfeatures work from the artist’s ongoing series of abstract grids that compartmentalize urban architecture into meditations on shape and form, pattern and geometry.

Slow Form: Decompositions: Lost Earring at School 33
Nov. 10 – Jan. 6, 2018, 1427 Light St.  Three brand new exhibits open this month at the Federal Hill arts institution. Slow Form is a group show that explores a sense of the physical world in a state of flux and includes photographs, sculpture, painting, film, and video work by artists such as Kei Ito and Mary Baum. Decompositions, a solo exhibition by Chris Zickefoose, studies structure, renovation, and the physical traces of time. And in his multi-media installation, Lost Earring, Elliot Doughtie ponders how our cultural touchstones shift over time while considering the evolution of his own queer sexuality and transgender body.

Performing Arts

Charm City Fringe
Through Nov. 12, various locations  After five years at venues spread throughout various Baltimore neighborhoods,  this year’s Charm City Fringe Festival will be held in the Bromo Arts District, and for the first time, it is now possible to walk to every venue. There’s much to see at this eclectic, Best of Baltimore winning celebration of independent theater and performing arts, including Fluid Movement’s Druid Hill Haunt: A Chiller Thriller Roller Show and Trajectory Dance Project work Barriers, which investigates, through movement, the social boundaries that divide us.

PDZ City of Dreams
Nov. 4, Pipe Dreamz, 407 N. Charles St.  This showcase of some of the biggest names in Baltimore’s hip hop scene—Al Rogers Jr., Lonnie Moore, Tragedy, and Brittany Anderson—is sponsored by art space and boutique Pipe Dreamz, as well as City of Gods, the Hollins Market apparel brand and creative instigator.

Ru-Jac Records and the Legacy of Baltimore Soul
Nov. 11, Arch Social Club, 2426 Pennsylvania Ave.  This event, sponsored by the Creative Alliance, celebrates the history of the 1960s West Baltimore R&B record label. Featuring performances by Ru-Jac stars Winfield Parker and Joe Quarterman as well as Joy Postell, all backed by young Baltimore musicians. Beginning the night is a panel discussion that takes a deep look into the Ru-Jac Records’ place in the era’s bustling music scene. Discussion moderated by Brooks Long. The event will take place at Arch Social Club, a century-old African-American organization that has been centered in Penn North neighborhood, close to Ru-Jac’s headquarters, for over 40 years.

Music in the Stacks Part 2
Nov. 15, George Peabody Library, 17 E. Mt. Vernon Pl.  This collaborative recital will explore the connection between music and literature in the stunning George Peabody Library. Come hear music inspired by Emily Dickinson, Robert Frost, Ovid, and many more! Featuring Caleb Bradley on oboe, Sam Bessen on horn, and Yesse Kim on piano. 

Joy Postell and Wendel Patrick at The Motor House
Nov. 17, 120 W. North Ave.  Two of Baltimore’s most talked-about performers have come together for a unique local line up at The Motor House. Joy Postell is a soulful singer-songwriter who uses unruly, jazz-like rhythms, fiercely sharp lyrics, and emotive energy to address issues faced by the African-American community. Wendel Patrick has been referred to as “David Foster Wallace reincarnated as a sound engineer” by Urbanite Magazine and as “wildly talented” by the Baltimore Sun. The alter-ego of classical and jazz pianist Kevin Gift, Wendel Patrick is rapidly making a name for himself as a producer to be recognized. His five albums, “Sound:”, “Forthcoming”, “JDWP”, “Passage” and “Travel” were all produced without the use of samples, with Patrick playing every note of every instrument. They will be joined by Randi Withani Roberts and DJ Station North Sadboi.

Classical Music for People With Short Attention Spans
Nov. 30, WTMD, 1 Olympic Place, Suite 100, Towson  Do you love classical music, but can’t sit through a whole 90-minute symphony from start to finish? This show is for you. WTMD and Classical Revolution Baltimore are partnering to present. It’s the “Cliffs Notes” of classical music — all of the parts you know and love in a few minutes or less.The arrangements vary, too, from more traditional classical ensembles to electric guitar and beatboxing. Featured performers include Pique Collective and the Baltimore vocal artist Dominic Shodekeh Talifero, and who will present such beloved pieces as “O Fortuna” from Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7.

Events

The Necessity of Tomorrow(s)
Nov. 11, Union Baptist Church, 1219 Druid Hill Ave.  The first event of the BMA’s new series, The Necessity of Tomorrow(s), brings together one of the most accomplished artists of his generation, Mark Bradford, and BMA Dorothy Wagner Wallis Director Christopher Bedford for a conversation exploring how the artist grapples with these and other key questions in his artistic practice and community-based work. Doors open at 11:30am with performances curated by SunSets with spoken word artist Kondwani Fidel, jazz musician Clarence Ward III & Dat Feel Good band, and DJ Pierre Bennu. Enjoy light refreshments, community conversation, and a collaborative activity to map the future with Baltimore-based artist Graham Coreil-Allen.

This weekend, Everyman Theatre opens its second production of the season, Intimate Apparel, which has themes of class, culture, and circumstance. It centers on an African-American seamstress in turn of the century New York, who makes intimate garments for a variety of clients, and shares lingering affections with a Jewish fabric maker. Intimate Apparel’s playwright Lynn Nottage is the first woman to win two Pulitzer Prizes for her work, and this is the third of her plays that Everyman has produced. Everyman Resident Company member Dawn Ursula, who plays the lead Esther, joined us to talk about preparing for the role, the power of live theater, and getting star struck.

This is your third leading role in a Lynn Nottage play at Everyman. Nottage is one of the most acclaimed playwrights around right now, as she won the Pulitzer Prize for drama last year. Are you starting to feel like you know her characters and her style?

That’s a good question. I think with some playwrights and their work, you might be able to say that. But I think what’s so brilliant about Lynn Nottage is how varied her plays are. [Last year’s prize] was the second Pulitzer that she’s won, she won for Ruined previously, and when I think about Ruined [about the plight of women in war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo] versus Intimate Apparel, you could convince me, if I didn’t know better, that different playwrights wrote those plays. She can really craft something so uniquely that you can’t quite peg the way she’s going to channel the story. Although I could find and draw similarities between the characters and their struggles, they are such wonderfully different people. It’s a real joy to be able to start fresh and really begin, asking, “Ok, who is this person? How do they walk in the world?”

Even if they are so different, they seem like such complex characters.

And that’s a gift from the playwright to us as the actors that these characters are so wonderfully human. And when a playwright crafts something like that, you’re able to give it full body, and that’s what makes that much more of an impact on the audience. Human beings are such complex creatures, we can have such empathy and be so brilliant and yet so brutal. She knows how to draw that out.

Do you ever get star struck when you’re performing Nottage’s works because of who she is and the quality of what you’re preforming?

Yes, I can admit to that happening. I think it probably manifests itself in some good, positive nervousness. It’s like, ok, we’re doing a Lynn Nottage play, and we really can’t mess this up, ya’ll, because it’s her. (laughs) There’s a little bit of good intimidation and fear that we’re able to recognize and put into the work, and that drives us all that much more. It’s the same with an August Wilson piece—it’s of that caliber. We recognize how precious it is.

Intimate Apparel has a history in Baltimore. It had its premier at Center Stage in 2003, and Esther seems like a character who could have easily existed here. What’s your process been like researching and preparing to play her?

Luckily for us, we have a director, Tazewell Thompson, who has directed it before, and even the way he conducts rehearsals, he sets up what the world was like for us in Manhattan in 1905. The character of Esther is based off of some facts and information about a relative of Nottage’s, and she puts pretty much all the information you need in the text—which also shows how amazing a playwright she is, because the character is clear because of the circumstances she is going through, what she says, what people say about her.

How do Lynn Nottage characters compare with others you’ve played in terms of how deeply you feel them?

I grow immensely and so quickly affectionate towards the characters that I play, and it’s easy with Lynn Nottage pieces. Even Mama Nadi, the madam in Ruined. I might have my issues with her, but I loved me some Mama Nadi. I will know when Intimate Apparel is done based on how long it takes Esther to leave me alone. Sometimes, when a show is closed and I’m ready to move on, a character will leave me quickly. But others might still be rattling around. With Mama Nadi, I had to ask her to go. I had to be like, “I love you, I’m so glad we got to tell your story, but you need to leave now.”

What’s it like to bring this play at this time in history? And what has really resonated about the story with you?

Hopefully one day this play is done and it’s just done for the beautiful story that it is and it doesn’t feel so timely. But it’s such an immigrant story— it’s about this new country where people want to come and work hard and make a life and be prosperous and fruitful and good and the hardships that they encounter. And then the discrimination and the classicism that occurs and the socio-economic barriers that come up. There are also challenges that these women are experiencing. I fully expect there to be lots of moments in the play when the women in the audience, and hopefully the men too, cringe at the fact that though it’s set in 1905, that incredibly sexist thing that’s happening on stage could happen in 2017. Hopefully, that gives us all pause.

In some ways, I’m sure that’s frustrating, but in other ways, that also serves as a connection point between you and the audience.

I do think about it that way. So much about what the gift of theater is for us to acknowledge and see ourselves where we are and where we want to go. We watch these real people on stage living these lives and it is for us as an audience to take a moment to reflect, to be empathetic, to make a discovery. That’s like a good bowl of chicken soup when you’re sick, and that’s one of the wonderful things that a play like this does.

She rose to national prominence after winning a portrait competition at the National Portrait Gallery. Now, for the second time, her art will grace the walls of the storied institution—and it will portray a high profile subject.

Baltimore painter Amy Sherald has been selected by the National Portrait Gallery to paint its official portrait of Michelle Obama. The Smithsonian museum chose another rising art world star—New York’s Kehinde Wiley—to paint President Barack Obama’s. The paintings will be added to the National Portrait Gallery’s collection of presidential and first lady portraits next year.

Sherald’s painting Miss Everything (Unsuppressed Deliverance) won the 2016 Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition, which brought with it a $25,000 prize. That painting is currently touring the country as part of an exhibition of the competition’s top entries. Sherald was the first woman to have ever won the prize.

Sherald also has works at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture, and The National Museum of Women in the Arts. She has had two shows at the Monique Meloche Gallery in Chicago. In Baltimore, she is on the faculty of the Maryland Institute College of Art, her alma mater.

In a 2016 story that appeared in Baltimore, Sherald discussed how her work had changed from self-reflective and romanticized into a style in which she emulated old masters and combined that with her experiences as a black woman.

“I’d go through all these art books and look at technique, but not necessarily see my story represented,” she said. Her dream, she said, was for people “to look at a black child and see themselves. I want my paintings to take you to a different space in reality, and allow you to recognize yourself,” she says. “That’s the magic that I want all of my paintings to have.”

For three years, it has been carefully stowed away, waiting to once again share its magnificence with the world.

Now, the Asian art collection at the Walters Art Museum—one of the most lauded collections of Asian art in North America—is back. But don’t expect to see these splendid works displayed in the same way, or even in the same place.

The Arts of Asia installation inhabits what was once a carriage house that sits between the Hackerman House and the Walters’ main museum. The 150 works—including 30 objects that have never been on view—showcase the artistic traditions of countries that span 2,000 years and Asian countries from Thailand to Korea.

As for the Hackerman House, where the Asian collection was displayed prior to 2014, it remains closed until late spring 2018, when the revitalization of One West Mount Vernon Place will be complete.

“This project is a way of focusing the museum to re-tell the story of our collection,” said director Julia Marciari-Alexander. These new efforts are ushering in “a new way of how we work at the Walters. We’re asking the question, how is it that we frame the experience for the visitors?”

The Walters has taken steps to ensure that the art is displayed in unique ways that allow you to have new experiences take new meaning from the works. So here are a few things to keep in mind before your journey to the Far East. 

Artistic Meditation

Strolling through Arts of Asia, you might encounter a work that is set off by itself, perhaps with a bench close by, as if it’s inviting you to take a seat and savor what you are encountering. These tranquil spots were put in place to encourage viewers to have a more personal, perhaps spiritual connection to these objects. “We wanted singular works of art to really sing,” said Amy Landau, director of curatorial affairs and curator of Islamic and South and Southeast Asian art.

One particular spot where this rings true is in a gallery with deep red walls that holds a late 14th or early 15th century Chinese sculpture of the compassionate bodhisattva Guanyin, as well as a monumental Buddha from 18th to 19th century Myanmar that sits in a meditative pose, flanked by sculptures of devotees. The air is hushed and you can hear the faint toning of a gong playing over loudspeakers. 

Girl Power

At the foot of the grand staircase that leads to the John and Berthe Ford Gallery, on the carriage house’s lower floor, the Hindu goddess Devi greets you with a penetrating gaze. The Indian sculpture, which dates from 975-1000, is one of several prominent depictions of female goddesses that show just how much significance these powerful beings had in India, Nepal, and Tibet.

The Tibetan scroll painting (one of the earliest surviving examples of its kind) of the enlightened goddess Tara is another example. She sits in the lotus position in a mountain paradise, beckoning to you to pause and reflect.  

Collecting Histories

The new installation also tell the stories of three sets of collectors through the wondrous works they gathered.

Longtime Baltimoreans John and Berthe Ford have been profiled by The New York Times for having one of the world’s most important private collections of Himalayan and Indian art. Native Baltimorean Alexander Brown Griswold became interested in Asian art while stationed in Thailand during World War II and the Thai sculptures of Buddha that he acquired grace the second floor of the carriage house.    

And who could forget tobacco heiress Doris Duke, who, as Landau said, was one of the first collectors of Islamic and Southeast Asian art. She had hundreds of works stored in the barn of her New Jersey estate until the Walters obtained them after her death. 

VISUAL ART

Miami Is Nice
October 7-28, SpaceCamp, 16 W. North Ave. Cue the timeless notes of “Thank You For Being a Friend.” Miami is Nice is a group art exhibition, queer performance series, and gay wedding, inspired by the fearless irreverence of the hit television show The Golden Girls. In addition to the various programmatic elements—including an evening of queer performances—Miami is Nice will host a marriage celebration of Baltimore artists and performers Zachary Z. Handler and Nick Horan as part of the exhibition. Decorative remnants from the reception will remain in the gallery for the duration of the show as an art installation: a reminder of the ever-present fragility of the queer experience in America today.

Retreat/ William Lamson/ Lu Zhang
Oct.14– Jan. 13, 2018, Area 405, 405 E. Oliver St.  This exhibit features the work of Lu Zhang and William Lamson, two artists whose practices specifically focus on immersing themselves in creating a studio practice that is the process. Zhang, formerly of Baltimore’s roving modern art museum The Contemporary, transforms the front gallery space into an expanded series of experiments that will remain in flux throughout the exhibition. Lamson features projected videos in the back gallery. Curated by Area 405 creator Stewart Watson. 

Coyote
Oct. 18-29,  The Walters Art Museum, 600 N. Charles St.  In a special installation, artist Edgar Reyes responds to the museum’s ancient Americas collection and explores the ongoing displacement of native people whose traditions are not defined by national borders. Coyote explores the connection between the art of the past and the contemporary Mexican diaspora.

A Measure of Place
Oct. 27-Dec.1, The Creative Alliance, 3134 Eastern Ave.  Artist Erin Fostel explores and documents mood, atmosphere, and the immensity of grief in her haunting charcoal drawings of the architecture of Baltimore. A love for drawing and storytelling led her to the Maryland Institute College of Art and upon graduating in 2004 she stayed in Baltimore. She loves to draw, and even though she appreciates that the world is full of amazing colors she enjoys pushing the tonal boundaries of charcoal, which is her primary medium.

Structure and Perspective: David Brewster Explores Maryland’s Social Landscape
Oct. 12- Oct. 14, 2018 The Maryland Historical Society, 201 W. Monument St. This installation will bring together commissioned works by Maryland-born artist David Brewster with objects from the MdHS collection. This marrying of old with new, contemporary with “antique,” creates a dialogue that will inspire thought-provoking discussions of how the objects of the past remain relevant to today’s ever-changing social landscape. Brewster’s commissioned works focus on challenging and complex themes including gender as an evolving concept, race relations in the State of Maryland, the impact of urban decay, suburban sprawl’s effects on rural areas, and many topics causing intense political tensions in America today. 

Birdland and the Anthropocene
Oct. 6-29, The Peale Center, 225 Holliday St.  This 30-artist group exhibit examines different perspectives on birds and people’s relationship to them and includes more than 120 art pieces in media ranging from a 360-degree hologram of bird migration to creative taxidermy of extinct species. Special programming includes a performance of birdsong-influenced selections by Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s principal cellist, a bird-themed open mic and a closing costume party. 

PERFORMING ART

Embody
Tonight, Oct. 5, WTMD Studios, 1 Olympic Place, Towson  This award-winning, mind-blowing showcase of the human voice just sold out, but if you can score a ticket by any means necessary, it’s worth it. Embody returns to WTMD for a second installment featuring Tuvan throat-singing stars Alash, Baltimore rapper DDm of Bond St. District, singer-songwriter/vocal trumpeter Victoria Vox, New York vocal percussionist/beatboxer pioneer D.O.A., Baltimore vocal artist Shodekeh, and singer/rapper Jasmine Pope. And remember this is a vocal-only show.

The Songster Series—Susan Alcorn
Oct. 10, Creative Alliance, 3134 Eastern Ave.  The pedal steel guitar is a hard instrument to play and very difficult to master. 2017 Baker Artist Award-winner Susan Alcorn is a master. She has a deep grasp of where pedal steel has been and is a bold pioneer of where it can go. Join host Brooks Long for an evening of music and conversation with Susan about how blues great Muddy Waters led her to pedal steel guitar, her time playing Country in the 1970s, Straight-Ahead Jazz in the 1980s and since then, bringing her pedal steel under the influence of Indonesian Gamelan, Indian Classical and avant-garde influences like late-period John Coltrane and mentor Pauline Oliveros’ deep listening philosophy.

Manuel Barrueco-The Spanish Guitar
Oct. 28, Kaplan Concert Hall, Towson University, 8000 York Road, Towson  The legendary guitarist Manuel Barrueco will perform live at the 30th anniversary celebration concert for the Baltimore Classical Guitar Society. The program will include the most-loved Spanish guitar music. 

The Inaugural WTMD Towson Rock Block
Oct. 7, 1 Olympic Place in Towson  Think a fall version of First Thursdays in Towson and on a Saturday. This free live event features performances by The Districts, Stone Senate, and Grizfolk and food from Cunninghams’s, Bagby Pizza Company, Kona Ice, and Jimmy’s Famous Seafood.

EVENTS

Open Studio Tour
Oct. 7, 8, various locations  It’s the 29th anniversary of School 33 Art Center’s event that celebrates artists and their creative places throughout the city, giving collectors and art lovers the opportunity to visit the studios of visual artists. For two days, meet Baltimore’s artists, see their work and get a behind-the-scenes glimpse into their creative processes. And if you get a chance, check out the Open Studio Tour Kick off on Friday, Oct. 6 at the Youth Resiliency Institute in Cherry Hill, where you can meet with artists from the community and watch a panel discussion while enjoying West African cuisine and music from Abu The Flutemaker.

NEWS

The Greater Baltimore Cultural Alliance has announced the nine artists selected for 2017 Rubys Artist Project Grants in literary and visual arts. The Rubys give up to $10,000 to emerging and established Baltimore-regional artists to support the creation of innovative artistic projects. The artists and their projects are as follows: M. Saida Agostini (poetry collection); Oletha DeVane (visual artist); Elizabeth Evitts Dickinson (memoir); Celeste Doaks (poetry collection); Tiffany Lange (puppetry ); Ada Pinkston (installation art); Kate Reed Petty (novel); Ernest Shaw and Kenneth Morrison (visual art and poetry project)

September in Baltimore means one thing for bibliophiles—The Baltimore Book Festival. For three days, the Inner Harbor becomes a book store, reading room, and literary salon all rolled into one, with stages featuring a host of local, national, and international authors to gather inspiration from. To make navigating this weekend’s schedule a little easier, we’ve highlighted 10 writers and events that are not to be missed—and broken them down by your genre of choice.

Literature Lovers

Maryland Humanities presents Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
2 p.m., Saturday, Sept. 24, Literary Salon  This Johns Hopkins grad who grew up in Nigeria has taken the literary world by storm. Her latest novel Americanah, was published around the world in 2013, and has received numerous accolades, including winning the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction and The Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize for Fiction, and it was named one of The New York Times Ten Best Books of the Year. Her 2003 novel Purple Hibiscus was the One Maryland One Book selection this year and her TED talk about feminism is a must-see.

Alice McDermott
3:30 p.m., Saturday, Sept. 24, Literary Salon  McDermott, a professor at Johns Hopkins University, is the author of seven novels, including Someone, which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the National Book Award, and Charming Billy, which won the National Book Award. She’s also been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize twice, and her articles, reviews, and stories have appeared in The New York Times and The Washington Post, USA Today, The Atlantic Monthly, and The New Yorker. She’ll be promoting her new book The Ninth Hour at the festival.

True Crime Enthusiasts

It’s amazing that a few years after the Serial podcast became such a huge hit that we are still pondering the future of Adnan Syed, who was convicted in the murder of Hae Min Lee. Two women with special connections to Syed are appearing at the festival. First is Asia McClain Chapman, who will tell her story of how she became the key alibi witness for Syed in Serial, and now in her book, Confessions of a Serial Alibi. (3 p.m. Saturday, Inner Harbor Stage.) And an hour later, catch Rabia Chaudry, Syed’s public advocate and author of the New York Times bestselling book Adnan’s Story. (4 p.m. Saturday, Inner Harbor Stage.) 

Local Scenesters

A Touch of Literati 
6 p.m. Friday, CityLit Stage Baltimore’s own CityLit Press celebrates the launch of author Rafael Alvarez’s new collection of fiction, Basilio Boullosa Stars in the Fountain of Highlandtown. The book commemorates the 20th anniversary of Alvarez’s fiction debut, The Fountain of Highlandtown. The celebration includes two prize-winners: 2017 Gordon Parks Foundation Fellow Devin Allen, who will speak about the Time magazine photo that changed his life and the youth educational program he founded, and Deborah Rudacille, a 2017 Guggenheim Fellow, and science writer who tells stories about the ways in which science influences culture and culture informs science, the links between science and social justice movements. This session is moderated by WYPR’s Aaron Henkin. 

Foodies

The intersection of food and literature is always a welcome discussion, and the book fest has plenty of cooking demos and cookbook signings at its Food for Thought Stage. But there’s also Lunch at the Homesick Restaurant (1 p.m. Friday, Food for Thought Stage), where national best-selling mystery author Laura Lippman joins author Ann Hood and author and home cook Michael Ruhlman to discuss the way fiction informs food and food informs fiction, both in their own work and the works of others. Audience members who know their fictional food will have a chance to win some distinctly Baltimore treats.

Kids or Kids at Heart

Pets on Wheels
(11 a.m.-1 p.m. Saturday, Top of the World Observation Level) What could be better than cute pets and books? Children will be partnered with a therapy dog (or cat!) from Pets on Wheels. After selecting a favorite book, the child is invited to sit and read to their furry friend. And we maintain this event shouldn’t just be for kids—adults like to read books aloud, too. 

The Conservation Conscious

McKay Jenkins (11:30 a.m. Saturday, Food For Thought Stage) has been writing about people and the natural world for 30 years, and continues this work in his new book, Food Fight: GMOs and the Future of the American Diet. He is also the author of ContamiNation, which chronicles his investigation into the myriad synthetic chemicals we encounter in our daily lives, and the growing body of evidence about the harm these chemicals do to our bodies and the environment. He teaches at The University of Delaware and lives in Baltimore.

Poetry Aficionados

Poets Speak: Raw Wounds, Wise Blood, Speak Water
(2 p.m. Sunday, CityLit Stage) You might know the name Kondwani Fidel from his recent viral essay that analyzed the human toll of Baltimore’s violence in his personal experiences. The writer, speaker, and spoken word poet has also authored a book, Raw Wounds, has been featured in Business Insider and CNN, and was a 2016 recipient of the Ford: Men of Courage Award. He joins Robert Earl Price the author of four books of poetry, including Wise Blood and Truth Thomas, a singer-songwriter and poet who was the winner of the 2013 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work in Poetry. Ron Kipling Williams, author of Black Freak Mosh Heaven, will moderate.

Be Free Live! hosted by Love the Poet (Michelle Antoinette Nelson)
(4 p.m. Sunday, Inner Harbor Stage) Baltimore’s longest running monthly open mic will take place live at the book festival. Hosted by Michelle Antoinette Nelson aka LOVE the poet an artist, innovator, and Founder of Brown and Healthy a non-profit and global health and wellness initiative for people of color. She’s dedicated over a decade to her life’s work to authoring books, plays, writing arts + education curricula, and providing platforms for artists to explore and discover the true nature of their art. Featuring Almight Ra, Antoine Hayes, Najh Bayyan, and others.

When he was living in Harlem during the 1930s and 1940s, Jacob Lawrence would walk the 50 to 60 blocks from his home to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. There, he would gaze at the series of paintings created by art masters like Leonardo Da Vinci that were dedicated to the life of one figure in history. And Lawrence would gather inspiration for how he could memorialize his own African-American heroes.

“Then he would spend hours at the library researching Harriet Tubman and Frederic Douglass, choosing the scenes that he could illuminate like the old masters did,” said Jacqueline Copeland, director of education and visitor services at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum.

That led to Lawrence’s own series of paintings, and prints of some of those works are now on display at a new exhibition at the Lewis museum. Maryland Collects: Jacob Lawrence gathers more than 50 prints, as well as two artist books, in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the renowned artist’s birth.

Lawrence was fortunate enough to find success early in his career. When he was 24 years old, the Philips Collection in Washington, D.C., and the Museum of Modern Art in New York each purchased 30 pieces from his Migration series, for which he is probably best known. And Lawrence was particularly prolific. Copeland notes that he created 31 paintings in a series about Frederic Douglass as well as 30 paintings about the life of Harriet Tubman during two years.

“He was a historian all to himself, and he was a storyteller,” said Charles Berea, the Lewis museum’s director of collections and exhibitions. “He painted the American scene, and he wanted to educate the masses on African-American history.”

One part of that history is a series of vibrant prints showcased at this exhibition that detail the life of Haitian revolutionary Toussaint L’Overture. Lawrence expertly depicts both the action of the rebels capture and more intimate moments, like L’Overture’s birth, with boldness and emotion.

Prints from the Tubman series are also on display, including a brilliant, more abstracted scene of figures in motion entitled Play. And Lawrence’s works that explore sermons surrounding the beginning of the Bible’s Book of Genesis and more commercials give the exhibit a rounded

A particularly notable part of this exhibit is that, as the title would suggest, all of the works came from collectors in Maryland. Berea said the museum intends to continue this series “to show what truly great works of art are right here in our state.”    

Maryland Collects: Jacob Lawrence will be on view until Jan. 7, 2018.

Performing Arts

Sally McCoy

Sept. 14-Oct. 1, The Fallout Shelter at United Evangelical Church, 923 S. East Ave. Cohesion Theatre Company presents the world premiere of its co-founder, Alice Stanley’s new play. Set in August of 1882, in the midst of the first gruesomely violent event of the legendary Hatfield and McCoy feud, and with her three eldest sons captured by the Hatfield clan, Sally McCoy defies her womanly place in the home and crosses miles of Appalachian wilderness in the dark of night in order to save her children from certain death at the vengeful hands of the Hatfields. After traveling miles alone in the dark of night to the home of the Hatfield patriarch, “Devil” Anse Hatfield, Sally refuses to let anything stand in her way until she’s seen the “Devil” face to face.

The Terrible Secret of Lunastus

Sept. 15-Oct. 8, Zion Lutheran Church, 400 E. Lexington St. The Baltimore Rock Opera Society (BROS) opens its first (and only) full-scale production for 2017, “The Terrible Secret of Lunastus”. It’s a sci-fi comedy set in the near future about the impending destruction of Earth, and the efforts of four astronauts and their stupid robot to find a new home for the human race, all performed to an original soundtrack inspired by classic 1970s rock.

Outcalls Album Release Show with Super City, J Pope and the HearNow
Sept. 15, WTMD Studios, 1 Olympic Place, Towson  Like many of its Baltimore music peers, Outcalls is fearless. It loves to experiment and collaborate, and lift each other up through innovative songwriting and captivating live shows. Led by Melissa Wimbish and Britt Olsen-Ecker—both classically trained singers—Outcalls draws inspiration from political and social events and fills their music with melodic and harmonic surprises. Their songs unfold in chapters, and have a cinematic quality. Joining them are glam pop rockers Super City and the soul, fun, hip hop fusers J Pope and the HearNow.

Amy Reid album release
Sept. 15, The Crown, 1910 N. Charles St. The song and synthress that is one half of the group Chiffon is releasing her first solo album, and is celebrating with this show at The Crown. Best of Baltimore winners :3lon and DJ Trillnatured will be on hand as well.

Abdu Ali: I’m Still Here
Sept. 22, EMP Collective, 307 W. Baltimore St.  Baltimore Club Artist Abdu Ali is launching his national tour with this new style performance with drummer Josh Stokes. TT the Artist will get the party started.

Visual Art

Out/Side & In/Between/The Holy Ghost Goes to Bed at Midnight/ A Parable at School 33
Through Oct. 28, School 33 Art Center, 1427 Light St. Three new exhibits open this month at School 33. Out/Side & In/Between is the first of two annual juried group exhibitions, curated by Jarvis DuBois. “The Holy Ghost Goes to Bed at Midnight is a solo exhibition of new works by James Bouche’, and A Parable is an installation and ongoing performance by NI Xin. on Friday, September 8, 6-9 p.m. All three shows will be on view from September 1-October 28. 

A Woven Thread at Terrault
Sept. 9-Oct. 28, 218 W. Saratoga St. This exhibition features the works of Alex Dukes and Liora Ostroff. Dukes’ paintings are an autobiographical exploration of memory, identity, race, and how they all are intertwined. Liora Ostroff’s current body of work uses paired art-historical themes with imagery drawn from contemporary life.

Altered Realities at Maryland Art Place
Sept. 14-Nov. 4, Maryland Art Place, 218 W. Saratoga St. The exhibition aims to subvert the viewer’s perspectives by focusing on uncanny interpretations of the everyday experience, highlight exceptional works ranging from painting, sculpture, video, fiber arts, virtual reality, and photography. Featured artists include Scott Cawood, Se Jong Cho, Phaan Howng, and Balti Virtual. 

Cardinal Grand Opening
Sept. 16, 1758 Park Ave. During the grand opening of this new Bolton Hill art space you can get a tour of the building, which includes exhibition space as well as artist studios. Also, on display will be its first exhibition, Natural Order, which invites each contributor to create a typewritten list on a legal-sized piece of paper, which will go on view immediately following its creation.

Events

Bollymore
Sept. 8, Metro Gallery, 1700 N. Charles St. This bi-monthly night of art and dance is inspired by the sounds + stories of the subcontinent. Bollymore is Baltimore’s space of fellowship and exchange amongst the South Asian diaspora. It aims to celebrate the arts and collaborating across cultures, featuring the music of Jacob Marley, Nikilad, and DJ Beti.

The Joy and Pain of Collecting Art
Sept. 16, Reginald F. Lewis Museum, 830 E. Pratt St. Need help picking the perfect artwork? Want to know how to start collecting art? Hear from experts in the field to get the inside scoop about how to build your very own collection. Presenters include Myrtis Bedolla from Galerie Myrtis, and renowned Collector Walter O. Evans who has amassed one of the greatest fine art collections in the country.

Philip Glass Film & Opera Series
Sept. 22, Centre Street Performance Space, 5 E. Centre Street Baltimore native and Peabody Preparatory alumnus Philip Glass turned 80 on Jan. 31. To celebrate this great composer’s birthday, Peabody Conservatory is hosting screenings of Glass’s “portrait” operas—Einstein on the Beach, Satyagraha, and Akhnaten. His meditation on the great physicist Einstein opens up the series. 

Fall For Art
Sept. 24, Hooper Mill Studios, 3500 Parkdale Ave. Celebrate fall in Woodberry and discover new works by local artists. Tour the studios of six local artists, featuring sculpture, painting, drawing and photography. Proceeds benefit The Walters Art Museum and its educational programs and exhibitions. 

News

The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra has announced the 2017-2018 BSO Pulse lineup. This season, at the concert series that pairs classical music with prominent indie and alternative artists, see Grammy-winner Esperanza Spalding (October 19), Tiny Desk concert winners Tank and the Bangas (January 4), and the acclaimed singer-songwriter Valerie June (March 22).

For the second year, all concerts at Peabody Institute are free. It also happens to be the debut season of Peabody’s recently appointed artistic director of ensembles Joseph Young, whose first performance of the season will be with the Peabody Chamber Orchestra in a performance of Dvořák’s Othello Overture and works by Handel and Schubert on Sept. 19. 

Other season highlights include the Peabody Chamber Orchestra, performing Baroque and early-Classical-era works and smaller orchestral works of the present day, and the Peabody Studio Orchestra, making its debut on Halloween with popular music from movies. And the Peabody Symphony Orchestra concerts will be led by Maestra Marin Alsop (September 28), and feature the legendary Leon Fleisher (October 11).

Everyman Theatre’s artistic director Vincent Lancisi and veteran company member Bruce Nelson got the rarest of opportunities this summer. A chance encounter led them to a meeting with the man who was the inspiration for the main character, Rene Gallimard, in the Tony Award-winning M. Butterfly, which opens Everyman’s season on September 6.

In the play, Gallimard, a French diplomat, is seduced by Chinese opera singer, who turns about to be masquerading as a man. The two are swept up in a tale of espionage, hidden identities, and betrayal. Nelson, who plays Gallimard, joined us to talk about what happens when you meet the real-life inspiration for your character.

This story seems like you couldn’t make it up if you tried. How did all of this happen?
One day, I was passing by Vinny’s office, and he told me to come in and sit down, that he had a story for me. This crazy coincidence begins to unfold, where Vinny’s wife had opened up to the driver of a tour bus in France and that tour guide had told them that he was the private driver for a famous guy, that there was a movie and a play about. Vinny’s ears perk up immediately, and the driver can’t believe he knows that it’s M. Butterfly. They get the man, Bernard Boursicot, on the phone, and they arrange for a visit. The only sticking point was it seemed too good to be true. We all decided to take a leap of faith, and these donors stepped forward to make the trip possible. Maybe two weeks later, I was on a plane to Paris.

It seems like you never get these kinds of opportunities as an actor.
Yes. You assume for the better part of your career you’re not going to know anything about the person you’re playing except for what you’ve made up. It was thrilling to be able to layer on my experience with Bernard. I had developed in my mind that he was a bigger-than-life personality. Somehow, I’d gotten into my mind that, as a former diplomat, he was living in a fabulous chateau in the French countryside where he was waited on by white-gloved waiters. And we would be swept in, wined and dined, told this fabulous story—and maybe we would get a scoop, there would be something we’d learn that nobody knew.

But then we showed up at a nursing home, and he was this 74-year-old man—and old for 74—with too much hair and needing a shave, wearing clothes that maybe he’d worn a couple of days in a row. And he lived in a little cell of a room—like the jail cell where his character is at the beginning of the play. He is diminished, he is small, and he is real—not larger-than-life. There might have been a part of me that thought, ‘I don’t want to know this.’ The Bernard in my mind is very different from this. He did seem to give credence to the fact that as a twenty-something, going on this very wild adventure, he was naïve and he was easily taken advantage of. And he kept saying ‘yes’ to wild opportunities that he had no business saying yes to, but that informed the next several steps in his past. The idea that he was open to being duped I think made the duping possible. It does make for an amazing, epic story. 

What was the visit like?
He was waiting outside in the rain for us under a little awning. It was like out of a movie. There was rain on the windshield, and we could see him waiting, and we were like, that’s Bernard? We get out and he takes us into the wing where he lives. It had glaring fluorescent lights, and there weren’t enough seats for us, so we kind of perched on his bed.

In the book, when Bernard needed money, he would sell off some item that he’d collected in his adventures. His room was spare and Spartan. There was one little album that he flipped through and showed us some things. And he did present us, wonderfully, charmingly, with two ties. The visit was about four hours. At one point, we had this wonderful meal, a four-course dinner catered by the nursing home’s kitchen—wine, cognac, lovely dessert. He ate like a horse, and the actor, the psych 101 in me, wondered what he was really hungry for—has he got enough in life? So it was just eating, chitchatting, and then we were on the road, dumbfounded that it had happened.

How has that experienced informed the character for you?
He’s small now. We open the show, not on a bigger than life, grand scale type guy. He is a simple, real man. And it’s sad that he couldn’t be fully who he was. He was a gay man who can’t be a gay man. And I can get that you can’t be yourself, you have to hide. Even when all the evidence points to what you truly are, you deny, deny, deny.

He was a man clearly rooted in a certain way of being, and I guess the fight out of that was probably why it hit him so dreadfully hard that the opera singer was a man that he was able to deny that. That suggests wanting to save himself and that he’s an insecure person who needs to maintain the wall. Oh, it’s so sad. But when you go on stage, you can’t play the sad, you can’t play the pity, you’ve got to advocate for your character. And it’s the audience’s job to get drawn into the sadness.

So, during the visit, did you get your scoop?
There were no scoops. He continually recounted, in an almost formulaic way, what we already know from the book and the articles about the story. We didn’t expect that [during our visit] Bernard would continue to refer to the opera singer as ‘his majesty.’ There was an upper hand.

We want the story in a lot of ways to be a love story, and I think part of the power of the play is you are led to believe that they are falling in love, and then it’s something much, much more. It’s espionage, a man pretending to be a woman. You have to draw the audience in, believe that it’s a love story, and then you break that apart. You get the audience questioning and wondering.  

You don’t have to be a hardcore movie buff or drama nerd to see that film and theater are related. We’ve all likely seen film adaptations of plays we loved, or perhaps we’ve been reminded of a favorite character or noticed a similar theme when thinking about stage or screen productions.

It’s in that spirit of connecting across genres that Everyman Theatre and the Maryland Film Festival are partnering to bring about a six-part screening series at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Parkway. “Everyman at the Parkway” will bring influential films to the Parkway that relate to Everyman’s 2017/18 season.

“All arts audiences are passionate audiences, and we are delighted by this opportunity to merge two mediums, bringing film- and theatre-lovers together to celebrate and discuss the many ways of bringing great stories to life,” said Everyman’s founding artistic director Vincent Lancisi.

Whether artistically, structurally or thematically, each film/play coupling aims to inspire conversation about the material exhibited on stage and on screen. Every film will be introduced and accompanied by a post-screening audience discussion, hosted by the Everyman artist who selected the pairing.

First up on September 26 is David Cronenberg’s M. Butterfly, a 1993 film adaptation of the stage play that stars Academy Award-winner Jeremy Irons and written by David Henry Hwang, based on his Tony Award winning play of the same name. The pairing is inspired by Everyman Theatre’s fall production of M. Butterfly, directed by Lancisi (in performance Sept. 6-Oct. 8).

Upcoming screenings will also include Ava DuVernay’s 2012 feature Middle of Nowhere, presented by Everyman Resident Company actor Dawn Ursula as a companion to Everyman’s Intimate Apparel on October 24 and, on December 12, Benoît Jacquot’s 2012 French drama Farewell My Queen, hosted by set designer Daniel Ettinger, to pair with Everyman’s The Revolutionists.

“We are thrilled to partner with Everyman Theatre to continue to explore the translation of one medium to another—film,” said Jed Dietz, founding director of the Maryland Film Festival. “We’re building many community partnerships, and we have been big fans of Everyman’s work, so it’s especially exciting to be part of this Everyman season.” 

Visual Arts

Summer ’17 at C. Grimaldis Gallery
Through Aug. 26, 523 N. Charles St. Catch some of Baltimore’s biggest artistic names at this group show, including the works of Sondheim Artscape prize finalists Zoe Charlton, Wesley Clark, and Hasan Alahi. 

Concrete/Complex: a portrait of McKeldin Fountain
Aug. 12-Sept. 3, Current Space, 421 Howard St.  Using photography, video, and sound, Baltimore-based artists Shannon Collis and Liz Donadio documented McKeldin Fountain’s last days. Their portrait of the once-functional space culminates in an immersive installation that conjures a meditation on the essence of this urban landmark. The installation’s sculptural forms reference the fountain’s Brutalist design, and celebrate its minimalism and strong angles; video shot on site traverses each of these surfaces. Collis and Donadio’s abstract, visual, and auditory impressions offer a sensory memorial experience of McKeldin Fountain, opening a layered engagement with viewers. 

What We Learn While Waiting
Aug. 14-20, Eubie Blake National Jazz Institute and Cultural Center, 847 N. Howard St.  Inspired by Baltimore City’s public benches, “What we learn while waiting” – a conversation with Baltimore, the greatest city in America; is a gallery exhibition that explores the many experiences, dynamics, and realities that exist within our city’s parameters. The works curated by Malaika Aminata Clements, with Shan Wallace and LieAnne Navarro, are inspired by public space, human interaction, mass transit, and Baltimore city’s benches. This event is sponsored by    

Our Right To Smile
Opens Aug. 26, Dovecote Café, 2501 Madison Ave.  This exhibit from painter Jerrell Gibbs provides a glimpse into his world through recreations of childhood photographs and memories. Gibbs bestows viewers a lens into the everyday life of the community he’s familiar with. He gives the audience a sense of the traditional Baltimorean family functions. His use of elongated figures, inspired by Ernie Barnes, and expressive gestures allows him to convey a feeling of liveliness in the form of two-dimensional paintings.

Performing Arts

Super City/ Chiffon/ Twen
Aug. 14, Ottobar, 2549 Howard St.  Catch Baltimore rockers Super City and Twen as they head out on tour. Ultra-smooth R&B group Chiffon joins them for this show. 

Ultrafaux
Aug. 20, An Die Musik, 409 N. Charles St. Fresh off their new album release, Ultrafaux—an acoustic trio that presents original music rooted in the authentic technique of 30’s French guitarist Django Reinhardt—will present a set of Reinhardt’s songs exploring the evolution of the gypsy jazz style.  

Summer in the Square with Symphony Number One
Aug. 23, Mt. Vernon Place’s West Square  This performance from the Best of Baltimore winning chamber orchestra that specializes in substantial works by emerging composers includes 15 pieces, 14 of which are new compositions that have never before been played in public. The works feature spoken word poetry by Eubie Blake, a toy piano, dub-step influences, selections from George Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess, Saint-Saens, a taste of patriotic flair, and a piece inspired by the Mount Vernon Place Conservancy’s discovery of the Washington Monument cornerstone.

J. Roddy Walston and The Business
Aug. 24-26, Ottobar, 2549 Howard St. J. Roddy Walston and The Business are returning to Baltimore (they are now based in Richmond) for this three-day residency at the Ottobar. Specializing in a classic-sounding Southern rock/Americana style that emphasizes songwriting and danceable kinetics, they are about to release their fourth studio album this fall and have a new single, “The Wanting”, their first four years.

Events

Throwback III: A 90’s hip hop party
Friday, Aug. 11, Creative Alliance, 3134 Eastern Ave.  Curators of Hip Hop and Creative Alliance are partnering for a 90’s R&B, soul, and hip hop party, with two dance crews one dance floor. Bmore Than Dance and local Bboy and Bgirl crews will be there along with artists Eze Jackson, Jahiti of Brown FISH, Joy Postell, Al Rogers Jr. and Bobbi Rush, who will be performing your favorite 90’s hits.Throwback gear highly recommended but not mandatory.

Literary Mt. Vernon walking tour
Aug. 19, meet at the Enoch Pratt Free Library, 400 Cathedral St. Follow in the footsteps of Baltimore’s literary luminaries on this Maryland Humanities tour. Discover the elegant brownstone mansions and majestic cultural institutions built by Baltimore’s successful 19th century merchants and industrialists on . Learn how a neighborhood of scholars, struggling artists and authors, newspaperman, philanthropists and social reformers offered rich opportunities to discuss and debate ideas and open new literary avenues. 

News

On August 12, 1992, the American Visionary Art Museum became a United States Congressionally designated national museum. Though it wouldn’t open its doors for another three years, founder and director Rebecca Alban Hoffberger recalls, “That early and unanimous official recognition gave AVAM the imprimatur of credibility to flourish that which has since wildly exceeded even the sweetest of all our dreams. We say on the eve of our 25th Anniversary as a beloved national museum, God-speed the rapid return to united and Bi-Partisan Congressional care and action to impact the greater good. We sure need their urgent visionary action to repair infrastructure, healthcare, climate, and create the jobs of the future, now.”

Jasmine Pope, frontwoman of J Pope and the HearNow, has been a powerful presence in Baltimore’s music scene for years. Her band is making waves right now for its debut album, Soul Searching, which was released this summer. She joined us to talk about influences, juggling practices with day jobs, and the band’s first Artscape performance.

 I know people are familiar with you from outlets like the Baltimore Boom Bap Society, but tell us what the essence of J. Pope and the HearNow is.

 We are two entities that came together—me, J Pope, got together with Funk Friday around 2009, 2010. They were going to Goucher College and I had done a show there and they were the house band. We hit it off and since then we’ve been performing together. They were Funk Friday without me and our sound changed as we started performing together more. It shifted from funk and we started getting into alternative, soul, hip-hop, a bunch of other things other than funk. The name change came about because we didn’t want to be pigeonholed as just a funk band—we wanted something that captured everything it is that we do.

How would you describe your sound? 

We had more of a jam band sound, but our sound now is much more intentional. Jacob Kohlhas, our guitar player, does a good part of our musical arrangements, so I’ll do lyrics and an arrangement of vocals, but Jacob is very precise and has a lot of wonderful ideas about dynamics in the music. Where we used to be loose and jamming, we’re now precise with swift changes now, and I think this album captures that. It comes off well in our live performance, but for a few years we’ve been trying to capture it in our recorded pieces and we hadn’t gotten it exactly how we wanted it to be until we hooked up with [producer] Wendel Patrick and he was shaping that sound and bringing it out during the recording sessions. 

I feel like I hear this brought up a decent amount in Baltimore, where evolution of sound has more to do with a community of people who come together and work together.

I completely agree. The beautiful thing about Baltimore is, even though it’s a smaller city, our scene is really robust and tight-knit and that’s across genres. Being able to work with different folks, from what I do with Boom Bap and our performance with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the different kinds of music that we do influences what we do when we come together. Our drummer plays with the Bumper Jacksons, which is a completely different type of music than we play, our saxophone player has a basis in jazz, but can play anything. Every experience we have as individual musicians translates when we come together to compose and write. I think that’s another reason why our sound has evolved because we just individually as musicians are interacting with the community of folks who are around us. There aren’t many cities that you can go to where you can hear someone who’s classically trained on violin and a throat trumpet player and a classically trained opera singer from Peabody Conservatory and me. It happens in Baltimore regularly, and I think that’s just so unique, and gives us an opportunity to make sounds that you aren’t able to find in other places.

I wanted to ask you about what has influenced you and got you into music. 

So I came to music probably the way most brown girls will tell you they did, which is through the church. There was a gospel group that would come to my grandmother’s Baptist church. They were five sisters and the only instrument was a piano that one of the sisters played, and they performed like there were 1,500 people watching, even though that church probably held about 200 and probably had only had 45 people in the audience. But the energy they created when they performed had me awestruck, and they came every year to the church, so that made me more interested in music. As I got older, I started getting into Donny Hathaway and Nina Simone. I heard Lauryn Hill and saw that girls could sing and rap and I was ok, I can do this. I was in a gospel/rap group when I was in high school in Prince George’s County, and our administrators would let us out of school to go to other schools and perform. That started everything, and when I went to college at Towson University is when I started my first band. I had a history of jazz class there and the professor gave us the option of writing a paper for our final project, or forming a band, and little did he know there were some pretty amazing musicians in the class. I ended up forming a band and we did good stuff and we ended up staying together for five years. I stayed with them until I started rocking with J Pope and HearNow.

So what do you have planned for Artscape?

We’ve played Artscape a few times, but this is going to be our first time together as a band. Wendel Patrick will be accompanying us, and we’re also going to have a background vocalist that we hope will make our live show feel a little bit bigger since this is a bigger venue. We’re going to do a lot of really cool surprises, and we’re going to do what we always do which is have fun and entertain.

Now that the album is out, are you thinking about future plans for you and the band?

I’ve wanted to do another solo, straight hip-hop album, probably because my little brother is always like, “Yeah, this is great, but when are you going to do more rap?” So I’ve been kicking that around in my head and writing a little bit. As a band, we’re writing new music. Once we finally finished this album, it felt like a permission slip to be able to write new music. We’ve been writing and practicing and writing and practicing.

One thing I don’t think most people understand is the time commitment that’s required to be in a band like this. Can you talk a little about what your schedule is like?

(laughs) I also work a 9 to 5 job—I run an HIV and sexually-transmitted infection prevention program with Chase Brexton—so between that and having a five-year-old, I  practice with the band every weekend and sometimes during the week, getting off work at 5 and practicing sometimes 6:30 to 11. But that’s just my schedule. Most of the guys in the band teach music professionally, so they’re up early to do that, and then they practice all day individually, and they also gig with other bands. It’s really about juggling, but we’ve been together for a few years, so I think that testifies to the commitment we have. We’ll do whatever it is we need to do to make sure we can continue to make music together.   

Let’s be honest—what we love most about Artscape is the way the city is transformed for three days and nights into an art-loving, community-vibing, dancing-in-the-street big party. In fact, one of the best things to do, in our opinion, is simply walk around Charles Street and Mount Royal Avenue, soaking up all the sights and sounds of summer in the city.

But we’d be remiss if we didn’t weigh in on the extensive list of performances, exhibits, installations, and family events that make up the country’s largest free arts festival that runs July 21-23. So without further ado, we give you our list of what not to miss at this year’s camp-themed Artscape.

Installations

One of the biggest visual cues that Artscape will have arrived will be the appearance the larger-than-life works of art in Mount Vernon and Station North. Take the Charles Street Trail, for instance, where, between Penn Station and Lanvale Street, you can meander among works by three artists that hint at more mysterious encounters than a typical wander in the woods. (And, apparently, you should watch for a Sasquatch!) Then, there’s Let’s Build a Big Campfire!, a 20-foot-tall sculpture made from steel and logs that features a marshmallow on a 30-foo-long skewer. Large scale, indeed.

Mount Royal Avenue at Dolphin Street will transform into Aquarium Falls, a participatory installation presented by the National Aquarium in collaboration with visual artist and Maryland Institute College of Art graduate Kasey Jones. Festival-goers will assist Jones in the creation of a waterfall created entirely of repurposed plastic materials, and playfully explore a park-like landscape complete with a winding stream, stepping stones and trail activities.

And while camping is thought of as a way to get away from it all, Who’s Watching (Charles Street by Penn Station) reverses this by exploring aspects of surveillance. This installation brings viewers into one of two physically separated custom framed tents. Initially, participants may be aware only of the chamber into which they are entering, without knowledge that they are watching each other. The live feed will be erratically interrupted by surveillance footage from 2015 now available online, connecting the surveillance occurring live in the space with historical surveillance in Baltimore City.

Performances

So, yes, on Friday, the MICA Main Stage will feature Sheila E., Prince’s drummer, collaborator, and former fiancé (he proposed to her on tour while performing “Purple Rain”, swoon.) And that crazy Gypsy punk band Gogol Bordello takes the stage on Saturday and Sunday features soulsters Robert Randolph and the Family Band. But make sure to check out J. Pope and the Hear Now, the funk-infused Baltimore group whose debut album Soul Searching has made a splash since its release this summer.

At the Morgan State University Sound Off Live! Stage (Mount Royal Avenue near Lafayette), check out Wordsmith (Saturday 2-3 p.m.), a rapper and musician who will perform with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra next season, and Super City (Sunday, 1-2 p.m.) a indie quintet made up of Towson University grads.

The Johns Hopkins University Station North Stage has a diverse lineup that is so perfectly Baltimore, from Baltimore City Public Schools students (Friday 12-1:30 p.m.) to punk rockers Natural Velvet (Sunday 4:30-5:30 p.m.) and PLRLS (Sunday 7:15-8 p.m.). Also check out up-and-coming rapper Martina Lynch (Saturday 2-3 p.m.) and Wing Dam (Saturday 8-9 p.m.), who make a return trip to their Baltimore hometown from their new digs in San Diego. And don’t for get about the George Michael Tribute on Friday night.

 One of our personal favorites this year is Dance Camp (Charles Theater parking lot), where you don’t have to be a budding ballerina to get the full workshop and performance experience. In fact, the schedule was artfully designed to provide the audience with an experience of a typical day at camp. Each day, campers can wake up to morning yoga, attend dance workshops, listen to a fireside chat and, most importantly, just dance. Competitions, games, and talent shows are spread throughout the three days so you can participate and cheer on your favorite professional crews and dancers. Check out all types of battles, choreography workshops, even Parkour instruction, and as the days eases into night, check out a special version of 4 Hours of Funk and a Mobtown Ballroom-sponsored dance party with a live jazz band.

Film

Celebrate the return of film to Artscape at the newly opened Parkway Theatre, home of the Maryland Film Festival. On Friday from 6-9 p.m., programming starts with a free feature film, Wet, Hot American Summer. On Saturday and Sunday from 12-6 p.m., a variety of free short films are shown throughout the day with filmmaker Q&A’s.

The Lyric, Theatre Project, The Meyerhoff, and MICA Brown Center

An Argentinian dance company that blends precise footwork, drumming, and a 17th-century style South American song, Che Malambo brings their fast-paced footwork and traditional drumming to the Modell Performing Arts Center at the Lyric (Saturday and Sunday, 1 and 6 p.m., 140 W. Mount Royal Ave.).

Per usual, Theatre Project presents dance performances, including a Dirty Dancing tribute (Saturday 12:30-2 p.m., 45 Preston St.), where you can audition to join the company.

In addition to the BSO presenting a concert of classical favorites, the Meyerhoff (1212 Cathedral St.) will also host the Dunbar High School Alumni Jazz Band, the Polytechnic Institute Extradition Step Team, and the Baltimore City College “Knights of Jazz.”

The Brown Center at the Maryland Institute College of Art (1301 Mount Royal Ave.) features a broad-reaching program, including the Victoria Piano Trio performing music of the great outdoors by Gershwin and Beethoven (Friday 3:30-4:30 p.m.), Baltimore Concert Opera exploring what makes up an opera with an engaging program for kids (Saturday 3:30-4:30 p.m.), and Full Circle Dance Company presenting a new work based on the experiences of Harriet Tubman (Saturday 6:30-7:30 p.m.).

Pop-Ups

These small but might performances have the advantage of choosing wherever and whenever they want to perform during the festival. And while you might not be able to plan to see them, if you do encounter them, we guarantee you’ll be entertained. It’s an eclectic mix, from Smallfoot, a mysterious giant creature who roams Artscape and drum students from the BSO’s OrchKids program to belly dancers, a dance crew, and the skating wizards of It’s My Skate Night.

Street Theater

Experience an unbelievable performance from Dimitri Reeves, who’s won acclaim as a Michael Jackson impersonator (Friday 8-9 p.m.). On Satuday, check out Spirit of Ma’at, (11:30 a.m.-12p.m.) a Baltimore based troupe that mixes traditional belly dance with hip-hop, African and modern dance, and a showcase by Bmore Than Dance and Follow the Art (7-7:30 p.m.) that features of a variety of dance styles including popping, b-boy, ballet, tap and modern hip-hop. And on Sunday, Tradiciones Bolivianans (2:30 – 3:30 p.m.) take festival-goers on a trip to South America.

Visual Art

Undesign the Redline Exhibit
Through July 9, Gallery CA, 440 E. Oliver St. This interactive exhibit connecs the intentional, systematic housing segregation by race of the 1930s to the political and social issues of today through the powerful narratives of the people and communities affected by redlining—the practice of restricting access to credit for prospective homebuyers based on the demographics (particularly race) of the community they want to buy into.

The Dog & Pony Show
Through July 30, Area 405, 405 E. Oliver St. During its 12-year run, The Janet & Walter Sondheim Prize has generated an elite alumni of visual arts from the Baltimore/Washington region. This new exhibit at Area 405 (whose own director Stewart Watson is one such esteemed alumnus) recognizes those who have been previously selected as Sondheim finalists as a community of high achieving visual artists. The exhibit at Area 405 is curated by Watson, and Cara Ober, Editor of BmoreArt and is designed to celebrate the award and the evolving careers of former finalists.

Through the Layers Pt. 1 at Terrault
July 8-29, 218 W. Saratoga St., Third Floor. Antonio McAfee’s fascinating work made him the winner of Terrault’s juried art show earlier this year. In this exhibit, McAfee appropriates photographs from W.E.B. Du Bois and Thomas Calloway’s Exhibition of American Negroes (1900) into various 3D images and collages, attempting to provide alternate ways to see black figures, ways that allow for the subjects to have multitudes of possibilities, real and imagined within a still image. 

The Weight of Absence
Through Aug. 13, Goucher College’s Rosenberg Gallery, 1021 Dulaney Valley Rd. The architectural drawings that artist Erin Fostel is working on came about through grieving the loss of her father in 2014. He was an architect who enjoyed exploration, always interested in finding new ways to get from here to there. She wanted to create a body of work that served as both a commemoration of his life, and a relief from the heartbreak of his death, so she started exploring parts of Baltimore City she did not know well. At some point, she began taking photographs of certain buildings and structures that caught her attention, ones she thought would have been of interest to her dad. These ruminations, explorations, and photographs have become the foundation for her new body of work.

S33 Studio Biennial/Ursula Populoh/Giulia Livi
School 33 Art Center, 1427 Light St. Three new shows open at School 33 this month, including an exhibition that highlights the work of the studio artists in residence there, including Taha Heydari, Cheeny Celebrado-Royer, and Lynn Cazabon. And catch solo exhibits by fiber artist Ursual Populoh, and Giulia Livi, whose geometric objects and paintings utilize materiality to investigate light, form, and the weirdly functional. 

Performing Arts

Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s New Music Festival
July 13-15, various locations. This inaugural event has the BSO musicians performing at new, unique venues—like pizza favorite Joe Squared on North Avenue. There’s also a concert that features two BSO premieres by Polish composer and soprano Agata Zubel, as well as the World Premiere of Syrian-American composer Malek Jandali’s The Silent Ocean. And as an added bonus, all of the composers featured in the festival will be in attendance so you can say you’ve brushed elbows with true creative geniuses.

Tick Tick Boom at StillPointe Theatre
July 14-28, 1825 N. Charles St. You likely know Jonathan Larson from his epic, Broadway-changing musical Rent—but you might not know its intimate, autobiographical predecessor. This deeply personal peek into the life of an artist follows one man’s journey to define success on his own terms. 

News

Doors Open Baltimore, the architectural tour that showcases all things eclectic, historic, and truly Baltimore, is expanding to two full days this fall. Locations range from returning favorite the Arabber Center, a must-see attraction at one of the country’s last remaining locations for this African-American folk tradition and Charm City Meadworks, Baltimore City’s only meadery and the event’s newest addition, which will be open for tours and tastings of mead, a honey-based historic beverage similar to wine.

After more than 10 years of serving emerging artists, collectors and the Baltimore community at large, Jordan Faye Contemporary is closing its doors at the Maryland Art Place building at 218 W Saratoga Street, effective July 28th. “What an incredible journey it has been,” founder and director Jordan Faye Block wrote in an e-mail. “Never did I think, when I moved here from a small college town in New Hampshire 14 years ago, that I would fall so in love with this city – its culture, its visionary people, its architecture & the art community.” Block said she is exploring options for a new venture within the city.

The owners and operators of downtown Baltimore’s Platform Gallery—Abigail Paris and Lydia Petit—have announced they are handing over the reigns of the exhibition space to Baltimore Youth Arts, an artist-run, after school program that provides artistic and professional opportunities to youth, ages 14-22. “We could not be more thrilled to have this location and space occupied by a cause that is so crucial to the community, and we encourage everyone who supported us to continue to attend the events they hold,” Petit and Parish wrote in a statement.

UPDATE: 7/16/2017

FORCE: Cindy Cheng has won the 2017 Janet & Walter Sondheim Artscape Prize at a ceremony at the Walters Art Museum.

Cheng, who teaches drawing at the Maryland Institute College of Art, creates complex constructions and installations that investigate the relationship between drawings and objects and are incubators for history, memory and reflections on the physical and abstract self. Her work has been the focus of shows in Baltimore, Toronto, and later this year in Portland, Oregon. 

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Every year, the arts community waits anxiously for the announcement of the finalists for the Janet and Walter Sondheim Artscape Prize, the city’s largest visual art award that brings with it a $25,000 fellowship.

And each summer, those finalists exhibit their work at a show that is one of the highlights of the summer, showcasing the depth and range of artistic excellence in the Baltimore and Washington D.C. region (this year, all seven artists are Charm City residents). This show also gives visitors the rare treat of seeing contemporary art displayed at The Walters Art Museum, which has a collection that mostly predates the 20th century.

As is typically the case, this show—which opens to the public on Saturday, June 17—is markedly different from last year’s, which dealt with themes including sexual violence, the inequalities of the African-American experience, and our relationship with the environment. This crop of winners is just as varied, but even if the subject is serious in nature—for example, the value of personal information in commercial culture, and the inability of art to capture reality, the artist explores it in a bright, lively, even playful, way that draws the viewer further in.

Mequitta Ahuja
Ahuja’s newest paintings are self-portraits, but that doesn’t mean they’re just about her. She uses figurative painting as a way to explore conventions over centuries, and her work finds inspiration in the symbolism of early American art. “My work is a form of tribute, analysis, and intervention,” Ahuja said in her artist statement, “by positioning a woman of color as primary picture-maker, in whose hands the figurative tradition is refashioned.”

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Mary Anne Arntzen
Several forms dominate Arntzen’s canvasses—interlocking tubes, repeating stripes, and folded chevron shapes to name a few. Her work resembles sections of a quilt as they repeat and mirror each other across square frames. “The physical state of paint is crucial to my process: I paint thickly then thinly, dig through, wipe off, and repaint,” Arntzen said in her artist statement. “I braid painted marks together like strands of rope or allow them to misbehave, taking on the chaos of knotted strings.”

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Cindy Cheng
Cheng’s practice is based on drawing, but her work also takes on a form that merges sculpture and assemblage. “By creating works that incorporate thoughtfulness with a sense of play and optimism, I hope to make my practice accessible to anyone who cares to spend time with the work,” Cheng said. Take, for example, the work above, Untitled (Straight and Narrow), which incorporates foam, sawdust, and plexiglass along with ceramic figures made by Cheng herself.

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Sara Dittrich
Dittrich wants to give viewers a renewed awareness of their bodies. For example, she wore enormous celluclay and foam feet and hands she fashioned and shot pictures of herself moving haphazardly, which became the work Arrhythmia of the Body #1-20. As she said in her artist statement, she “uses devices such as repetition, absurdity, and collaboration to filter in the physical rhythms and movments of the body created by the accumulation of footsteps, breaths, and heartbeats.” 

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Benjamin Kelley
Using four seemingly unrelated events—including the fossilization of a tree in a peat bog, astronauts departing for a space mission in 1995, and the opening of the Walters in 1934—Kelley explores how objects were shaped by these happenings and became relics. Take, for instance, his piece Residual Evolutions, (above) which incorporates a cylindrical tube that runs along one gallery wall, containing an ancient bog oak and the right glove from an astronaut’s space suit.

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Kyle Tata
Tata’s newest work utilizes patters derived from security-tinted envelopes, which he uses to mask film images. It gives the effect of seeing figures and colors through a screen. “This series investigates the notion that within an increasingly immaterial culture, personal information can become as valuable as currency,” Tata said in his artist statement.

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Amy Yee
“I’m interested in the failure of art,” Yee says matter-of-factly in her artist statement. She’s also curious about art objects and the problems they run into when pretending to be “the real thing,” and she wants the media she works with to clash with the subject matter. Like her piece The Field (Arranged), where she has organized on shelves Giant-brand Kleenex boxes that have a design of waving grass. The white Kleenex peak out of the boxes, mimicking the grass. 

The finalists’ exhibit is on view until August 13.

Cue the giant sculptural campfire, the Adirondack chairs, the dance socials—and, apparently, performances by a Gypsy punk band and a kick-ass female drummer.

Gogol Bordello will headline this year’s camp-themed Artscape, performing on Saturday. The night before, legendary R&B and funk performer Sheila E. (“Glamorous Life”, anyone?) takes the stage, and Sunday features soul group Robert Randolph & The Family Band.

“Artscape is one of the most exciting things we do in the city every single year,” said Mayor Catherine Pugh at the press conference announcement at the Parkway Theatre today. 

Camp Artscape: Adventure Awaits—as the country’s largest free arts festival is being designated this year—runs from July 21-23. And there are plenty of features that are on theme—from a “camp site” on Charles Street where festival-goers can taste camp-inspired eats and connect with fellow “campers” to a whole installation devoted to “dance camp” where you can live out your summer stock dreams in a workshop or catch a high-energy performance.

And, of course, there will be plenty of the old favorites—the artists’ market that lines West Mount Royal Avenue, street performers, concerts from the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and OrchKids. Plus, there’s food from 100-percent Maryland food vendors and, new this year, the beers will also be 100-percent local, including selections from Flying Dog, Heavy Seas, Union Craft, and The Brewer’s Art. 

“It’s great because it’s right in our backyard,” says Tom Creegan, co-owner of The Brewer’s Art. “It’s been a trend that’s been building for a long time and the people at BOPA have really taken notice. I’m glad they’re seeing the plethora of really awesome products available and are choosing to highlight them along with all of the local artists.”

As for new features, the Parkway will host a free feature film and short films, Argentinian dance phenom Che Malambo will perform at the Lyric, and a portable gallery will showcase the work of Brian High, a junior at the Baltimore Design School, at the median of Mount Royal Avenue.

Add to that sets by Ama Chandra, Baltimore rockers Super City, and 15-year-old rapper Faame Emanuel, plus pop-up performances and art shows around the city, and Artscape promises to be the same sweat-soaked, mind-blowing, city-wide party that is always a highlight of the summer. 

Exhibits

Artists for Truth Benefit Exhibition
June 2-23, SpaceCamp Gallery, 16 W. North Ave.  Some of Baltimore’s greatest artistic minds have come together to form a fundraising and educational platform they called Artists For Truth. They aim to support information literacy and freedoms, and to explore the artist’s role in amplifying, reflecting, and addressing societal concerns. Their exhibition at SpaceCamp features 250 artworks by 150 artists, hailing from Baltimore and across the United States, and the works will all be for sale through a silent auction. The exhibition will raise funds for organizations that work to combat the spread of misinformation, teach news literacy, ensure the right to share and access factual information, and protect the rights of truth-tellers in our democracy. Proceeds from the auction benefit Enoch Pratt Free Library (Baltimore), Baltimore Action Legal Team (Baltimore), News Literacy Project (Bethesda), and the Center for Media Justice (Oakland, CA).    

2017 Sondheim Artscape Prize Finalists Exhibition Opening
June 17-Aug. 13, The Walters Art Museum, 600 N. Charles St. The finalists for the city’s top visual art prize never fail to astound and inspire. Each year for the past 12 years, this acclaimed group from the greater Baltimore region is showcased at an exhibit as they vie for a $25,000 fellowship. This year’s finalists are Mequitta Ahuja, Mary Anne Arntzen, Cindy Cheng, Sara Dittrich, Benjamin Kelley, Kyle Tata and Amy Yee. The competition winner will be announced during an award ceremony and reception on Saturday, July 15.

Deconstructed
June 10-July 1, Terrault Contemporary, 218 W. Saratoga St. 3rd Floor  Whether temporary, permanent or in this context imagined, humankind has been making structures as long as we’ve existed. These structures mark time, history and memories, sometimes functional and others monumental. The artists in Deconstructed, which is curated by Esther Ruiz, all employ their individual aesthetic in making their own “structures”. Borrowing likeness from household items, architecture, formalism, symbols, and found materials, these artists deconstruct preconceived elements of structure to create distinct visual languages. At times combining the familiar with the unfamiliar and juxtaposing abstraction with representation while deconstructing defined uses of material, scale and imagery. 

‘Sindikit presents Lauren Davies and Melissa Webb
Through July 1, 405 E. Oliver St.  Check out the work of Joan Mitchell Foundation Award winner Lauren Davis, and Melissa Webb, who is presenting her first new installation work since she started facilitating and curating exhibitions as exhibitions manager at School 33.

Murmurs: New Works by Lydia Petit
June 10, Hotel Indigo, 24 W. Franklin St. Check out the latest works from Platform Gallery co-founder Lydia Petit, curated by Maryland Art Place’s Amy Cavanaugh Royce.

Events

Highlandtown’s Inaugural Art Walk
Friday, June 2, various locations  Baltimore’s east side arts district is the latest area to encourage cultural appreciation with a stroll through its many galleries and cultural centers. Stop by Y:ART for a solo show by abstract painter Effie Gereny, or check out Highlandtown Gallery’s Our Baltimore show, which showcases all things Charm City.

West Baltimore Celebrates 10th Boundary Block Party
June 3, Pennsylvania Avenue Triangle Park, Fremont and Pennsylvania Ave.  Organized by the The No Boundaries Coalition, and Pennsylvania Avenue’s own community arts program, Jubilee Arts, the Boundary Block Party is an annual event the brings residents in the 21217 zip code together across race and class lines. The block party will feature marching bands, local music acts Eze Jackson, Mova Dween, and About The Flute Maker, face painting, mural painting, a community-run produce stall, free food and voter registration.

Books In Bloom: The Inaugural Book Festival of Downtown Columbia
June 11, Merriweather Park at Symphony Woods, Little Patuxent Parkway, Columbia As part of Columbia’s 50th anniversary celebration, this new festival will brings together some of the country’s best and brightest writers for a daylong festival celebrating the joy of books and reading. Attend readings by Baltimore’s own April Ryan, panel discussions, a poetry wall, and pop-up bookstore by Politics & Prose.

The Storyteller Series: An Acoustic Evening at Cask & Grain
June 21, 2823 O’Donnell St. Last month, new Canton restaurant hot spot Cask & Grain introduced its Storytellers Series, which features acoustic performances by local and regional artists. This second event will highlight the soulful blues of Maryland native Jordan Sokel of the Annapolis-based trio Pressing Strings. Guests enjoy a three-course dinner with beverages served a la carte in the upstairs dining room.

BmoreArt Panel with ARTS.BLACK
June 24, The Motor House, 120 W. North Ave.  This second iteration of BmoreArt’s discussion series will focus on ARTS.BLACK and its founding editors Jessica Lynne and Taylore Renee Aldridge. Arts.Black is a journal of art criticism from Black perspectives predicated on the belief that art criticism should be an accessible dialogue—a tool through which we question, celebrate, and talk back to the global world of contemporary art.

Performances

Flock of Dimes and Amy Reid
June 8, Ottobar, 2549 N. Howard St. Jenn Wassner is one of the powerhouses of Baltimore’s music scene, with her Joni Mitchell-esque introspective lyrics and her soulful alto. Her solo project Flock of Dimes is showcased at the Ottobar, along with Chiffon’s Amy Reid. 

Maryland Traditions Folklife Festival
June 10, Creative Alliance, 3134 Eastern Ave. This celebration of Maryland’s many cultures is one of the most unique and fun events of the year. This year, learn Native American round dancing, hear the story of Baltimore jazz, and experience the beauty of Beijing opera, among many, many more participatory activities and performances. The festival was created 16 years ago by folklorists Elaine Eff and Rory Turner  as part of the Maryland State Arts Council‘s longstanding folklife program, Maryland Traditions works to identify, support, and present Maryland folklife from the Appalachian Mountains to the Chesapeake Bay.

ART/SOUND/NOW
June 22, The Walters Art Museum, 600 N. Charles St. This innovative experience brings live performance into the galleries on fourth Thursday nights in the summer. Experience the collections in new ways as musicians provide intriguing soundscapes in the galleries for one night only. Pop and electronic artist Pangelica will explore our emotional attachments to inanimate objects and the hidden sacrifice of luxury in the museum’s Treasury, while jazz bassist Jeron White, trumpeter Brandon Woody, and drummer Kweku Sumbry will reflect on the pluralism of cultures and beliefs represented in the Walters’ Icons gallery, which houses Jewish, Ethiopian Christian, and Eastern Orthodox objects. 

News

• Bill Gilmore, chief executive officer of the Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts (BOPA), announced today that he will resign after 37 years with the organization. To ensure continuity during this transition, Gilmore will remain on board until his replacement has been chosen. BOPA, a nonprofit 501 (c)(3), is the city’s arts council, events center and film office. “It has been an honor and a pleasure to work with Team BOPA, the most outstanding and dedicated staff on planet Earth. The work that we have accomplished together has had a profound, long lasting and positive effect on the City of Baltimore,” said Bill Gilmore.
Gilmore began his career at the organization as a graphic designer. Under his leadership, BOPA has produced nationally renowned events such as Artscape and Light City along with the Baltimore Farmers’ Market & Bazaar, the holiday celebrations for New Year’s Eve and Fourth of July, the unveiling of public art including sculptures of Governor William Donald Schaefer, musician Frank Zappa and Orioles Hall-of-Famer Brooks Robinson as well as various parades. He was also the founder of the Baltimore Book Festival, and originated Free Fall Baltimore, providing citywide cultural access for the month of October.

• Baltimore Design School, Maryland’s only school dedicated to preparing middle and high school students for careers in design, will graduate its first class of seniors on Saturday, June 3. This marks a major milestone for the school, which provides an innovative model in which design and creative problem-solving pervades and informs all aspects of the rigorous curriculum. Each of the 36 graduating seniors has been accepted to a two- or four-year higher education institution, many with scholarships. BDS graduates will be primed to become designers and architects who see design as a way of living an ethical, productive, and rewarding life.

Susan Alcorn was at a hair salon when she got the call. And when she heard the news, she was dumbfounded.

Alcorn, the noted Baltimore pedal steel guitarist, had won the top, $40,000-prize at this year’s Baker Artist Awards, which recognize artists in any medium who reside in Baltimore City and five surrounding counties.

 “All of a sudden, your reality changes,” Alcorn said. “Now, it’s ‘What am I going to do now, and with all this money?’”

Alcorn is being recognized along with five other artists, who won $10,000 prizes: dancer Naoko Maeshiba (who was also a recipient last year), visual artist David Marion, filmmaker Theo Anthony, writer Elizabeth Dickinson, and interdisciplinary artist Sara Dittrich.

Alcorn said she was first attracted to the steel guitar by its floating, iridescent sound. “There’s just something magical about it that drew me to it,” she says. “As my relationship with the steel guitar has progressed, I listen to the instrument more and try to feel what it’s telling me.”

She started playing in bands that specialized in pop, country, and western music, where the instrument is more commonly heard, but soon found herself pulled into the worlds of free jazz and experimental classical music. Alcorn has released six albums and toured the world, collaborating with artists from a variety of genres (including the Baltimore Boom Bap Society).

In addition to sprucing up her home studio, Alcorn said she will use the prize money to start a collaboration with Swedish singer Hanna Olivegren.

It’s exciting “to get recognition here in Baltimore from my colleagues and the arts community,” she said. “This process was validating in ways I didn’t imagine.”

The 2017 Baker Artist Awards: An Artworks Special airs on MPT-HD Saturday, May 27, at 8 p.m. and on MPT2 on Sunday, May 28 at 6:30 a.m.

Mark Bradford stands in front of a wall where his sweeping, detailed, rough-hewn mixed-media work Go Tell It On the Mountain hangs. He is telling a man holding a large camera about the duality of this piece.

While there’s a lightness, there’s also strength, says Bradford, the famed Los Angeles-based painter. “That’s kind of all of us right now. There’s a vulnerability in the air, a fragileness, an uncertainty, unease. There will be bad times, but there will be good times, too.”

Bradford might be standing in front of one person in Venice, Italy, but in reality, he is on the world’s stage—and so, in turn, is the Baltimore Museum of Art. Bradford’s work makes up the U.S. Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, the world’s preeminent art show, which opens Saturday.

Right alongside him are 11 BMA staff members, including director Christopher Bedford, who captured this conversation for his own social media followers. They have been tasked with presenting Bradford’s work—which includes two sculptures, six canvases, and a video—to the world at the art event that occurs every two years, and where 86 nations will compete for the prized Golden Lion awards that will be handed out on Saturday to the best pavilion and best individual artist.

“The great appeal to us at the BMA is that everybody who’s important to us as well as people we would never know see this exhibition,” Bedford said previously about his staff’s role at the Biennale.

Bedford also called Bradford the ideal artist to represent the U.S. “He belongs to a peer group of principally black, American artists who have changed the way that we collectively think about social change as precipitated by the actions of artists.”

Baltimore has another reason to be proud at this year’s Biennale. Famed Baltimore filmmaker John Waters has contributed art to the Biennale’s centerpiece, Vive Arte Viva, along with 119 artists from around the world.

The BMA presented the U.S. entry into the competition once before, in 1960. The storied Baltimore institution is co-presenting the U.S. Pavilion with the U.S. State Department and the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University, which Bedford headed before moving to Baltimore last August.

Along with the staff members, who are staying in Venice for periods ranging from days to weeks, members of the board of trustees and donors will attend Saturday’s opening.

Baltimore will get the opportunity to see Bradford’s work in September 2018, after the Biennale closes in November. Bedford says there will likely be a social component to Bradford’s work as well.

Bedford said his aim is for the Biennale to further the role of the BMA in the world.

“I have full confidence that Mark’s show will be one of the extraordinary events in Venice in 2017, so I would like a broad public acknowledgement of Mark’s greatness and of the BMA’s instrumental role in advancing that in the world,” Bedford said. “I hope that this sets the bar for us so that there is this level of national and international attention very regularly.” 

Events

True Laurels Issue 02 Celebration
May 5, New Beginnings Barbershop, 1047 Hollins St.  On Friday May 5, 2017 Baltimore-based and focused zine True Laurels—which has been featured in The Fader and Nylon—will be celebrating the release of its second issue. The launch takes place at Sowebo-based barbershop and gallery space, New Beginnings. The event will give attendees the first chance to read and purchase the issue, which like its predecessor, features stories on some of the most captivating musical and visual artists of Baltimore City and beyond. The event will not only give a first look at the issue but also display work from artists featured. 

The Milkshake Band’s Pre-Mom’s Day Concert
May 13, Creative Alliace, 3134 Eastern Ave. The beloved kids’ band is also hosting a mini-activist fair as part of their Celebrate Mom’s Concert. Kids can have their face painted and make Mother’s Day cards for mom, and even get their picture taken with Moo, Milkshake’s mascot. Moms can check out some great non-profit organizations to connect with. Every mom also gets a flower and some chocolates, and if you bring a diaper and/or diaper ointment donation for Share Baby, an organization that provides baby gear to community organizations, and you can get a free Milkshake CD.

In-Gallery Conversation: Jack Whitten & Katy Siegel
May 20, Baltimore Museum of Art, 10 Art Museum Drive  One of America’s most renowned abstract painters, Jack Whitten, joins BMA senior programming and research curator Katy Siegel in a thought-provoking conversation about the trajectory of social abstraction, and specifically Black abstraction, from the post-War years. They’ll also discuss Whitten’s work to the contemporary, and the work of Mark Bradford.

Performances

An Evening With Snail Mail
May 16, WTMD studios, 1 Olympic Place, Towson  At this year’s South by Southwest, everybody was talking about a three-piece rock band from Baltimore named Snail Mail. Pitchfork raved about them, and awarded them Best New Track. In a profile of Snail Mail’s singer, Lindsey Jordan, Pitchfork called her “the wisest teenage indie rocker we know.” On Tuesday May 16, see Snail Mail live, a week before they set off on their first big national tour. 

H.T. Darling’s Incredible Musaeum Presents: The Treasures of New Galapagos, Astonishing Acquisitions from the Perisphere Through May 14, The Peale Museum, 225 Holliday St.  In this new immersive theater work by the inventive Submersive Productions, H.T. Darling is a high-society explorer who has just returned from an expedition to an area of outer space, “The Perisphere,” and a planet he calls New Galapagos. Darling will share his curious discoveries at The Musaeum, where each audience member choses their own path through the evening’s strange events.

Psycho Beach Party May 19-June 16, Stillpointe Theatre, 1823 N. Charles St.  Psycho Beach Party” is a manic party-mix of 50’s psychological thrillers, 60’s beach movies, and 70’s slasher films. The story focuses on Chicklet Forrest, a 16-year old tomboy who’s desperate to be part of the in-crowd of Malibu beach surfers. She’s the typical American girl – except for one little problem: her personality is split into more slices than a pepperoni pizza.

Exhibits

Young, Black, & Gifted at Gallery CA and Arts Every Day’s Annual Student Art Show Two shows this month showcase powerful, young minds. Young, Black, & Gifted’s purpose is to demonstrate the talent of young black artists in Baltimore. The youth artists of Baltimore Youth Arts want to show their city in a more positive light to address the stigma of youth of color and change the narrative that isn’t reflective of their true identity. They’ve been working with Shan, an award-winning photographer from East Baltimore, to organize the exhibit. (May 5-June 9, Gallery CA, 440 E. Oliver St.)

The exhibition organized by Arts Every Day—which connects Baltimore City public schools to the arts and culture community—features more than 150 pieces art, including sculptures, portraits, quilts, and murals. (Through May 7, The Walters Art Museum, 600 N. Charles St.)

American Made: Mass Production/Mass Incarceration Through May 27, Maryland Art Place, 218 W. Saratoga St.  This exhibition and reading room, curated by students at the Maryland Institute College of Art, showcases photography, zines, video and other visual art forms produced by current and former prisoners that examines concepts of mass production and forced labor in prisons. Work includes videos from the Real News Network presented by Baltimore-based artist Bashi Rose; new drawings by artist Angelo, in collaboration with Chicago-based collective Temporary Services; and posters by New York-based designer and artist Josh MacPhee.

‘Merica and You Can’t Just Draw a Line in the Sand Through June 17, School 33, 1427 Light St.  One of two new exhibitions opening this month at School 33, ‘Merica, a group exhibition, examines and dissects deeply ingrained American iconography such as the American flag and printed U.S. currency. Featured artists Susie Brandt, Wesley Clark, Emily Erb and René Trevino engage in a literal and tactile deconstruction, reconstruction, and/or re-imagining of this imagery in an effort to process the complex, evolving relationships that they themselves and others have with it. The other exhibit, a solo show by David Eassa, uses paintings sculptures, and installations to explore this theme: “Just when you think everything is set in place with a clear trajectory, it seems like something always comes along to flip it all upside down. Your once certain way of being, your tried and true ways of existing within yourself, your environment, and with others… everything is now challenged and called into question. You ask yourself, ‘Where do I go from here?’”

Mattye Hamilton, Peter Smith, Maxine Taylor May 5-28, Hamilton Gallery, 5502 Harford Road  This group show explores the human form, and the process of changing and growing. Through her paintings Mattye Hamilton illustrates the way in which she is connected to her environment. Her works radiate light and teases emotion, and she is drawn to the patterns, colors and figures of daily life. Peter Smith and Maxine Taylor present works depicting the human figure. Their investigations of the human form include works in watercolor, pastel and oil. 

News

Composers Du Yun, who last week was awarded the Pulitzer Prize, and Felipe Lara, hailed for his “voluptuous, elemental lyricism,” will join the artist faculty of the Peabody Conservatory’s highly regarded Composition Department beginning in the fall semester of the 2017-18 academic year. They come to Peabody in the midst of numerous initiatives and developments demonstrating the Conservatory’s renewed commitment to creating, performing, and celebrating the music of our time. “Composition has long been a strength at Peabody, and we are proud to welcome two new faculty artists of such stature as Du Yun and Felipe Lara,” noted Dean Fred Bronstein. “I look forward to seeing how their distinct creative contributions will expand and enhance the work we are doing across the Conservatory in the new music space.”

If you’ve ventured to the woods in Columbia for a concert recently, you probably noticed Merriweather Post Pavilion’s makeover—from sparkling new seats and restrooms to an expanded stage and more concession stands.

Now, even more improvements have arrived as the venue celebrates its 50th anniversary, including a new box office, a stage expansion—including a spinning turntable insert that enables five-minute set changes—and a re-vamped, motel-inspired backstage with two pools, (yes, two pools) so touring artists can relax before show time.

“We’re jumping from the 1960s to the 2020s,” said Brad Canfield, vice president of operations. “The building is 50 years old, so we didn’t want to make it feel too new. A lot of the venues now are just made of big cinder blocks, so we wanted Merriweather to be welcoming, and make it feel like home.”

I.M.P., the Bethesda-based company that owns the 9:30 Club in Washington, D.C., and operates Merriweather, is three years into a five-year, $55-million renovation, and just signed a 40-year lease with Merriweather’s new owners, the Downtown Columbia Arts and Culture Commission. Concert-goers will also notice nine new food options—from General Tso’s pork pops to sweet potato waffle fries—as well as new restrooms and stage lighting.

“The renovation was really necessary, as the infrastructure was literally falling apart,” Canfield said. “Our updates include energy efficient materials and new technology, like LED lighting and devices on the dressing room doors that alert us when a performer has left.”

Merriweather has planned quite the season to celebrate its 50th birthday. Kicking off this weekend, it includes Ryan Adams and Jenny Lewis, Bon Iver, Paul Simon, and John Legend. And, on July 15, the amphitheater will showcase a special 50th birthday concert featuring Jackson Browne (who recorded his famous Running on Empty album live at Merriweather), Willie Nelson, and Rockville native Father John Misty, hosted by Grace Potter.

“When people think of Merriweather’s history, Jackson Browne is right at the top. And Willie Nelson has played here quite a bit over the years,” Canfield said. “It seemed like a natural fit.”

The story of Henrietta Lacks has resonated with people around the world—through an award-winning book by author Rebecca Skloot and most recently, through a movie produced by and starring Oprah Winfrey that premieres this Sunday on HBO.

Now, that story will be immortalized further through a mural that Lacks’ granddaughter, Jeri Lacks Whye, and a Philadelphia-based art studio are working together to bring to life. They’ve also enlisted The Johns Hopkins Hospital, and see the process of creating the mural as a way to start conversations about the tensions between the storied medical institution and the surrounding community.   

“Jeri always says, ‘I just want people to know my grandma,’” says Lizzie Kripke, co-principal artist at Meg Saligman Studio. “Her grandmother is someone who’s a part of all of us now, in a literal way if we’ve had a polio vaccine.”

On January 29, 1951, Hopkins doctors took a biopsy from Henrietta Lacks—wife of a Bethlehem Steel worker—who had an aggressive form of cervical cancer. Though she passed away eight months later, the tissue, used by researchers without her consent, went on to establish the cell line HeLa—the first immortal human cells ever grown in a culture, which have been invaluable to medicine ever since. 

“There’s a lot of beauty in the science and in her life and family, along with the darker side,” Kripke says. “If we can cast things in a positive light, and acknowledge what’s gone wrong but also celebrate what’s gone right, I think that’s a different way to present this.”

She and the Lacks family are still deciding the site for the mural, and Kripke expects that the bulk of the work will take place next year.

“We’ll feature Henrietta Lacks, but it’s not going to be just a picture that memorializes her,” she says. “It’s going to pull lots of elements from the area as well as her life and story.”

The process of designing the mural will include getting Henrietta Lacks’ family, community members, and Hopkins doctors and officials in the same room for discussion.

“We can’t overstate what the art will do, as this story touches on so many interconnected issues,” Kripke says. “But I do think art is effective in getting the ball rolling and shifting culture in one way or another.”

Events

Toward Equity in the Arts
April 13, The Walters Art Museum, 600 N. Charles St.  This talk will examine how race and class have impacted access and inclusion practices for funding, promotion, and exhibition opportunities in the arts, and will look at efforts to improve equity in these areas. The conversation includes Jess Solomon of Art in Praxis, Sheila Gaskings, and Darryl Ratcliff. Jonothan Gray and Chelsea Gilmer will open the evening with performances of their spoken word poetry. The annual lecture is held in honor of the Walters’ founding Director of Education, Ted Low, and focuses on an important current topic in the museum field.

Starts Here Reading Series
April 15, Bird in Hand Coffee Shop, 11 E. 33rd St.  This latest reading in the series hosted by Best of Baltimore winner Jen Michalski features Elise Levin, the director of the MA in Writing program at Johns Hopkins University, and Meghan Kenny, who held the Tickner Writing Fellowship in Baltimore and now lives and teaches in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.     

Bromo Spectacular
April 22, 29, various locations in the Bromo Arts District
These free, 90-minute walking tours of the arts district that includes downtown and the Howard Street corridor will invite people into invisible public spaces and storied buildings while learning about the speculative and spectacular efforts shaping the neighborhood. This free, 90 minute New Public Sites walking tour will feature little known histories, urban design successes and challenges, and current artist-led redevelopment projects, including Le Mondo and Current Space.

Exhibits

Thought Forms
April 20-May 27, C. Grimaldis Gallery, 523 N. Charles St.  This exhibition of paintings by Lisa Beck, Lydia Dona and Joan Waltemath stages the work of these New York artists who have simultaneously developed distinct practices in conceptual abstract painting. They are united by their strategic approach, in which a painting operates as a structural field that animates the subject’s relationship to architecture, machinery, and the universe surrounding it. 

Sacrifice
April 13-May 14, Motor House, 120 W. North Ave.  About this exhibit, artist Rene Trevino writes: “History is subjective; there are many blurred lines and so much distortion.  Context and point of view are very important. One person’s hero is another person’s villain…it depends on who tells the story.  As a gay Mexican-American I have always felt excluded and under-represented by history.  By using a historical context as a backdrop for my work, I can reweave these “lessons” of the past.”

Performances

David London’s Weekend of Magic
April 13-15, Theater Project, 45 W. Preston St.  Magician David London combines magic with storytelling, comedy, puppetry, philosophy, surrealism, and that which cannot be defined, to create original shows of magic unlike anything you have experienced before.

Rise Bmore
April 19, Union Baptist Church, 1219 Druid Hill Ave.  This free evening of words and music, of and for Baltimore, is in honor of Freddie Gray, who died on April 19, 2015. The event starts with a conversation featuring writers Sharea Harris, LOVE the poet, Brittani McNeill, and Hannah V. Sawyerr. The concert that follows features music by Peabody Conservatory professor Judah Adashi, Tariq Al-Sabir, Ruby Fulton, Lafayette Gilchrist, Brooks Long, and Martina Lynch, as well as poetry by Tariq Touré and images by Joseph M. Giordano.  

A Short Reunion
April 20-30, Single Carrot Theatre, 2600 N. Howard St.  For its latest play, Single Carrot is breaking out of its theatre space and onto the streets of Remington. Local businesses have partnered with Single Carrot to help transform this sprawling piece – a Frankenstein hybrid of never-before-seen shorts – into a short walking tour of the neighborhood. Charmington’s, Miller’s Court, Parts & Labor, Sweet 27, B. Willow, and Brick and Board will all be stops on the journey, along with neighborhood landmarks like the Remington ‘R’. In addition to creating new foot traffic and introducing potential customers to the businesses, A Short Reunion will give audience a taste of the complex and changing flavor of the neighborhood as a whole.

Spectral Lines
April 23, Maryland Science Center, 601 Light St.  Digital art, science, and music meet on and under the Planetarium dome. Local artist, Kevin Blackistone, inspired by extrasolar planets, manipulates computer software to create digital art for the Planetarium dome. The immersive visual art is enhanced by live music performed by Baltimore band Wume. 

Charm City Bluegrass Festival
April 29, Druid Hill Park, 900 Druid Park Lake Dr.  This fifth iteration of this celebration of all things bluegrass (and in a stunning setting) has a heck of a lineup, including Supergroup, which blends members of Yonder Mountain String Band and Leftover Salmon, The Lone Bellow, and local boy Cris Jacobs.

News

The Enoch Pratt Free Library announced this week that Heidi Daniel would be taking over as president and chief executive officer. Daniel has served as the executive director of The Public Library of Youngstown and Mahoning County in Ohio since 2012. Daniel called the Pratt “one of the crown jewels of public libraries in the country, and I believe it is an integral part of the future success of Baltimore.”

You might remember that a few months ago we brought you the story of Throw, a documentary that told the story of East Baltimore resident Coffin Nachtmahr, who found acceptance among a subculture of yo-yo “throwers” and it turns out, he’s a virtuoso. He now helps others find a creative and social outlet by sharing what inspired him. Earlier this week, Throw was named as a nominee in the 21st Annual Webby Awards by the International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences. The nomination for the Internet’s highest honor is in the category of Documentary – Branded, where it will be judged against four other films. Other Webby nominees include the Netflix series Stranger Things, Pokemon Go and Beyonce.

The students who are a part of the iRhyme program at  Lakeland Elementary Middle School have done something most of their peers have not—they’ve created and starred in a music video, Guns Weak. And that video won the grand prize earlier this month at an art contest sponsored by Shock Trauma’s Violence Prevention Program. Take a look at it here:

St. Pierre has put together a team of people—including renowned Baltimore musician Dan Deacon, who created the background music—to work on the project. (To see how you, too, can get involved, check this out.)

And perhaps one of the most important parts of the installation doesn’t have anything to do with light or sound, and is something you’ve likely encountered before—a nametag, which visitors will receive when they arrive at the installation. St. Pierre hopes festivalgoers will use this simple tool as a way to get to know one another at the festival.

“There’s this idea of, ‘Hey, I’m not a stranger to you. Talk to me.’ We’re all just in this together,” St Pierre said. “I hope people really walk away feeling they connected on a human level.”

Colors

Music is a natural place to evoke the refraction of light into the colors of the rainbow. Light City performer and gifted local composer George F. Spicka performs inventive piano improvisations like Blue Aeons and Yellow Thoughts, while Baltimore legend Chick Webb leads his jazz band in the lustrous Azure. The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra rounds out this set, with Purple by Michael Torke, conducted by former music director David Zinman. Elsewhere on the list, you’ll find our own masterful maestra, Marin Alsop, conducting the BSO in Bernstein’s sacred yet profane Mass (“God said ‘let there be light,’ . . . and it was goddamn good!”). You’ll also catch her conducting the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra in The Light, by native son Phillip Glass.

Beams

Sprinkled throughout the playlist are radiant tracks, like “Give the World Light,” a gospel-infused number featuring Light City performer Ama Chandra. Besides Ama’s honest and attractive expression, the synthesizer choices really heighten the appeal. Pro-tip: listening with headphones reveals some clever channel-swapping effects that increase the energy of this great tune—terrific work on the part of the producers. Speaking of great synthesizers, Parliament, Portugal. The Man, Ellie Goulding, KSTONE4U, and Faame Emanuel bring the party throughout.

For a little romance, connect with “I’m Beginning to See the Light,” here performed by the Inkspots, along with Ella Fitzgerald’s smooth soubrette. Movie buffs will recognize that it’s the same version heard in Manchester by the Sea. For a trip to true frenzy, try classical music’s rising rockstar, Barbara Hannigan. Her kaleidoscopic performance of Hans Abrahamsen’s “Let Me Tell You” is the epitome of musical storytelling, with brash angles and sinewy curves setting off this powerful text drawn from Shakespeare’s Ophelia in Hamlet. The list wouldn’t be complete without LC 2017 headliner Biz Markie’s popular “Just a Friend.”

Daylight

Could you imagine a Baltimore without Nina Simone? Neither could we. Sit back and enjoy a scintillating remaster of “Here Comes the Sun,” followed by the boistorous bass of Rye Rye’s “Sunshine” remix. Try not to get style whiplash: Next up is Max Richter’s mournful “On the Nature of Daylight” from the motion picture Disconnect, starring Jason Bateman.

Dusk

Doubtless, the most alluring colors of the day fill the sky as the sun sets. Baltimore composer, Peabody faculty member, and music community leader David Smooke lights the evening sky with the iridescent “Dusk,” from his Transgenic Fields for piano. “Dusk” appears on his not-to-be-missed new album, Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death, which features a number of other Charm City artists performing Smooke’s exceptional and essential creations. For something completely different, dusk turns to night in The Dirty Dozen Brass Band’s performance of the classic, “Night Train.” This unconventional acoustic jazz/funk band creates unmistakable and effective train imagery with the snare drum and brass waves in the intro.

For those who love to mix their music with pop culture, the classic tune will bring to mind the background music of the “Under the Sea Dance” in Back to the Future. Sticking with jazz, and in homage to our hometown paper, this set rounds out with Ella Fitzgerald singing “Midnight Sun.”

Moonlight

Discovering new local music is one of the best parts of Light City and one of the most exciting parts of compiling this list. Prog rock ensemble Papadosio was one of the highlights. Check out their 11-minute jam, “Weekend at Bernie Sanders”—the title alone says it all. To follow it up, we go back in time to the soulful and songful “Moonlight in Vermont.” (Bernie would approve.) Oh, and check out the singer: that’s none other than Seth MacFarlane, creator of Family Guy and the voice of Peter, Stewie, and Brian. Can you believe the way he croons? To cap off this final section is Debussy’s Clair de Lune, French for “moonlight,” and the perfect conclusion to the soundtrack for your stroll down this year’s Light Walk. We’ll see you there.