Arts and Culture : In The News

La Rose Nightclub in Germantown welcomes teen musicians who want to play jazz, according to Jazz Times.

The Sunday evening jam sessions led by drummer Rob Henderson and jazz promoter Kim Tucker at the La Rose Jazz Club on Germantown Avenue in Philadelphia for the past two years are the epitome of this playful re-enactment of traditional rites of passage between the young and the old, the neophyte and the old head, the apprentice and the master, the eager and the cautious.

Many of the "young ones" come from Cheltenham High School, University of the Arts, Temple University, and the Kimmel Center and Clef Club youth jazz ensembles. Some of the standouts are 19-year-old saxophonist Dahi Divine; 16-year-old pianist Jordan Williams; 11-year-old drummer Nazir Zbo, the little brother of Philly phenom Justin Faulkner; 17-year-old bassist Bruce Ketterer (whose father drives him in from Reading); drummer Ben Singer; and 17-year-old violinist Ben Sutin, whose band has appeared at Chris' Jazz Caf�, one of the few remaining jazz clubs in Philadelphia. Photographers L. David Hinton and Anthony Dean make it a point to be present to document these early moments of what could be the next generation of young lions.

Source: Jazz Times
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The New York Times takes a tourist's road less traveled into Northwest Philly, where visitors get a heaping helping of Philly's quirks and charms in Germantown.

The No. 23 city bus running along the cobblestones is still known as the "trolley,"and you can take it to visit the house where a young Benjamin Franklin stopped for advice on books or to other homes where Revolutionary War battles left powder marks and bloodstains. George Washington slept here, a lot, and decades later so did runaway slaves at a well-preserved stop on the Underground Railroad. There's also a homey lunch spot known for its veggie burger.

Historic sites in Philadelphia (and restaurants that serve veggie burgers) may not seem so notable, but visitors don't often make it to Germantown Avenue, where the trolley runs, preferring instead to brave the crowds at Independence Hall and the National Constitution Center in Center City.

Source: The New York Times
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When Center City's Beaux Arts Video closes its doors for good, a former customer says a long goodbye, according to The Millions.

At first glance, Beaux Arts Video didn't look like much. A cramped storefront on Tenth and Spruce Streets in Philadelphia, it was a few hundred square feet of worn carpet, handmade shelves, and ceilings that dripped when it rained. The front of the shop, bright and neatly kept, was devoted to new releases; a larger, scruffier section, down a short flight of steps, held the rest of its aging stock, VHS to DVD, classics to pure dreck.

Despite its shortcomings, Beaux Arts managed a modest greatness. Its overstuffed racks spoke like an ardent fan who loved Tootsie, Marty, and Zardoz pretty much equally. When my wife and I moved to Philadelphia in the summer of 2001, we found ourselves there most nights, our eyes aglaze with choice. Kirsten browsed upstairs, moving slowly from row to row; I poked around downstairs, searching for something weird: Delicatessen, Logan's Run, maybe A Boy and His Dog.

Source: The Millions
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A Philly newcomer and CNN correspondent writes about where to go and what to see here, including a shout out to Philly Beer Week.

Philly is one of the nation's oldest cities, which means you can walk a lot of places. The majority of the time, walking is the best bet, considering parking can be a nightmare. Pay your meter, otherwise get a ticket or towed. (There's even a reality show about the Parking Authority, and they mean business.) Check out the art on the walls with a walking tour of the Mural Mile to get a distinctive look at the city's charm.

Source: CNN
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A new species of lichen is discovered on a rock in Pennsylvania and is named in honor of a Philadelphia plant expert, according to Science Daily.

A Philadelphia botanist who has studied rare plants for 50 years, but has never attained the honor of having a plant named for him is finally getting his due, but with a barely visible organism so rare it may never be seen again.

Dr. Alfred "Ernie" Schuyler, emeritus curator of botany at the Academy of Natural Sciences and a world expert on rare plants, recently was honored when a colleague discovered a new species of lichen and named it after him. The barely visible lichen (LIE kin), Vezdaea schuyleriana, is known to exist on a single boulder in rural central Pennsylvania, northwest of Lewisburg -- and nowhere else in the world.

Source: Science Daily
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The New York Times reports on the not-quite unanimous move to file for bankruptcy and the spirit of playing on as the Philadelphia Orchestra regroups.

The Philadelphia Orchestra's program Saturday night was to include music from the Berg opera "Lulu," and the ensemble hopes to avoid the protagonist's tawdry end. The board of the Philadelphia Orchestra's program voted Saturday to file for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 11. Unlike Lulu, who died at the hands of Jack the Ripper, the orchestra will live on, rehearsing and continuing to give concerts while a bankruptcy court judges considers the case.

Source: The New York Times
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The Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts is worth a trip to experience the French Arts connection, according to the Baltimore Sun.

If you want to spend April in Paris but can't afford it, a short hop to Philadelphia may at least give you that French feeling.

After nearly three years of planning, the city kicks off the first Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts this weekend, featuring 1,500 artists and 135 exhibits, performances, lectures and films, all paying homage to Paris.

Source: The Baltimore Sun
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Art commemorating the significance of pigeons comes down, while its counterpart, Mobile Museum of Pigeon Culture and History, remains in place at the University of the Arts, according to the UPI.

A display honoring the significance of pigeons in Philadelphia will start coming down Saturday.

Matt Zigler, a North Carolina resident attending the University of the Arts, erected the display in recent weeks, including a shrine-like series of boldly rendered depictions of the birds, where passersby are encouraged to make an offering of bird seed.

Nearby, the "Mobile Museum of Pigeon Culture and History" is still set up, all part of a project tied to Zigler's master's thesis.

Source: UPI
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The USA Today reports the young professional population is on the rise in urban centers, especially in Philadelphia, which saw a 57 percent increase among college-educated 20- and 30-somethings.

In more than two-thirds of the nation's 51 largest cities, the young, college-educated population in the past decade grew twice as fast within 3 miles of the urban center as in the rest of the metropolitan area - up an average 26 percent compared with 13 percent in other parts.

"This is a real glimmer of hope," says Carol Coletta, head of CEOs for Cities, a non-profit consortium of city leaders that commissioned the research. "Clearly, the next generation of Americans is looking for different kinds of lifestyles - walkable, art, culture, entertainment."

Source: USA Today
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Philadelphia singer-songwriter Amos Lee talks about writing and recording Mission Bell in an interview with the Boston Globe.

A certain cookie maker isn't the only entity making the name Amos famous these days. Over the past six years, Philadelphia singer-songwriter Amos Lee has built a following for his beguiling mix of folk, pop, soul, and roots music. That following includes admirers like Bob Dylan, Lucinda Williams, and Willie Nelson.

Lee is currently touring for his fourth album, "Mission Bell,'' which debuted at number one on the Billboard albums chart last month, and features contributions from Williams and Nelson as well as friends like Sam Beam of Iron & Wine, Priscilla Ahn, and veteran timekeeper James Gadson (Marvin Gaye, D'Angelo). We recently chatted with Lee, who plays a sold-out show Sunday at the Wilbur Theatre, by phone from a Michigan tour stop.

Source: The Boston Globe
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Philadelphia's Office of Arts, Culture and Creative Economy boss says underserved neighborhoods will improve with cultural infusion, in an essay Steuer writes in The Huffington Post.

The new Census numbers for Philadelphia are in, and the city managed to actually record a population increase, the first in 50 years. And while the increase was tiny -- 8,456 residents, which represents a .6% increase to 1,536,006 - the reversal of the decades-long decline is huge.

Virtually all the neighborhoods that have seen huge population increases during this ten-year period have also seen large increases in the number of arts organizations and artists living and operating in them.

Source: The Huffington Post
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Actor and rapper Will Smith provided 30 computers to West Philly High School, according to ABC News.

Will Smith is donating replacements for 30 stolen computers to a high school in West Philadelphia, where he was born and raised.

The Will and Jada Smith Family Foundation and the Charlie Mack Cares philanthropic organizations are giving 29 Apple laptops and one desktop to West Philadelphia High School.

Source: ABC News
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New residential construction in Northern Liberties transforms the traditional split-level so that each room expands vertically as well as horizontally, according to Architectural Record.

The Northern Liberties neighborhood, just north of Center City in Philadelphia, used to be a decrepit Rust Belt remnant, but it now attracts the artist crowd. Over the past decade that crowd has come, stayed, become organized, and turned the neighborhood into a vibrant community that honors its local history while allowing a modern sensibility to permeate new design. Architect Kevin Angstadt, principal of Qb³, has completed three projects in the neighborhood, and he says his latest, Split-Level House, could not have been accomplished without the forward-thinking neighborhood association of Northern Liberties.

Source: Architectural Record
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Rock music idol maker Bob Marcucci, who created the careers of Frankie Avalon and Fabian, has died at age 81, according to the New York Times.

Bob Marcucci, who discovered Frankie Avalon and Fabian and helped make them two of the biggest rock 'n' roll stars of the late 1950s and early 1960s and whose career inspired the 1980 film "The Idolmaker," died on March 9 in Ontario, Calif. He was 81 and lived in Los Angeles.

Mr. Marcucci was a lyricist and co-owner of Chancellor Records, a Philadelphia label hungry for a hit, when he first laid eyes on Frankie Avalon in 1957.

Source: The New York Times
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