http://www.kentucky.com/arts//index.xml News, sports, and entertainment from Kentucky.com en-us Copyright 2008 Kentucky.com Arts and Life 60 Fri, 18 Jul 2008 03:03:13 EDT http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss McClatchy Interactive's Workbench webmaster@kentucky.com http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/408065.html http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/408065.html Sun, 18 May 2008 18:52 EDT
GEORGETOWN . There is a mythic irony that hovers around art and artists, an unspoken aphorism, that fame will come after life. The mythology of this feeling, however, is just that, an imaginary desire. Death for artists, as with all people, does not equal instant prominence. More often, sadly, it results in being forgotten.

Such is the case with Kentucky artist Will T. Hunleigh. Upon his death in Georgetown in 1916, the portraitist and watercolor artist was remembered in his obituary and .family history as a successful, self-supporting painter who was well-known and well-liked among his .Kentucky peers. His regional .reputation, however, might have faded from public memory except for a happenstance in his artistic circle.

Hunleigh knew and painted .alongside Kentucky's best-loved .artist, Paul Sawyier. Together, they used American Impressionism's love of color and outdoor scenes to capture the unspoiled beauty of turn-of-the-20th-century Kentucky landscapes. One artist soared to art history's heights, while the other languished in collectors' memories.

Until now. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/360949.html http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/360949.html Sun, 30 Mar 2008 15:19 EDT
For all the Hollywood attitude that seems to surround the image and presentation of country music these days, corporate Nashville still doesn't have a clue as to what to do when one of its own defects to Los Angeles.

Take the case of Shooter .Jennings, who shot onto radio three years ago with a smart debut album called Put the .O. Back in Country It mixed West Coast honky-tonk drive, lyrical schemes every hard-living and home-loving country buck could embrace, and a fervent respect for the musical inspirations passed on to him.

For crying out loud, the guy is the only child of Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter. How could he not feel reverence for country music tradition with parentage like that?

But after a pair of studio .follow-ups (the 2006 Southern rock manifesto Electric Rodeo and the new, genre-splitting The Wolf ) and a white-hot concert document ( Live at Irving Plaza 4.18.06 ), the younger Jennings is at a crossroads. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/354516.html http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/354516.html Sat, 22 Mar 2008 19:40 EDT
The first thing to be stressed is that The Punch Brothers is a band.

Well, above that, even, is that its members aren't really brothers, except in spirit. The next thing to understand is that, despite mandolinist Chris Thile's initiative in bringing this new-generation pack of progressively minded, bluegrass-bred string players together, The Punch Brothers is not some fleeting project or pick-up unit the now-former member of Nickel Creek has chosen to spearhead.

.The band is definitely a band,. Thile said. .It's not my band. It's our band..

Admittedly, though, it took a big slab of Thile's music and two other ensemble names to get The Punch Brothers off the ground. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/348428.html http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/348428.html Sun, 16 Mar 2008 10:06 EDT
As the second act of . Arcadia opens, English scholar Bernard is reading to several friends and associates what he thinks will be his career-making speech.

He keeps getting interrupted; when he asks where he was, he receives a variety of responses:

.Game book,. says mathematical biologist Valentine.

.Sex,. says flighty teenager Chloe. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/340329.html http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/340329.html Sun, 09 Mar 2008 10:06 EDT
Mystical and magical, passionate and poetic, Ireland might well have been created by the wave of a sorcerer's wand. The island has a surreal quality; its fields really do seem greener, its mists more diaphanous and its people, wonderfully winsome. Ireland gave the world the potato, the jig and a sinfully rich coffee . not to mention leprechauns, four-leaf clovers and an excuse to drink green beer every March 17.

The gateway to this enchanting island is the West Country . the counties of Clare, Limerick, Galway, Kerry and Tipperary . a region where medieval castles and ancient abbeys crown emerald hills; thatch-roofed inns offer a respite for afternoon tea; unusual stone crosses mark the country's Celtic past, and villages of pastel-colored cottages drip with roses and honeysuckle around every bend of the twisting country lanes.

Castles galore

It would be hard to imagine a more perfect fairy-tale castle than Dromoland in County Clare. The 16th-century castle, now a luxury hotel, was the ancestral home of the O'Briens, direct descendents of Brian Boru, Ireland's beloved 10th-.century monarch. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/334689.html http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/334689.html Mon, 03 Mar 2008 10:07 EST
Occasionally, the Lexington native will say "OK" or "yeah" in reply. She's also sipping coffee and clicking the mouse on a desktop computer.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is the life of an aspiring country music star.

The office is a little house on Nashville's legendary but quaint Music Row. The people on the other ends of the line for the Monday morning conference call are Rhodes' team -- promoters, publicists and managers.

"This town is filled with people who jumped into their cars with a guitar and came here hoping for the best," Rhodes says.]]> http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/327288.html http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/327288.html Sun, 24 Feb 2008 08:37 EST
Growing up in Tennessee and Eastern Kentucky, she figured out at a young age that she wanted to sing.

"It gave me a way to express myself," she says.

That all started nearly two decades ago for Balltrip, who will sing the role of Gretel in the University of Kentucky Opera Theatre's production of Hansel and Gretel this week. Although singing came naturally to Balltrip, she was a long way from opera when she started.

At age 3, when Amanda would put on shows for her friends and family, she told her mom that she wanted to be a rock 'n' roll singer.]]> http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/320959.html http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/320959.html Sun, 17 Feb 2008 08:47 EST
Now, New York-based director Elizabeth A. Herron is trying to take back hip-hop with her production of the play for University of Kentucky Theatre.

"The commercial hip-hop movement is sexualizing women in a way that is really aggressive and demeaning," Herron says.

That's not the entire hip-hop industry, she emphasizes. It's commercial hip-hop that focuses on sex and conspicuous consumption, Herron says.

"There is a very conscious hip-hop movement that's underground," she says.]]> http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/314213.html http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/314213.html Sun, 10 Feb 2008 14:44 EST

The market for books about Abraham Lincoln appears limitless, especially as we approach the bicentennial of Lincoln's birth.


How do you pick?


We took an informal survey of history buffs and Lincoln experts to get some suggestions. Here they are.


Lincoln for fun: A favorite of many of those surveyed is Land of Lincoln by Andrew Ferguson. It's a light-hearted recounting of the Lincoln industry as it is practiced throughout America.
]]> http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/306592.html http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/306592.html Mon, 04 Feb 2008 10:07 EST
The work for orchestra and narrator is one of the signature compositions about our nation's 16th president. But it is hardly the only artistic comment on Honest Abe.

In the near century-and-a-half since Abraham Lincoln's death, in 1865, he has been portrayed on stage and in music by many artists from many angles.

That's appropriate, says Illinois State Historian Tom Schwartz.

"Growing up on the frontier, he was not in a cultural mecca," Schwartz says. "But he quickly gravitated toward books, and he was steeped in the classics," including the Bible, Aesop's Fables and Pilgrim's Progress. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/283148.html http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/283148.html Sun, 13 Jan 2008 08:42 EST
Growing up in Lake Forest, Ill., Robinson started studying piano at age 5, playing by ear the first three years. As a teenager, he became interested in "the sheer power and mechanics of the organ.

"My brother was a musician, and he taught me how to get into the church and turn on the organ," Robinson says.

Robinson seated himself at that console of keyboards, buttons, levers and pedals and acted on some wisdom he now imparts to his students at the University of Kentucky: "Trust the intuitive element. Let yourself be free with this instrument that can seem rather daunting."

He flipped open a hymnal and started to play. If anyone at the Episcopal Church of the Holy Spirit in Lake Forest was annoyed at the surreptitious organ playing, the payoff was a new church organist.]]> http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/271690.html http://www.kentucky.com/arts//story/271690.html Thu, 03 Jan 2008 09:51 EST
There's evolution and change taking place here, and that usually doesn't easily fit into a calendar year. But evolution and change are exciting, so let's see what was going on.

Summer reboot: One of the late-breaking stories of 2006 was the dissolution of the Lexington Shakespeare Festival. The arts community responded in force, filling the summer with events including Actors Guild of Lexington's Shakespeare at Equus Run and SummerFest, a theater event that swooped into the Arboretum to replace the Shakespeare Festival.

The summer also saw the debut of new chamber music festivals at the beginning and end of the season: the Chamber Music Festival of the Bluegrass, featuring the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, at Shakertown; and the Chamber Music Festival of Lexington, featuring Lexington native and Chicago Symphony violinist Nathan Cole, at the Fasig-Tipton Sales Pavilion.

This story will continue to develop in 2008. Actors Guild has already decided to pass this year on presenting a indoor musical -- last summer it did Kiss Me Kate -- and SummerFest will probably look different in its 2008 offerings. We'll keep you posted.]]>