On the evening of Feb. 4, 1932, an eager crowd gathered at the Hoyt Sherman Place auditorium for a recital of spirituals by a man whose bass-baritone voice was already […]
Music history
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Composer Bart Howard, born in Burlington, wrote the definitive song of the space program
From Mount Pleasant’s James Van Allen (“Father of Space Science”) to Beaconsfield’s Peggy Whitson (who holds the U.S. endurance record for most cumulative time in space at 695 days) to […]
Posted inCommunity/News
A cult in Iowa helped hide Yoko Ono’s daughter from her for years: ‘We never talked about my mom and John’
For a pair of prominent anti-war activists, John Lennon and Yoko Ono had many battles to fight in 1971. Upon their move to America, they faced the ire of bitter […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Dubbed the ‘gadget guy’ of jazz, Herbie Hancock used tech to change music forever. He honed his skills in Grinnell
In his last performance in Iowa City, jazz great Herbie Hancock mentioned how he felt “at home in Iowa” because of his years at Grinnell College. For most artists, a […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
An early Velvet Underground ‘protégé,’ Jonathan Richman wrote his way into punk history while trying to troll the hippies
Jonathan Richman can still pinpoint how the Velvet Underground transformed his life with their collar-grabbing sound back in 1967. “It was on record and it was that drone! Oh my […]
Posted inCentral Iowa
Ozzy Osbourne, British rock god known for an infamous show in Des Moines, dies at 76
Ozzy Osbourne has died. Heavy metal’s “Prince of Darkness,” who later had a second career as an avuncular reality TV star, was 76 years old. “It is with more sadness […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Lizzie No knows folk, drawing inspiration from ‘the Lilith Fair girls’ and social justice movements
Lizzie No’s discography is an eclectic mix of everything from country ballads to folksy foot-tappers to alt-rock imbued with righteous anger — the kind of music that perfectly soundtracks a […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
‘A little bit of chaos is OK’: Pokey’s Fest keeps punk music, ethic alive in Iowa City
Punk isn’t dead. Sure, punk is old enough that it may be dad — or mom — but it’s still by and for the kids. For proof of life, one […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Review: Orchestra Iowa conjures an anti-fascist classic in masterful Coralville concert
Orchestra Iowa (previously the Cedar Rapids Symphony Orchestra) presented their next-to-last concert of the season on Sunday, May 18 at the Coralville Center For the Performing Arts. I don’t think it […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Shall we dance? The Magnetic Fields will perform all ‘69 Love Songs’ (including their accidental wedding standard) over two nights at the Englert
Magnetic Fields’ 69 Love Songs (1999) contains two of Stephin Merritt’s most beloved numbers, “The Book of Love” and “Papa Was a Rodeo.” Both have become standards a quarter century […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Behind the ultimate rock-umentary — and its 20th anniversary re-release, ‘Dig! XX’ — is a sister-brother duo with an eye for mad genius
Multi-award-winning filmmaker Ondi Timoner has amassed a wide-ranging body of work about people she calls “impossible visionaries.” Her documentary subjects tend to stray from social convention and take the path […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Peak Iowa: Arthur Russell, Oskaloosa’s lost genius
Tape hung like curtains in Arthur Russell’s apartment. The recording devices responsible were powered by an extension cord that ran out the window and down a few floors to Allen […]
