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Artist Robert Segovia to perform
STAPLES — Artist Robert Segovia will perform songs from his album “When All is Said and Done” from 5-7 p.m. Saturday at the Stomping Grounds in Staples.
‘Flicks on Friday’ film series
CROSBY — Unlimited Learning will be hosting new special interest group called “Flicks on Friday” that will be shown from 1:30 to 4 p.m. on Fridays through Aug. 5 at Heartwood Senior Living Community in Crosby.
The season with open with four of Steven Spielberg films: “Jaws,” “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” “Raiders of the Lost Ark” and “E.T.” Other movies under consideration are “Saving Private Ryan” and “Schindler’s List” if time allows.
There are no fees, all ages from 14 on up are welcome. For more information call George Cowie at 829-6591.
Lakes Area Chamber concert set Sunday
AITKIN — The third annual Lakes Area Chamber Music Festival will present its prelude series concert at 7 p.m. Sunday at Aitkin’s United Methodist Church.
There is no admission fee. The program will include J.S. Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1, Brahms Violin Sonata No. 2, Corelli’s Trio Sonata No. 2, Handel-Halverson’s Passacaglia, Poulenc’s Sonata for Flute and Piano, Vieuxtemps’ Souvenir D’Amerique and von Weber’s Fantasia and Rondo for Clarinet. A reception will follow the concert.
The music will be performed by graduate music students from America’s leading music conservatories. For more information go to www.lakesareamusic.org.
Lakes Area Summer Organ Series concert Wednesday
NISSWA — Laura Raedeke will perform at noon Wednesday at Lutheran Church of the Cross in Nisswa as part of the Lakes Area Summer Organ Recital Series.
Composers to be featured will include Bach, Mendelssohn and Gigout.
Hertzel next author to be featured at library
Laurie Hertzel, the sixth author in the Brainerd Public Library “Brown Bag Lunch” Summer Authors’ Series, will speak at noon Monday.
Participants can bring a bag lunch to this free event sponsored by the Friends of the Brainerd Public Library.
Hertzel’s book “News to Me: Adventures of an Accidental Journalist won the Reader’s Choice Award of the 2011 Minnesota Book Awards.”
It is the adventurous story of Hertzel’s journey into the bustling world of print journalism in the mid-70s. At age 19 she began her 18-year-career at the Duluth News-Tribune in the newsroom. Besides her personal story, it is the story of small-town newspapers struggling with declining readership.
In Duluth, she covered the big stories like the Congdon murders and the establishment of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area as well as the daily news of life. Part of the story is her trips to Petrozavodsk (Duluth’s sister city in the Soviet Union) to write about the life in the Soviet Union and the writing of a book with Mayme Sevander “They Took my Father: Finnish Americans in Stalin’s Russia.”
Currently, Hertzel is the books’ editor for the Star Tribune in Minneapolis.
Book signing event scheduled
BAXTER — Northern Minnesota author Duane Schwartz, who has four published novels and the fifth about to release, will be at a book-signing event from 12-2 p.m. Wednesday at Book World in Baxter.
Schwartz was twice nominated for Minnesota Book Awards and is a two times finalist in the Northeastern Minnesota Book awards. Schwartz was awarded a grant to broaden his readership area from the Minnesota Cultural and Heritage Fund and the Mcknight Foundation.
Schwartz’ new book won’t be out until after the event at Book World. Schwartz will make an appearance and sign his other books, including “Cobb’s Landing,” a tale of a mob-owned resort in northern Minnesota during the days of prohibition, “Calumet,” a novel about the founding of a Mesabi Range town in 1907, “Little Cicero,” a story depicting a modern day range town and the discovery of tunnels beneath its streets that once led from speakeasy to speakeasy during prohibition), and “Fetchenko,” the story of three Minnesota boys who were wrongly convicted of a crime and grow up to seek revenge.
Artist receives People’s Choice Award
NISSWA — David Rickert recently received the People’s Choice Award at the Lake Area Artists’ Art Show in Nisswa on June 23-25. Rickert’s work will appear again at the Lake Area Artists’ 16th annual art show July 28-30 at the Nisswa Community Center.
Intensive convention held
Just or Kix studio in Baxter hosted an Intensive Convention June 21-24 where 120 dancers attended from 13 states across the country. The purpose of the event is to raise the level of dancers’ ability in a short amount of time.
Dancers are exposed to a wide variety of instructors and dance styles including classical ballet, pilates, jazz, contemporary, lyrical, kick, swing, musical theater, modern and hip-hop.
Local teachers were Alexandra Clough, Kelsey Villwock, Brittney Schubert, Adina Balenger, Jody Davis and Carlos Stroia. Other key instructors for St. Cloud and the Minneapolis Metro Area included Davie Le, Hannah Frederick and Tia Bont.
Guest star instructor was Benji Schwimmer, “So You Think You Can Dance” Season 2 champion from California who also is a national West Coast Swing Champion.
Dancers also performed a brief show for their parents at the end of the convention.
Bluegrass in the Bandstand
Mike and Chris Kingery and their family will be performing their style of bluegrass gospel music at 7 p.m. Thursday in the bandstand at Gregory Park.
Rain out location will be the Lakes Area Senior Activity Center in Brainerd. Bandstand performances are a collaboration between the Brainerd Parks and Recreation Department and the senior center.
Orvs Avenue to perform in Staples
STAPLES — Orvs Avenue will present a concert at 7 p.m. Sunday in the Northern Pacific Park as part of the Staples Music in the Park series.
In case of rain, the concerts will be moved to Centennial Auditorium. For more information on the Music in the Park series, check out www.staplesmotleyarts.org.
Orvs Avenue is a rock n’ roll band from Staples Motley High School. They play a wide variety of classics from Elvis and The Beatles, to new age rock. Like a lot of young groups, they began in their parents’ basements and started performing in public two years ago with an appearance at the Relay for Life. Since then, they have performed at school events and the Stomping Grounds Coffee House. The Music in the Park Series is funded by the Staples Host Lions Club. The Series is organized by the Staples Motley Area Arts Council, with Staples Motley Public Schools and the City of Staples.
Final concert of the summer in NYM
NEW YORK MILLS — Texas-based country-rock artist Slaid Cleves will perform at 3 p.m. Sunday at the New York Mills VFW.
This concert is outdoors at the bandshell.
Tickets are $15 advance sale and $18 the day of the concert by calling (218) 385-3339. Doors open at 1 p.m. Michael O’Connor, Austin, Texas-based guitarist and singer-songwriter, will be Slaid’s side man.
Ahoy! Artists on deck
The Crossing Arts Alliance invites the public to attend Artists on Deck, joining art lovers and meeting artists at the Gull Lake Yacht Club on Love Lake Road in Brainerd.
An artists reception will be held from 5-8 p.m. Saturday. Cost is $12, or $10 for TCAA or GLYC members, or $8 for members of both organizations. The exhibition will be open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday.
Sneak peak of ‘An Afternoon in Venice’
Ruthie Gmeinder’s elaborate costumes for “An Afternoon in Venice,” of stylishly designed creations that will be on display Friday through July 29 at The Crossing Arts Alliance’s Q Gallery at Franklin Arts Center in Brainerd. The display will be open from 12-4 p.m. Tuesday through Friday.
The event “An Afternoon in Venice” will take place 1-4 p.m. Oct. 8 at Madden’s Town Hall, with a matinee performance at 2 p.m.
Art displays up at county building
Crow Wing County Community Services purchased the Walker Display System and will be rotating art on a quarterly basis through Sept. 30.
Artists featured will be Evelyn Matthies and Lily Atwel. Matthies has worked in clay, metals, wood cuts, gyotaku, oils, acrylics, watercolors and fibers. Matthies, president of The Crossing Arts Alliance, has taught more than 8,000 students ranging in age from 5 to 85. Atwel works with rubber stamps to create greeting cards. Atwel studied interior design at Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Australia.
Call for Crow Wing County artists
STAPLES — The Five Wings Arts Council will host a display of work by Crow Wing County artists at the Middle Ground Gallery in Staples for the months of August, September and October. All county artists who create two and three-dimensional artworks are invited to participate. The work will be on display in the gallery with a virtual display at www.fwac.org and on the Arts Council’s YouTube channel. A reception for the artists will be in August or September during which a People’s Choice Award will be announced.
For more information call (877) 654-2166 or e-mail fwac@arvig.net for more information.
Music General attends national dance competition
Music General Dancers, along with their families, recently attended Midwest Starz National Dance Competition in Wisconsin Dell, Wis., and returned home as national champions.
The four day event was held at the Kalahari Resort and Waterpark on June 16-19. The competition was host to more than 35 participating studios from Minnesota, Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin and Indiana, and had more than 1,000 routines vying for the national title. Awards were given out to each entry based on a routines’ technique, showmanship, choreography, costuming and overall impression. Dancers were awarded either Platinum (146.5-150) points, High Gold (145-146.4), Gold (143.5-144.9) or Silver (140-143.4) for their efforts.
Music General competed in two divisions, the Preteen division (ages 8-11) and Junior division (ages 12-15) where they performed 34 routines. They took home 27 Platinum awards and five High Gold awards, earning them the Best Studio Record of the event. The competition culminated with the Grand National Finals where the five top scoring routines of the week in each division were chosen to compete for the national title.
Music General’s Crash Test Dummies competed against 122 entries to qualify in the Preteen Division, and the routine “Habanera”, competed against 210 entries to qualify for the Junior Division. Crash Test Dummies, took home the title and was crowned grand national champions, while dancers in “Habanera” were grand nationals first runner-up. Music General also had two soloists crowned grand national champions: Libby Borash, of Baxter, and Savanna Oberfeld, of Isle tied with a score of 148.07 to win the Preteen Division, competing against 127 other soloists in their division.
News from the Jaques Art Center
“Plein Air Revisted” exhibit will open on July 22. Artist Reception will be held noon- 3 p.m. on July 23. Artists will speak at 1 p.m. Come and view the talent of the 2009 and 2010 Jaques Plein Air award winners — Michelle Combs, Jonathan Gaetke, Dianne Lewis, Robert Luedtke & Sue Wipf.
Card making workshop Aug. 26-28
Artist Kathy Kovala will be hosting a watercolor card making workshop Aug. 26-28 at Lake Edward Town Hall. The Christmas Card class fee for 3 days is $175 or $60 per day.
Kovala also will be hosing a weekly watercolor class resume for eight weeks from Aug. 8 to Sept. 28 at Lake Edward Town Hall. Fee for the class is $200 or $30 for individual three hour classes. Time of the class is 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. and for beginners it is 1-4 p.m.
To register for the classes call (715) 360-9929 or 829-1457 or go to Kovola’s webiste
Website kathykovala.com - e-mail kathykovala@msn.com
