by Michael Janairo

Sandy Hook Students Record “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” Benefit Song

The Associated Press reports:
Children who survived last month’s shooting rampage at Connecticut’s Sandy Hook Elementary School have recorded a version of “Over the Rainbow” to raise money for charity.

Twenty-one children from Newtown, Conn., performed the song Tuesday with singer-songwriter Ingrid Michaelson on ABC’s “Good Morning America.” Most of them are current and former students of the school, where 20 first-graders and six staff members were killed.

They recorded “Over the Rainbow” on Monday at the Fairfield, Conn., home of Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth, two former members of the Talking Heads and Tom Tom Club rock bands. Copies went on sale Tuesday on Amazon and iTunes, with proceeds benefiting the United Way of Western Connecticut and the Newtown Youth Academy.

Read more: http://www.timesunion.com/news/crime/article/Newtown-shooting-survivors-record-song-for-charity-4195164.php

by Michael Janairo

Photos: Xu Bing’s ‘Phoenix’ at Mass MoCA

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By Tim Kane

Stacks of large shipping crates reveal and conceal Xu Bing‘s installation “Phoenix” at Mass MoCA.

With arrows pointed upward, the crates guide and serve as a metaphor for China’s rise on the global stage, yet wall you off from what’s on the other side — two massive talismans representing contemporary China.

The containers are reminiscent of the Great Wall, built centuries ago to keep Mongol invaders out, but, unlike the 5,500-mile wall, they provide a path — albeit circuitous — to two imposing birds, measuring 100 feet long and with a combined weight of nearly 20 tons.

The birds are made from debris Bing collected at a construction site in Beijing amid the flurry of building activity under way in the country. They don’t soar but flutter, almost clanging forward, suggesting China’s ascendancy isn’t a single upward arc. Continue reading →

by Michael Janairo

New York State Writers Institute announces spring 2013 schedule

VISITING WRITER SERIES

February 4 (Monday): The Burian Lecture presented by Colman Domingo, actor, director, and playwright

Seminar – 4:15 p.m., Assembly Hall, Campus Center, Uptown Campus

The Burian Lecture – 8:00 p.m., Recital Hall, Performing Arts Center, Uptown Campus

Colman Domingo, rising star of the American stage, received a 2011 Tony Award nomination for Best Performance in a Broadway Musical for “The Scottsboro Boys.” He wrote and starred in the autobiographical off-Broadway play about 1970s West Philadelphia, “A Boy and His Soul,” winner of the GLAAD and Lucille Lortel awards. His film credits include Spielberg’s Lincoln and Spike Lee’s Red Hook Summer.

Cosponsored by UAlbany’s Theatre Department and funded by the Jarka and Grayce Burian Endowment

February 6 (Wednesday): Jorgen Randers, author and environmental scientist

Reading/Discussion – 7:30 p.m., Lecture Center 7, Academic Podium, Uptown Campus

A founding figure in the new field of “sustainability studies,” Norwegian environmental scientist Jorgen Randers coauthored the enormously influential 1972 book, The Limits to Growth, which predicts that world population growth will ultimately lead to the collapse of the earth’s resources. His new book is 2052: A Global Forecast for the Next Forty Years (2012), a fresh perspective on humanity’s immediate future- or possible futures.

Cosponsored by UAlbany’s School of Business, Office of Environmental Sustainability, Rockefeller College, and College of Computing and Information, as well as the System Dynamics Society Continue reading →

by Michael Janairo

ASO with Yo-Yo Ma @ Palace Theatre, 1/12/13

ALBANY — Sure, it’s only the second week of January, but Saturday night’s Albany Symphony Orchestra performance with Yo-Yo Ma may go down as the concert of the year.

What the sold-out crowd of 2,851 witnessed at the Palace Theatre was a magical combination of “the world’s greatest concert musician,” according to conductor David Alan Miller, and a hometown symphony that continues to be on fire. Over the course of four diverse pieces, audiences were given top-notch musicianship replete with lusty playing by both soloist and orchestra, especially in the three movements and 40 minutes of Antonin Dvorak’s of the immensely crowd-pleasing Cello Concerto in B minor, Op. 104, B. 191.

Continue reading →

by Michael Janairo

Good job, Albany: One weekend, three shows, all sold out

Albanians — pat yourselves on the back.

This weekend, three shows in Albany from wide ranging genres — bluegrass, comedy and classical — have all sold out.

That’s right, John Oliver of Daily Show and Community fame has sold out his comedy show at The Egg tonight; likewise the Gibson Brothers, who were the subject of a great interview by Michael Eck in Thursday’s Preview section. And on Saturday, the Albany Symphony Orchestra with soloist Yo-Yo Ma has sold out its show at the Palace Theater.

So expect restaurants and bars to be busy tonight and Saturday night in and around Albany. Give yourself time to park.

by Michael Janairo

Rock for Recovery at Valentines raises $4,193

Albany promoter Greg Bell of Greg Bell Productions has announced that the two-day Rock for Recovery concert event at Valentine’s raised $4,193 for two charities in regards to the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting.

The proceeds will go to EverRibbon: My Sandy Hook Family Fund, which aims to raise $2.6 million for the 26 families that lost loved ones in the tragedy, and Newtown Youth & Family Services, which provides mental health and support services to children and families.

The Rock for Recovery concerts had featured Conehead Buddha, Dr. Jah and the Love Prophets, Skunk Hostage, The Lucky Jukebox Brigade, Timbre Coup and Way Down on Friday night; and Black Mountain Symphony, Erin Harkes Band, Matt & the Bad Ideas, Sean Rowe, Super 400 and the Hearing Aides on Saturday night.

Valentine’s is located at 17 New Scotland Ave. in Albany.

by Michael Janairo

Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival announces 2013 season

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By Tresca Weinstein

Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blues.

For the 2013 season at Jacob’s Pillow, Executive Director Ella Baff has put together a marriage of dance and theater, classical and contemporary, with each of the traditional wedding-gown elements in place.

Continue reading →

by Michael Janairo

Review: Downton Abbey Season 3

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The more things change … well, that’s it, isn’t it? Things do change, no matter how fervently Lord Grantham and fans of “Downton Abbey” may wish otherwise.

The third season of the justifiably popular British import, created and written by Julian Fellowes, comes to PBS on Sunday with the first of seven new episodes set in 1920.

It is the dawn of a new age, not only for the residents of Downton Abbey, upstairs as well as downstairs, but for England as well. The Great War is over, and society is changing. Women are getting their hair bobbed and wearing their dresses shorter — well, the younger ones anyway: Certainly not the Dowager Countess (Maggie Smith). Continue reading →

by Michael Janairo

Mick LaSalle: Critics and audiences must confront movie violence

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By Mick LaSalle

We enter 2013 with the sickening, dispiriting events in Newtown, Conn., still fresh in mind and yet without much conviction that anything can be done to prevent such future horrors. Obviously, the overriding issue is that we have a gun problem in the United States and a political climate that has been, at least until now, too timid to do anything about it.

But we also have a culture problem, and we know this. We know, because though Newtown shocked us and stopped us in our tracks and continues to haunt our imaginations, it did not surprise us. If the Newtown killings were an act of terrorism, the whole country would be mobilized to protect itself from the Other. But this felt like something from within, not just from within our borders, but from within the soul of the nation. And in talking about matters of the soul, our cultural gatekeepers have been just as timid as our politicians.

Fourteen years ago, Lt. Col. Dave Grossman and Gloria DeGaetano, in “Stop Teaching Our Kids to Kill,” were warning us about the effects of violent video games and movies on young and impressionable minds. They compared the games that kids play with the conditioning that soldiers get in order to desensitize them to killing. They pointed out that by the time children reach adulthood they have witnessed hundreds of thousands of simulated violent deaths and have come to associate witnessing death and mayhem with pleasure.

Continue reading →