March 27, 2003 - As we try to understand what's happening in Iraq right now, one Minnesotan watches and listens with a unique perspective. John Hartnett is a veteran of the first Gulf War. He was a Military Police Platoon Commander with the Marines. His job was to round up prisoners on the battlefield and take them to POW compounds in Saudi Arabia. John Hartnett has written a book about his experiences. He says the job was sometimes very stressful.
March 28, 2003 - MPR’s Marianne Combs reports on Chamber Music Society of Minnesota’s presentation of the Midwest premiere of Aleksander Kulisiewicz’s "Camp Songs" - 5 poems from the holocaust set to music.
April 2, 2003 - MPR’s Dan Olson profiles Vern Sutton, a living Minnesota opera legend, who is retiring. Sutton is ending 36 years as a faculty member at the University of Minnesota School of Music. However, Sutton is not leaving the stage. As he explained to Olson, Sutton loves to perform.
April 3, 2003 - All Things Considered’s Lorna Benson talks with folk musician John McCutcheon about his music career, travels, and musical education. McCutcheon says he first considered becoming a professional musician on a trip he took to Appalachia, while he was a student at St. John's University in Collegeville.
April 4, 2003 - There are more than 200 community theatres in Minnesota. The amateur companies are a place where people can express themselves artistically. For many small towns it's the only local live theatre available. But with a sour economy and budget cuts looming, community theatres are braced for cutbacks. Mainstreet Radios Bob Reha reports. <
April 8, 2003 - Mainstreet Radio's Erin Galbally profiles Somali singer Hibo Mohamed Nuur. The Somali superstar is unrecognized by most people in her new home in Rochester. For decades, Nuur's legendary voice drew thousands to concerts from Mogadishu to Toronto. Fans still call her the “James Brown” of Somali music. Nuur is hopeful she'll sing again in Somalia.
April 11, 2003 - Northfield native Siri Hustvedt says her new book called "What I loved," began with a single image. An naked, obese woman's corpse lying on a bed. The image doesn't appear in the novel. But Hustvedt says it launched the process of writing and re-writing which lasted several years. The image morphed into a series of portraits by an artist. One of them attracts the attention of an art historian. These two are the book's central characters. The men become friends, and the novel follows their lives. We learn how their families are changed by their loves and losses over a period of thirty years. Siri Hustvedt told Minnesota Public Radio's Euan Kerr it took a great deal of work to achieve the effect.
April 11, 2003 - On this Word of Mouth program, MPR’s Chris Roberts looks at the Penumbra production of August Wilson’s “Seven Guitars,” Northern Clay Center in Minneapolis hosting the fifth annual American pottery festival, a play adaptation of Sinclair Lewis’s “Main Street” novel, and “Dancing with Shadows” performance art.
April 14, 2003 -
April 21, 2003 - The Cargill Foundation today announced the biggest capital contributions in its history. The foundation is the charitable arm of Minnetonka-based Cargill Corporation, the largest agribusiness company in the United States. The foundation will give 6-point-eight-million dollars to nine Twin Cities arts and civic institutions. Grant recipients include the Walker Art Center, the Mill City Museum, and the Salvation Army of Minneapolis.