December 27, 2017 - MPR News with Tom Weber presents a full program dedicated to James "Cornbread" Harris, Sr. Earlier in 2017, the 90-year-old rock 'n' roll pioneer (also known as Jimmy "Jam" Harris, Jr.'s dad) visited The Current's studios to record an in-studio session with Local Show host Andrea Swensson and MPR News host Tom Weber to kick off their Summer Music Series. Program includes song performances and sharing stories of his life and career.
December 20, 2016 - MPR News with Tom Weber presents a program on The Dakota Access oil pipeline, which winds hundreds of miles from the oil fields of North Dakota to a pipeline hub in southern Illinois. In 2016, it was almost entirely built — except for a section under Lake Oahe, a Missouri River reservoir just south of Bismarck, N.D. Members of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and a coalition of other groups camped out near the site of the river crossing in an effort to stop pipeline construction.
October 23, 2015 - MPR’s Doualy Xaykaothao interviews local playwright May Lee-Yang and poet/playwright Saymoukda Duangphouxay Vongsay about “Hmong-Lao Friendship Play.”
September 30, 2015 - MPR’s Marianne Comb interviews writer and performer Roger Guenveur Smith about his play “Rodney King.” The one-man show, "Rodney King," is performed at Penumbra Theatre in St. Paul.
July 13, 2015 - Next this hour, more arts- but art in Minnesota schools. There's been a lot of talk in Washington about updating the education law known as No Child Left Behind, but that law focuses on math and reading. What about arts education? MPR news has been inviting people from across the state to our studios to talk about several aspects of the arts community today- arts education.
July 2, 2015 - On MPR News with Tom Weber, Tzianeng Vang shares details on The Hmong Freedom Celebration, also known as J4. The annual event at Como Park features a soccer tournament, as well as other sports, activities, traditional Hmong goods for sale, and food. This year the festival holds a little more significance because it was 40 years ago this year that the first Hmong arrived in Minnesota.
April 23, 2015 - On MPR News with Tom Weber, Kao Choua Vue previews Quia Dab Neeg Film Festival, held at Metropolitan State University in St. Paul. The sixth-annual Hmong film festival showcases films produced by Hmong artists from Minnesota, around the country, and from Laos.
February 27, 2015 - This week, a roundtable discussion on what it's like to be a first generation American.
September 10, 2014 - Penumbra Theatre is hosting a conversation about events in Ferguson, Mo., where the killing of an unarmed young black man by a white police officer unleashed demonstrations and racial unrest.
August 19, 2014 - With the announcement of author Louise Erdrich winning National Book Award for book “The Round House,” The Daily Circuit presents a rebroadcast of a 2012 interview with Erdrich about her book. The novel tells the story of a crime on a North Dakota reservation in 1988.