OUt and about May 17

There are other events, of course, too, some of which stretch into the next week.

Aspiring illustrators plan to gather in Westport to enjoy the town library’s first comics convention. Musical fans have several year-end concerts to enjoy, including a performance by the Stamford Young Artists Philharmonic. Christine Lavin will make a return to the Edmond Town Hall in Newtown. Jean-Michel Cousteau will be at the Maritime Aquarium early next week. James McCartney (yes, Paul’s son) will be in New Haven. And, Melissa Ferrick will feature songs from her new record during an appearance in Fairfield.

Like the “American Idol(s)” of today, Jenny Lind captured the attention of America back in 1850, during a tour of the country organized by P.T. Barnum. The singer’s influence continues today with Saturday’s Jenny Lind competition that is part of the Barnum Festival. Meanwhile, Danbury band Standby hopes to attract some attention during a release party at Heirloom Arts Theatre. The Connecticut Choral Society delivers some music, as well.

On stage, A.R. Gurney’s “Black Tie” will receive its Connecticut premiere this weekend in Stratford. And community dancers will take to the stage to raise funds for Curtain Call.

Phew! But, wait …

You can see Pilobolus at the Shubert Theater in New Haven. There will be a full weekend for endangered species at Connecticut’s Beardsley Zoo. A parody of “Harry Potter” comes to Hartford. You can see the stars in Stamford or Danbury. Singer Summer Williams will entertain in Bethel. Westfair Singers will put on a concert in Greenwich. The Travelin’ McCourys and Karla Bonoff will be in Mamaroneck, N.Y. The Capitol Theatre will welcome Iron & Wine and Secret Sisters. Or, perhaps it is a spring doo wop you seek. Motley Crue anyone? Soundgarden? Rave On will be in Westport. And, Connecticut Playmakers will begin two weekends of popular hits.

“Connecticut Inventions and Innovations” will open in Bridgeport. Lidia Bastianich and Faith Middleton will be in Simbsury. And Boothe Memorial Park will mark the beginning of a season in style. You can help the Norwalk Seaport Association open its season on Saturday. You can check out Adopt-A-Dog and Westhill High School’s combined cause. Or, you can walk in support of breast cancer research.

Until next time …

P.S. The Bruce Hornsby show, originally scheduled for Sunday, May 19, at the Ridgefield Playhouse has been postponed because the singer is coping with a “persistent vocal issue,” according to the Playhouse. The show has been rescheduled to Sept. 29. A recent news statement indicated that previously purchased tickets will be honored.

At right, a flotilla of small craft fill Niantic Bay off East Lyme, Conn., as the USS Carter Hall is moored offshore Friday, July 6, 2012, to kick off festivities in OpSail 2012. Niantic currently tops the list of “Fan Favorite” towns in a contest sponsored by Connecticut’s Office of Tourism. Voting in the competition ends tomorrow. (photo/The Day, Sean D. Elliot)

It appears the smaller the better when it comes to the voting in Connecticut’s “still revolutionary” campaign to pick the top fan-favorite town or city in the state.

Voting ends tomorrow in the program, which is running on the Visit Connecticut Facebook page. As of this post, Niantic is at the top, followed by Mystic. The remaining towns within the top 15, in order, are Putnam, New Haven, Old Saybrook, Wethersfield, Essex, Hartford, New London, Newtown, Willimantic, Wallingford, Bridgeport, Waterbury and Milford.

The top 10 will enjoy a summer of promotion from the state’s office of tourism.

Niantic has been at the top since the contest began last month. The commitment is high in this small village. You can see that dedication in a video that was made with 34 local businesses and community groups (see below). The competition brings attention to the state’s tourism tagline, “Still Revolutionary,” by asking participants to vote for those places that are known for “original ideas, inspiration and innovation,” according to a recent news release. Further, specific businesses, destinations and attractions within those towns and cities can be designated as the best within the best.

This is the first year the state is seeking a top town. Last year, it only sought destinations and attractions, which enabled several Fairfield County sites to enter the top 10, including Stamford’s Curtain Call, Inc. and Westport’s Levitt Pavilion and Westport Country Playhouse.

For those who prefer the pen-and-paper route, you can mail in your vote by including a first and last name, date of birth, telephone number and email address on a 3×5 card. List a town and destination or business that inspires you and mail it by May 15 to “Connecticut Fan Favorite Town” Sweepstakes, 220 East 42nd St., New York, NY 10017 Attn: Jennifer Kohanim.

Out and about May 10

Growing up, Lucie Arnaz did not have far to go to be surrounded by great musicians and great songwriters, she said recently. Early on, this daughter of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz was exposed to the kind of music that teamed winning melodies with moving lyrics.

Arnaz, a Weston resident, is set to appear in Ridgefield on Friday to share some of these classics of the American songbook, but with a twist. She will deliver them with a Latin flavor, honoring her father’s roots. As she noted in a recent article:

He had such a great love of music that all he did was want us to enjoy it with him

Arnaz is not the only musical act set to entertain this weekend. The Fab Faux will be at the Capitol Theatre. Brian LaBlanc will bring out the Diamond on Saturday. Norwalk singer Tangela Smith gives a hometown show on Saturday, which happens to be the same day that Stanwich Congregational Church offers up a spiritual welcome to spring. Barry Manilow can be found at Mohegan Sun.

There’s plenty more music. The Sherman Chamber Ensemble performs Sunday. Nellie McKay comes to the Emelin. Huey Lewis and The News will be in Tarrytown, N.Y., along with Mary Chapin Carpenter and Shawn Colvin. The Fairfield County Children’s Choir will share “The Miracle of Singing,” while Musicians from Marlboro will share their talent in Greenwich. There also will be a tribute to Chet Baker in Westport.

Robert Dean, Tom Shillue, Mike Epps, Donnell Rawlings, Nazareth, Lily Tomlin and Jodi Weiner are some of the comics making their way to stages throughout the state. On stage you can find “Cirque Ziva,” “Seascape,” “The Dixie Swim Club,” “30! TAW Celebrates,” “Of Mice and Men,” “Beauty and the Beast” and “Showstoppers on Stage” all on area stages.

If you plan to go out, there is the Norwalk Regional Tree Festival and art exhibitions up on display at the Glass House grounds. There is a special evening of art and music planned at the site for Friday. Meanwhile, Connecticut’s Beardsley Zoo is hosting a Mother’s Day event (consider this a reminder: Mother’s Day is Sunday.) The Bartlett Arboretum will be hosting a plant sale, too. Or, even if you plan to stay in, you can hear from someone who has his eyes to the outside. Audubon Greenwich will welcome Alvaro Jaramillo, senior biologist at the San Francisco Bay Bird Observatory, for a talk about birder’s brains.

Dance events include the Center Stage showcase in Stamford, “Dance Across China” in Ridgefield and a performance of “Snow White” in Purchase, N.Y. The visual arts offer up a number of events, as well, including several openings and ongoing shows. These include new shows at the Loft Artists Association, New Canaan Library, Bruce Museum, and Flinn Gallery and Stamford’s Mayor’s Gallery.

If you are looking for a cool day trip, get yourself onto a train into Grand Central to check out the Parade of Trains, just one of many events scheduled this year to honor the terminal’s 100th anniversary.

Until next time …

About 6 miles separate two art openings this evening, meaning, with hustle, you just might be able to catch both.

In Stamford, the Mayor’s Gallery, located on the 10th floor of the Government Center, will host an opening reception for “Visions” an exhibition that features the work of Claudio Altesor, Benjamin Casiano, Rosa Colon, Eddie Nino and Sandra Rossini, who are members of Liber-Art, a one-year-old collective of artists who are looking to foster emerging artists, increase opportunities for display and bring multiple creative disciplines together for events throughout the region.

Rossini, a Stamford artist, offered her thoughts about the group in a recent email:

Creatively, it helps me think outside my comfort zone. I have my favorite style of painting and subjects, but the public exposure has inspired me to explore new methods and be more experimental. …. Professionally, as an artist, I have been able to look at the broader picture, meaning how my art will be viewed in 20-60 years from now. I have been able to recognize styles and change of in my work which have associated with life’s milestones, that has been fun.

When the group gets together for social events, Rossini said it is a time to meet fellow artists and offer them guidance and support. She also meets fellow art enthusiasts who are there for the same reason that she is: “the love of art.”

Rossini will be at the opening and intends to work with the group to keep the community informed on additional upcoming events.

As to the group’s future, she noted:

(I hope) that the building blocks we are setting for artists will someday become the backbone to an influential and positive art movement and channel, within a fast paced modern environment. Advances in technology are wonderful, but creativity is in the core of all individuals.

The reception will run from 5:30 to 7:30 p..m. The show itself will be on display through June 28. Gallery hours are 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday to Friday.

Meanwhile, tonight marks the opening reception for ” Very Short Stories: Conceptual Illustration” at the Flinn Gallery at the Greenwich Library. The show features the work of four artists, including Roz Chast, Leslie Giuliani (see “Playground 2, right), Marc Rosenthal and Jackie Welsh. The show will run through June 19.

The reception will run 6 to 8 p.m. in the gallery, which is located on the second floor of the library. Regular gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday to Wednesday and Friday to Saturday; 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Thursday; and 1 to 5 p.m. Sunday.

Early next week will begin a series of artists’ talks associated with the exhibition, beginning with cartoonist and illustrator Roz Chast, Monday, May 13, at 7 p.m. at the Cole Auditorium.

Lidia Bastianich's Norwalk, Conn., taping

Culinary celebrity Lidia Bastianich is whipping up a brand new television show, set to air in October on public television stations across the country. Bastianich’s new show will coincide with her new cookbook, “Lidia’s Commonsense Italian Cooking.”

All 26 episodes of “Lidia’s Kitchen,” which is being produced by her production company, Tavola Productions, were recently taped at Clarke Showroom and Test Kitchen in Norwalk, Conn. The shoot took just nine days.

In a recent news release, the store’s general manager Sean Clarke said he was honored to have her use the showroom as her studio kitchen, considering she uses her home kitchen in her other cooking shows, which include “Lidia’s Italy in America” and “Lidia’s Italy.”

Clarke’s other appliance showroom in Massachusetts will serve as the studio kitchen for Chef Ming Tsai, who will tape his 11th season for the PBS’ “Simply Ming” this summer. Seven years ago, Clarke produced its own show, “New England Living,” which focused on different areas of New England and featured a cooking demonstration by a local chef.

Clarke began in 1955 when Jim Clarke Sr. opened an appliance store, The Clarke Electric Company in Stamford, according to the company’s website.

“While television is certainly not our core business, we believe in the power of video to communicate and empower,” Clarke noted in the release. “Lidia’s show is totally synergistic with our mission at Clarke. We like to tell our clients that cooking is believing.”

The Avon Theatre of Stamford will welcome back New York radio personality Dennis Elsas for an evening of memories and music when he hosts “Rock ‘N’ Roll Never Forgets,” Tuesday, May 7 at 7:30 p.m.

Elsas last appeared at the Avon on Nov. 7, drawing a crowd despite an early season snowstorm and the after-effects of Superstorm Sandy. Organizers said interest that evening merited a return engagement. The May 7 event will include classic interviews, photographs and recollections of historic moments in radio. Elsas also will conduct a question-and-answer session.

As one of New York’s enduring and well-known radio personalities, Elsas has interviewed many rock greats during his more than 35-year career, including John Lennon, Elton John, Levon Helm, Pete Townshend and Jerry Garcia. Elsas said recently these music greats are just some of the people that he had a chance to meet and interview. Audio and video highlights from those sessions are a major part of the show, he added.

The heart of the show reflects Elsas’ own history and his memories of growing up in the 60′s with Top 40 radio and the personalities that he listened to,  “that unknowingly at the time were shaping my future.”

As he progresses through his college years and the early days of progressive FM radio, he eventually arrives at his long tenure at NYC’s WNEW-FM in the early 1970s.

Elsas, a Queens, N.Y., native, grew up in the 1960s listening to such Top 40 AM radio stations as WABC, WMCA and WINS. By the time he entered college, FM radio was increasingly adopting free-form progressive rock formats and other original programming.

After leaving Queens College, where he helped to establish the campus radio station WQMC, he found work at WVOX in New Rochelle, N.Y., and then, later, set up camp at WNEW-FM, where he would spend 25 years, eventually becoming the station’s music director. For the past 13 years or so, he has anchored the afternoon (2 to 6 p.m.) show at WFUV (90.7). He said the station’s “eclectic format and programming freedom recalls the best features of those early FM  days.”

“Rock ‘N’ Roll Never Forgets” will feature a multimedia presentation of classic interviews, photographs and recollections of historic moments. It has been about six years since he started compiling this history of radio and his career on his website, and about a year since he has taken it on the road.

“When I set up the archives, I found a way to put the information out there,” he said. However, the live shows have given Elsas a way to meet fans and friends who have shared this musical history.

Tickets for the May 7 event are $6 for members (carte blanche members are free), $8 for students and seniors, and $11 for nonmembers. The Avon Theatre is located at 272 Bedford St., Stamford. For more information, call 203-967-3660 or visit avontheatre.org.

Above, the Stamford Museum and Nature Center’s Model Ts to Mustangs outdoor antique and classic car display will take place Saturday, May 4, 2013, and feature many makes and models. However, special attention will be given to Fords this year. For more information, call 203-322-1646 or visit http://www.stamfordmuseum.org. Contributed photo

With the spring blooms having sprung and nice weather on tap for the weekend, it appears to be the time to check out a number of outdoor events planned over the next few days.

Car fans can see how the Model T eventually gave rise to the Mustang, and later Ford models, during the 10th annual classic and antique car show at the Stamford Museum and Nature Center. About 70 cars are expected to roll their way onto the meadow on Saturday, and perhaps pick up a few honors in the process. Flora will be the focus in Fairfield when the 78th annual Dogwood Festival gets under way. There will be music, blossoms, outdoor items to purchase and food to enjoy. KidsFest will bring vendors, activities and inflatables to Ridgefield’ Ballard Park. And Wilton will enjoy a Go Green festival in this season of green.

Of course, there will be music, too, including a special concert at Sacred Heart University in honor of the late actress and singer Patricia Hemenway-Cook. The Greenwich Choral Society will be spreading a bit of “Eternal Joy,” and welcoming back Greenwich native Holly Sorensen. Pacifica Quartet will be in Westport and Rodgers and Hammerstein will be honored with a show in Bridgeport. The Connecticut Master Chorale will put on “A Hungarian Rhapsody” in Newtown. Joni Mitchell’s “Blue” tribute will be staged in Hamden. And, Yale’s Redhot and Blue will perform at the Coastal Chordsmen Barbershop Chorus’ annual show in Stratford.

The weekend continues into next week, with a melding of film and music when the Fairfield Theatre Company hosts a screening of “Stop Making Sense,” the 1984 Talking Heads concert movie. It will help to raise funds for the theater company and WPKn 89.5.

Live productions aimed at a younger audience include “You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown” and “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day” in Fairfield, “Little Mermaid Jr.” in Ridgefield and the “Wizard of Odds” in Bridgeport. Children and families may also want to check out the Victorian tea party that is taking place in Norwalk.

The stage is not just for children’s fare. “American Idiot” comes to the Shubert, while Albee’s “Seascape” comes to New Milford. “Looped” arrives in Hartford; “Clybourne Park” settles in to New Haven run; “The Dixie Swim Club” will be presented in Stamford and “The Dining Room” continues in Westport. “Of Mice and Men” will open in New Canaan and “The Little Dog Laughed” will play in Newtown.

There are several art events, as well, including an opening reception for Steven Miller’s work in Greenwich, an ongoing show of Philip Trager’s work, a First Fridays event at the Aldrich, the 14th annual Vivian and Stanley Marine Show opens at the Stamford Art Association galleries.

Tomorrow also marks Free Comic Book Day. Several shops around the area will be hosting the day with special events, including Stamford’s A Timeless Journey. At Heroes Comics & Cards in Norwalk, Jeff Marsick and Kirk Manley will be there signing their books (“Dead Man’s Party” and “Z-Girl and the 4 Tigers”), making art and giving away items. Rogue Comics of Bridgeport will be involved, as will Alternate Universe of Milford and New Haven.

Rounding out the weekend (and into next week), Florence Henderson, a star of theater and television, will be at the Sacred Heart University’s Edgerton Center this weekend to talk about her career. You can see her before she attained her “Brady Bunch” fame in performance below. Dennis Elsas of WFUV will present “Rock ‘n’ Roll Never Forgets” at the Avon Theatre in Stamford and comedian Elaine Williams comes to Ridgefield.

Get on out there. Until next time …

Diana Ross returns to Stamford

If you missed Diana Ross’ 2011 sold-out performance at the Stamford Center for the Arts, you will get another chance to hear this Grammy Award winner when she returns this summer to take the Palace Theatre stage.

She is set to perform on Saturday, Aug. 17.

Tickets go on sale to the public today, either through the center’s website, phone at 203-325-4466 or at the center’s box office in downtown Stamford.

The evening will likely include some of her greatest hits from a career that has stretched from the early 1960s, when she was in her teens, to the present day. Starting out as a member of The Supremes, she went on to a successful solo career by the late 1960s. An Academy Award-nominated actress, some of her notable roles include Billie Holiday in the film “Lady Sings the Blues,” the lead in the 1975 film “Mahogany” and Dorothy in the 1978′s “The Wiz.” The Stamford concert also will likely put a spotlight on her glamorous style and fashion sense.

Ross, a longtime Greenwich resident, has performed in the area in the past. In 2004, she took to the stage at Roger Sherman Baldwin Park in Greenwich for a benefit concert for the Arch Street Teen Center.

As part of the launch of its Hummingbirds At Home science initiative, Audubon Greenwich (613 Riversville Road, Greenwich) will host a special screening Friday of the PBS Nature program, “Hummingbirds: Magic In The Air,” as well as a visit by Geoff LeBaron, the National Director of Audubon’s Christmas Bird Count. (Above, you can see a preview of the show’s original broadcast.)

The evening, which will run 6 to 8:30 p.m., is a chance to catch the show, which first premiered in 2010. Using high-tech cameras and advanced techniques, the film crew was able to capture a creature that can beat its wings up to 200 times a second. You can see what the crew went through during this “behind-the-scenes” program.  The crew’s techniques also enables viewers to see how these diminutive creatures are able to hover, fly backwards and fly upside down.

For those who want to attract some hummingbirds to their homes, there will be information on this new citizen science program, which will ask individuals to keep track of the hummingbirds that they see. Data that is collected will help further knowledge about the birds and help to develop conservation strategies, according to organizers.

The cost for the evening is $10 adults, $5 youth. A reception is planned prior to the screening. Registration is requested by emailing greenwichcenter@audubon.org or by calling 203-869-5272, Ext. 239.

Have you longed to be an integral part of the Stamford Downtown Special Services District’s Jazz Up July music series?

Well, there is no time like the present if you are an area jazz musician with designs to perform on the same stage as this year’s roster, which includes Bernie Williams (who kicks off the series), Poncho Sanchez and his Latin Jazz Band, Dianne Reeves,  the Brubeck Brothers Quartet, which includes Dan and Chris Brubeck, sons of the late jazz pioneer and longtime Wilton resident Dave Brubeck, and Chick Corea (you can see him perform in above video), who concludes the series.

The district is calling for musicians, looking for exposure, to sign up by May 14.