Kaleido festival to transform Alberta Avenue into Fringe of the North

Look up. Look wa-a-a-ay up. Just try not to walk into a lamppost as you are serenaded by live music being played from the rooftops along Alberta Avenue during the Kaleido Family Arts Festival. And that’s just one treat in a cornucopia of artistic endeavours for both enjoyment and participation, running all weekend in and […]

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: Bob the Angry Flower reflects on 20 years

It’s no secret: To know Bob the Angry Flower is to know his creator, cartoonist Stephen Notley – son of the late Grant Notley, brother of Rachel Notley, and longtime Edmonton native since relocated to Seattle, where he writes and designs video games. For 20 years now, in the back of whatever the local weekly […]

WEEKEND MUSIC PREVIEW: Beyond the Boom

This weekend’s musical calendar is of course dominated by the 2012 version of Sonic Boom on Sunday. So far it’s looking like the weather will cooperate for the event, which will feature Linkin Park and Silversun Pickups at Northlands. There are also some great local bands playing around town on Friday and Saturday. Friday Joe […]

FILM REVIEW: Martial arts doc a powerful Edmonton family story

Legend of a Warrior, a new National Film Board-supported documentary that premieres Friday at Metro Cinema, is ostensibly about a son trying to learn more about his father, a world-famous Martial Arts instructor based in Edmonton. But it goes beyond any preconceptions its viewers might have about a stereotypical tale of a driven father neglecting […]

EDMONTON RADIO: Peter Brown is the smart one

Peter Brown just missed out on becoming an actor when he realized “I wasn’t talented enough to make it fast and I didn’t love it enough to be a waiter and make it slow.” So then he fell back on narrowly avoiding a PhD from Cambridge University, deked around the opportunity to work for the […]

SONIC BOOM 2012: Buzz bands, alt metal and modern rock goodness

This year’s version of Sonic Boom is probably the deepest line-up that’s been put together for the day-long festival yet. Thanks to a “sister” event in Calgary the day before Edmonton’s show at Northlands on Sunday, Sept. 2, Sonic Boom 2012 has at least two acts that could’ve been headliners, with Linkin Park and Silversun […]

Symphony Under the Sky: Cannons in the park

Like rock ‘n’ roll, classical music is measured by weight: Heavy or light. Unlike rock ‘n’ roll, almost all classical musicians aspire to perform the heaviest music they can get their hands on and still get paid for it. That’s what all that training and sacrifice was for – to play the heavyweights. Mainstream classical […]

Party Under the Dome: you paid for it, you might as well enjoy it

In some of the more mature – meaning “old” – countries, celebrating the 100th anniversary of a building would seem rather gauche. Maybe 150 years, certainly 200, but a mere Century? Please. But this is Alberta, where we have a different concept of what constitutes old. Here, the centennial of a building is reason to […]

GOTYE: Just some song that we used to know

Once in a great while the pop music mainstream brings up something truly great, an artist with talent, integrity and intelligence who has worked hard, poured heart and soul, blood, sweat and tears into their work – and with some luck, perhaps divine intervention, come up with a song that defines an entire generation. And […]

MEET THE FRINGE CRITICS: Opinion and perspective needed

The army of Fringe theatre critics – more than 65 in all – have by now seen and reviewed just about all of the 215 plays at Village of the Fringed. Each review comes with a star rating to aid the bewildered theatrical consumer in making the difficult choice of what to see on the […]

ART ON FILM: Gerhard Richter doc reveals ‘secretive business’

Paint. The thickness of it. The sensuousness of its colours. The textures of its application. The weights and balances, lines of force, harmonies and dissonances of its composition on a plane. The resonances of emotions and ideas it leaves hanging in the eye and the mind. These are the subjects – foreground and background – […]

FRINGE HOLDOVERS: The people, and the critics, have spoken

Want to see that great Fringe play that got five stars in all the papers, but found it’s all SOLD OUT? They hate it when that happens – which is why we have the annual Fringe Holdovers, the Fringe After the Fringe, starting next week at the Westbury Theatre (Venue 1, Arts Barns) and at […]