The local folk/rock band The Maldives have performed everywhere from the back of a flatbed truck to the stages of Sasquatch, Bumbershoot, Capitol Hill Block Party and SXSW.
The Maldives are a seven-member band that started with lead singer and guitarist Jason Dodson over six years ago, and have established themselves as a quintessential band in the Northwest music scene. Jason Dodson joins us in studio to talk and perform live.
Leslie Helm was born and raised in Yokohama, Japan. Most of his family members are of European descent, and you would be hard pressed to look into his face and see his half-Japanese grandparents reflected back. When he adopted Japanese children, he started exploring his own roots. Leslie Helm takes us along on his journey as a "Yokohama Yankee" — a story that outlines the racial and economic tensions that defined US and Japanese relations for much of the 19th and 20th centuries.
In her poem "What Stays Here," Colleen McElroy imagines life as a female soldier who must choose between loyalty to herself, and loyalty to a military code that says "keep quiet" and "get along." Like many of the poems in McElroy's ninth collection, "Here I Throw Down My Heart," (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2012) the poem awakens us to voices and stories we might otherwise never hear with such intimacy and power.
Seattle's music scene was booming in the mid-1990s. Four friends from different established bands decided to get together for a side project called Mad Season. Layne Staley sang in Alice in Chains, Mike McCready played guitar for Pearl Jam, Bassist John Baker Saunders toured with The Walkabouts and Barrett Martin was the drummer for Screaming Trees.
When you take stock of Seattle’s cultural institutions, you’ll often see the name Bagley Wright attached. More than 50 years ago, Wright helped transform the Seattle Art Museum from a small, family-run operation into what it is today. One of his final gifts to the museum he loved is “Mirror,” a permanent installation on SAM’s northwest facade that both the museum and the artist hope will spur urban conversation in downtown Seattle. Marcie Sillman talks with Virginia Wright about her husband’s legacy at Seattle Art Museum and throughout the city.
When Seattle Art Museum opened its expanded downtown building in 2007, some people thought the main entrance on First Avenue was a little undistinguished.
One of those people was the late arts patron Bagley Wright. His wife, Virginia, says he thought the museum entrance needed to be marked in a dramatic way. "Because it looked like the entrance to an office building," she recalls.
When you hear the word burlesque, what comes to mind?
Some of us envision down and dirty night clubs populated by weary strippers clad in not much more than feather boas and G-strings. For most of the past century, burlesque has been synonymous with women doing a little bump and grind for mostly male audience members. Remember the musical "Gypsy?"
Most people know about singer-songwriter LeRoy Bell from his appearances in 2011 as one of the top performers on the network television singing competition, The X Factor.But long before televised competitions, LeRoy Bell was at the top of the pop music charts.
The region's top middle school spellers go head to head this weekend in the King-Snohomish Regional Spelling Bee at Seattle's Town Hall. The winning wordsmith heads to Washington, DC, to compete in the 86th Annual Scripps National Spelling Bee. Last year's regional champ had to spell "putrescible." Think you have what it takes to win? Call 206.543.5869 and prove your spelling prowess on live radio against your fellow listeners.
