Blues legend Buddy Guy will roll into Concord on Saturday for a powerful night of electric blues.
At age 80, Guy is a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee, a major influence on rock titans like Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton and Stevie Ray Vaughan and a pioneer of Chicago’s fabled West Side sound. Guy has received seven Grammy Awards, a 2015 Lifetime Achievement Grammy, 34 Blues Music Awards (the most any artist has received), the Billboard Magazine Century Award for distinguished artistic achievement, a Kennedy Center Honor and the Presidential National Medal of Arts. Rolling Stone ranked him No. 23 in its “100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time.”
The Capitol Center for the Arts show starts at 8 p.m. Tickets range from $48.50 to $78.50.
Just one week later, the Capitol Center will be filled with the sounds of another heavy-hitter when Lyle Lovett comes to town. Lovett brings with him Texan and “Americana living-legend” Robert Earl Keen.
Coupled with his gift for storytelling, the Texas-based musician fuses elements of Americana, swing, jazz, folk, gospel and blues in a convention-defying manner that breaks down barriers. His live performances show not only the breadth of this Texas legend’s deep talents, but also the diversity of his influences.
When Keen tours with Lovett, it’s just two old friends swapping songs on acoustic guitars like they used to do on Keen’s front porch.
The Lovett and Keen show starts at 8 p.m. Oct. 1. Tickets range from $35 to $65.
For tickets and more information for either show, visit ccanh.com.
Organized by two leading literary organizations, The Poetry Society of New Hampshire and The New Hampshire Institute of Art, the 2nd Annual New Hampshire Poetry Festival will take place Saturday at the New Hampshire Institute of Art in Manchester.
The conference features readings, panels and workshops by some of the country’s best-known poets. Highlights include:
Headliner reading by former chancellor of the Academy of American Poets and 2015 MacArthur Fellow Ellen Bryant Voigt.
Workshops by award-winning poets Paige Ackerson-Kiely, Wyn Cooper, Cate Marvin, and January Gill O’Neil.
Readings from diverse poets from across New England and around the world.
Panel discussions on topics including a tribute to Maxine Kumin; translation; short poems and social media sharing; poetry and community; poetry and art collaborations; and more.
The N.H. Poetry Fest brings together a broad community including poets winning prestigious awards; Guggenheim, MacDowell Colony, Cave Canem and National Endowment of the Arts Fellows; former and current poets laureate; heads of literary organizations; professors; well-known editors, and students of poetry at multiple levels.
The New Hampshire State Council on the Arts is an event supporter. Gibson’s Bookstore from Concord will sell speakers’ books on-site. Participants also have the opportunity to talk with exhibiting publishers and educators including Folded Word, Hobblebush Books, Tupelo Press, Zephyr Press, New Hampshire Institute of Art, The Solstice Low-Residency MFA in Creative Writing Program at Pine Manor College and New England College MFA Creative Writing Program.
For more information or to register, visit poetrysocietyofnewhampshire.org/fest or find them on Facebook (facebook.com/nhpoetryfest) or Twitter (@NHPoetryFest).
Slam Free or Die will host the fourth annual VOX POP Poetry Slam Tournament (formerly known as N.U.T.S.) on Friday and Saturday at Stark Brewing Co. (Milly’s Tavern) in Manchester. The two-day event offers poetry writing and performance workshops and will culminate in a battle of words that will make the winning team $1,000 richer. Area poets are invited to compete, and the poetry battles, or bouts, are open to the public. This event is the only pick-up team poetry slam tournament in all of the Northeast and the largest poetry slam tournament ever held in New Hampshire.
On Friday, there will be a performance showcase for the poets who will facilitate the workshops Saturday; followed by an individual poetry slam in which 10 poets will face off across three rounds. Like the rest of the tournament, there will be a few twists on the “normal” poetry slam structure, forcing the competing poets to think outside the box and keep things interesting. One winner will walk away with $100. Doors open at 7 p.m. with a $5 cover.
On Saturday during the day, Slam Free or Die will offer three two-hour writing and performance workshops with the first one starting at 10 a.m. Each one will be unique and hosted by a different special guest poet. Cost of workshops will range from $5 to $10 (depending on which workshop) and seating is limited so it’s recommended that people looking to take part arrive early.
Then, that evening, ten “pick-up” teams will compete in two, five-team bouts, with the top two teams advancing to a final “deathmatch” to decide which one will walk away with a top prize of $1,000 cash. “Pick-up” teams allow poets to choose their own teammates (normally, teams are decided through competition). Doors open at 6 p.m., and there is a $5 cover for this all-ages show.
The sixth annual New Hampshire gathering of One Hundred Thousand Poets for Change (100 TPC) will take place in Exeter on Oct. 1 from 12:30 to 4 p.m. The program is co-sponsored by the Poetry Society of New Hampshire and the First Unitarian Universalist Society of Exeter. This event will be held outdoors on the FUUSE Parsonage Green at 12 Elm St., or in case of inclement weather, in the Sanctuary. It is free and open to the public.
100 TPC was conceived by poet and publisher Michael Rothenberg six years ago with the vision of encouraging poets, musicians, and other performing artists to communicate their concerns and hopes for the world through the art of poetry. It would happen on a day when poets in hundreds of indoor and outdoor venues around the globe could share their work in a common cause. Now each year, hundreds of cities and towns across six continents hold such events in many languages, to inspire encouragement and change among people all over the world.
For the Exeter event this year, the New Hampshire poets and musicians who are planning to perform include Joann Duncanson, S Stephanie, Gordon Lang, Julie Dickson, Dan Miner, Jenny Riddle, Ed Pacht, Priscilla Burlingham, Barbara Bald, Lindsey Coombs, Charlotte Cox, Rodger Martin, Lauren Vermette, Rosemary Staples, Nancy Jean Hill, James Rioux, Kate Leigh, Pat O’Brien, Pat Parnell, Chris George, Cleone Graham, Diana Durham, Jonathan Stoker, Trina Daigle, Paul Pindris, Joan Henson and Dudley Laufman.
For more information about the event, go to 100tpc.org. For more information about the Exeter event, send an email to bmoore628@comcast.net; call 642-4648; or find it on Facebook.
Lakes Region poets Barbara Bald and Beth Fox will introduce their newly published book Other Voices/Other Lives at a reading hosted by Wolfeboro Library. This reading and signing event will take place at the Wolfeboro Library on Oct. 6 at 7 p.m.
Other Voices/Other Lives, released this summer, has gathered high praise from New England’s poetry luminaries. Robert Demaree, author of Fathers and Sons, Mileposts and After Labor Day, says, “In Other Voices/Other Lives, Bald takes us along in her volunteer service with senior adults, bringing her distinctive poetic voice to the many stories she has learned from the seniors she has come to know. These fine poems are part of her service to them as well as to the reading public.”
Two years ago, Bald and poet/friend Fox decided to explore the possibility of reading poetry to assisted living residents of Sugar Hill Retirement Community in Wolfeboro. To their surprise, they found that not only did residents enjoy hearing the poems, but also that the poems themselves stirred memories inside each of them. The sharing became a way of helping folks connect with each other on a deeper level. They are still reading to these residents twice every month, and where possible, they are using their words to record their memories and turn them into poems. Together they have created both individual and group poems, several of which have already been published. Other Voices/Other Lives is the published culmination of those efforts.
The authors encourage audiences to participate in an open mic after the reading, so bring something of your own to share. There will be a display of books for sale and browsing, with ample time to meet other creative people. For more information, contact Barbara Bald at river1@worldpath.net.
The 2016 Boston Film Festival will dot the city this weekend with films addressing themes of acceptance, tolerance and bullying, timely and urgent concerns in contemporary society, according to a press release about the event.
A panorama of striking projects will be included – American Wrestler: The Wizard (starring Oscar winner Jon Voight and William Fichtner) and The First Girl I Loved, the U. S. premiere of the documentary Underfire and the East Coast premiere of Finding Oscar (produced by Oscar winner Steven Spielberg) among them.
The local venues of the festival will be the AMC Boston Common, Theatre One at the Revere Hotel, the Boston Public Library and the Patriot Cinema in Hingham, Mass., for a closing night event. Question-and-answer sessions will take place following the film screenings with directors and actors.
Among the stars scheduled to appear are William Fichtner, Dylan Gelula, Bill Sage, Sean Patrick Flanery, Christina Scherer, Kevin Bigley, Ali Afshar, George Kosturos, former governor Michael Dukakis, World Welterweight Champion Tony DeMarco and Tony Vaccaro.
The closing night film on Sunday is American Wrestler: The Wizard from director Alex Ranarivelo. The true story begins in Iran in 1980 and follows a teenaged boy who escapes the unrest in his country by coming to America, where he encounters more hostility due to the ongoing Iranian hostage crisis. Determined to fit in, he joins the school’s weak wrestling team and fights to master the sport and identify as a real American – and finds the inner strength to become his own champion. Fichtner, Voight, Kevin G. Schmidt, Lia Marie and Gabriel Basso are among the stars. Newton, Mass., native and producer Haleel Reda will be attending.
The First Girl I Loved centers on 17-year-old Anne, who falls in love with Sasha, the most popular girl at her Los Angeles high school. But when Anne confides in her best friend Clifton – who harbors a secret crush on her – he does his best to get in the way. The film stars Dylan Gelula (The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt), Brianna Hildebrand (Deadpool) and Pamela Adlon (Californication) with Kerem Sanga as the director.
In the Center Piece spotlight is Delinquent, directed by Kieran Valla, a thrilling exploration of a teen’s struggle to manage the fallout after a robbery goes wrong. The feature probes the ties between family and loyalty – and what the young man knows to be the morally right thing to do. Kim Director (Orange Is the New Black), Erin Darke (Good Girls Revolt) and Bill Sage (American Psycho) star. The film was shot entirely in Connecticut.
Other feature films include the world premiere of Interior Night, which depicts four characters whose lives are enmeshed as they hit bottom over the course of one night. Riley Smith (True Blood) and Christina Scherer (Two and a Half Men) star and Alan Watt directs. In Kepler’s Dream, an 11-year-old girl searches for a missing rare book from her grandmother’s library as she tries to understand why her family is fractured during a memorable summer in a New Mexican adobe house. Amy Glazer directs and Holland Taylor, Sean Patrick Flanery (Dexter) and Kelly Lynch (Ally McBeal) star.
Among the striking documentaries are Finding Oscar, an East Coast premiere from producers Spielberg, Frank Marshall and Nick Loud, concerning the real story about the quest for justice in the devastating aftermath of the 1982 Dos Erres massacre in Guatemala. The bloody trail of evidence leads to two little boys who survived the nightmare and implicates the government of Guatemala. Ryan Suffern directs.
Tickets are available through bostonfilmfestival.org for more details and to purchase tickets. Individuals are also asked to make a seat reservation for the free films at library through the festival website. Facebook: Boston Film Festival; Twitter: Bostonfilmfest; Instagram: bostonfilmfestival