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Author: Susan Viebrock

[click "Play" to hear Laren Metzger talk about "Spooktacular]

Spook_poster The trick: Carving out the time on one of the busiest days of Fall for family fun.
The treat: A Spooktacular day at Telluride's Ah Haa School for the Arts.
The event takes place October 24, in conjunction with the 350.org celebrations.

Halloween, the annual holiday celebrated one week later on October 31, has its roots in the Celtic pagan festival of Samhain, marking the end of the summer season and harvest, and the Christian holy day of All Saints, honoring all those who have attained the beatific vision in heaven.

In anticipation of Halloween, Ah Haa opens its doors from 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. for parents and kids work together to create creepy crafts and temptations to decorate the ultimate spooky home.

21 October, 2009 /
[click "Play" to listen to Roz Savage speaking with Susan]

Roz_Savage_Enhanced Many of them are regulars and veterans of Telluride Mountainfilm: climbers Conrad Anker, David Breashears, Lynn Hill, and Jim Whittaker, as well as ocean rower Roz Savage. They are among the elite and professional athletes, 350.org.Athletes team, who have pledged their support through actions, words, and general celebrity to back the global initiative spearheaded by author/environmentalist Bill McKibben.

Bill McKibben is a man with a plan: Move the world back to 350 ppm –  the maximum carbon dioxide parts per million Planet Earth can handle without coming unhinged. Experts have clocked us in at 390 parts per million now and climbing, an unhappy fact of life triggering a meltdown in Mother Nature.

20 October, 2009 /
IMGP0672 On the road, Telluride Inside... and Out, especially on family visits to big cities on both coasts, tends to build our days around friends and museums and our evenings around theatre, music, or dance. Now and again, food is the main event.

Kjerstin Viebrock Klein, TIO's partner in charge of social networking and optimization, lives in Pittsburgh with her family, husband Greg Klein, entrepreneur and owner of Willi's ski shops, and their two children/our grandchildren Dylan and Anna. On our weeklong visit, Kjerstin and Greg suggested an evening out at their favorite Italian restaurant.
19 October, 2009 /
IMG_0454 Cold, snow and wind are pre-empting fall in Telluride and elsewhere in America. Telluride Inside...and Out is in Pittsburgh, where rain washed out plans for grandkids' soccer games. On Friday, however, we visited the extraordinary Carnegie Museum, whose must-see permanent collection – two Van Goghs in one of the Impressionist galleries are worth the price of entry, not to mention one of the best of Monet's waterlilies series – includes a new Alex Katz, given star billing in the lobby. The Alex Katz depicts trees in fall, irresistible given TIO's ongoing coverage of the colors of a season fast coming to a close.
19 October, 2009 /

When it comes to the arts, Telluride puts its money where its mouth is, lending support in substantive ways such as an artists' cooperative known as the Stronghouse Studios. Pittsburgh has the Mattress Factory, an artists' co-op and museum featuring installation art in room-sized...

18 October, 2009 /
10-19 TFF The Telluride Film Festival Cinematheque is a program of free films, food and discussion produced in conjunction with Telluride's Wilkinson Public Library for cinephiles in the greater Telluride community who want to enjoy the art of filmmaking all year 'round, not just  Film Festival weekend. The event is programmed by Telluride Film Festival co-director Gary Meyer. The next program is Monday, October 19.

Last season, the theme was French New Wave. This second season, the subject is film noir, a genre that emerged post WWII in the late 1940s when the mood in the country was dark. Post war malaise is the result of the atrocities of war and deeper understanding of the human nature's dark underbelly.

A defining characteristic of film noir is fatalism, one small step that leads to doom: an "ordinary Joe" protagonist, a predatory femme fatale.
18 October, 2009 /
[click "Play" to hear Susan's conversation with Valerie Madonia]

IMG_6708 Valerie Madonia is a Telluride local who, for years, commanded the world stage as a prima ballerina with The Joffrey Ballet of Chicago. Earlier, she was in the corps de ballet of the National Ballet of Canda and danced solo roles with American Ballet Theatre under the direction of Mikhail Baryshnikov. Madonia still makes guest appearances at ballet galas and teaches around the globe. The pointe is the lady knows her stuff.

IMG_6952 Madonia founded, with Shirley Fortenberry, the nonprofit that eventually became the Telluride Dance Academy. For the past month, she has been rehearsing 30 young dancers from the Telluride region, including members of the Telluride Dance Academy, to perform in the cast of the State Street Ballet's production of Sergei Prokofiev's "Cinderella." The composer completed the popular ballet in 1944, first performed in 1945 at the Bolshoi in Moscow.
17 October, 2009 /

On Sunday, October 18, 3 p.m., Telluride's Palm Theatre presents the State Street Ballet's production of "Cinderella." The production includes about 30 young dancers from the Telluride region. A little birdie told me one of them is Katy Bowlby – playing a little...

15 October, 2009 /