Author: Susan Viebrock

[click "Play" for Erik Dalton's discussion about the gear they used in Nepal]

 

SUMMIT THORANG PEAK Generally when a person reaches the top of whatever heap, he wants to hold on tight to his position. Not Telluride local/mountaineer Ben Clark. His objective was to get there and get down.
 
As many who followed Ben's adventure on his popular website skithehimalayas.com (or Telluride Inside... and Out) already know, he set out on October 14 on his ninth trip to Nepal with one objective in mind: summit Thorung Peak, a 20,200 foot peak in Himalayas. (In Spring 2010 Ben sprained an ankle attempting  Baruntse.) Mission accomplished in early November.

Image001 Eat. Pray. And Telluride's Two Skirts has lots of Love in store in the forms of bracelets and earrings designed by Me & Ro, the inspirational line of symbolic pieces featured in the movie (made from The Book).

In 1991, director/founder Robin Renzi opened her New York City-based jewelry house on the belief in the power of jewelry to express the human values of strength, love, and faith. Using ancient characters from Tibetan, Chinese, Sanskrit and Tamil languages, much of the line is engraved in a simple, straightforward manner with words/phrases fraught with meaning, turning each piece into a modern-day talisman. Throughout the years, Me & Ro developed a strong celebrity following, including actress Julia Roberts.

[click "Play" for Todd Murray's conversation with Susan]

 

Unknown The Telluride AIDS Benefit has focused on prevention education and outreach since its inception in 1993. The next chapter in TAB's playbook occurs Friday, November 19, when TAB hosts Hope's Voice, a special program, exclusive to the student body of the Telluride Middle School/High School.

The talk, "Does HIV Look Like Me," features Hope's Voice spokespeople Todd Murray and Christina Rock, two young adults living with HIV/AIDS. Specifically the duo plan to discuss the realities of living, not dying, with an uninvited and persistent "companion."


(w)holeposter Telluride Inside... and Out was on the road again, this time in Denver for a weekend away to celebrate the most recent triumphs of two talented friends: Ivar Zeile of the Plus Gallery and Tracy Shaffer, actress, playwright, founder of the Thriving Artist Alliance (and TIO's popular Denver writer.) Art by two. Art squared.

Located at 2501 Larimer, Plus is Denver's edgiest art emporium and Ivar, a rainmaker among the avant garde. The night we arrived Ivar had teamed up with Win Wear to host an evening of experimental shorts dedicated to the poetic exploration of landscape. (We bagged: Too tired after the winter drive. But later heard the fun lasted into the wee hours of the morning.)

The next evening, en route to Tracy's play, "(W)hole," we stopped for dinner at the Zeiles' – pizza and wings ordered in from Marco's, the best in town –  and to see the latest exhibition at Plus, "Primitives," featuring the work of California sculptor Mike Whiting.

[click "Play" to hear Scott Doser talk about this new Community Cinema sreies]

 

11-17 Film Deep Down Telluride's five-star Wilkinson Public Library has partnered with ITVS, co-presenter of the Emmy-winning Independent Lens PBS TV series, to present Community Cinema. The FREE monthly series begins Wednesday, November 17, 6 p.m. with "Deep Down," a film by Jen Gilomen and Sally Rubin about a community battle over a proposed mountaintop removal coal mine.

Independent Lens is an indie film fest designed to be delivered into the comfort of your home via PBS. Films come in all flavors: feature-length documentaries, comic shorts, highly experimental. The thread that binds is the spirit that drives the filmmakers, relentless visionaries who tend to ignore conventional rules of the road in pursuit of stories about people not normally seen on TV and little-known worlds. It's a whole different spin on the notion of reality TV.
 

[click "Play" to hear Ashley's take on big jewelry]   Telluride's weather changes at least as quickly as the mood of our country's electorate. Quicker. So we have all become accustomed to the concept of layering. But Ashley Deppen of Telluride's ever popular Two...

[click "Play" to hear Susan's conversation with John Jacobs]

 

 

JJacob Telluride Inside... and Out has some sound advice to offer.

Thursday, November 11, 6 p.m., Telluride's five-star Wilkinson Public Library hosts Grammy-nominated producer, engineer, arranger John Jacobs to lead Engineering Live Sound 101. His workshop explores how to set-up and get the most out of a PA system. Find out what EQ is and how to dial it in to your system and what equipment you might need for whatever sound reinforcement you are doing. Jacobs also talks about how to get better sound while you are operating cameras or doing live broadcast work.

Former Atlantic Records executive Jerry Wexler made the following comment about Jacobs' production of Maria Muldaur's Richland Woman, describing the project as "the best blues album of the century." (Billboard, 2002.)  Jacobs' folk, blues, and jazz projects have included work with Maria Muldaur, Bonnie Raitt, Taj Mahal, Dan Hicks, Dave Brubeck, Joe Craven, and John Sebastian. A physics-turned-UCLA music major and a working musician for 20 years, Jacobs has built a reputation for melding production and advanced recording technology with the artistry of a musician.

(Ed. note: Susan and Clint are now back at their desks in Telluride. This is a delayed post)

IMGP1997 Telluride Inside... and Out returned from Greece last night  but there are still a few loose ends to tie up regarding our three memorable weeks on the road. For those who might be considering following more or less in our footsteps all the way through the doors of our hotels, here's the bottom line: There were places to rest and places to nest, all hits, no misses and a few homeruns.

The places to rest were mostly boutiquey, (read relatively small, including several family hotels our driver,  Nikolas, on the mainland found for us) very good, with comfortable rooms, high speed(ish) Internet and helpful, courteous service from a caring staff (or owners in the case of the family-owned places).

IMGP2325 (Ed. note: Susan and Clint are back in the US and will be at our desks in Telluride starting November 7.)

It's Sunday. Since Sunday is the traditional day of worship in America, Telluride Inside... and Out thought it might be a good day to write about a place of worship.

The place is not one of Greece's many awe-inspiring monasteries, including the majestic sextet we viewed at Meteora. It is not a church, such as the 10th-century Church of Dormition in Kalabaka, a quick stop, thanks to our driver Nikolas Vogiatzakis' local knowledge about hidden gems. The little church was built on the back of a former temple to Apollo, which was  torched by the Nazis in revenge for Greece's very brave and stubborn resistance during WWII. (The Nazis' thumbprint remains in the blackened frescoes on the church walls.)

IMGP2160 Telluride Inside... and Out headed out of town at 4:30 a.m., the dark time when Rethymnon turns its streets over to cats stalking scraps from bags of garbage put out for collection, and a few stragglers, mostly guy gangs, done stalking women, ready to turn in just ahead of their alarm clocks.

Clint and I made our way quickly through the narrow, winding path leading to the car park, grateful, in the absence of string, that we had rehearsed the route, reminding ourselves what our guide Joanna Kalypso Glyptis, had told us about what the town planners had in mind. Rethymnon's  variation on the theme of labyrinth was intentional, designed so that its denizens with local knowledge could easily elude invaders or pirates in hot pursuit.

Joanna feels most guidebooks and guides talk the party line, not the facts. For example, Knossos was never a palace. Palaces have kitchens. No places to prepare meals were ever found on the site. The dolphins in the queen's room, the ones our guide told us signified music and harmony? The illustrious Welshman Arthur Evans who excavated the place did some redecorating. The dolphins were transplants from another location. Heresy?