Culture

Thesorcerersapprentice_smallteaser Despicable-Me-Poster Telluride's Nugget Theatre will be busy with music during the Telluride Jazz Celebration this weekend, Friday through Sunday.

On Monday, it's back to movies. "Despicable Me" (rated PG) returns for two showings a day through Thursday. See last week's "Nuggets" for a description.

The late movie, Monday-Thursday, is "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" (PG), a Disney movie that gives a nod to the old Disney masterpiece, "Fantasia". Only the older audience members will remember Mickey Mouse doing battle with enchanted brooms and buckets. I personally remember nightmares about that sequence. In this case, we are talking about Nicholas Cage as a good magician with a young apprentice who has the "Gift". Together they must prevent bad magicians from the time of King Arthur gaining power in today's world. Got it?

See below for showtimes and the Nugget website for trailers and reviews.

[click "Play" to hear Raul Midon's conversation with Susan]

Raul 4 Telluride Jazz Celebration impresario Paul Machado is a champion of diversity. The line-up for the 2010 musical happening, More Than Jazz, may be his most imaginative and wide-ranging to date, moving across the cultural spectrum from Dan Hicks & The Hot Licks to Chuchito Valdez. The Guest of Honor is the 80-yer-old legend, bebop piano/bandleader/arranger Toshiko Akiyoshi, but the 30-year-old pianist Hiromi performs with Stanley Clarke. Another relative youngster in this crowd is also a rising star, singer-songwriter-guitarist Raul Midon.

Midon is on the Telluride Jazz Celebration schedule Friday night at The Nugget, Saturday afternoon on the Toshiko Akiyoshi Town Park Stage and Sunday for a late show at The Nugget again.



Telluride's Ah Haa School for the Arts, 300 South Townsend, honors painter Robert Weatherford with a retrospective showcasing 25 years of painting, including florals, landscapes, still-lifes and portraits. The opening of the exhibit in the Daniel Tucker Gallery coincides with the Telluride Council for the Arts & Humanities' First Thursday Art Walk, August 5, 5 - 8 p.m. Across town, a show at the Stronghouse Studios, 283 South Fir Street, features the work of one of Weatherford's students, county commissioner Elaine Fischer. Fischer's work underlines the legacy of her teacher: the triumph of visceral over cerebral.

( For a list of the goings-on around town and a map of all participating venues, go to the TCAH website)
[click "Play" to hear Dianne Reeves' conversation with Susan]

Media02sm Double the pleasure. Double the fun.

This year, Telluride Jazz Celebration impresario/ Festival director Paul Machado welcomes two great female jazz vocalists to the Toshiko Akiyoshi Town Park Stage. Jackie Ryan performs Saturday night at the Nugget Theatre and again on Sunday in Town Park. And Dianne Reeves is the closing act on opening day, Friday, August 5: a good choice because Reeves has the star power and hardware (four Grammys, including the soundtrack for George Clooney's "Good Night and Good Luck") to deliver a very grand finale.

[click "Play" for Jen Wineman's interview with Susan]

Poster Telluride's SquidShow Theatre is the living end. This time we mean that literally. Saturday July 31 – Tuesday, August 3, the Squids present "Cataclysm!: "The end is closer than you think. So is the beginning." The happening takes place nightly at 7 p.m. at The Deep Creek Mine, just seven miles outside of town.

"Cataclysm" was conceived by SquidShow Theatre founder Sasha Cucciniello and her long-time collaborator, New York City-based playwright, Sarah Gancher.

After working with the Deep Creek Artisan Guild, Sasha became determined to create a show specifically for this rustic location. For years, the idea of a site-specific theatrical piece at Deep Creek percolated, eventually took shape in "Cataclysm." Sasha tapped Sarah to come to Telluride to co-write this theatrical extravaganza, created from scratch through the rehearsal process under the leadership of director Jen Wineman and designer Melissa Trn.

Poster Poster-1 Telluride's Nugget Theatre is screening two movies the week of Friday, July 30 to Thursday, August 5. "Knight and Day" is a holdover from last week. The action movie stars Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz, and is rated PG13.

"Despicable Me" is an animated film with some great voices, an improbable super-villain, three orphan girls in search of a dad, and a plot to steal the moon. What could possibly go wrong? It is rated PG.

For movietimes, see below; for trailers and reviews, see the Nugget website.

[click "Play" to listen to Larry Coryell's conversation with Susan]

Coryell Six years ago guitar legend Larry Coryell was honored at the 28th annual Telluride Jazz Celebration, where he performed with drummer Lenny White and bassist Mark Egan. Coryell returns to the 34th annual Telluride Jazz Celebration, August 5 – August 8, to time to honor a friend, former Telluride Jazz Celebration board member Chris Bou, who died in May 2009.


To tribute Bou, Coryell returns with Egan, changing the recipe on his aural elixir just a little bit with two special guests, Paul Wertico replacing White on drums, and saxophonist Karl Denson. The quartet is scheduled to perform Sunday, August 8, 3:40 – 4:50 p.m. on the Toshiko Akiyoshi Town Park Stage.

"Larry has style, awesome technique, a sharp wit and big charisma," said Telluride Jazz Celebration impresario Paul Machado of his friend and supporter.