The Fabulous 413

We explore language today! What's that? We explore language every Wednesday because of The Word Nerd? To that we rebut: indeed. But how is this Wednesday different from any other Wednesday? Perhaps it's because we had a great listener question from a listener about the origins of certain English phrases (inspired by our look at the origins of the language in a previous show). So Emily Brewster, resident wordster and senior editor at Merriam-Webster, dives right into the Middle-English of things to show us how some common phrases have evolved, and giving us more food for thought in the process. Or perhaps it is because we spent time with Polly Byers of the Karuna Center for Peacebuilding. Their Building Resilience Against Violent Extremism in Schools (or the BRAVE Schools) program seeks to help middle and high school students, as well as the staff in those institutions, in using dialogue to deescalate instances of violence and hate. This weekend, they host "Bringing the Lessons Home:The Power of Dialogue, Locally and Globally" at the Amherst Women's Center to help folx see the applicability of the word to help everyone near and far. But mostly we're thinking it's because we have a bonus Live Music Wednesday. On tour from Boston, and making a stop at the Jewish Community of Amherst, is Levyosn. With their name taken from the Ashkenazi Hebrew for “Leviathan”, the group specializes in Yiddish song and klezmer, but they also sing in Hebrew, Ladino, and English and draw from adjacent Eastern European folk traditions, all of which you can hear on their brand new album "Lullabye". Lucky for us, they dropped by the studio to give us a taste of that new album in person.

Today is all about participation! It's exactly what we want to do in strawberry season! and since that has just started, we head to the pick-your-own fields of Pie In The Sky Farm in Northampton. There, proprietors Kristen Sykes and Fred Beddall walk us through their many different varieties (some ready and some not), show us some of their other PYO crops that are just getting started, and speak to how their particular land stewardship helps all their crops and the area itself do better. It's what we want to do with our neighborhoods too. And what better way to participate than making art! Britt Ruhe of Common Wealth Murals swings through the studios to talk about all of the murals her organization has been bringing to Springfield. We discover how Common Wealth Murals helps to train more muralists, how they got involved in the Nelson Stevens restorations, and how the second organization that CWA founded,Fresh Paint Springfield, truly gets the community involved while continuing to do bigger and better things (some this week even!) And speaking of cities, we participate in the civic process. NEPM reporter Jill Kaufman has been reporting on a motion to censor books in Ludlow school libraries. She, and author Jarret J. Krosoczka who has had his books banned before, sit with us to un-tease the Gordian knot of how we got here before the meeting next week that may put the sanctions into place.

We did a whole show live from the stage at the NEPM Asparagus Festival in Hadley! Since this is our first time trying something like this, we figure we'd pull out all the stops and have a show just jam packed with guests. So that's exactly what we do. For something as iconic to Hadley as asparagus, we need to bring along someone who's been immersed in the crop for ages. So we bring in Wally Czajkowski of Plainville Farm, who not only has been growing Hadley grass for decades, but has the most delightful way of saying it as well. We have Ashley Randle of the Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resourses, Scott Soares of the USDA, and Rep. Jim McGovern join us to chat about the state of not just asparagus, but farming in western Massachusetts in general, especially in the fall out of a series of terrible weather events. We have a Tina Turner Memorial Wine Thunderdome with Michelle Kersbergen of Black Birch Vineyards, and a beer tasting with Jeff Goulet of Loophole Brewing, who gets to share more about the brewery's upcoming move to Springfield. And Latin Grammy Award winning local artist Mr. G regales us alongside the Global Citizen Ensemble. It's a wicked good time.

It's a day for acknowledgements. We're honoring the legacies of legends whose contributions can't be quantified. Such is the case with Ramsey Lewis, who is being honored on June 3rd at Gateway City Arts in Holyoke. Genuine Culture, LLC has gathered a group of jazz players and MCs to walk through his catalog to give a glimpse of the breadth of his influence across many genres. We speak with Damany Gordon about about the many innovations and connections Lewis made over the course of his life. We're honoring icons we recently lost by renaming the wine thunderdome for it's namesake. And under it's new heading, we head for Table and Vine in West Springfield to sip with Michael Quinlan. It's our third straight week of firsts, as we try two wines of the same type from the same vineyard and truly see the variety that terroir can bring. And we're honoring fortitude and virtuosity as well. Jeffrey Foucault starts his residency at Floodwater Brewing tonight, performing for the next three Fridays, but he's also playing in the Berkshires over the weekend at the Egremont Barn. Both he and his drummer for the night, Don McAulay were a part of Sparkletown: a tribute to Kate Lorenz a few weekends back at The Shea Theater, so in addition to hearing music from his catalog, we reminisce with the two of them about loss in the musical community near and far.

Today we're getting into the local glow-ups. There's no containing our excitement when we speak with Ruth E. Carter, Springfield native, four-time nominee and two-time winner of an Oscar for costume design. Over fifty movies later, we're still in awe of how her vision truly brings together characters. We talk about her start in costuming, working on Marvel movies, her late mother, and the truly impressive list of accolades she's acquired over the years. And we mcgovern with Rep. Jim McGovern, who's had a nail-biting week as we narrowly escape defaulting on our payments as a nation. But the final resolution didn't sit well with him and we'll find out why he voted against the measure in the end. Plus, Pride month is here! And although we'll have more on various events happening in the 4 counties of western Massachusetts soon, we give you a quick rundown of Pride events happening this very weekend in Pittsfield and Springfield! Please note: we mention in the show that Ruth E. Carter is being honored at a gala later in the month. More information about the Pink Magnolia Gala and the causes that supports can be found here.

Hidden gems are always fun to find. There's cool things to discover in our very language itself. Emily Brewster, resident wordster, senior editor at Merriam-Webster in Springfield, helps us delve into the conflict ridden marriage of German and French that ultimately resulted in the modern English Language. The Battle of Hastings is very involved, but your dinner might be also. We encounter gorgeous flora at the Berkshire Botanical Gardens. Nestled in Stockbridge, spring finds the grounds literally bursting with life, and new projects to bring more plant life to western Massachusetts. Executive director Thaddeus Thompson and director of horticulture Eric Ruquist speak with us on the new things they've got planned, the problems climate change is posing, and reveal some of the surprises found among their 24 acres. And perhaps there's a famous face in the crowd that gets noticed. Which is what happened this weekend during Amherst College's commencement where several folx spotted Harrison Ford in the wild. So we ask you what celebrity you've encountered in the 413, and share some of our own as well. **Please note: there is humor regarding death within our talk at the Berkshire Botanical Gardens

There is something to be said about just getting things done. It's not always easy, and this is an impasse that The Literacy Project seeks to address. In fact, on June 1st, they are holding a graduation ceremony at Greenfield Community College for folx who have just completed their GED through programs they have in place. We chat with outgoing executive director Judith Roberts, Kat Brenton and Amos Johnson who'll be graduating this week, and their keynote speaker, Tim Lovett, who is a graduate of the program himself, about the importance of keeping education open to everyone. It's happening in Northampton, where the 3rd Summer on Strong begins today, shutting down a portion of the street to instead offer outdoor dining, music, and entertainment all summer long. We interrupt them in the middle of setting up to talk about the power of eating local with Jeremy Werther of Homestead and invite Deb Flynn of Eastside Grill and Amy Cahillane of the Downtown Northampton Association along to look at how community has made this festival happen in more ways than one. And not to double down on Northampton, but it's happening in their City Hall as well. For our third installment of "Meet the Mayor", we get to hang out with Gina-Louise Sciarra. Now that the Bombyx debacle has mostly died down, we get to ask her about the redesign of downtown, the IHEG liquor license problem, and the finer points of city budgeting.

Sometimes the weekend requires a shift in perspective. Which is exactly what Provisions is aiming to do in the Wine Thunderdome. Benson Hyde and Bruce McAmis bring us a possibly contentious set of contenders as we pit two canned wine spritzers against each other, and examine one of the more sustainable routes wine may be taking forward. It's what all of us will have to take with the Bombyx Center for Arts and Equity in Florence. Over the past three weeks this venue has been through logistical and bureaucratic rollercoasters. But we chat with Cassandra Holden from Bombyx and Laudable Productions and Bombyx Board Chair, Elizabeth Dunaway about what exactly got them shut down, and about the steps they and the city are taking to get them opened up again. And we can even make a pivot with time signatures. In their own words, The Threesies rage against the tyranny that is common or 4/4 time by taking up the underappreciated 3/4 and it's many derivatives. The band itself is a frequently rotating cast of players, but Paul Kochanski, J.J. O'Connell, and Jim Henry join us (in a set of three themselves, no less) to bring more light to songs that swing.

Today, there is an overabundance of creativity. Scotty Swan is engendering it in kids. He teaches Rock Band Camp who will perform at the Northampton Center for the Arts on May 28th. We chat with him about getting kids comfortable enough to really shred, and about the other camp he runs in the summer: The Urban Wizards Academy. There's a whole organization that's encouraging this creativity in older kids also. MAPS, or Music and Poetry Synchronized has been operating for 17 years on a simple model: get two schools and have them bridge ethnic, gender, socio-economic, and environmental differences by making art together. In order to take a look at the whole program and see how it works and evolves while continuing to have more and more schools participate, we speak with some of the students participating this year, with the administrators and founder of the program, and the teachers getting their classes involved. And we see it in a cautionary tale of sorts. Our regular check in with Rep. Jim McGovern is besieged by technical difficulties, and we're forced to look at the congressman's own past words to figure out a way to salvage the whole thing.

There's a little extra curation happening today. The Word Nerd, Emily Brewster, senior editor at Merriam-Webster, and our resident wordster, alerts us that a shift is happening between our iced coffee and ice tea. Letters are disappearing from certain descriptive words in a totally natural way and we dig into why. Then we are figuring out how to un-curate, of sorts. Thousands of indigenous remains have been kept in museum, school, and library collections for ages. And the rules for giving those remains back to the peoples they came from are about to change in a drastic way. We sit with NEPM's Nancy Eve Cohen to find out more about the ways NAGPRA, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, is changing and how that affects some local tribes and institutions. And we're more than a little impressed by the curation Mass MoCA has done for it's summer program. From theater, to installations, to a bevvy of fantastic musicians from all over the globe, they're pulling out a lot of stops in these next few months. Addison McDonald, general manager of performing arts and film, chats with us about the things he's most excited to share with us in North Adams. Plus, we reminisce on the legacy that the great Tina Turner leaves in her wake.

Today, we peek behind the curtain. There's synergy to be found in young folx collaborating and figuring out new paths of expression. The School of Dance and Contemporary Thought approaches this from several fronts: working with other youth arts group, and by fostering it's own young pre-professional company in The Hatchery. Both prongs of this philosophy have shows this weekend at the Academy of Music in Northampton and we chat with Artistic Director and Founder Jen Polins about fostering a blossoming dance culture in the valley. There's adaptations to be found in Sunderland. Dave Wisseman of Millstone Market, Warner's Farm, and Mike's Maze gives us a real look at how devastating last week's frost has been, and at how learning on the go helped them not only survive that late season freeze but the pandemic as well. Also about his love for strawberries (which mostly managed to survive). And there's growth to be found in the mountains. We head to Tanglewood to visit it's namesake. Which isn't to say that the woods are tangled, but that their tales may be. So we seek out groundskeeper Thomas Leahy (who we have affectionately dubbed the Lorax-in-residence) to discover all things arboreal at the BSO's summer home. Between he and senior publicist Matthew Erikson we get a full view of the symphony of trees on their grounds, and their efforts to keep them in harmony.

We're starting the week with a flurry of activity. That activity includes veritable rock legends, as we talk with June Millington about her band, Fanny. They've got a documentary that's airing on PBS+ and covers all the boundaries that the still performing and touring band broke over their tenure. That's not all though, as proven by IMA: The Institute for the Musical Arts. We get into the origin stories of both the band and the hilltown organization helping folx rock hard. We encounter it in the 3rd Annual Odenong Powwow, which happens this weekend at Amherst-Pelham Regional High School. The event is free and open to the public, but is intentionally a space for especially Indigenous, Native, and First Nations people to convene and celebrate. Powwow singer, lecturer, and artist Justin Beatty and organizer Kara Nye sat with us in studio to elaborate more on the events they have planned (including ways you can help make the whole thing happen). And we find it in the collisions on planets, as that's how moons get born sometimes. Mr. Universe, Salman Hameed, explains how looking at the craters on Mars' moons through successful rover missions is giving folx a better understanding of how those celestial bodies come to be. And how, on occasion, those lunar blemishes accidentally ride the coattails of popstars.

So much happening this weekend, let's dig in. First, we head back to Lenox to enter the Wine Thunderdome once again. Nejaime's Wine Cellars has set a pretty high precedent for these, becoming our first setting for a rosé showdown. And once again, Joe Nejaime has us doing our tasting blind, which is always a fun extra challenge. Then we skip across the mountains to discover that modern beekeeping has its roots in Franklin County. Beefest is now in its 13th year of celebrating Greenfield's connection to our pollinating friends with art, demonstrations, and more. Organizer, and one of the founders of the festival, Sandy Thomas stops by to give us a rundown of the festival goings-on as well as a look at how reverend Lorenzo L. Langstroth's innovations still have impact today. And for Live music Friday, we bring in some big guns with Pamela Means, whose musical versatility simply cannot be contained. She's got a slew of gigs coming up all over New England, but you can often catch her at Luthier's Co-Op in Easthampton, where she's got a Jazz Residency happening every third Thursday. We dig into her musical history, wicked cool cover choices, and her passion for justice and protest songs.

Collaboration is the name of the game. We're pretty sure that Rep. Jim McGovern wishes that word was a little more prevalent in his goings-on Capitol Hill-wise. But debt ceiling and resignation woes aside, the congressman himself has been up to a lot of working with other folx, including using a little technology to aid in a recent commencement speech. Collaboration is at the very core of singing with other people, and we hear it in regional champions, all-female barbershop quartet Saffron. The four women who make up the group, Valerie Reynolds, Amanda Fowski, Sue Berry, and Christine Bulgini, stopped by the studios after teaching a master class on the genre to some of Marcos Carreras' students at Springfield Conservatory of the Arts. Saffron competes in the Northeast Regional Sweet Adeline's Competition on May19th, seeking to regain their title. And working together although your events are very far apart is what we got two former poet laureates to do. Martín Espada and Rich Michaelson will each be giving readings on May 20th: Espada at a benefit for the LAVA center, and Michaelson at Forbes Library (with Michaelson giving a bonus reading through Zoom on May 21st). In addition to hearing some of their new work, we also get a glimpse of the neighborhood in which they both grew up.

There is a certain strength in demanding what is needed. We find this in the civil rights movement. In particular, a smaller predecessor to the movements we know now and came from the meeting of two Massachusetts minds is highlighted in an upcoming documentary. Florence filmmaker Lawrence "Larry" Hott joins us to preview his latest film titled "The Niagra Movement: The Early Battle for Civil Rights", which you can also see this weekend at the Northampton Center for the Arts just ahead of its debut on PBS+. He brings with him professor Aldon Morris, who is featured in the film, to elaborate on the impact of the group's brief bright flame. It is also found in our ongoing struggle to bridge digital divides. May 18th is Global Accessibility Awareness Day (or GAAD) which seeks to highlight and address issues and solutions for inclusion for folx with disabilities/impairments. Shivaji Kumar, accessibility specialist, spoke to us about his personal experiences with technology as a blind person, and about some of the initiatives happening everywhere. And we find it as language evolves. The Word Nerd, Emily Brewster, senior editor at Merriam-Webster, teaches us about strong verbs and how we as a language are slowly moving away from them, except for one particular word which seems to have snuck it's way into being one.

Everyday is a good day to build more community. We forge connections between nature and humans, while watching what became of the dinosaurs, listening eagerly to their scintillating songs. David Sibley, ornithologist, author, and artist, joins us to speak on all things birds, just as he will on May 22nd at a fundraiser for Tilton Library. All this orchestrated by librarian Candice Bradbury, who tells us how this will all help the library's renovation plans. We also dig into connections forged while growing into a new home. The Center for New Americans helps immigrants in the area adapt and adjust to life stateside, and they'll be presenting "Immigrant Voices" at the Shea Theater this Sunday with some of the folx who have benefited from their programs. Director Laurie Millman and current student Roberto Loccident of Haiti give us a glimpse of what the organization does and will show us onstage. And we reconnect with our neighbors, especially those in need. Hunt Chase of the Hilltown CDC came to our studios to chat about all the things the organization does for all the folx in the hidden hills, especially the Hilltown Mobile Market, which has seen remarkable growth and is incredibly useful to those who might otherwise have to go without.

Today, we stumbled into turning points. Seems just about right for a Monday. There's the point at which a star looks at the planets around it and fails to recognize itself in the mirror. And we in turn, or at least those of us studying that star, fail to recognize it as well. This is the case with Fomalhaut, a star once likened to "The Eye of Sauron", but which is now being seen in a different light, and we sit with Mr. Universe, Salman Hameed, to discover why that is. There is the moment one realizes that the fight you're in may be the wrong one and you make a change. There are folx who bring forges to engender that change. Inspired by a passage in the Old Testament, Swords to Plowshares takes voluntarily surrendered firearms and converts them to usable garden tools using classic blacksmithing techniques. We chat with the head of the region's chapter of this organization, retired bishop Jim Curry, and the person helping to bring him and his forge to Southampton this weekend, Sue Teece. And there is the instance where dough, cheese and sauce are not necessarily enough. Thus we embark on Pizza Quest IV at Pizzeria Boema in Lenox, where we stray a little off of our regular path, to delicious results

Weekends are for spreading out and connecting. There's connections to be found among the many musicians that make up the Happy Valley Guitar Orchestra. Originally founded by Peter Blanchette, the collection of players combines now under the direction of Joseph Ricker. For live music Friday, we crashed their practice to hear them prepare for their spring concert "800 years", which will encompass a wide swath of pieces within that span of time, including work from Grieg, Stereolab, and the artistic director himself. Then we go even further to bring musicians together. UMass Professor Felipe Salles has just released an album new album called "Home Is Here", featuring the Interconnected Ensemble, a whopping 19 member big band which creates multi-diasporic jazz. His inspiration is rooted in the nature of immigrant experiences, and we dig into his work as the ensemble get ready to present this album live in June. And once again, we enter the wine thunderdome, pitting two wines against each other in the deep reaches under State Street Fruit Store in Northampton, seeking which vintage connects best with one of our favorite mollusks: oysters.

Ideologies and worlds collide on today's show. First, our weekly check-in with our congressperson as we mcgovern with Rep. Jim McGovern. There's a lot happening on capital hill and beyond and we get his take on Santos' charges, the expiration of title 42, and more. Then we head to Florence where worlds will meet sonically this weekend. Colliderfest is coming to Bombyx this weekend and bringing with it musicians from all over the world and the sounds of their dance parties with them, including joropo, gqom (or igqom), Ethiopian groove, afrobeat, rumba, and more. Curator Edo Mor joins us to talk about the importance of keeping one's ears open to new musical experiences, all of the extra non-music things you can do at Colliderfest, and about a new concert experience he's developing to have even more of these musicians visit the area in a more sustainable fashion. Plus Monte and Kaliis get a response to yesterday's conversation about "field", discuss a recent article about issues in an Amherst middle school, and introduce the concept of the "plywood ramp to the weekend". Author's Note: Since this episode was released, Colliderfest has since been canceled. No details of why have been made public, but more information about the artists who were coming is still available on the Bombyx website.

Today, we dive head first into local, and then national controversy surrounding one of our favorite things: word usage. There's buzz around the word "ladies" and how it impacted the search for a new school superintendent in Easthampton. Having heard from the mayor recently, we engage another side of this story: that of the word user himself, Vito Perrone, and get a different perspective on that situation and the impact of its aftermath. Then we sit with resident wordster, word nerd and senior editor at Merriam-Webster, Emily Brewster to discuss the word "field", which was recently removed from the language of an office at Smith College. And law professor at Western New England University, Jennifer Taub joins us and delves into the differences and distinctions between the two defamation cases Trump is embroiled in with E. Jean Carroll, including the one he just lost.

With the massive attrition of dairy farms in Massachusetts, (and the alarming amount of sad cow stories we've had on the show), we're turning our attention to a co-op that is still making milk magic happen. Angie Facey of Bree-z Knoll Farm, which is a part of Our Family Farms, shows us around their new facilities, including a robot that uses lasers to milk their cows, and a brand new, only-been-open-for-a-month milk processing plant. Then we head east to encounter a group determined to make everyone feel closer to symphonic music. The New England Repertory Orchestra, or NERO, is a boundary-breaking, canon-rethinking, community-entrenched organization that does that and more. Presenting a pair of works centering grief, including a premiere of a newly commissioned piece from Felix Jarrar, the orchestra takes the stage at The Shea Theater this weekend. We chat with artistic director and conductor Cailin Marcel Manson and violin first-chair Michi Wiancko about how diversity as a mantra helps them change the landscape and equity of symphonic and operatic music.

We're starting the week off with a bang! And that's literal in the case of the sun. Just in time for all your existential dread, Mr. Universe, Salman Hameed, talks to us about how the sun will eventually devour the Earth. The process is genuinely cool and we found out more about how this happens by watching another star eat one of its planets. For a good portion of May, that bang will bring a plethora of films of various shapes, genres, and sizes to the valley. The Easthampton Film Festival sees its second year and a huge expansion of programing to go along with that. Organizer Chris Ferry joined us in studio to chat about all the things you can see. He brought along Wally Marzano-Lesnevich and Melissa Dimetres, both local filmmakers who will be showing work over the course of the festival. And Monte went to Hampshire Pride this weekend, where he got to ask mayor Gina-Louise Sciarra, councilors Garrick Perry and Marissa Elkins, and police chief Jodi Kasper their feelings on the return of the festival. He also captured the proclamation that might have been hinted at previously.

Music, mezcal, and OSHA are what we're all about today! Don't think these things go together? Well, we're about to be the center of that particular Venn diagram. You may have heard about a death due to dust inhalation at a dispensary in Holyoke. We bring in reporter and UMass Professor Dusty Christensen, who recently wrote a more in depth article about this incident and other related issues for The Nation. We pick his brain about the inequities of cannabis production. One vice deserves another. So in honor of Cinco de Mayo (a distinctly Texan holiday, we learned) we enter the Mezcal Thunderdome with local chef and foodways activist Neftalí Durán, who lets us taste 2 very different mezcals straight from Oaxaca. He also lets us know how we all could be doing mezcal better. And since rock comes in all shapes, sizes, and ages, we get down with a few members of the infamous Young at Heart Chorus, who are putting a performance on this Sunday at the Academy of Music called "The Love Show". They are always a delight, even ask us to sing along! Who are we to refuse a request for backup singers?

It is wars in the stars day! Which means it's the day before Cinco de Mayo, often celebrated in ways that are... shall we say questionable. But Latinas 413 and Hot Plate Brewing are seeking to change all that, while still having fun in the process. They're hosting a Cinco de Mayo event at the brewery that day and we checked in with Sarah Real of Hot Plate, and Lilliana Atanacio, Perla Mendoza, and Laura Cabrera of Latinas 413 to hear more about the actual history of the holiday as well as what those festivities are going to entail. We mcgovern with Rep. Jim McGovern about the country's Cuba policies and his trepidation surrounding the news of the possible Umass Amherst Layoffs. But we also asked our Congressperson what his favorite Star Wars® character is, because it's May the fourth, and we are nerds at our core. We want to find out who else in the NEPM building is feeling the force, so we ask our colleagues about the saga that continues.

It's our 50th episode! Time to party! And we're not the only ones. Transhealth, an all queer run organization seeking equity and unity in gender care, is celebrating too! And although their official 2nd anniversary show is sold out, that doesn't mean that we can't party with them. CEO Dallas Ducar and development director Em Ayers swing through to let us know what the organization has gained so far and what they have on the horizon. Getting free things is totally a festivity and Free Comic Book Day is happening on May 6th, so we pestered Christian W.Z. Reader of Comics 'N More in Easthampton about their store's involvement with the event as well as the innovative ways they've figured out to get even more folx into comics. And we can't be formal at parties, not the fun ones anyhow. The Word Nerd, Emily Brewster senior editor at Merriam-Webster talks with our hosts about the casualizing of language: both spoken and written.

This weekend is Pride in Hampshire County! Yes, a whole month before the rest of the country! But Northampton Pride gets its start under much smaller and more dangerous circumstances. Dr. Jane Fleischman was there at the first few marches, back when it was the Gay and Lesbian Liberation March. Although she primarily digs into sexuality of folx later in life with her practice Speaking Of, LLC and her podcast Our Better Half, we speak with her about those beginnings and its initial progress. Once we examine the origins, we turn to its future as Hampshire Pride emerges phoenix-like from the ashes of its Northampton predecessor. Organizers Clay Pearson, Kayla Abney and Celina Almendarez join us to talk about the importance of preserving not just the Pride March itself, but queer spaces in general. They are just fantastically decked out in our studio and we have the pics to prove it.

It is more than just our mornings that become eclectic this Monday. We bring another installment of "Meet the Mayor", this time heading up I-91 to Easthampton to chat with Nicole LaChapelle. A lot has happened in that city as of late, so we talk about it and her love of local music. Mr. Universe, Salman Hameed, comes with us to the re-opening of the Seymour Planetarium at Springfield Museums this past weekend. We get his thoughts on the update as well as some of their other exhibits! And Julie Lemieux of Windy Ridge Organics in Hawley stops through to speak about their interesting and innovative CSA program, and how they raise things off the farm as well!

With all of the stress of the week, we figured we would not only double but triple down on the relaxing today. We head to West Springfield for the Wine Thunderdome once again. It's Sardenga versus Tuscany as Michael Quinlan of Table & Vine brings us two Vermentinos to try out. Just ahead of their show at the Academy of Music, Langhorne Slim and John Craigie join us in studio. Each has a new album out, and although their songwriting styles seem very different from each other, their partnership dovetails them well, and as does their love for both The Beatles and the late Harry Belafonte. And pillar of the local rock scene, and endless font of stories about said scene, Ray Mason pays us a visit. He's got a new album coming out soon called "Is There Wiggle Room?" about which we are quite excited.

If you had no plans for this weekend, no worries, we've got you covered. There's so much happening in the 413 this weekend that we wish there were more hours in the day. A lot of those happenings involve hip-hop, where a legend in the genre is making an appearance in Easthampton this weekend. Large Professor performs at Daily Operation on Saturday and we chat with chef/owner David Schrier about how that's just one small part of keeping hip-hop vibrant in Western Mass. From there we go to Bombyx in Florence, where the 2nd Annual Power of Truths Festival is taking place on April 29th & 30th. The innovative and ambitious program seeks to inspire folx in order to create more equitable communities, and we chat with Michael Lawrence-Riddell of Self-Evident Education and Jared Bridgeman, aka Akrobatik about how Hip Hop is a large part of that picture and American history as a whole. This Saturday will also see the return of GreenNFit, a volunteer driven event heralded by Revitalize Springfield (a subset of Revitalize CDC). We talk with President & CEO Colleen Shanley-Loveless and Director of Programs Ethel Griffin about the impact of this program and others throughout the Connecticut River Valley. And we mcgovern with Rep. Jim McGovern, who is encountering and enduring difficult terrain on Capitol Hill.

We hope you like language because we're getting deep into it today. The Word Nerd, Emily Brewster, senior editor at Merriam-Webster here in Springfield pulls back the curtain to show the bones of how definitions actually work. Former poet laureate, and current professor at UMass, Karen Skolfield celebrates National Poetry Month with us by sharing some of her experiences and a bit of her work as well. At Smith College a production of La Ruta is running this weekend. The show examines the lives of women working and living around Juárez, and director, and new faculty member, Monica Lopez Orozco and one of the actors in the piece, Naidelyn Cruz join us to talk about the import and impact of the play. And tomorrow is McGoverning with Rep. Jim McGovern! Email your questions for the congressman to [email protected] or text us at [1-800-639-9120](tel:18006399120).

We got up to music, and farms, and moons today, oh my! Damany Gordon of Genuine Culture LLC in Holyoke is heralding a night of classic hip-hop in Springfield at White Lion Brewing this upcoming weekend. It honors the collective Native Tongues and we tap into why that group is so important and influential. We hear from Chelsea Gazillo of the American Farmland Trust about the Bay State's efforts to save small farms, as well as a preview of the story she'll be sharing as part of Field Notes, CISA's storytelling event happening this weekend. NEPM reporter Jill Kaufman keys us into a progressive and effective music therapy program happening in Franklin County. It's akin to other programs across the country seeing similar results and involving some big names as well. And Mr. Universe, Salman Hameed, shows us insights and connections between the moon, math, and Eid as Ramadan nears it's end.

Today was all about being both collegiate and past tense. First, Umass had a Bach Festival this weekend! As a part of the festivities, the Asian and Asian American Studies Arts and Culture Center brought three prominent composers and performers to campus to perform new works: Hyeyung Sol Yoon, Texu Kim, and Vijay Iyer. We talk with them about issues relating to western canon and how moving on from that influences their work now. And since climate change is very very real, and officially Earth day was this past Saturday (though an argument could be made that every day is Earth Day), we sat down with some folx from the Five College area to check in on what their particular campuses are doing regarding sustainability. It was a crowded house with Beth Hooker from Smith College, Sara Draper from Hampshire College, Ezra Small from UMass Amherst, and Weston Dripps from Amherst College (one day we'll catch them all). Each of their sustainability initiatives is gaining ground, and we got to hear about how they're collaborating with other colleges and universities in the Bay State to do even better.

When you live close enough to someone who's won multiple Nobel prizes and the Gandhi/King/Ikeda prize from Morehouse College, you have to get them in studio with you. You just have to do that. That is how we end up talking with Dr. Ira Helfand about the threat of nuclear war and all the things we can do to stop it, including the mission of the Back from the Brink Campaign. And that was such heavy conversation for the first day of the weekend that we needed to lighten our moods a little. Introducing: The Cocktail Thunderdome. Sean Billson of Judd's Restaurant at Gateway City Arts in Holyoke, who pits two variations of Corpse Reviver no. 2 against each other. And it's live music Friday, which we dig into with Noam Schatz of The Lucky Shots who have a new album that's just come out and a show on April 29th to celebrate that.

It is the 20th day of April, which is celebrated by many it turns out. But being in one of the few states with legal access to jazz cabbage is not without its nuances too. Payton Shubrick of 6 Bricks dispensary in Springfield, one of only 3 black woman owned in the whole state, chats with us to dig into some of the issues with equity and equality in the industry. (She also shares our fascination with antiquated terminology for cannabis.) Then we bring a pile of young actors from First Generation into the studio to give us a taste of Shout! Elevate! Inspire!: a performance they'll be a part of at Springfield Technical Community College this weekend alongside Samira Evans, Haneef Nelson and more. Julie Lichtenberg and James Arana of The Performance Project also let us know more places you can catch the show they excerpted. And after a week's hiatus, we are once again back to mcgoverning with Representative Jim McGovern, who shares his worries about guns, transgender kids, and other issues arising on Capitol Hill.

We're hoping to fit in with the cool kids today. Some of those cool kids are running on airport runways. We talk to Julie Kumble of Treehouse Foundation and Holly Lurgio of the Northampton Airport about the Runway 5k happening on April 23rd, where they'll be raising funds by letting people run where the airplanes roam (but not while the airplanes roam). We find out how Treehouse is changing the landscape of foster care and that yes, some folx do build their planes from kits. And other cool kids will be hanging out with Lindsay Patterson and Marshall Escamilla from the Tumble Science Podcast for Kids, who in addition to bringing their songs and knowledge to Meltdown in Greenfield this weekend, bring us tales about birds and blind scientists. But the coolest kids of all can go backwards in time with their words. Resident wordster, Emily Brewster of Merriam-Webster teaches us about a term coined by former NPR President Frank Mankiewicz and how it dates the evolution of technology.

Some stories are best told by the people who have actually lived them. But we can accompany those stories with pizza, because food is wonderful. Pizza Quest volume 3 hits the Berkshires as we make a stop, sadly without our amateur pizziaolo, to Betty's Pizza Shack in Lenox. Then, as it is still April and therefore still National Poetry Month, local poet and social worker Lauren Singer joins us with some of her work and updates on her many projects examining grief and adaptations to loss, including a new podcast. And CISA is preparing to host Field Notes, stories of our local foodways, at the Academy of Music. So we get a small preview of what will be onstage April 30th with Jacob Nelson and Trouble Erin Anne Gouch Mandeson. **Please note: The Lauren Singer readings mention child death.

We get to go both forward and backward in time today, which is fitting for a Monday somehow. Mr. Universe, Salman Hameed tells us about the ESA's new probe JUICE (already taking selfies in space), its mission to the moons of Jupiter, and the lengths we do to make sure the probe looks but doesn't touch. Then we digress quite a bit about pizza and semantics with Jarrett J. Krosoczka. He's got a new graphic memoir out called "Sunshine" that will receive a full cast reading treatment on April 18th at the Academy of Music in Northampton. We pick his brain about the origins of the book and the ways the events have influenced his life today. Plus it was the holiday that only 5 other states celebrate, and on which we look east to watch folx run 26.2 miles into the state capital. Neither of our hosts are particularly fond of running, however, so they look to you for other marathon-esque activities you may have participated in! (Do tell us at [email protected], we are curious indeed)

It was wicked warm out today. But just because it's warming up, doesn't mean we can't get comfy with it. The heat makes us think of white wine. In the Berkshires we have our very first set of white wines in the thunderdome, courtesy of Nejaime's Wine Cellars in Lenox. Our hosts Joe Nejaime and Xavier Letteron even threw an extra wrench into this showdown, for which we were entirely game. Our studios are currently being moved down the street to our new offices, but it's Friday, and having live music has become a fixture. So instead we headed to Northampton to meet Flora Reed and Philip Price of The Winterpills to do a live music Friday at The Parlor Room instead. With beverages and music covered, we just need a good read to round it out. Lucky for us, local author and Pulitzer Prize winner Tracy Kidder has a new book out called "Rough Sleepers: Dr. Jim O'Connell's Urgent Mission to Bring Healing to Homeless People". We chat with him about the people called to help, and how simple solutions don’t always suit complex problems. Cozy bases all covered. **Please note: The reading included from the Tracy Kidder book mentions suicidal ideation

We're preserving and creating community today. We find out about a decades strong jazz jam session in Amherst being revitalized through the interest of more young people attending. Reporter Ben James takes us to The Drake to see what's going down. A group of 5th and 6th graders at Fort River School are just now learning how to change the world through their civic engagement class. They walk us through their projects with a little help from their teacher, Tim Austin. And one of those projects relates to educator and member of North-South America Chithue (the Tibetan Parliament in Exile)Thondup Tsering, who is helping to bring activist and poet Tenzin Tsundue to speak on UMass campus on April 17th about the release of his latest book, "ནང། Nowhere to Call Home". Together they paint a bigger picture of the importance of resistance, and the connections that resilience builds. And Greenfield drummer, drum tech for The Rolling Stones, and general awesome person in sound Don McAulay stopped in to help us celebrate the life of a pillar of the local music community, Stone Coyote's drummer Doug Tibbles, who we lost earlier this week.

It's fun when you discover things a little closer to home than you first thought. It's true of language and turns out it's true of grain too. Word Nerd Emily Brewster chats with us about prefixed words whose opposites pre-date their root word. We are quite gruntled to know there's a running list of them. Then we skip across the river to take a look at what was for quite some time the only malting house east of the Mississippi. Andrea and Christian Stanley of Valley Malt and Ground Up Grain moved their operation from Hadley to Holyoke, upgrading some of their equipment and products while they did it. Along with Phil Korman of CISA, we stopped into their new digs to take a tour, hear how their plans and business have evolved over the past decade and change, and eat goodies brought by their baking consultant: Deb Bernardini.

Let's take a look at houses. We dig into housing equity from more sides than one with H. John Fisher, fair housing manager for Way Finders in Springfield. Their 17th annual Fair Housing and Civil Rights Conference which will continue through the 13th, so we ask about some of the problems we can easily see, which of course leads to conversations about the ones we can't. Then we segue into poetry with someone who used to be a tenant lawyer. Martín Espada, poet and professor of English at UMass Amherst, joins us to chat about his work, it's connection to community, and the language that joins us all. He'll be reading at Greenfield Community College on April 12th, so we asked him to read for us too. (He obliged.) And just in case you maybe have a burning question for Rep. Jim McGovern, here's a quick reminder that you can send us your questions for him anytime! Just email [email protected], or text us at [1-800-639-9120](tel:18006399120), and we'll ask the congressman your query!

Mondays need a little beauty in them, and as we find ourselves right in the middle of National Poetry Month, it seems fitting to bring in a little lyricism to allay our daily doldrums. So we talk to one of the poet laureates of Easthampton, Jason Montgomery. Although he and his partner Alex Woolner will soon be stepping down from the position, that didn't stop us from talking about their various poetry projects at Attack Bear Press, and his art in and outside of the 50 Arrow Gallery, plus a cool form of poetry they'll be highlighting on April 13th. We spoke to the meter of buildings and architecture with Dylan Gaffney of Forbes Library's Local History & Special Collections, who will present a series of photographs documenting the evolving landscape of Northampton from 1887-1987. And we discovered the prose of space with Mr. Universe, Hampshire College's Salman Hameed, who showed us the magic of rogue black holes.

It's Good Friday! Good as in we have a pile of wicked good things we get into. First, in a confrontation months in the making, we invite NEPM's own Elizabeth Román to live taste test UK vs USA Cadbury Creme Eggs. Is there a difference that you can really notice? And just in time for passover, we head to Provisions to have two kosher wines enter the thunderdome! Benson Hyde and Bruce Amis let us sample some non-Manischewitz options available this holiday. Plus a musical double header! We catch band leader for Snarky Puppy, Michael League, on his way to sound check and ask him what's in store for their show at the UMass Fine Arts Center next week. Then local bluegrass heroes Poor Monroe stop into our very stripped down studios ahead of their concert at Gateway City Arts on Saturday to share their musical histories and some aquavit. Good things for your Friday, indeed.

We bring extra springtime in the studio today, now that it's warm! We welcome Ashley Randle, the first female-identifying commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resources (MDAR). She tells about some of the department's plans, raising cows, and farming across the baystate both rural and urban. Then we get into the not-so-Jewish past of Springfield with editor and podcaster Mark Oppenheimer of the podcast Unorthodox. He also keys us into some of the new traditions folx might see in their Passover festivities. (Chag Sameach to those celebrating!) And Rep. Jim McGovern sidesteps the indictment debacle. With that much needed breath of fresh air, we instead learn how he's on the congressional robotics caucus advisory committee, that the robotics caucus exists, and how his work on that committee lead to a recent visit to Worcester Polytechnic Institute. And then an alarming amount of Star Wars references happen. They may or may not be acronym related.

We all need a bit of reprieve from Tuesday's kerfuffle. So we dig into some books instead! NYT bestselling author, opera composer, and Kennedy Center education artist in residence, Mo Willems shows us his latest art exhibit, Wrecked Shapes. And we celebrate the 20th anniversary of perhaps his best known character: Pigeon. Then we head to Hatfield, where the largest collection of cookbooks resides! At least that's according to the Guinness Book of World Records, and its winner Lisa Ekus let us run rampant among its tomes while telling us how the massive assortment came to be. Her daughter Sally Ekus also gave us insight to the cookbook publishing industry and their place in it. Plus we hear some of your thoughts about the goings on, locally with the use of the word "Ladies" in Easthampton, and nationally with the aforementioned indictment! Tell us yours at [email protected] or text us at [18006399120!](tel:18006399120)

Hampshire College Astronomer Dr. Salman Hameed on the James Webb's deep dive into the TRAPPIST-1 system. Is there a planet there that could host life as we know it? Plus the unveiling of the Artemis I crew. And Hannah Moushabeck on her new book Homeland: My Father Dreams of Palestine with special guests her father, Michel, and her uncle, Gabriel. All three of these Moushabecks have a lifelong dedication to books, bookstores and publishing. We'll hear about those connections and how they link up to Western Mass.

Surprise! Former President Donald Trump was indicted yesterday, much to everyone's surprise. Western New England University Law Professor, Jen Taub, give us her take on the news. Tasting the King and Queen of Northern Italian wines in The Wine Thunderdome with the Wine Snobs from State Street Fruit Store, Deli, Wines and Spirits in Northampton. Jennifer Lee, from the Narragansett Tribe, on the Indigenous Voices screening at The Lava Center in Greenfield. And the band Cloudbelly, performing at The Drake in Amherst tonight.

A conversation with Congressman Jim McGovern in the wake of the Nashville shooting. Will a Republican controlled Congress take any steps? And why was Richard Gere hugging the congressman on the steps of The Capitol? Then a tour of a new exhibit as Mass MoCA called "to see oneself at a distance," with artists Suneil Sanzgiri and Tu Le. And an informal poll: Red Sox or Yankees? It's Opening Day form Major League Baseball. The 413 has divided allegiances. Where do your allegiances lie?

Comedian Jimmy Tingle and the FCCMP

Monte & Kaliis talk with Phil Korman from CISA and with Bob Lowry from Bueno y Sano about the history of that now iconic Western Mass Burrito shop. They even get a DoorDash delivery and a briefing about how DoorDash is impacting the restaurants and the communities the restaurants serve. And then a conversation with Lev BenEzra, executive director of The Amherst Survival Center about their upcoming Empty Bowls Dinner and about how a cut in pandemic era SNAP benefits is affecting the greater Amherst community.