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Mountain Music Folk School is on the Map Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Jessica Martin is a senior fellow at CreateHere, and an aspiring Mandolin player. She sends us this update on the Mountain Music Folk School.

In less than one year, Mountain Music Folk School (MMFS) founders Matt Evans and Christie Burns have laid groundwork for the preservation, perpetuation, and promotion of folk music in Chattanooga. By way of innovation, alternative thinking, and love for the music, Christie and Matt have established themselves as entrepreneurs and artists in our community.

Since the inception of MMFS in 2009—aided by a MakeWork grant—the program has completed a successful first semester of classes, landed a brick and mortar space on the North Shore, and revitalized the breadth of energy surrounding folk music in Chattanooga.

After helping administer MakeWork grants for two years, it has become apparent to me that there is certainly no lack of talent in our city. And along with many other projects and initiatives that were born out of the grant program, this is one worth mentioning and even getting involved in.

The beauty that lies in the MMFS model is that it’s all about participation and collaboration. Classes are held in group sessions and not only embrace the music itself, but there is a strong emphasis on collective knowledge and experimentation.

Fortunately, whether you’ve signed up for the next semester of classes or are just scoping out the scene, it matters not; the group is holding an event to honor past, present and future students this Sunday, January 24 from 1 PM to 4 PM at Barking Legs, so join the party, bring a friend and bring an instrument!

Posted by Administrator in Arts in Culture
January 20: City Share featuring Casey Caplowe of GOOD Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Casey Caplowe is the creative director for GOOD, an integrated media platform for people who want to live well and do good, community-based work. GOOD seeks to be both a company and community for the people, businesses, and NGOs moving the world forward, with a mission to provide content, experiences, and utilities to serve this community.

For next week’s City Share, Caplowe will not be discussing one city in particular, but rather explaining several city enrichment initiatives that GOOD is featuring, encouraging, and participating in. Through open-source brainstorming and international design expos, GOOD is helping to connect big ideas in small towns across the country and the world. On Wednesday, Caplowe will give us a tour of some of these ideas and we’ll have a chance to voice some of our own.

Please join us Wednesday, January 20 from 12-1 pm at CreateHere.

Lunch will be provided by JJ Mavericks, so you don’t need to bring anything to the table except your ears and your ideas.

If you plan to attend, please RSVP to Blair Waddell at blair [at] createhere.org or 423.648.2195.

By Alison Burke

Posted by Administrator in Economy in Culture
Celebrate Community with Films that Explore Sustainable Food

CreateHere and green|spaces are pleased to partner for a Night of Foodie Flicks on January 22, in conjunction with the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Working Group’s (SSAWG) annual conference, Practical Tools and Solutions for Sustaining Family Farms. Held in Chattanooga for the second year in a row, the conference draws 1100+ attendees from across the region. The Night of Foodie Flicks event aims to create a dialogue between this group and the Chattanooga public using films, food and libations.

Chattanooga’s food economy is a fascinating, vibrant one. The local food economy here is unique not only in flavor, but in the intimate connections that exist between those involved. The SSAWG film night is an opportunity to showcase our community, bringing local foodies, food producers, residents, and regional talents together to celebrate our sustainable foods.

The film night runs from 7:30 pm to 9:00 pm, with both short and feature-length films to be screened at CreateHere and green|spaces.

Short films include:
Buttermilk: It Can Help Knoxville’s Earl Cruze, proprietor of Cruze Family Dairy, extols the virtues of buttermilk. It might not solve all the world’s problems, but it can make a big dent.
Hush Hoggies Hush A look at Tom Johnson’s famous praying pigs, circa 1978.
Greenhorns Get to know a growing and diverse network of young farmers—scrappy, resourceful, and adaptive.
The Adventures of the Big Bad Chef Like a lot places in the Mississippi Delta, the Bourbon Mall serves hot tamales, but so far they’re the only folks with enough guts to deep-fry them. Follow the Big Bad Chef on a deep-fried detour through the Secret South.
Every Third Bite Two years ago, honeybees started disappearing: about one in every three colonies left their hive never to return. Every Third Bite attempts to discover what plagued these hives.
Smoke & Ears Smoke & Ears tells the story of the Big Apple Inn in Jackson, Mississippi. Known as “Big John’s” by its faithful customers, the Big Apple Inn’s defining duo of pig ear sandwiches and hot smoked sausage sandwiches (known as “smokes”) has kept folks coming back again and again for over 70 years, and counting.
Mutton: The Movie Visit the northwestern corner of Kentucky, where descendants of the Welsh who originally settled the banks of the Ohio River don’t count sheep; they barbecue them.

Feature-length films include:
Fresh Fresh celebrates the farmers, thinkers and business people across America who are re-inventing our food system. Each has witnessed the rapid transformation of our agriculture into an industrial model, and confronted the consequences: food contamination, environmental pollution, depletion of natural resources, and morbid obesity. Forging healthier, sustainable alternatives, they offer a practical vision for a future of our food and our planet.

Home Grown Home Grown follows the Dervaes family, who run a small organic farm in the heart of urban Pasadena, California. While “living off the grid”, they harvest over 6,000 pounds of produce on less than a quarter of an acre, make their own bio diesel, power their computers with the help of solar panels, and maintain a website that gets 4,000 hits a day.

This event is free and open to the public.

CreateHere is located at 55 E Main Street, Suite #105 + green|spaces is located at 63 E Main Street

Posted by Administrator in Culture in Environment
Audition Announcement: Tonight at 6:30 pm Monday, January 04, 2010

Ensemble Theatre of Chattanooga will hold open auditions for an exciting project that will combine the visual and performing art disciplines in a way that is unique to Chattanooga and the Southeast.

Local artist Thomas Spake was commissioned to create a sculpture, that sculpture inspired four commissioned playwrights to write four new plays; those four plays each will inspire their own piece of visual art. The result will be an evening of jointly inspired theatre and art which we hope to present at various venues in the Chattanooga area, including at ETC.

The auditions will consist of cold readings from the current drafts of the four plays. If you have never performed or auditioned with ETC before, then please bring a headshot and resume.

We will be casting up to 3 females ages 20-35 and up to 6 males ages 20-35.
We will also be looking for a stage manager.
All roles will be paid.

Where: St Andrews Center
When: January 4th between 6:30-9:30

Rehearsals will be in January and performances are planned for February.

Any questions or concerns please email .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

Posted by Administrator in Arts