Down on the (progressive) farm If you’ve ever wondered how a modern, sustainable-agriculture farm works, here’s a chance to see for yourself: The Carolina Farm Stewardship Association will hold its third annual tour of eight innovative family farms on Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 12 and 13, from 1-6 p.m. The self-guided tour will include organic […]
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Better clear out the chairs for this band: It’s participation music, with grooves that make you move in ways not always compatible with stable things like furniture. “We don’t want to do stuff you just have to sit back and listen to, concert-style,” declares drummer Ray Kelly of the Asheville-based Information Network. No, this group […]
Bound free
The idea for Jason Watson’s new exhibit, Tether/Leash, popped up during a day he spent at the beach. But the subject matter explored in this installation at Zone one contemporary gallery — the young Watson’s first nonstudent show — is anything but, well, a day at the beach. How about near-death from dysentery in a […]
Letters to the editor
The corporate-litter connection Managers of public areas know it is vitally important to promptly and, as quickly as possible, repair damage, control graffiti and pick up litter. Removing these visual cues tells the public their property matters and is being cared for, [and hopefully] motivates them to care for it, too — emphasizing a sense […]
Likin’ them apples
Long believed to hold magical powers — from keeping the doctor away to eliciting good grades from that special teacher — apples are as deeply ingrained in the American consciousness as, well, apple pie. Romantic myths aside, though, the business of apples is big in western North Carolina — to the tune of $21 million […]
Apple music
Music has always been a crucial part of the North Carolina Apple Festival, from the early days (when festival visitors square-danced to local country bands) to today, when a mixed slate of regional and national acts takes the stage. This year’s festival headliners are: • The Buddy “K” Big Band: This 18-piece ensemble, fronted by […]
Foreigner, go home!
Fund for Investigative Reporting “Lydia” is an American whose roots in western North Carolina run deep. She owns a home in Asheville and works full time at a mid-management job in human resources. A devout Christian, she’s also been active in missionary work for years, particularly in Mexico and South America. About two years ago, […]
Let them eat regs …
The sweeping Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 contains a whopping 671 sections, with provisions amending everything from land-border inspections to the salaries of immigration judges. One of the law’s more controversial aspects has proved to be its drastic cuts in all forms of public assistance for immigrants (some of which were […]
Caught in a crossfire
Even in western North Carolina, immigrants come in all shapes and sizes; they don’t always fit the stereotypes held by many Americans. Here is one such couple’s story: On the surface, Sergey Ivanchenkov‘s life in the small, former Soviet republic of Uzbekistan seemed ideal. As chief executive director of the Swedish corporation Molnlycke SCA, he […]
Notepad
AIDS Memorial Quilt comes to Knoxville For anyone who has ever lost a friend or relative to AIDS, the Memorial Quilt may be one of the most painful yet meaningful works of community art in the modern era. This poignant work will be on display at the Knoxville Convention Center Sept. 4-6. The quilt began […]
Buncombe County Commission
The sound of whispered “Amens” filtered through the passionate, determined standing-room-only crowd in the commissioners’ chambers with a hushed, Sunday-morning fervor. Not surprisingly, the matter in question — a resolution to impose a moratorium on the licensing of adult-oriented businesses in Buncombe County — drew no opposition at the Aug. 18 meeting. Angry pastors, concerned […]
Notepad
Taking their demand to the world — As a follow-up to their recent news conference (held outside the gates of the Buncombe County’s School Board offices), the Intertribal Association of Buncombe County has posted a Community Resolution of Respect for American Indian Culture on the World Wide Web. The resolution calls for an end to […]
William Smith receives Conservancy Volunteer Award
William Smith of Asheville is a kind and humble man with a dear heart who personifies the word faithfulness. That’s the way Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy Director Lynn Cox describes the 88-year-old recipient of the Conservancy’s 1998 Murray Volunteer Service Award, presented this June at the group’s annual meeting in Crossnore, N.C. Smith had never […]
Summer spectacular
It’s 8:30 on a Saturday morning, and I’m watching sculptor-turned-choreographer Norma Bradley work with members of Asheville Contemporary Dance Theatre. “Wake up this hillside in a way it hasn’t woken up before!” she calls out to the dancers as they move along the knoll, improvising with tree branches and bamboo poles. The dancers disappear down […]
Home on the fringe
The places of our childhood linger in our memories, like wistfully distant, teasing Edens. Charlie Gearhart, songwriting headman for the Goose Creek Symphony, remembers his Kentucky boyhood in his multilayered creations. Guitars Pickin’/Fiddles Playin’ (1991) paints an impressionistic portrait of Goose Creek Hollow, as rich as Dylan Thomas’ poetic memoir of Fern Hill, with rollicking […]
Of corpse
Like the corpses whose untimely demises they track, detectives, it seems, come in all descriptions these days. In Miracle Strip, a hoydenish confection of a mystery by first-time author Nancy Bartholomew, exotic dancer (and unwitting sleuth) Sierra Lavotini happens upon a mobster, dead as a tuna in the can, in her friend’s refrigerator — only […]
Letters to the editor
Life’s a risk Bruce McCanless [Letters, July 15 and Aug. 12] continues to rail inanely about LSD. Millions of people brain-damaged from taking LSD? Where’d he get that? There were hardly millions of people who ever took the stuff at all, much less fried their brains on it. This sounds like something McCanless came across […]
Letters to the editor
Asheville police lost it at Bele Chere I am having trouble going to sleep tonight due to an unfortunate event I witnessed at the [recent] Bele Chere festival. First, I would like to state that I do not know any of the people involved in this incident — and will, most likely, not ever meet […]
Once more, with feeling
The tension was palpable at the WNC Air Pollution Control Agency, when its embattled board members reconvened on Aug. 10, to hold a second set of elections. By the meeting’s end, the board had accomplished publicly what it had tried a month earlier to accomplish by secret ballot. The board elected Buncombe County appointee Doug […]
Grading Asheville’s schools
On the heels of the start of another school year, Asheville City Schools administrators are poised to release an assessment of the school system’s progress toward meeting goals the school board set last year at its annual retreat in Boone. But before the report — tentatively titled “The Annual Report of School Progress” — has […]
Mining the soul
All radiant, blonde good looks and youthful exuberance (they’re both 23), it’s hard to believe, at first glance, that Jennifer Nettles and Cory Jones (a.k.a. Soul Miner’s Daughter) possess any real, well, soul. But the minute Nettles opens her mouth to belt out one of the duo’s original tunes — or a seductive, hopped-up version […]