Arts & Culture

Johnny Mathis is coming to Boise. The 81-year-old singer celebrated his 60th year as a recording artist in 2016. He’s recorded 78 original albums and has sung with everyone from Barbara Streisand to Ray Charles.

He’s known for a long-string of hits – he’s had 43 singles on the Billboard pop charts – including “Chances Are,” “It’s Not for Me To Say,” and six original Christmas albums.

Last weekend, the Fiddlers of Idaho State Championship was held in Hailey. Those with the top scores have now advanced to the national championships in Weiser this summer. 

There was competition at all levels, from the “senior senior” division of 70 and above, to the “small fry” division of eight and younger.

Contestants were judged on three fiddle songs: a waltz, a hoe down and a tune of their choice. But who wasn’t there was as important as who was.

When it opened in New York, the play “The Clean House” was championed by The New York Times as a production of “theatrical audacity and emotional richness.” It is the work of celebrated playwright Sara Ruhl; and it opens this weekend at Boise Contemporary Theater and runs through May 6th.

Prior to showing 'A River Runs Through It' in 1992, The Flicks in downtown Boise wasn't making much of a profit.

Thanks to a chance meeting at the Morrison Center between The Flicks owner Carole Skinner and Robert Redford, the film's director, the theater was able to obtain permission from Columbia Pictures to show the film. The weekend premiere of the movie attracted a record-breaking audience and jump-started a loyal following The Flicks would carry on for years to come.

Boise State Public Radio’s new podcast Some of the Parts just launched. It tells the stories of small groups of people in Idaho. It’s hosted by KBSX’s reporter-turned-podcaster Adam Cotterell. He told Morning Edition host Matt Guilhem that the project was born from a desire to do what Cotterell likes to call, “founding principles reporting.”

The legacy of the late Gene Harris is celebrated in the Gene Harris Jazz Festival, which next week celebrates its 20th anniversary. Dr. Alex Noppe, director of jazz studies at Boise State University, is a celebrated trumpeter, composer and scholar and the person who now oversees the jazz festival.

Noppe talks with Weekend Edition host George Prentice about this year's festival slate, the return of "club night" to downtown Boise, and Harris' musical spell that is cast on the next generation of great jazz artists.

Treefort Music Fest is in full swing in Boise. The British band Happyness returns to the festival, all the way from London. They release a new single this week, from their forthcoming album, Write In.

They’ve modeled their sound after American Indie Rock bands of the 1990s, like Pavement, Yo La Tengo, Sparklehorse and Low.

Musicians Benji Compston and Jon EE Allan talk about their creative process and their long trip to Idaho, and preview their new album, to be released in April 2017.

Boise’s Treefort Music Fest is well underway and events like Hackfort, Storyfort and Filmfort are just part of the fun. This year, Kidfort will once again bring concerts, crafts and interactive events to a younger audience. New this year is an idea dreamed up by one Boise man who wants kids to put down their electronics and start building things out of cardboard.

The Treefort Music Fest has begun. The annual Boise music-and-arts event runs through Sunday. Each year it seems to get bigger, which festival organizers welcome, as long as it stays true to its roots. There are definitely business challenges to managing growth.

Drew Lorona, one of the co-founders of Treefort, points to the streets outside The Owyhee in downtown Boise as "the festival hub."

One of the stars at the 2017 Sun Valley Film Festival is actor Geena Davis, known for a string of movie hits in the 1980s and 90s and for playing a television version of the president in 2005 in Commander in Chief.

The Academy Award winner had only good things to say about the Wood River Valley.

“I love Sun Valley. I love this festival. I was here last in 2012 and always have a great time here.”

The sixth annual Treefort Music Fest starts has begun in downtown Boise (March 22-26). The festival will once again showcase indie music from around the region and beyond. In total, 420 bands will take over more than 20 venues around downtown -- not to mention all the mini forts. 

About a dozen teenagers are helping set up a stage in a burrito shop in downtown Boise. (The salsa bar is stage right.) Some are stringing decorations from the ceiling and walls, in preparation for the slew of bands they'll host during Treefort Music Fest.

Gus Marsden is helping run this new venue as a leader of the festival's all-ages volunteer team.