Cover Story
History told by the survivors
UPDATE: The groundbreaking for the Seneca Art and Culture Center will be held on Monday, September 16, at 11 a.m., and the public is invited to attend. One lasting effect of the actions of empires is that it can be difficult to locate the voices of the underdog, unmitigated by the interests of the victor.…
VOTE NOW: Best of Rochester 2013 Primary Ballot
Primary Ballot closes Wednesday, September 4 at 5pm!
Moody’s lowers Monroe County’s credit rating
Moody’s Investors Service has lowered Monroe County’s bond rating, which could translate to higher borrowing costs. The move follows an approximately two-year period where Moody’s first increased the county’s rating, then held it steady. The financial services company issued the action yesterday and it also changed the county’s ratings outlook — its prediction of future…
Schumer targets specific type of railroad tanker
In 2009, approximately 30 railroad cars per day were shipping oil or ethanol across the United States, but that figure has grown substantially over the last few years, according to Senator Chuck Schumer. Approximately 200 to 300 of the cars pass through Rochester on the CSX freight line each day, Schumer said today during a press…
Concert Review: The Branch Davidians, Joywave, Fowls, People Can Be More Awesome, and Tugboat at the Bug Jar
Saturday night at the Bug Jar was a local music showcase, with five solid Rochester-based acts on the bill. The underground hip-hop outfit Tugboat was first up, and entertained with an — at times comical — yet impressive display of smooth rhymes, provocative samples, and engaging beats. People Can Be More Awesome followed with what…
Week ahead: Forums on Lake Ontario health, school board candidates
The Lake Ontario ecosystem will be the subject of a public meeting at 6 p.m. Thursday at the Port of Rochester terminal building, 1000 North River Street. The forum is being put on by the federal Environmental Protection Agency, the state Department of Environmental Conservation, and New York Sea Grant. A DEC press release says…
Study: woodpeckers are eating ash borers
The emerald ash borer has devastated ash tree populations in some states and is expected to do some serious damage in other areas. Part of the reason is because, as as invasive, non-native insect, it lacks predators. But apparently, woodpeckers have developed a taste for the ash borer, according to a new study — “Effects of…
Train station gets federal funding
This morning, House Representative Louise Slaughter’s office announced that Rochester’s new Amtrak will receive $15 million in federal funding. The U.S. Department of Transportation has permanently allocated the funds, says a press release from Slaughter’s office. The money means that the contract for design and construction can be awarded in the fall, it says. The…
Don’t get too excited over Chesapeake news
Earlier this week, Reuters scored a massive scoop when it reported that Chesapeake Energy is dropping its court fight to extend gas-drilling leases in parts of New York. At issue were some Chesapeake leases in the Southern Tier, many of which, as Reuters piece put it, “were agreed to long before a boom in hydraulic…
Preservation Board says no negative impact from University Ave. apartment plan
Despite some lingering concerns about the size of the project and the planned removal of some older trees, members of the City of Rochester’s Preservation Board seem reassured about a proposed apartment complex for 933 University Avenue. The board met last night on Morgan Management’s controversial proposal for a 99-unit apartment building on the site,…
Vargas responds to poor test scores
A somber Superintendent Bolgen Vargas said at a press conference this afternoon that the just-released results of new state tests, in which Rochester students scored the lowest of all the Big Five school districts, were predictable. The district has for years provided the least amount of instruction to students who need more time on task,…
REVIEW: The Amazing Acro-Cats at MuCCC (through 8/11)
Let’s just get this out of the way: the Amazing Acro-Cats show, now at MuCCC through Sunday, August 11, is completely and utterly ridiculous. How could it not be? It’s a dozen or so cats (plus two chickens, a trio of low-energy rats, and a woodchuck) performing a variety of stunts when and if they…
Rochester students fare poorly on new state tests
This morning, the State Education Department released test results for grades 3-8, and the scores for the Rochester school district are shockingly low. Only 5.4 percent of city students are proficient in English and only 5 percent are proficient in math. Rochester scores are again the lowest of the state’s Big Five school district’s, with…
ROOTS ROCK | John Hiatt
Though couched in a sort of self-induced irony, John Hiatt has always made perfect sense. He is a painfully honest, poetic, hysterical, and unparalleled American treasure. Hiatt’s music still chugs along the tracks and dirt roads of classic American music. Before Americana was a term, Hiatt was. After Americana gets swallowed up in another blanket…
ROCK | Uproar Festival
Alice In Chains, Jane’s Addiction, Coheed and Cambria, Circa Survive, Walking Papers, and a plethora of others make up the Uproar Festival. This line-up is the best of the best of the heavies; bands that represent the majority of post-grunge, post-metal music. These bands offer more thought-provoking lyricism and unique takes on modern rock. It’s…
ROCKABILLY | Kim Lenz & the Jaguars
Her mother was in the rodeo. Her father was a Wolfman Jack devotee. It seems as though Kim Lenz was born to be rockabilly royalty. While growing up in southern California, her musical education was all over the map. She was raised on such disparate acts as Wanda Jackson, Cole Porter, and Blondie. Combining a…
ELECTRO-POP | Nick Maynard
Nick Maynard’s “The Future: Part I” is an electro-pop concept album revolving around a world that is entirely of his own invention. Maynard ushers his listeners into a different dimension and time, though his overall arching theme is familiar and timeless. Maynard has managed to unite almost-theatrical lyrics with bubbly, dancey pop hooks — no…
ROCK | Boulder Fest
Boulder Fest showcases all things local, including music, food, and art. Favorite local bands such as Roots Collider, White Woods, Gin & Bonnets, and Mosaic Foundation will hit the stage, along with a vast collective of other fantastic acts. Boulder Fest will take place Friday, August 9, through Sunday, August 11, at Boulder Coffee Company,…
The pain and politics of school closings
Politics may be local, but school closings are personal. School 44, which is due to be closed, had a group of teachers, parents, and homeowners from the 19th Ward confused and angry at a meeting of the Education Committee of the Southwest Common Council earlier this week. Many of the school’s teachers said they had…
CLASSICAL | Finger Lakes Opera
The Rochester area needs another opera company like it needs another…well, come to think of it, we could definitely use some additional operatic action here. The brand-new Finger Lakes Opera hopes to help fill the breach. The program for this inaugural concert, led by the company’s artistic director Gerard Floriano (pictured), includes Metropolitan Opera soprano…
Feedback 8/7
We welcome your comments. Send them to themail@rochester-citynews.com, or post them on our website, rochestercitynewspaper.com, our Facebook page, or our Twitter feed, @roccitynews. For our print edition, we select comments from all three sources; those of fewer than 350 words have a greater chance of being published, and we do edit selections for publication in…
COUNTRY | Keith Urban
If you’ve got it as bad for country as I do, this has been a great summer of concerts at CMAC. Next up is Keith Urban with Little Big Town and Dustin Lynch. It’s the “Light the Fuse Tour 2013,” and Urban’s most recent “Little Bit of Everything” has me pushing up the volume and…
MUSIC FEATURE: Cold Sweat
There’s plenty of presentation and protocol in this live-music racket that threatens to upend the whole affair. There are plenty of bands that don’t put the music first, concentrating instead on the biz, buzz, and baubles. Then there’s a quartet like Rochester’s Cold Sweat, a straight-up, straight-ahead blues band. Sure, there are detours into Latin…
SPORTS | PGA Tour
If you have the desire and the bank to watch a bunch of rich men move tiny balls around a lush obstacle course, head to Pittsford, where the PGA Championship is being held at Oak Hill Country Club (346 Kilbourn Road). Events began on August 5, continue through August 11, and kick into full swing…
Hemlock-Canadice’s watershed moment
The City of Rochester sold approximately 7,000 acres of land around Hemlock and Canadice lakes to the state in 2010 to make sure that the waterfronts remain safe from development. And yet the lakes are currently at the center of a controversy about gas and oil drilling. That’s because the state’s proposed plan to manage…
FILM | Classical 91.5 Film Series
You don’t have to have seen Stanley Kubrick’s classic bug-out sci-fi flick, “2001: A Space Odyssey,” to recognize the über-iconic, mega-dramatic, suspenseful theme music. It’s so pervasive in pop culture, used as a soundtrack whenever anyone is trying to let us know exactly how epic anything is. But if you haven’t seen the film, you…
Great Lakes agenda
The state Department of Environmental Conservation recently released its Great Lakes basin action agenda — 10 items and related goals compiled from existing plans and studies. Many will be familiar to anyone who follows issues around the Great Lakes. | Some of the agenda’s objectives are likely to get more attention than others. For example,…
FESTIVALS | Puerto Rican Festival, Carifest
Celebrate island cultures this weekend with the Puerto Rican Festival, which will take place Friday, August 9, through Sunday, August 11, and Carifest, to be held on Saturday, August 10. The theme of the 44th Annual Puerto Rican Festival is Our Cultural Heritage: Peace, Respect, Dignity. The event will be held Friday and Saturday, noon-11…
“I’m So Excited”
With a hard-earned reputation for flirting with outrageous and comical interpretations of sex, the Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar demonstrates in his new movie, “I’m So Excited,” that the outrageousness and the comedy, without wit and invention, cannot sustain an entire film. A late work in a reasonably prolific and quite successful career, the picture seems…
THEATER | “The Drowsy Chaperone”
I have a good buddy who has an intense dislike of musicals simply because he feels it’s unrealistic for people to burst into song to narrate what’s happening. Another of my friends wishes that life was actually lived that way, and frequently sings what she means to say. These two once had me wondering what…
“2 Guns”
The first time I saw the poster for “2 Guns,” the new action-comedy from Icelandic director Baltasar Kormákur, a friend pointed it out to me while standing in the lobby of the multiplex, observing that it looked so hilariously generic it seemed to be one of those posters for a fake movie you see in…
SPORTS | Silver Ball Tournament
Baseball has come a long way from base ball, the old-timey game invented in the mid-1800’s. Besides closing the gap in the name and adding gloves and protective equipment, a few of the rules and terminology have changed. Get acquainted with the game of yesteryear this weekend, at the 11th Annual National Silver Ball Tournament,…
“Blackfish”
UPDATED 8/9/13 to reflect a change to the Q&A at the Little. In the provocative new documentary “Blackfish,” director Gabriela Cowperthwaite examines the treatment of orca whales in SeaWorld theme parks, demonstrating the dangers (to both the animals as well as their human trainers) of keeping these fiercely intelligent, but often misunderstood, creatures in captivity.…
SPECIAL EVENT | Palmyra Pirate Weekend
Avast ye landlubbers! Tell your mateys to meet ye down at the Village and Port of Palmyra for the seventh annual Palmyra Pirate Weekend, which takes place Friday, August 9, and Saturday, August 10. The event will feature an invasion of the Erie Canal by Palmyra’s Pirates, bed racing, a Jolly Roger 5K run/jog/walk, music,…
Urban Action 8/7
This week’s calls to action include the following events and activities. (All are free and open to the public, unless otherwise noted.) RCSD grants meeting The Rochester school board will hold a meeting at 5:30 p.m. on Wednesday, August 7, to discuss and possibly vote on whether to accept a grant from the Bill and…
THEATER REVIEW: 2013 Shaw Festival
In the four plays I just saw at the Shaw Festival, accident and unpredictability are constant, as are contradiction and reluctant confession. Some are triumphs, others anything but, but the liquid nature of identity is everywhere. Even the reliability of time is up for grabs. That’s the case in Tom Stoppard’s “Arcadia” (Studio Theatre, through…
Lessons from Detroit
Last week was a tough week in Rochester, with the news about Valeant moving the B+L headquarters to New Jersey and laying off hundreds of employees here. And I keep thinking about Detroit’s bankruptcy. There are a lot of differences between us, certainly, beginning with the sheer magnitude of Detroit and its problems. Detroit spreads…
DINING REVIEW: Amore Italian Restaurant and Wine Bar
Dining in a restaurant housed within a grocery store — a store featuring an animatronic crowing rooster — is an odd sensation. In the span of a few minutes, you can move from dodging grocery carts in the parking lot, to walking by cupcakes decorated to resemble Cookie Monster and Elmo, to being asked if…
