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By STEVE PFARRER

Fall brings lots of familiar sights and traditions to the Valley: football games, colorful foliage, crisp nights, pumpkin and squash harvests.There’s another tradition in early November: artists opening their studios to the public.On Nov. 4 and 5,...

By STEVE PFARRER

About five to six years ago, staff at the Yiddish Book Center began considering an expansive exhibit on Yiddish culture that would open in 2020 to mark the book center’s 40th anniversary.The pandemic and a few other things prevented that from taking...

By STEVE PFARRER

Tennis star. Tennis innovator. A celebrity in her day who appeared on the cover of LIFE magazine. A woman who also sang professionally, designed clothes, worked as a sports columnist, hobnobbed with movie stars, and rebuilt her tennis career after a...

By STEVE PFARRER

Sometimes artists want to work on a big scale: to tell a particular narrative, to juxtapose images in a unique way, or to do something outside of their usual working parameters.But the challenge to that can be finding enough exhibition space to...

By STEVE PFARRER

Matt Andersen may not be a household name in the U.S., but he’s plenty well known in our big neighbor to the north. The New Brunswick native has won a slew of Maple Blues Awards, Canada’s biggest blues honor, while also earning nominations for the...

By STEVE PFARRER

The Privilege of the Happy EndingBy Kij JohnsonSmall Beer Press Fantasy writer Kij Johnson has a long list of awards and award nominations to her name, from Nebula and Hugo Awards — two of the premiere prizes for fantasy and science fiction writing —...

By STEVE PFARRER

Max Roach is celebrated as one of the most influential drummers in jazz history, a pioneer of Bebop who led groundbreaking ensembles in every decade of his long career. As a drummer and a composer, he’s credited with making drums a more expressive and...

By STEVE PFARRER

Always Matt: A Tribute to Matthew ShepardBy Lesléa NewmanIllustrated by Brian BritiganAbrams Comic Arts For a quarter of a century, Holyoke author Lesléa Newman has felt a special kinship with Matthew Shepard, the gay college student at the University...

By STEVE PFARRER

Editor’s Note: The Juke Joint Jazz performance at the Marigold Theater in Easthampton on Sept. 24 has been rescheduled due to COVID cases in the band. A new date will be announced soon.Several years ago, singer and songwriter Pamela Means decided to...

By STEVE PFARRER

The Hilltown 6 Pottery Tour, in which potters in the region open their studios to visitors, has been a staple in the Valley for almost 20 years.Now the Hilltown Open Studio Tour is making its move to become a mainstay annual event.The Hilltown tour,...

By STEVE PFARRER

In 1972, a new publication, Ms. Magazine, hit newsstands during a turbulent era marked by the civil rights movement, protests against the Vietnam War, changing trends in clothing and music — and the rise of the women’s movement.Ms., co-founded by...

By STEVE PFARRER

My Kind of Life — LeFeverDawn Lepere and Jeff Starns met years ago at an open mic in Ohio and soon forged a musical and personal connection. They dreamed of making a career in music, too, especially after they won a blues competition in Ohio and were...

By STEVE PFARRER

Ever wonder what tattoo artists get up to when they’re at home?Well, a good number of them from this region are involved in different kinds of art — painting, drawing, photography, sculpture — that’s now on display at Northampton’s A.P.E. Gallery on...

By STEVE PFARRER

September brings hordes of college students back to the Valley — as well as new art exhibits. Here’s a selected look at what’s on tap at several local campuses, as well as some area galleries.University Museum of Contemporary Art, University of...

By STEVE PFARRER

Musicians are always looking for another venue to play. Actors and playwrights search for a new place to stage a show. Dancers want another floor to move on.At Holyoke Media, they all can find room.The independent, nonprofit organization, funded...

By STEVE PFARRER

When the World Didn’t EndBy Guinevere TurnerCrown Reading Guinevere Turner’s affecting coming-of-age memoir, “When the World Didn’t End,” you’re left with one thought in particular: How did this woman endure years of emotional and psychological trauma...

By STEVE PFARRER

There are any number of guitar virtuosos in the world, but there are few if any who combine melodicism, technical skill, and sheer exuberance as well as Tommy Emmanuel, who grew up in Australia but was heavily influenced by fingerstyle American...

By STEVE PFARRER

FLORENCE — The world watched in horror last month as devastating wildfires wiped out a historic community on the island of Maui, killing at least 115 people in and around the town of Lahaina and destroying an estimated 2,200 structures.According to...

By STEVE PFARRER

Beyond the Monuments in Washington, D.C.Photographs by Michael Jacobson-HardyLevellers PressThe gross disparity between the grandeur of the federal buildings and monuments in Washington, D.C., and the severe poverty in other parts of the city has been...

By STEVE PFARRER

A few years ago, Pioneer Valley Jazz Shares (PVJS), the member-supported concert series, faced the same issue all musicians, clubs, and show promoters were dealing with: a problem called COVID-19.Like others, PVJS went online during the worst of the...