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NPR debuts new Bob Dylan Sinatra cover album
Today, NPR debuted a single from Bob Dylan’s newest album “Shadows in the Night,” a collection of new interpretations of songs made famous by the great crooner Frank Sinatra. Here it is, “Stay With Me,” for your listening consideration. When it was announced that this would be Dylan’s next project, I responded with a notable amount…
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Walk-through inflatable body in Hibbing
This Saturday, Jan. 17, the 2015 Fairview Range Health Expo will be held at the Hibbing Community College gymnasium. A wide variety of medical organizations and services will display their work and doings, but that’s not why you clicked on this link and it’s not why you’ll drive over to the college this weekend. The…
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Our penchant for meat raffles nets LA Times story
Minnesotans just want to be acknowledged. We see the airplanes flying overhead, the contrail expanding behind them in the cold Northern skies. We want the people on those planes to look down and see us. Yes, that’s me waving! Yes, see me. SEE ME! New York and Los Angeles are false idols. We have peace…
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Cuyuna cycling group sets goal of ‘3 days of riding’
We’ve written before about the Cuyuna Iron Range’s tremendous success rebranding itself for fat tire mountain biking instead of just as a “former mining region.” Late last week, the Cuyuna Bike Crew — the organization created to organize and advocate for mountain bikers and trails — announced its comprehensive plan. While the plan is replete…
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Hibbing ‘New Year Baby’ descendent of Hatfield-McCoy feud
To prove the world is a small, strange place, the first baby born at the Fairview Range Medical Center in Hibbing in 2015 is the ninth generation descendent of a world-famous family feud from the Appalachian region of Kentucky and West Virginia. Kelly Grinsteinner of the Hibbing Daily Tribune reported the story last weekend. Conner Hatfield…
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These fancy tent people seem to be getting attention
A classically brisk Northern Minnesota winter finally set in this week. After an abnormally warm December, I might have been among a minority glad to feel the sharp chill of extreme cold when I walked out the door last night. Then again, easy for me to say; I don’t live in a tent. Minnesota Public…
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Hibbing’s Dylan Days committee disbands
I bring some long awaited, sadly official news tonight. Dylan Days, the arts and literary event held every May in Bob Dylan’s hometown of Hibbing, Minnesota, will be going on indefinite hiatus. The three-member steering committee (of which I was a founding member) voted to disband this fall. In the time since we’ve been working…
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Spend holidays with the Great Northern Radio Show
On Dec. 6, 2014, I hosted the winter edition of my Great Northern Radio Show in a live broadcast from the Northern Lights Casino in Walker, Minnesota, as guest of the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwa. That show will re-air Wednesday, Dec. 24 — Christmas Eve — from 7-9 p.m. on Northern Community Radio, 91.7…
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Paul Metsa to star in musical based on trippy autobiography
One of the more successful musicians to emerge from the Iron Range later in the 20th Century was Paul Metsa, a singer-songwriter who certainly fits in the mold of the Range’s somewhat-more-successful star, Bob Dylan, crossed with a bit of Bruce Springsteen to boot. Metsa, who is from the Range city of Virginia, has lived and…
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Remembering Ely storyteller Mike Hillman
As I travel around the state with my Great Northern Radio Show I’ve had the privilege of meeting many wonderful and talented people in all the towns we visit. Mike Hillman was one such person. Mike told stories in our Ely show last summer. One story was an old pioneer legend from the early day…
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‘Night Before Christmas’ dances onto iconic Hibbing stage
A Hibbing High School alumnus will bring her dance company to the school’s historic auditorium stage this Saturday, Dec. 20, at 7 p.m. for a free holiday show based on the classic poem “The Night Before Christmas.” Danielle Ricci founded the award-winning Borealis Dance company in 2008 in Austin, Texas, before moving it to Minneapolis last year. This…
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Celebrate the solstice at Olcott Park Greenhouse
The longest nights of winter will be this weekend, but that doesn’t mean you can’t live it up in a warm tropical environment right here on Northern Minnesota’s Iron Range. The Friends of the Greenhouse will be hosting their second annual Celebration of the Winter Solstice this Saturday, Dec. 20, at noon at the Olcott…
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Northern journalists taunt each other with lutefisk
The “Great Northern” states extend from the Dakotas through Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan and are marked by the strong and enduring influence of Scandinavian immigrants. In addition to being the genetic forebears of many people who live here, these Scandinavians (Norwegians and Swedes, in particular) brought and kept many traditions that have lasted to this…
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Local, weird, darkly funny: ‘The One Who Watches’
A new short film, “The One Who Watches,” by Duluth filmmakers Nicholas Sunsdahl and Molly Josefson, made the following impressions on me, in this order: 1) the mix of Bemidji, Iron Range and Twin Ports settings and characters, 2) the abject film school weirdness, and 3) the dark, persistent humor, punctuated by one scene that made me laugh…
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‘What’s left’ project nears goal with time running out
If you recall my column of Nov. 23, 2014, “What’s Left Unsaid,” I shared the personal story of my uncle’s suicide in order to explain my friend John Bauer’s “What’s Left” project. John lost his daughter Megan to depression last year and has found a way to channel his emotions into something hopeful. This multimedia art…