HURD ORCHARDS IN HOLLEY DRAWS FROM MORE THAN 200 YEARS OF FAMILY FARMING. BY
FLORENCE CARDELLA
18 ARTS THE NEW OWNER OF SCOTT’S ROCHESTER PHOTO SUPPLY CONTINUES ITS FILM LEGACY. BY TEN GARDNER
22
SPORTS OP ED WITH THE PRO LACROSSE TEAM’S DESTINATION YET TO BE DETERMINED, A CASE FOR KEEPING THEM LOCAL. BY ELI HACKETT
CULTURE MEET THE PEOPLE WHO ARE CONTRIBUTING TIME, ENERGY AND PASSION TO MAKE OUR CITY (AND BEYOND) A BETTER PLACE TO LIVE, WORK AND PLAY. BY CITY STAFF 40
280 State Street Rochester, New York 14614 feedback@rochester-citynews.com phone (585) 244-3329 roccitymag.com
PUBLISHER
Rochester Area Media Partners LLC, Chris Hastings, chairman
FOUNDERS
Bill and Mary Anna Towler
EDITORIAL
Editor: Leah Stacy
Arts reporter: Patrick Hosken
Multimedia reporter: Roberto Felipe Lagares
Contributors: Kellen Beck, Sydney Burrows, Florence Cardella, Gino Fanelli, Ten Gardner, Eli Hackett, Alyssa Koh, Roisin Meyer, Justin Murphy, Jessica L. Pavia, Rebecca Rafferty, Louis Ressel, Matt Rogers, Mona Seghatoleslami, Helana Shumway, Veronica Volk, Ryan Yarmel, Denise Young
CREATIVE
Director, Strategy: Ryan Williamson
Art director: Jacob Walsh
ADVERTISING ads@rochester-citynews.com
Advertising consultant/ Project manager: David White
OPERATIONS/CIRCULATION
Operations manager: Ryan Williamson
CITY is available free of charge. Additional copies of the current issue may be purchased by calling 585-784-3503. CITY may be distributed only by authorized distributors. No person may, without prior written permission of CITY, take more than one copy of each monthly issue.
CITY (ISSN 1551-3262) is published monthly 12 times per year by Rochester Area Media Partners, a subsidiary of WXXI Public Broadcasting. Periodical postage paid at Rochester, NY (USPS 022-138). Address changes: CITY, 280 State Street, Rochester, NY 14614. Member of the Association of Alternative Newsmedia and the New York Press Association. Copyright by Rochester Area Media Partners LLC, 2025 - all rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, photocopying, recording or by any information storage retrieval system without permission of the copyright owner. WXXI Members may inquire about free home delivery of CITY including monthly TV listings by calling 585-258-0200.
On the cover: Design by Jacob Walsh
ARTS. MUSIC. CULTURE.
The (mad) dash
EDITOR'S LETTER
BY LEAH STACY LEAH@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM
Deep in the storage area on the fifth floor of WXXI, there are giant metal filing cabinets filled with black-and-white photos preserved from the years before digital took over the art department at CITY. It’s fascinating to sift through faces and places of a Rochester past — since the magazine began operating in 1971, many changes have taken place for both our city and CITY as a media outlet.
These days, our team attempts to document via digital and film — which Roberto and Jacob did as they tirelessly capture the portraits and video snippets for our annual Rochester 10 issue. There’s still something so powerful and special about analog. Someday, maybe another reporter will find CITY’s film portraits of the Rochester 10, or the pages of the magazine itself.
This is one of our team’s favorite issues to write, shoot and design. The stories are inspiring, and meeting the people behind them, even more so. It reinvigorates our belief in the good happening in and around Rochester, and the many who work to make an impact.
Life is short, and time is precious: our 2025 Rochester 10 cohort is a testament to making the most of both.
I have a milestone birthday this month, and I’ve been thinking about timelines and deadlines. The standards we hold ourselves to; societal expectations. As I enter the “second half” of life, I’m not following a traditional path. But I’ve come to realize that this life takes many different forms, and no one journey is right for (or available to) everyone. It is simply our responsibility to honor the time we are given on this earth.
The years we live and work and love — the mad dash, as it often feels — are so simply summed up in a dash between the year we are born and the year we die. In her poem, “Dirge Without Music,” Edna St. Vincent Millay wrote,
Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind; Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave.
We know the ending.
Let’s make the most of the (mad) dash while we can.
Cheers, L
Join us for the next CITY Social from 5-7 p.m. on Wednesday, 8/6 at Radio Social, 20 Carlson Rd. Meet the Rochester 10, chat with our team, grab a copy of the mag and snack on some hummus. Free; all ages welcome.
Pride '25
FOLLOW US ON
Scenes from the 2025 Rochester pride parade & festival on July 19. PHOTOS BY LOUIS
RESSEL
A Rochester 10 Retrospective
PAST LIVES THAT MADE A MARK ON THIS CITY.
BY MATT ROGERS
Sometimes it feels like there’s only two, maybe three, Rochesterians who made history. And while it cannot be overstated how impactful the contributions of Frederick Douglass, Susan B. Anthony and George Eastman are — their social advocacy and innovations have been felt at the regional, state, national and international level — they’re not the only people who lived here and left a mark.
Even the most esoteric hobbyist or amateur historian could find a Rochesterian hiding within the history of their area of interest. As a mid-size city, we punch well above our weight in societal contributions (example: when we were in the throes of earning our Flour City nickname, the royal family of England preferred to order goods from our region for their royal bakeries).
As this annual issue showcases 10 current Rochesterians working to make our little slice of paradise just a little bit better, here are 10 historical Rochesterians (of many, many more) that left their mark on society — and don’t always get the recognition they deserve.
Asa Dunbar (1754-1810s)
Dunbar was raised in a diverse Massachusetts community of religious sects, pioneers, natives and fellow free Black people. In 1791, he moved his family to the Genesee Valley, settling near Irondequoit Bay where he hunted game and gathered produce. By 1797, he helped develop the city of Tryon, literally (at six feet, seven inches tall, he was frequently called upon for construction projects). After the fall of Tryon in the 1810s, Dunbar moved his family to Canada, but his contributions to a young Rochester would remain.
1
Blanche Calloway (1902-1978)
Baltimore natives Cabell Calloway II and his wife Martha instilled a love of music into their children, namely daughter, Blanche, and middle son, Cabell III (who would later go by Cab). Blanche Calloway got her big break in 1927, following a national tour and domination of Chicago’s jazz scene. She became the first woman to lead an all-male jazz orchestra in 1931, yet struggled to reach the same heights as her brother due to sexism and racism in the music industry. Cab Calloway was always reverent towards his sister's musical style, though, and how it influenced his own.
2
Howard Coles (1903-1996) 4
Born in nearby Mumford in 1903, Howard Coles attended West High School (now Wilson) downtown as the only Black male student. In 1930, he moved to New York City for a stint, then to Albany, finally landing in Chicago to work for “The Defender,” a national Black newspaper. Inspired by the work, Coles returned to Rochester and founded “The Frederick Douglass Voice” in 1933, focusing on Black history, advocacy, reform and community news. He expanded his social commentary in 1938 by becoming Rochester’s first Black radio announcer, and continued serving the Black community in multiple roles throughout his life.
Antoinette Brown Blackwell (1825-1921)
Following her parents' strong religious convictions, Antoinette Brown became a full member of the Congregational Church in her hometown of Henrietta by the age of nine. She later graduated from Oberlin College in Ohio, returning to Henrietta as a traveling lecturer. On September 15, 1853, Brown was ordained as minister of the First Congregational Church in Butler (Wayne County), New York, making U.S. history as the first woman minister of a recognized denomination. She lived long enough to see the passage of the 19th Amendment, and legally voted at the age of 95.
Audrey Munson (1891-1996)
After her parents divorced when she was nine, Munson and her mother left Rochester for Rhode Island, eventually relocating to Manhattan in 1909. Munson was discovered as a model in 1915 by Felix Herzog while window-shopping on Fifth Avenue. He, in turn, welcomed her into his circle of famous artist friends, where she would go on to be one of the most prolific visual artist subjects, star in four silent films and achieve the title of America’s first supermodel; earning the nicknames the "Panama–Pacific Girl" and "American Venus." Munson’s life took a tragic turn in 1919 with a deadly love triangle, and in 1931, at the age of 40, she was committed to a psychiatric asylum by her mother. Munson was a ward of state for more than 60 years, until her death at age 104.
After completing her studies at West High School (now Wilson) in Rochester, Mary E. Clarke aided the World War II efforts in the private sector before enlisting into the Women’s Army Corps in 1945. She served in Berlin and Toyko before returning stateside as a commissioned officer. In 1978, she achieved the rank of Major General — the first woman to do so in U.S. Army history. Maj. Gen. Clarke retired in 1981 after serving her country for 36 years, the longest army career of any woman at the time.
New York Black Yankees (1931-1948) + Brooklyn Tigers (1936-1937)
While Rochester has its own history of homegrown pro sports teams, it has also warmly welcomed pro teams that started elsewhere: The New York Black Yankees, a prominent Negro League baseball team, played their 1948 season at Silver Stadium. They chose Rochester for its welcoming atmosphere for exhibition games in the past. In 1936, the second American Football League awarded Rochester a team, but operations soon moved to Brooklyn. The Syracuse Braves moved to Rochester midseason and lasted until November 1, 1936 before folding. Shortly after, the Brooklyn Tigers moved back and played at Silver Stadium, but also folded after the 1937 season.
Libanus Todd (1862-1933)
As an inexperienced 20-something, Libanus Todd sought to solve a unique problem: protecting the integrity of bank checks. In 1899, he developed a machine to improve trust between banks and their customers and revolutionized banking with the Todd Protectograph Company. During the Great Depression years later, Todd noticed the grand estates along East Avenue were losing their grandeur, so he conceived a plan to sustain the estates by employing skilled workers. The Rochester Plan was adopted nationwide and had a direct influence on the Public Works programs of FDR’s New Deal.
CONTINUED ON PAGE 10
Dr. Algernon Crapsey (1847-1927)
When he moved to Rochester in 1879, Dr. Algernon Crapsey became minister of Calvary St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in the South Wedge. He developed summer classes, founded the St. Andrews Brotherhood (a mutual benefit charitable society) and created the first kindergarten school in the city. Dr. Crapsey also extended his social advocacy by giving lectures at other churches, leading retreats for Catholic nuns and founding the Citizens Political Reform Association. In 1906, he was embroiled in a political scandal with Episcopal leadership and was convicted of heresy (based on his questioning of the divinity of Jesus Christ). Dr. Crapsey left the church but continued his work as social reformist, serving as delegate to the International Peace Conference of 1907 at the Hague, officiating weddings and funerals, working as a parole officer and giving counsel to the sick and needy.
9
George Washington Goler (1864-1940)
After relocating to Rochester in 1878 to work with his uncle (also George Washington Goler), the younger Goler earned his medical degree from the University of Buffalo in 1891, rising to the post of Rochester’s Health Officer in 1898. Devoted to public health, Goler worked to improve labor conditions and establish child health programs. He also reduced the city’s infant mortality rate by 50 percent, focusing on clean dairy milk sold to families. He educated farmers on hygiene, increased inspections and promoted safe handling amongst nurses and retailers. As his policies were replicated in other cities, national infant mortality decreased considerably.
A living legacy
BY FLORENCE CARDELLA
Working in the service industry has taught me a few things about eating — namely, that choosing to buy local produce during peak season will fill you up in a way packaged foods never could. Sustaining your body is impossible without sustaining your mind and soul, a connection that is evident at Hurd Orchards on West Ridge Road in Holley, just west of the city.
Sustainability is rooted not only in environmental longevity, but a social responsibility to leave a community’s ecosystem better than it was found, all while building on heritage and legacy. Heritage extends beyond those little navy and gold plaques by the side of the road denoting an event of cultural or historical significance. Heritage encapsulates tradition, like a recipe for the perfect pie crust passed down through generations, or a ‘sixth sense’ that tells you exactly when it’s time to pick that first crop of the season.
Orchards in Holley draws from more than 200 years of family farming.
CULTURE
Inside the barn at Hurd Orchards. PHOTOS BY FLORENCE CARDELLA
Amy Machamer has been in business with her mother, Susan Hurd Machamer, for 40 years, continuing the family’s more than 200-year legacy. After earning a degree in art history from Amherst College, Machamer returned to the farm in 1984 — a shift in her life path that soon made sense.
Beauty is an integral part of the community Hurd Orchards has built. It’s found in the barnturned-event space; the bottles of chive blossom vinegar that line the store windows like stained glass; the richest conserve you’ve ever tasted; the quiet, yet boisterous laughter floating from the kitchens.
The generational fruit farm’s roadside market is the home to intentional creative decisions and design. The market itself is nestled next to a grove of cherry trees, next to a barn that hosts seasonal tasting luncheons and events that not only feature, but honor the changing of the seasons and their offerings. Both buildings boast artifacts from the land’s history and the family who has cared for it for so long. Dried flowers hang from the rafters alongside handwoven baskets, handpainted signs name the apple varieties grown onsite and antique tables and chairs are scattered throughout the space. Each corner of the two buildings
feels like it holds a secret waiting to be discovered — and sometimes, Machamer lets visitors in on the reveal.
During a recent rhubarb luncheon, Machamer shared a story about discovering a crop of what she believes to be mammoth rhubarb, a plant thought to be all but extinct, on the family’s land. Machamer also spoke excitedly about the ‘ancient apples’ grown on the farm.
“These are varieties dropped from our edible repertoire, heirloom or heritage varieties,” she said.
The Hurd Orchards team honors that heritage by nurturing and cultivating trees that produce sometimes rare, varied fruits. (According to Dr. Susan Brown of Cornell University, there are more genes in apples than there are in a single human being — 54,000, to be exact.)
A particular point of pride for Hurd Orchards is the sweeping variety of apples grown on the 150acre property. They are eco-certified through Red Tomato — which means the farmers take precautions to protect pollinators and the environment that they’re farming — and partnered with Headwater Food Hub, which distributes food from over 200 family farms throughout New York State.
Above: House made tinctures at Hurd's market. Below: A tablescape inside the barn
According to Red Tomato, a family farm oriented fair trade organization that connects farmers with consumers, Hurd Orchards grows “over 70 varieties of apples, [which] include old-fashioned, heritage and new experimental varieties bred for flavor, quality and natural disease resistance.”
These apples, as well as other fruits, are available as pick-your-own or fresh at the roadside market, as well as in baked goods and luncheons that feature hyper-local ingredients.
“Literally everything is done by hand trellising and irrigation,” said Machamer. “Everything is picked by hand — from harvest to customer to kitchen to counter
— everything has to be incredibly careful so that you can have a moment of ‘Oh, how lovely.’”
The farm, market and events are designed to infuse visitors with joy as well as the opportunity to slow down and think about the food they’re eating; how it’s the product of human hands across generations.
All of the events, which Machamer co-hosts with her mother, begin with an educational speech detailing updates from the farm and the kitchen, details about the produce and recipes that make up the meal and an undeniable magnetic energy.
A seasonal salad served at one of the Hurd Orchards lunches
How have you lived your life up until that moment without being eternally awe struck by the bounty and plenty our region provides?
Micro-seasonality is key at Hurd Orchards, a fact reflected in the tablescapes as well as the entirety of any meal hosted there. Each dish presents at least one application of a featured ingredient, and none are predictable — that which is savory turns sweet, sweet turns savory and somehow, harmony is achieved in the most unexpected places.
I learned more about farming from Machamer during one luncheon
than in any science class I ever sat through. Most importantly, though, I learned what it means to support a local farm, and witnessed firsthand what it takes for a single raspberry or apple to journey from seed to tree to hand to table — a veritable miracle. May we all have the patience to listen to the land and learn from those who have come before us, in order to leave things better than we found them for those who come after.
hurdorchards.com
Above: The orchard yard, where Hurd hosts private and community events. Below: A dessert display.
Starting a fresh roll
BY TEN GARDNER
Sitting in an attic somewhere collecting dust are two disposable film cameras from a family vacation in 2008. Fortunately, for Rochester residents, the ability to breathe new life into such relics is simple: Scott’s Rochester Photo Supply.
Since the 1970s, the building at 1755 East Ave. has housed four iterations of photo laboratories — Carhart Photos, Scott’s Photo, Scott’s Photo by Rowe and now, Scott’s Rochester Photo Supply. The small business offers services such as film processing, scanning, high-quality printing, camera repairs, image restoration and camera sales, catering to everyone from experts and professionals to hobbyists and beginners.
Scott’s is the last operating fullservice camera store and film lab in a city once known as The World’s Image Center, established by George Eastman and Kodak. Should it bear the weight of upholding Rochester’s film photography legacy? One young photographer was willing to find out.
In January 2025, veteran owner Richard Rowe handed over the keys to 29-year-old Tatiana Ariola. After 63 years in the photography industry, Rowe chose to sell, not to step away, but to keep the spirit of the Photo City alive and pass the baton on to the next generation.
“I’m very, very sad we’re in this position in Rochester, which used to be the photo Mecca,” Rowe said. “I’m sad we’re the last people standing, but, on the other hand, I’m thrilled we’re the last people standing. Tatiana has some ideas I
Above: Tatiana Ariola (second from right) cuts the grand opening ribbon alongside her partner Adam Montoya (middle) and Mayor Malik Evans (left). Inset: An assortment of film options at Scott's Rochester Photo Supply. PHOTOS BY ROBERTO F. LAGARES
think will make the business grow and become even more stable.”
The store has become a Rochester icon — not just to the photography community, but to the city at large. Faded brick walls, a vinyl “We do film” sign clinging to the front window, the faint metallic tang of film developer in the air and fluorescent lights bouncing off glass cases color the sensory-rich experience of Scott’s.
Most employees have been with the company for decades, throwing familiar smiles to the store’s regulars. They bear witness to growing families, developing photos of pregnancy and birth. They help uncover lost memories of great-grandmothers long passed and faces nearly forgotten. In doing so, they become honorary members of the family. New owner and self-proclaimed photo nerd Ariola understands the importance of maintaining that reputation at Scott’s Rochester Photo Supply.
CONTINUED ON PAGE 20
“Rochester is the birthplace of modern photography, and people come here from all over the world because of that history,” she said. “To be the last camera store and film lab still operating with a storefront right down the road from Kodak is way bigger than us.”
Film photography is experiencing a renaissance with the younger generation, gaining popularity for its aesthetic quality and lengthy processing window. Film presents an augmented view of life. Colors are dulled and the image fuzzy, like looking at the world through glasses of the wrong prescription. It demands care, patience and deep understanding, challenging modern ideals of instant gratification and planned obsolescence. Both Rowe and Ariola began their photography careers working with film, each growing a lasting respect for the measured art form.
“I apprenticed for my dad, and the first thing he had me do was work in the darkroom developing sheet film, 8x10 negatives,” said Rowe. “From an early age, there was a certain magic in working with film.”
Today, Scott’s develops anywhere from 60 to 90 rolls of film per day, which makes up a large portion of the company’s business. Film is tangible
and fragile; it requires presence and skill. It is the antithesis of the digital age. Ariola attributes film’s resurgence to a cultural shift among young artists, who are discovering the same magic Rowe first felt in his father’s darkroom.
“Digital photography went so far, it’s so high quality that you can see every pore. It’s so technically accurate that it’s not creative anymore,” she said. “You take hundreds of photos on your phone and never look at them again. With film, it’s a much more intentional slowdown and nostalgia. It makes you feel like these shots are more important.”
When Rowe chose to sell the business, he wasn’t letting go of its legacy; he was investing in it. Ideally, Scott’s Rochester Photo Supply has a long life ahead, as Ariola has plans to expand educational programming and deepen community involvement. And for now, the resurgence of film photography keeps the dedicated team at Scott’s thriving six days a week. rocphotosupply.com
Tatiana Ariola, owner of Scott's Rochester Photo Supply
OP ED:
Rochester needs the Knighthawks
BY ELI HACKETT
Those who don’t love the Rochester Knighthawks have probably never been to one of their games. There’s nothing like introducing someone to their first Knighthawks game — but unfortunately, the future of the team is undetermined as of late June, when the Pegulas announced they were selling the franchise.
The Rochester Knighthawks are part of the National Lacrosse League — the world's premier professional box lacrosse league. Unlike the Rochester Red Wings and Americans, the Knighthawks play at the highest level of their sport. They’re not a Minor League team or farm team for a larger organization. These are the best box lacrosse players in the world (and many are the best lacrosse players, period). For those unfamiliar with the term ‘box lacrosse,’ it originated in the 1930s in Canada, where it’s the official summer sport. It plays like a mix of hockey and field lacrosse with a touch of basketball; the perfect blend of fast-paced, physical play and technical finesse and skill. There’s no shortage of nuance, but the base gameplay is accessible to understand, even when watching for the first time.
Under Pegula ownership, the fate of the Knighthawks has always felt
precarious. In addition to the Buffalo Bills and Sabres and Rochester Amerks, Pegula also owns the Buffalo Bandits — another team in the National Lacrosse League. And of course, Pegula recently decided to build an expensive new stadium for the Bills. The full financial snapshot of the Knighthawks franchise is unknown, but the roughly mid-capacity attendance per game probably doesn’t net much money, if any at all, after expenses. Several domino falls later, the Knighthawks seem like an easy line item to cut from the Pegula portfolio, and on June 23, it was official: COO Pete Guelli announced that effective June 30, they would no longer be operating the Rochester Knighthawks.
It’s the kind of news fans had been dreading. Will a new owner keep the team here or relocate them to another city? At press time, there is no answer, but it appears the deadline to make something happen may be August 1. At the time of the sale announcement, the National Lacrosse League said they’d do everything they could to keep the Knighthawks in Rochester. There’s certainly no shortage of people with ties to the Rochester area who could afford to buy the team, but if an NLL team is to succeed in the mid-5,000 attendance range, they may have to rely on collaboration with another business. The Sands family, with their Constellation Brands headquarters across the street? Following the recent layoffs, perhaps that’s not in the cards.
The best bet to keep the Knighthawks here might be a partnership with the Rochester Red Wings. It could be a symbiotic pairing of two professional sports teams that play in different seasons. Operating both the Red Wings and Knighthawks could help to reduce the downside of operating either one individually, with ticket sales nearly year-round and no downtime between the two. The Red Wings are partially owned by the fans — if that same opportunity was presented to Knighthawks fans and meant keeping the team here, most season ticketholders would absolutely buy in.
There have been no further announcements from either the National Lacrosse League or Pegula since the initial announcements. Rumors have circulated about what’s next, but nothing of substance. In the meantime, factors at play in the NLL could delay the start of free
agency — if delayed, it could buy some time to find a local owner. Hopefully when this issue is on stands, the team has announced some good news and everyone reading this can attend their first Knighthawks game right here at Blue Cross Arena in beautiful (cold) downtown Rochester. rochesterknighthawks.com
With the pro lacrosse team’s destination yet to be determined, a case for keeping them local.
A scene from a Knighthawks game at Blue Cross Arena.
PHOTO BY JON TENCA / NATIONAL LACROSSE LEAGUE
todo DAILY
Full calendar of events online at roccitymag.com
SUNDAY, AUGUST 3
MUSIC
Carbon Records Fest
Various locations, carbon2025fest.com
For 31 years, local record label Carbon Records has been a home for the weird, the noisy and the experimental. Founder Joe Tunis has cultivated a hub for strange creatives both close to home and internationally; fittingly, the label’s annual festival pulls in artists from around the Northeast to perform at a variety of venues around town. Gigs are booked from August 3-9 at the Bug Jar, Radio Social, Strangebird and more. Bring open ears (and, paradoxically, earplugs). PATRICK HOSKEN
FILM
“Seeing & Being Seen: LGBTQ+ Visions of Rochester”
Composed of community portraits from regional artists, this collaboration between ImageOut and the Eastman Museum’s Gallery Obscura aims
to highlight and celebrate diverse LGBTQ+ perspectives. Along with prints, the exhibition features a set of documentary images titled “The Rainbow Revolution: Pride Selfies.”
A 1:30 p.m. dialogue at the Dryden aims to bring community members and creatives together. The work is on view through October. PH
FESTIVAL
Glorious Garlic Festival
Geneva Waterfront, gloriousgarlicfestival.com
“Garlic is divine,” Anthony Bourdain once wrote. Perhaps both misunderstood and even overused (in certain circles), the almighty bulb gets its due at this two-day celebration in Geneva. With more than 50 local vendors (featuring wine and beer) and live music on the books, these savory days live up to the name of the fest. $5, with kids 12 and under free. PH
MONDAY, AUGUST 4
MUSIC
Nikki Hill
Abilene Bar and Lounge, abilenebarandlounge.com
Nikki Hill has been described a tender but tough “original force in American music.” The North Carolina native sang gospel in the church choir as a youngster and gradually gravitated to garage rock, blues and roots. “Rolling Stone” once wrote that Hill is “a revelation, her band masters of rocket-fueled bluesy swing, her voice the beacon which calls you home.” Or maybe to Abilene. Doors at 6 p.m.; tickets $35 advance, $40 day of show.
DENISE YOUNG
TUESDAY, AUGUST 5
FOOD + BEV
Westside Farmers Market
St. Monica Church, westsidemarketrochester.com
We all know and love the Public Market, of course, but if you're looking for a weekday evening option, head over to 831 Genesee St. from 4 to 7 p.m. every Tuesday through Oct. 7. The community-centered market in the parking lot of St. Monica Church offers seasonal produce, eggs, baked goods, prepared meals and more — including live music and kids' activities. DY
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 6
MUSIC
Rebecca Davis Band Record Archive, recordarchive.com
How good does the ukulele sound in the summertime? To answer this question, look no further than the upward folk melodies of Rebecca Davis Band, which performs in the Backroom Lounge as part of the shop’s Americana and roots series from 6-8 p.m. PH
There have been 65 years of steam at this festival featuring antique steampowered vehicles. Events include tractor pulls, sawmill demonstrations, live music, food and a worthwhile flea market. The Pageant of Steam runs from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. through August 9 at 3349 Gehan Rd. in Canandaigua; general admission for adults is $10, kids under 12 are free. PH
THURSDAY, AUGUST 7
FESTIVAL
Lucille Ball Comedy Festival
National Comedy Center in Jamestown, ComedyCenter.org
The premier museum and cultural institution dedicated to comedy will feature Jon Stewart, Bill Murray & His Blood Brothers and SNL’s Mikey Day and head writer Streeter
Seidell at the 35th annual Lucille Ball Comedy Festival, which runs through August 10. Notable events include “An Evening with Jon Stewart” on Saturday, August 9; and on Sunday, August 10, a stand-up showcase will be followed by a rock ‘n’ blues concert headlined by Bill Murray & His Blood Brothers. LEAH STACY
OPERA
“Rigoletto”
Robert F. Panara Theatre at RIT, fingerlakesopera.org
"La donna è mobile (woman is fickle),” sings the Duke of Mantua in Giuseppe Verdi’s opera of illconsidered love, betrayal and revenge. The woman at the center of this story (Gilda, daughter of the title character Rigoletto) is actually quite loyal, and the Duke is certainly no prince. Along with plenty of high drama, there are catchy tunes and beautiful melodies in this 19th-century Italian classic. Finger Lakes Opera is bringing it to the stage with a stellar cast including baritone Joshua Conyers (who is on the faculty on the Eastman School of Music), tenor Christopher Bozeka and soprano Jazmine Saunders, who has returned to her hometown to sing for us following her Metropolitan Opera debut. The curtain rises tonight at 7 p.m., with one more performance Sunday at 2 p.m.
MONA SEGHATOLESLAMI
FRIDAY, AUGUST 8
FESTIVAL
Hoochenanny Whiskey & Music Festival
Camp Eastman, hoochenanny.com
This three-day experience returns with a new location and co-ownership after its inaugural Geneseo-based iteration in 2023. Tommy Brunett of Iron Smoke Distillery and Sean McCarthy of McCarthy Tents and Events have joined forces to produce this year’s fest, which will feature 18 musical acts — including Joan Jett and the Blackhearts — whiskey purveyors of regional and national origin and an 8,700-square-foot tent. Even non-drinkers may find something to love at this celebration of spirits both liquid and internal. Other notable music acts include folkie Charles Wesley Godwin, jam band moe., alt-country heroes Old 97’s and Grateful Dead tribute experience Dark Star Orchestra. The fest runs through August 10, with advance single-day passes starting at $55 (or from $60 at the gates). PH
MUSIC
Giant Panda Guerilla Dub Squad
Rochester Public Market, cityofrochester.gov/events/2025-bandsbricks
There’s just something about seeing a quintessentially Rochester band at a quintessentially Rochester location — especially in the summer. The beloved Dubbers play on the bricks along with support from Noble Vibes. Gates open at 5:30 p.m., music at 6. Free. PH
SATURDAY, AUGUST 9
MUSIC
Rochester Summer
Soul Music Festival
Innovative Field, rocsummersoulfest. com
R&B legend Jeffrey Osborne headlines this annual celebration, and if his name doesn’t ring bells, his golden pipes surely will. As a member of the group L.T.D., Osborne crooned the hit “Love Ballad” before going solo on equally soulful tunes “On the Wings of Love” and “Stay with Me Tonight.” Other performers include Dave Hollister, Sunshine Anderson, Sky Whatley, Negus Irap, Erin and Ross, Garth Fagan Dance and DJ Dana. Gates open at 2 p.m. General admission tickets begin at $25. PH
MUSIC
Muler and Rectangle Creep
Bar Bad Ending, instagram.com/ barbadending
Two reasons to see this show: one, the music simply whips. Muler, a local indie-rock institution since the 1990s, has lost none of its urgency in the intervening years; Rectangle Creep, meanwhile, understands the power of fuzz and angular songwriting. This leads into reason number two: RC frontman Matthew Cutter literally wrote the book on Guided By Voices’ Robert Pollard. Rock fans of any age are in good hands at this 7 p.m. show. $10. PH
FESTIVAL
Brockport Arts Festival
Village of Brockport, brockportartsfestival.com
This westside festival has been going strong for 29 years and shows no signs of stopping. The gathering sees Main Street in Brockport filled with live music, artists’ work for purchase, live music, a rubber duck derby on the canal, and edible offerings — including a wine garden and farmers' market. The free festival is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. today and tomorrow, August 10. LS
SUNDAY, AUGUST 10
THEATER
“The Cayuga Canal Girls”
Bristol Valley Theater, bvtnaples.org Seneca Falls provides the backdrop for this play by Laura King, wherein five childhood friends reunite in their hometown to lay another one to rest. 2 p.m. matinee; tickets $23.04$48.39. Show runs through August 16. PH
MONDAY, AUGUST 11
MUSIC
Dream Float
The Little Cafe, thelittle.org/music
My dream float is a scoop of homemade peanut butter ice cream in a frosted mug of root beer. I dare call that flavor sensation transportive, a word I’d also use to describe local selfdescribed “high-energy instrumental fusion” group Dream Float. Catch the band every Monday in August at The Little Cafe from 7-9 p.m. PH
TUESDAY, AUGUST 12
MUSIC
Whitney
Anthology, anthologylive.com
Chicago duo Whitney began as indie rockers before mellowing into a folkier sound. In 2022, they veered toward pure pop; new album “Small Talk” promises to split the difference, luxuriating in Laurel Canyon songcraft and the moony falsetto of vocalist Julien Ehrlich. With support from Folk Bitch Trio, which can certainly hold its own in the three-part harmony department. 8 p.m. show. $40. PH
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 13
COMMUNITY
Peace Clean Up and BBQ
Hudson Avenue and Kosciusko Street, cityofrochester.gov/events/peace-cleanbbq
Clean your community and your plate with the City of Rochester’s Peace Clean Up and BBQ series. This two-day event includes a Wednesday community clean-up, followed by a classic summer BBQ on Thursday provided by Tdf’s Southern Cuisine Catering. Walking for Rochester is partnering with Pathways to Peace to bring food, music and fun to the Rochester community from 5-7 p.m. weekly for the entire month of August. Don’t miss out on the raffle during the clean-up days as well.
ROISIN MEYER
MUSIC
Publick Musick
Christ Church, publickmusick.org Bach and Graupner cantatas are on the program at this 7:30 p.m. classical concert, which features the use of Christ Church’s powerful CraigheadSaunders organ. It’s a great chance to see the instrument in action, the way baroque audiences in the 18th century might have. The show’s free, with a $20 suggested donation. PH
THURSDAY, AUGUST 14
THEATER
“Mercury”
MuCCC, muccc.org
Playwright Steve Yockey is not a household name, but his work might be. He developed HBO’s fun and pulpy “The Flight Attendant” and MTV’s television reboot of “Scream” in the mid-2010s. His stage work “Mercury” dabbles in similar themes: revenge, the occult and a touch of black humor. Crow City Theatre presents the show through August 16 at MuCCC. Ticket and time info available online. PH
FESTIVAL
St. Josaphat Ukrainian Festival
St Josaphat's Ukrainian Catholic Church, rochesterukrainianfestival.com
Rochester has long been home to a thriving Ukrainian community, so this annual festival — which started in 1973 — is an essential celebration
of the culture. Featuring traditional Ukrainian folk music and dancing, arts including ceramics, wood carvings and Ukrainian Easter eggs, food like pierogi and holubtsi, church tours and more. Runs through August 17: Thursday, 6 p.m.-10:45 p.m.; Friday, 6 p.m.-12 a.m..; Saturday, 1 p.m.-12 a.m..; Sunday, 1 p.m.-7 p.m. PH
FRIDAY, AUGUST 15
LITERATURE
Rochester Book Crawl 2025
Indie bookstores, rochesterbookcrawl.
com
This celebration of all things indie book shops runs through August 23 at locations throughout Monroe County. From trusted city spots like the Unreliable Narrator to Brockport institution Lift Bridge and suburban staples like Bookends, the venues are numerous. Make your own route, grab a booklet at your favorite shop and watch for upcoming events at the Crawl’s website. Free to join; participants are entered into a prize drawing. PH
NATURE
Perseid Meteor Shower Viewing Party
Cumming Nature Center, rmsc.org Mid-August is prime meteor season, and the Perseids are a favorite because of the long “wakes” they leave behind, resembling streaks of light in the night sky. Strasenburgh Planetarium director Jim Bader will be on site for this halfmile trek into a darkened viewing area. Guests should bring a blanket, a flashlight and bug spray. Check-in begins at 7:30 p.m. Members pay $5; non-members pay $7. Advance tickets only. PH
SATURDAY, AUGUST 16
MUSIC
Silversun Pickups
Anthology, anthologylive.com I’ve been waiting for this moment all my life — or at least since Silversun last took the stage at Anthology in 2017. Eight years, one pandemic and two new full-length studio albums later, the L.A.-based alt-rock quartet returns with the promise of fuzzy guitar noise, Brian Aubert’s iconic sad-boy wailing and — hopefully — a “Lazy Eye” encore. VERONICA VOLK
THEATER
The Sankofa Festival
MuCCC, muccc.org
This long-running celebration of Black theater aims to spotlight local playwrights, directors and actors and has been doing so for more than 15 years. Sankofa’s programming in 2025 includes performances, tributes and discussions — check MuCCC’s website for the latest information on its slate of events. PH
FESTIVAL
South Wedge Festival
South Avenue, swpc.org
The annual fest returns to South Avenue between Averill Avenue and Gregory Street, featuring a pet parade, food and drinks, a busking contest between 15 musicians and myriad artists and vendors selling local wares. The pet parade kicks things off at 11 a.m. in Marie Daley Park, the entire fest runs ‘til 5 p.m. with many businesses staying open later to offer specials. All ages welcome. LS
SUNDAY, AUGUST 17
FILM
“Stray Dog”
The Little Theatre, thelittle.org Director Akira Kurosawa’s 1949 crime film centers on a detective’s stolen gun amid the grimy atmosphere of postWorld War II Japan and plenty of soul searching. In Japanese with English subtitles. The screening begins at 7:30 p.m. PH
DANCE
“The Reverie Revue”
The Rose Room, rochesterroseroom.com
In celebration of their two-year anniversary, The Reverie Chorus Line will bring their most-loved routines together for the first time — performed onstage at the South Wedge’s newest performance venue. Join the company for an evening of dance, history and celebration of their community. Show at 7:30 p.m.; $5 suggested admission. All profits will be donated to the Rochester Mutual Aid Network. LS
MONDAY, AUGUST 18
FOOD + BEV
$10 Wings & Trivia Night
Moo’d Burger Bar, moodburgerbar.com Wings. Beer. Burgers. Bragging rights. Kick off the week with brainbusting fun and $10 wing deals at Moo’d Burger Bar every Monday from 6-8 p.m. for free-to-play Trivia Night. Bring your friends, test your knowledge, and compete for awesome prizes (also: get a milkshake). No signup needed — just show up, grab a table and get ready to play! Teams of one to six are welcome. LS
MUSIC
The Blues Beatles
Fanatics Pub, fanaticspub.com
With Brazil’s Blues Beatles, you get precisely what you’d expect: some of the best songs ever made by John, Paul, George and Ringo shot through with infusions of hot licks and warbling Hammond organ. The group comes stateside to Lima for a threenight stand. Tickets $42. Doors at 6 p.m., music at 7 p.m. PH
TUESDAY, AUGUST 19
MUSIC
GARZI
Bug Jar, bugjar.com/calendar
GARZI is a 26-year-old Miami native of Ecuadorian and Black descent who was raised by a strong single mother. Since he relocated to Los Angeles for his career, GARZI has become a beacon for diverse youths who want to pursue music — undertaking three national tours within a year. He'll stop in Rochester to play a show cohosted by Photo City Music Hall and Bug Jar, with support from bands Tight Schedule, Winning The Lottery and A Million Lights. LS
FILM
Lux Movie Night: “Mean Girls”
Lux Lounge, lux666.com
A weekly film at Rochester’s favorite South Wedge dive bar. It’s not Wednesday, but you can still wear pink for this week’s screening of the 2004 cult classic “Mean Girls” featuring a pre-Hallmark era Lindsay Lohan. (So fetch.) Movie starts at 10 p.m. LS
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 20
MUSIC
Dean Keller's Soul Jazz Joint
The Little Cafe, thelittle.org/music
Dean Keller’s Soul Jazz Joint is a quintessential cafe band. Loungey but peppy, jazz focused but crowd pleasing, cool and collected. That’s why a Wednesday evening gig at The Little Cafe (in the summertime especially) feels like the right venue to experience what they do. 7-9 p.m. PH
THURSDAY, AUGUST 21
COMEDY
Sal Vulcano
Kodak Center, kodakcenter.com
As one of the four “Impractical Jokers,” Sal Vulcano helped build a television prank empire centered around a time-honored tradition: messing with your bros. His standup is less rapid-fire, focusing on funny stories he takes his time to unspool (like one about accidentally holding a woman’s pair of pants hostage). Tickets for Vulcano’s 7 p.m. show begin at $57. PH
FOOD + BEV
Sunset Sips
Austin Steward Plaza, rochesterdowntown.com/sunset-sips Trade your desk for a drink at Sunset Sips, an after-work gathering with live music from Elaina Alston, drink tastings from local vendors, food trucks and mingling along the banks of the Genesee at the recently completed Austin Steward Plaza. Free to attend, must be 21+ for tastings. LS
FRIDAY, AUGUST 22
MUSIC
Kenny Foster's Game Night Quartet
The Trestle, instagram.com/the.trestle
“I tend to think of my own compositions as parlor games,” musician Kenny Foster recently told music archivist Dan Gross, “and rehearsals and performances are game nights.” The playful approach is central to his music with his group, which he assembled in 2023 to perform some songs he’d written during the pandemic. That includes keyboardist Jon Tucker, bassist Matt McNulty and drummer Dave Maccarone; all will be on board for a 7 p.m. gig in Sodus Point. PH
FESTIVAL
Flour City Brewers Fest
Rochester Public Market, flourcitybrewersfest.com
The New York State Brewers Association brings this sudsy celebration to the Rochester Public Market. If you like your beer to be local, the offerings here seem infinite at what organizers call the longest-running craft beer festival in New York State. Sample your preferred brews, ciders and wines and munch on food from 5-9 p.m. A double shot of live bluegrass comes courtesy of Sutton String Band and Good Weather String Band. General admission tickets are $55; $10 for non-drinkers. PH
SATURDAY, AUGUST 23
MUSIC Kash Doll
Water Street Music Hall, waterstreetmusichall.live
Detroit rapper Kash Doll arrived with “Ice Me Out,” a minimal and memorable cut from 2018. Her success behind the mic presaged an acting career that’s found her on “Empire,” “BMF” and “Diarra from Detroit.” But at heart, she’s a talent comfortable on any stage she finds. She’ll demonstrate at Water Street for this 7 p.m. show. Tickets start at $35. PH
DRAG
RuPaul’s Drag Race: Werq the World Awards
Kodak Center, kodakcenter.com
“The most exclusive awards show in herstory” arrives in Rochester for a night to remember, featuring queens like Jimbo, Daya Betty, Jaida Essence Hall and more channeling the likes of Joan Rivers, Lady Gaga, Beyoncé and fellow divas. 8 p.m. Tickets $53+. VIP passes available. PH
SUNDAY, AUGUST 24
SHOPPING
The Lucky Flea
The Grove, theluckyflea.com
Visit the ever-popular weekly vintage market, now in its second year of residency at The Grove, 266 E. Broad Street, adjacent to Parcel 5 downtown. Local creatives, collectors and vintage curators to gather and sell while connecting with the community; in addition to retail vendors there are food and drink pop-ups as well as photo ops (‘fit check — get snapped by TLF team and you’re likely to end up on their heavily followed Instagram account). Well-behaved, leashed pets and humans of all ages are welcome. The free event runs 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sundays through October 26. LS
MONDAY, AUGUST 25
FOOD + BEV
Rochester Tiki Week
Multiple locations, instagram.com/ roctikiweek
The second annual Rochester Tiki Week — operated by the crew behind Jack’s Extra Fancy on Atlantic Avenue and Easy Sailor, the forthcoming tiki bar on Park Avenue — returns in August rather than September this year, featuring rum-soaked cocktail events across multiple bars, “all for the love of tiki.” The culminating event is a Swizzle Contest at Marge’s Lakeside Inn, which takes place just before sundown on Sunday, August 31. LS
TUESDAY, AUGUST 26
LITERATURE
Inklings Writers & Readers Group
Boulder Coffee Co Cafe and Lounge, instagram.com/tenxfollowers
Bring a notebook and some ideas to share with fellow writers at this salonstyle meetup. Inspired by those held by scribes nearly a century ago, the core is community and support and, as always, creativity. 6-7 p.m. PH
As summer winds down, this schoolpreparation event will offer free school supplies, haircuts, resources and food. Attendees can even grab a new pair of kicks for the school year during a free sneaker drive giveaway presented by Bruce Blue. All school ages welcome, event runs 9:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. RM
LECTURE
Unlocking the Past Speaker Series
Riverie, cornhillnav.org/riverie
Part of the ongoing “Unlocking the Past Speaker Series on Riverie: Navigating the Erie Canal During the First 200 Years.” This series takes an in-depth look at the impact the waterway has had on the individual and collective society of upstate New York and beyond — all while listeners cruise the Genesee River in Cornhill Navigation’s Riverie boat. On August 27, Erie Canalway National Heritage Corridor volunteer Marilyn Higgins discusses her recently published historical fiction novel, “Dreams of Freedom, an Irishwoman’s story of love, justice and a young nation coming apart,” about the abolition movement, native displacement, women’s movement and religious fervor of the Canal corridor from 1830-1865. Cruise at 5:30 p.m.; individual tickets start at $25. LS
THURSDAY, AUGUST 28
FILM
“Boys Go to Jupiter”
The Little Theatre, thelittle.org When artist and animator Julian Glander appeared on “Jeopardy!” in 2022, he went viral for reciting the alphabet backwards. That’s not the only magic trick he’s capable of. His latest is assembling an all-star voice cast (Janeane Garofalo, Ayo Edebiri) for a surreal debut feature that critics have called “delightful” and “wonderfully absurd.” Its poster recalls 1996’s “James and the Giant Peach,” a possible hint to its manner of childlike whimsy. Limited run, through August 31. PH
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WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 27
FAMILY
Back to School Community Event
Rochester Community Sports Complex, cityofrochester.gov
FRIDAY, AUGUST 29
MUSIC
The Honey Smugglers Big Band
Three Heads Brewing, threeheadsbrewing.com
Three Heads Brewing kicks off their — gulp — fall music calendar with The Honey Smugglers, a six-piece folk rock band that blends catchy songwriting and instrumentation to create a feel-good soundscape. This special “big band” show features an additional keyboard player, horn section and added percussion to bring more energy to the stage (and the dance, er, brewery floor). Doors at 7 p.m.; $20 cover. LS
FILM
Movies with a Downtown View
Parcel 5, downtowndefinitely.com
The 2017 musical biopic about circus impresario P.T. Barnum, “The Greatest Showman,” accomplished two notable feats. Importantly, it let Hugh Jackman cook. But it also helped further the career of Zendaya, a magnetic and dazzling performer who is no less than five years out from EGOTing. Zac Efron is along for the ride, too, along with Michelle Williams and Rebecca Ferguson. A+ cast. Looks good on the big screen, so Parcel 5 is the place to see it at 7 p.m. Free and family friendly. PH
SATURDAY, AUGUST 30
MUSIC
The Black Keys
CMAC, cmacevents.com
Akron, Ohio’s second-largest cultural export (after LeBron James, of course) returns to CMAC for a blues-rock showcase with guest Gary Clark Jr. Both acts helped usher in a torrent of electric guitar-fueled, commercialready, soul- and glam-infused rock and roll that had a stranglehold on mainstream culture for much of the 2010s. With the benefit of hindsight, the Keys sound looser than they might’ve ever gotten credit for at the time. Doors open at 5:30 p.m. Music begins at 7 p.m.; tickets start at $48.
PH
MUSIC
Happy Chichester
The Little Cafe, thelittle.org/music Called “one of the most underrated songwriters of his generation,” Happy Chichester brings his singular blend of soul, psychedelia, and raw storytelling to The Little Theatre Cafe for one night only. A cult hero from Columbus, Ohio, Happy has performed with members of Afghan Whigs, toured with Jeff Buckley and once nearly joined the Foo Fighters at Dave Grohl’s request. With a voice that shifts effortlessly between swagger and heartbreak and a catalog that spans decades of uncompromising art-rock, Chichester delivers intimate, magnetic sets that feel less like concerts and more like confessions. Don’t miss this rare chance to catch a living legend in an up-close setting. Music starts at 7 p.m. RYAN WILLIAMSON
FESTIVAL
Irondequoit Arts & Music Festival
I-Square, artcenterrochester.com
Now in its third year, the Irondequoit Arts & Music Festival brings together artists, crafters and a wide variety of musical performances. Get there early to grab a spot on the sprawling lawn in front of the I-Square amphitheater, then browse the dozens of artisan booths showcasing original artwork and handmade crafts, sample local food and enjoy live music from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. All ages welcome; event held rain or shine. VV
SUNDAY, AUGUST 31
SHOPPING
Weekly thrift sale
ARTISANworks, artisanworks.net Thrift lovers unite! Experience the eclectic maximalism of ARTISANworks — and bring home a piece for yourself. The weekly thrift sale happens 12-4 p.m. each Sunday, promising unique treasures, vintage gems and maybe even a few surprises. Entry is free, and every purchase helps support the mission of ARTISANworks. VV
“IN FOCUS” BY GREG TOWNSON
Certain instrumental songs can shake up the fabric of the musical ecosystem. Link Wray’s “Rumble” brought the fuzzbox to the fore in 1958; “Green Onions” made kids want to sit down at Booker T. Jones’ Hammond organ in ‘62.
Other times, a wordless track can just be a vibe. A good hang. A companion.
Instrumentals of the latter variety happen to be Greg Townson’s bag. The frequent guitarist for Nick Lowe and Los Straitjackets seems to feel most at home when a guitar does the talking. This is evident on “In Focus,” his latest record and sixth of instrumental compositions, released July 18 on 2-Bit records.
But characterizing the cuts as ‘breezy’ does them a disservice. The seven tracks here are brassy, with horn parts and arrangements from Nashville’s Jim Hoke that bring sizzling gusto. (Look no further than opener “Jack Rabbit,” a jazzy slice of nightlife featuring Alex Hall on drums.)
Townson’s guitar is the binding agent, but he also allows for fun vocal moments. The swaggering “Popcorn Dinner Again” features Mila Walasek and Todd Bradley singing the title as well as the words “shake, shake, shake” — reminding listeners of the mood.
Songs like “Two Steps Ahead” and “Katy Did” feel primed for pouring a drink, while bluesy numbers “Tough Cookie” and “For One and For All” could soundtrack a winding road trip under a vast sky. All of them reveal Townson’s penchant for lively, upbeat tunes built around — though decidedly not beholden to — his guitar.
Townson called “In Focus” his last full-band record “for the foreseeable future,” and said he’ll put his energy into figuring out solo guitar arrangements of his songs. If that’s the case, “In Focus” has the distinction of being one more entry in a catalog that says so much by simply playing it.
— PATRICK HOSKEN
“HOME TAPING IS KILLING MUSIC” BY HOME VIDEOS
A fuzzy overture reaming in reverse begins Home Videos’ mammoth release “Home Taping is Killing Music,” released in June on Raincoated Records, astonishing throughout the emo-gaze pitch deck, transmuting rejection and avoidance into triumphant slacker rock-core.
“Underwater Breathing” meditates and bounces with dissonant guitar-work in unison and dreamscape tape production, with just an initial whisper of vocal concern. Punctuating through stoner-rock crusts are tight snare and cymbal hits. Next, on “Instant Coffee,” a gray lyrical resolve finds a porchy counterpoint.
Murkily crawling with straight-ahead shoegaze, “Take Care” strongly builds, with crashing instrumental breakdowns and outer-space drum work. Beneath this and “An Excuse, An Apology, Again” are undercurrents of searching and mismatches, slewing and building with dissonance, explosions and vocals up the octave: Writing loose leaf pages trying to make sense of it all.
“Pixie Daisies” is a sweet lament with an endearing, quiet introduction over a low solo guitar. The allure of falling for the one not recommended can be unignorable, though often leading to “Pablo Honey”style bewilderment from being let down: I should’ve listened when they said you were no good for me.
“The Devil’s Credit Score” kindles a mathy wall of bass-led fury, hurdling vocals from whisper to scream and concluding with chaos. Completely in balance, “My Whole Life” offers a clear, hopeful vision forward for a romantic avoider of reality, worrying but yearning for companionship in this more-direct album offering: Oh my darling, stay with me tonight, sleep in through the morning, soft against my side.
“Bedhead” seals the 48-minute, taperecorded album as an epic odyssey with a climbing chillness and extreme phrasing structure. Strings sound like they’ll break from rot, with kneading echoes tolling away like a train as closure.
— RYAN M. YARMEL
“ANSWERS” BY HELIUM BUBBLE
At the end of the 2025 Rochester International Jazz Festival, beloved New Orleans performer Trombone Shorty returned for a triumphant, free set downtown. If fest goers came early, they were treated to another speciality: Helium Bubble, a neo-soul, fusion-inspired group fronted by vocal talent Julia Weatherholtz.
The foundation of Helium Bubble includes several local heavy hitters, even as its music remains as vaporous (and playful) as its moniker. Drummer Tommy Mintel anchors Phish tribute band The Nasty Flyers; bassist Tyrone Coley frequently plays with contemporary mainstays Deepak Thettu and Judah Sealy; the fretboards of guitarists Paul McArdle and Brother Wilson have backed up several artists; and pianist Greg Woodsbie is no stranger to switching up genres.
It’s a formidable wrecking crew, and each member gets their due on the high-energy new album “Answers,” released June 28. As a cohesive document, the collection pans between subterranean showcases for Weatherholtz’s soulful croon and livewire instrumental flourishes.
“Mirage,” a breakneck fusion cut, nods to Woodsbie’s recent Jazz Festival set, recreating the Brecker Brothers’ “Heavy Metal Be-Bop” with the Viavattine Bros. Similarly, “Jonah” finds Mintel stealing the show with stuttering, complex rhythms, while sci-fi opener “On Your Side” flexes toward progressive jazz.
But the collection largely belongs to the lighter moments from Weatherholtz, including two collaborations with R&B and hip-hop talent Senoj from the Roc. The best one, the tender but muscly “Before the Sun,” is a perfect record for festival season in Rochester. It will sound just as good with a chill in the air, thanks to a pair of windswept lead-guitar lines.
That’s what makes “Answers” so dynamic. Technically dazzling and exciting with nimble turns of phrase, it’s made for all terrain.
— PATRICK HOSKEN
“LEG DAY” BY SHARK ARMS
When an album whisks a listener off to a location in the first 30 seconds, that’s when it has it.
Shark Arms’ new release, “Leg Day,” does just that — strapping folks into the driver’s seat from the first reverberating guitar hum in “POST” and holding, unwavering, until the triumphant final chord slam in “Thoughts of Death at the Aldi.” But this isn’t meant to be a solo ride — this is music designed to be shared, blown out through car speakers, headbanged to on a summer road trip.
And on “Leg Day,” released in late June, there’s enough range to satisfy any passenger when it comes up on aux. Those who gravitate toward lyrics have plenty to chew on with this EP, which tackles the aftermath of a relationship. The vocals themselves are full and weighty, ranging from Ethan Berman’s zingy pop-punk belt to Doug Zogby’s gritty, full-chest growl. Reminiscent of both Blink-182 and Vampire Weekend, Shark Arms’ sound has evolved over the years to strike a mature balance in its mix. (So has the band itself, which used to be called Secret Organ.) In any given song, a little catchy guitar feature will yowl through and then make way for a drum fill or melodic section.
That keen understanding of space and smart utility of backing vocals make for a hyper-relistenable set of songs — ones to shout along to, potentially at their August 17 gig at Photo City Music Hall, or drift amid the energetic nostalgia of a mid2010s montage together.
— ALYSSA KOH
CELEBRATING YOUNG FILMMAKERS
WXXI is proud to put a spotlight on young filmmakers with two events this August that give students the opportunity to share their work with a larger audience.
The Rochester
Teen Film Festival is a collaborative, juried media competition open to youth (1318 years old) which honors the work of urban, suburban, and rural teen filmmakers and provides young people an authentic opportunity to participate in a real film festival. Now in its 15th year, the competition received 50+ short film entries from Rochester and beyond.
Thirteen finalists have been chosen, and their films will be presented on the big screen, followed by an award ceremony to announce the winners as part of Rochester Teen Film Festival Screening & Celebration at The Little Theatre on Thursday, August 7 at 5:30 p.m.
WXXI spotlights the work of Rochester Institute of Technology film and animation students through RIT Shorts, a biannual short film series that premieres on WXXI-TV Thursday, August 28 at 8 p.m. and repeats Friday, August 29 at 10:30 p.m. and Sunday, August 31 at 3:30 p.m.
Congrats to all the finalists! Film titles and filmmakers are:
“PROCRASTINATION”
Georgina Merry, Orchard Park, NY
“BAD DAYS”
Leo Hogan-Roy, School of the Arts
“BYE-BYE, MY WORLD!”
Alice Huang, Irvine, CA
“THE MICROWAVE”
Mason Morrison, Aquinas
“RUBY HEIST”
Maddix Barnes, Rochester, NY
“MONOLITH”
Finn Berger, Brooklyn, NY
“RAPPER’S CHOICE”
Aasera Amiger & Eliannah Pardner, In Control / Utchat Vision “25.3” Olivia Solomon, Penfield HS
Thanks to our sponsors:
“GREGGY’S BIG SURPRISE!”
Teagan Klamm, Penfield HS
“SELF PORTRAIT”
Jack Saxon, Irondequoit HS
“THE ECHOS OF ELARA”
Jagger Cardinale, Jessica Tamari & Sophia Voicu, North Hills, NY
“THE LIFE OF A MUFFIN” Georgian Merry, Orchard Park, NY
“ILLUMINATION”
Charlotte Anthony, Menlo Park, CA
The Rochester Teen Film Festival Screening & Celebration is free and open to the public. For more information, visit thelittle.org.
This edition of RIT Shorts includes the following films:
A Fish and a Bird by Deanna Moorehead
A fish and a bird fall in love and don't know where to coexist. Also, they sing opera.
Encyclopedia Galactica by Kenneth Reynolds
Despite humanity’s disappearance from the galaxy, the worlds we have left behind still flourish with life and mystery.
I Had To by Vinh Nguyen
An exploration of the generational gap of the diaspora of the Vietnam war and its ripple effect on my life.
In addition to offering a platform for young filmmakers to share their work with a broader audience, the series gives WXXI’s audiences the chance to see the varied talent and creativity housed at RIT. To learn more, visit WXXI.org.
A LITTLE BIT COUNTRY
This August WXXI-TV goes a little bit country with six specials you won’t want to miss.
Academy of Country Music Honors
Friday, August 8 at 10 p.m.
Celebrate the 16th ACM Honors filmed at the historic Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, featuring performances from BRELAND and Keith Urban, Brandy Clark, Chris Janson, Lady A, Carly Pearce, Brett Young, Bailey Zimmerman, and more.
Photo: Keith Urban, Credit: Courtesy of the Academy of Country Music
Johnny Cash: We Walk the Line
Tuesday, August 12 at 8 p.m.
Celebrate the life of Johnny Cash with an all-star lineup at this 2012 concert. Brandi Carlile, Kris Kristofferson, the Carolina Chocolate Drops, Ronnie Dunn, Jamey Johnson, Willie Nelson, and more pay tribute to Cash’s music, roots, and heritage.
Photo: The Carolina Chocolate Drops, Credit: Blackbird Presents
Johnny Cash: Man in Black Live in Denmark 1971
Tuesday, August 12 at 9:30 p.m.
Experience Johnny Cash, backed by the Tennessee Three, along with June Carter Cash, Maybelle Carter, Carl Perkins, and the Statler Brothers for an evening of country, rockabilly, American roots music, and spirituals.
Photo: Johnny Cash, Credit: Sony Music
Kris Kristofferson: Life & Songs
Thursday, August 14 at 9:30 p.m.
Honor Kris Kristofferson in a 2016 concert with exclusive interviews featuring multigenerational country greats such as Willie Nelson, Reba McEntire, Eric Church, Alison Krauss, and Lady A.
Photo: Kris Kristofferson with the entire cast, Credit: Blackbird Presents
Country’s Legendary Duets
Sunday, August 17 at 11 p.m.
Hosted by Tre Twitty and Tayla Lynn, Country's Legendary Duets looks back at some of the great country music duet performers of all time, including George Jones and Tammy Wynette, Dolly Parton and Porter Wagoner, and Conway Twitty and Loretta Lynn.
Kenny Rogers Live in Concert
Thursday, August 28 at 10 p.m.
Celebrate the career of the Grammy Award winner, Country Music Hall of Fame member, and worldwide music icon in a 1983 concert recorded at the Greensboro Coliseum in North Carolina at the peak of his popularity.
Photo: Dolly Parton & Porter Wagoner, Provided by American Public Television
Pictures from a Hiroshima Schoolyard
Monday, August 4 at 9 p.m. on WXXI-TV
Originally sent as a gift of thanks from the war-scarred children of Honkawa Elementary School in Hiroshima—responding to a donation of art and school supplies from the children of All Souls Unitarian Church—a box of colorful drawings was uncovered at a parishioner’s home in 1995. They surprisingly depicted self-portraits, festival flags, and kites against a bright blue sky, children on a playground, and cherry blossoms in bloom—none reflecting the horror or trauma the children had endured. In 2010, church members set out to reunite the drawings with their creators. This film explores the remarkable stories behind these hopeful drawings and the evolution of a friendship across distance and time.
Photo: All Souls Children receiving gifts in 1946. Provided by American Public Television
P!NK: Live from Wembley Arena
Thursday, August 7
at 10 p.m. on WXXI-TV
Grab a front-row seat at P!NK’s sold-out 2006 concert, packed with the Grammy Award-winning singer/songwriter’s greatest hits. Captured in a dynamic 15-camera high-definition shoot during her I’m Not Dead tour in London, the show features performances like “Get The Party Started,” “Who Knew,” “Don’t Let Me Get Me,” and “Nobody Knows,” accompanied by acrobatics, elaborate stage sets, and sizzling costumes.
Credit: Andrew MacPherson
A Wild Idea: The Birth of the APA
Tuesday, August 26 at 10 p.m. on WXXI-TV
This documentary examines the early origins of New York’s Adirondack Park and the creation of the Adirondack Park Agency (APA) 50 years ago. The Adirondack Park is larger than Yellowstone, Yosemite, Glacier, Grand Canyon, and the Great Smoky Mountains National Parks combined. Using archival footage, the film examines the challenges in the creation of the APA and its role in the preservation and management of the Adirondack Park, one of the most ambitious land-use planning conservation efforts ever undertaken.
Photo: APA 1973, Provided by American Public Television
Great Performances: Vienna Philharmonic Summer Night Concert 2025
Friday, August 29 at 9 p.m. on WXXI-TV
Conducted for the first time by Maestro Tugan Sokhiev, this beloved annual concert performed by the Vienna Philharmonic takes place in Schönbrunn Palace Park. Renowned opera singer Piotr Beczała joins as the vocal soloist, performing three famed arias from Bizet’s “Carmen,” Puccini’s “Turandot,” and Kálmán’s operetta “Gräfin Mariza.” Additionally, the Vienna Boys Choir will perform at the concert for the first time. The Summer Night Concert includes renditions of legendary compositions such as Bach’s “Air” from Orchestral Suite No. 3 in D Major, Tchaikovsky’s “The Waltz of the Flowers” from “The Nutcracker,” and Puccini’s “Nessun dorma” from “Turandot.”
WFMT Network Summer Opera Series
Saturdays at 1 p.m. on WXXI Classical
AUGUST 2
Trouble in Tahiti / Leonard Bernstein
A Quiet Place / Leonard Bernstein
From the Royal Ballet and Opera in London, England. Chorus and Orchestra of the Royal Opera House. Depicting portraits of a family 30 years apart, Leonard Bernstein’s opera Trouble in Tahiti depicts a day in the life of Sam and Dinah, a married couple at odds with one another and the happy suburban life they crave while A Quiet Place picks up the story 30 years later, after a family tragedy brings their children home and memories of the past rise to the surface, prompting a series of confrontations.
AUGUST 9
Turandot / Giacomo Puccini
From the Royal Ballet and Opera in London, England. Chorus and Orchestra of the Royal Opera House. When the beautiful Princess Turandot will only marry a man who can correctly answer three riddles, the arrival of an unknown prince shakes the balance of power in Turandot’s court in this captivating opera of love and revenge, featuring Puccini’s ever-popular ‘Nessun dorma’ (Photo above).
AUGUST 16
Die Walküre / Richard Wagner
From the Royal Ballet and Opera in London, England. Orchestra of the Royal Opera House. On a stormy night, fate brings two strangers together, unleashing a love with the power to end worlds as an epic battle ensues in the realm of the gods between the ruler Wotan and his rebellious daughter, Brünnhilde.
AUGUST 23
Werther / Jules Massenet
From Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris, France. Les Siècles and Orchestre National de France. Drawing inspiration from Goethe’s The Sorrows of the Young Werther while exploiting all the potential of a large symphony orchestra, Massenet creates an intimate and emotionally incisive atmosphere which is perhaps best illustrated by his most heartstring-tugging operatic hit aria “Pourquoi me réveiller.”
AUGUST 30
Der Rosenkavalier / Richard Strauss
From Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris, France. Orchestre National de France.
After the “odysseys and rages” of Strauss’ Salome and Elektra, Der Rosenkavalier was a return to the Viennese tradition of character opera, embodying the moral disarray of a fading era that marks the shift from the light-hearted comedy of manners to a meditation on time and the ephemeral nature of feelings.
SUNDAY NIGHTS AT 9 P.M. ON WXXI NEWS (FM 105.9)
What if, in the future, everything breaks humanity's way?
Possible is an award-winning show that sketches the brightest version of the future—and what it will take to get there. Hosts Reid Hoffman and Aria Finger explore what’s possible with forward-thinking leaders, deep thinkers, and ambitious builders across many fields, such as technology, art, education and healthcare.
AUGUST 3 | Demis Hassabis on AI, game theory, multimodality, and the nature of creativity
How can AI help us understand and master deeply complex systems—from the game Go, which has 10 to the power 170 possible positions a player could pursue, or proteins, which, on average, can fold in 10 to the power 300 possible ways? Hosts Reid and Aria are joined by Demis Hassabis, a British artificial intelligence researcher, co-founder, and CEO of the AI company, DeepMind.
AUGUST 10 | Dana Griffin on AI, belonging, and intergenerational connection
Loneliness is a public health crisis affecting people of all ages. This week we meet Dana Griffin, co-founder and CEO of Eldera, a global platform using AI to foster intergenerational connections.
AUGUST 17 | Andrew Bosworth on AI, wearables, and mixed reality
The evolution of AI is changing the way we interact with the physical world, not just in how we use this technology, but also where and how we access it. In this episode, hosts Reid Hoffman and Aria Finger sit down with Meta’s Chief Technology Officer, Andrew “Boz” Bosworth, who is pioneering wearables for the company.
AUGUST 24 | Jane Goodall on Hope, AI, and the Natural World
What would it look like to keep all living creatures in the loop on the development of new technology? Co-host Reid Hoffman sat down for a wide-ranging solo discussion with Jane Goodall on that very subject and more. They talked about how to maintain hope and focus on local impact in today’s often chaotic world, how technology – and AI in particular – might be helpful for conservation, and Jane’s global youth program, Roots & Shoots.
NEW MOVIES AND SUMMER HORROR!
TICKETS
AND TRAILERS AT THELITTLE.ORG
Together
NOW PLAYING | A horror film that doubles as a date night movie! Years into their relationship, Tim and Millie (Dave Franco and Alison Brie) find themselves at a crossroads as they move to the country, abandoning all that is familiar in their lives except each other. With tensions already flaring, a nightmarish encounter with a mysterious, unnatural force threatens to corrupt their lives, their love, and their flesh.
Meeting with Pol Pot
OPENS AUGUST 1 | Three French journalists accept a risky invitation from the Khmer Rouge to visit Cambodia in 1978. Their journey becomes a dangerous odyssey as they witness the regime’s brutality and struggle to report the truth.
Weapons
OPENS AUGUST 8 | When all but one child from the same classroom mysteriously vanish on the same night at exactly the same time, a community is left questioning who or what is behind their disappearance. From the director of Barbarian.
Cloud
OPENS AUGUST 8 | Yoshii, a young man who resells goods online, finds himself at the center of a series of mysterious events that put his life at risk. The new thriller from suspense-maverick Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Cure, Pulse).
Highest 2 Lowest
MID-AUGUST | When a titan music mogul (Denzel Washington) is targeted with a ransom plot, he is jammed up in a life-of-death moral dilemma in modern New York City. Directed by Spike Lee, and based on Akira Kurosawa’s “High and Low.”
Boys Go To Jupiter
August 28-31 | A teenager in suburban Florida desperately hustles to make $5,000 in this dreamy and surreal animated coming-of-age comedy. With pastel 2000s video game aesthetics, aliens, the economics of fruit juice companies, and lo-fi musical numbers, The Little promises this is one of the most bizarrely-charming and original animated films you’ll see this year.
SILENT FILM CLIPS WITH LIVE SCORE!
What if the devil was a VJ? What if MTV broadcast from hell? Ghost Almanac features the best scenes from classic silent horror films, with a live score and foley by the vintage synthesizer enthusiasts of Montopolis. Tales from the Crypt meets VH1 in this 80 minute roller coaster ride of terror and old school beats.
After popular screenings of L’inferno in 2024 and Man with a Movie Camera in 2022, Montopolis returns to The Little with an all-new live score and live foley performance for an 80-minute program of horror classics presented in an all-new way.
FEATURING CLIPS FROM:
The Skeleton Dance (1929) Haxan (1922)
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)
The Haunted House (1921) (Buster Keaton; complete)
L’Inferno (1911)
Betty Boop’s Halloween Party (1933)
The Vanishing Lady (1896) Nosferatu (1922)
The Movies of Joe Cornish
Wednesday, Aug. 13 at 7:30pm
South London teenagers (John Boyega, Alex Esmail, Leeon Jones) defend their neighborhood from malevolent extraterrestrials. An electric debut from Joe Cornish and an instant cult classic.
The Kid Who Would Be King (2019)
Wednesday, Aug. 20 at 7pm
Old-school magic meets the modern world when young Alex stumbles upon the mythical sword Excalibur. He soon unites his friends and enemies, and they become knights who join forces with the legendary wizard Merlin. Together, they must save mankind from the wicked enchantress Morgana and her army of supernatural warriors.
The Dish
WHET YOUR PALATE
The Revelry on University Avenue returns to its lowcountry roots with a rebrand to Rev BBQ, including a space next door dedicated to grab-andgo, Rev BBQ Outpost; The Inn on Broadway has rebranded steakhouse Tournedo’s to Gio’s Prime 26 as well as opened a speakeasy jazz bar, Vanni’s, in the basement; and Zoe’s Haitian Restaurant is slated to open soon on State Street — it will be the city’s only completely Haitian eatery.
FOOD AND BEV NEWS, GOSSIP, AND GATHERINGS CURATED BY LEAH STACY
Park Avenue coffee shop Montgomery Court is still fighting city zoning restrictions to add more than six seats inside. More here: montgomerycourt. com/zoning-update. And pour one out for Black Button Distilling — after 13 years, president and CEO Jason Barrett announced that the company would shutter operations completely on July 12. Black Button was Rochester’s first craft distillery since Prohibition; they had recently relocated from the Public Market to a large facility on University Avenue.
Headed to the Finger Lakes? Stop at Folk Bar in Penn Yan, a wine bar from two FLX Hospitality and Living Roots Wine alums, and the adjacent Folk Bottle shop, which has a thoughtful curation of wine and spirits from the region.
FOR THE LOCAVORES
A Rochester native has your dream job, and he’s pretty (gouda) at it: cheesemonger Max Lazary won the 2025 Cheesemonger Invitational, an event that puts cheesemongers center stage in a unique competition to showcase their technical skills, encyclopedic knowledge and passionate salesmanship.
FOOD FÊTES
Hoochenanny Whiskey & Music Fest at Camp Eastman August 8-10 will include a rare Swilly’s pop-up (if you never made it to the brick and mortar in Pultneyville helmed by Brian Van Etten of Pizza Wizard and Swillburger, this is your chance). Still thirsty? Rochester Tiki Week returns August 25-31 for a week of rumsoaked revelry, for the full details visit instagram.com/rochestertikiweek.
This month’s Food Truck Rodeo is 5-9 p.m. Wed., Aug. 27 at the Public Market, with live music from The Occasional Saints. The Food Truck Fridays runs 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. in Washington Square weekly through Aug. 22 and features 11 rotating food trucks and live music curated by the Local Sound Collaborative.
CROSSWORD PUZZLE ANSWERS
PUZZLE ON PAGE 62. NO PEEKING!
the people in your neighboRhood
Meet CITY’s 2025 Rochester 10 cohort
By CITY Staff
As we pull back the curtain on this year’s Rochester 10 nominees, a quote from beloved PBS show host Fred Rogers comes to mind:
“Look for the helpers.”
In the following pages, you’ll find 10 such helpers — people who are contributing time, energy and passion to make our city (and beyond) a better place to live, work and play. From creating art and community building to putting food on tables and wielding the power of words, this cohort is making an inarguable impact. As in past years, they were chosen through nominations from both staff and contributors.
Read on to meet the 2025 Rochester 10 — the helpers
Want to nominate someone to the 2026 cohort? Please email leah@rochester-citynews.com for future consideration.
Photos by Roberto Felipe Lagares Art direction and design by Jacob Walsh
Profiles by Kellen Beck, Sydney Burrows, Gino Fanelli, Patrick Hosken, Justin Murphy, Jessica L. Pavia, Rebecca Rafferty, Helana Shumway, Leah Stacy and Veronica Volk.
TimothyLong
profile by Jessica L. Pavia
There is a boy in Oklahoma. A toddler listening to the Beethoven his mother plays, making a piano out of anything he can find. The music is emotional and encompassing; before he has the words to describe it, music is a feeling.
“I never, ever foresaw any of it,” Timothy Long, who is of Muscogee Creek and Choctaw descent, said. “I just loved to play piano.”
Long’s mother discovered Beethoven while sick at an Indian Tuberculosis Sanitarium after catching the disease at an orphanage.
“She’d only play Beethoven for us as toddlers, with no real intention of us becoming musicians,” he said.
Now the artistic and music director of opera at his alma mater, Eastman School of Music, as well as assistant conductor at the Metropolitan Opera, Long admits many miracles had to happen to get here, from the upright piano someone gifted his minister grandfather to the 15-year-old girl new to teaching who became his first instructor.
“To [my mother’s] great credit,” Long said, “she called the teacher of the students who always beat her at competitions and convinced her to listen to me. I auditioned for her, and she cleared her schedule. Wednesday nights we would drive [to Oklahoma City] and my father or mother would sit in the car for two to three hours then drive me back home.”
The classical world is demanding. It demands money, access, education and time. It’s overwhelmingly white due to those factors. Steadily, though, Long made his way,
“Because of my love of music, I clawed my way to a position in this world, and I want others to have this opportunity,” he said.
Long performed first as a musician and is now more often a conductor. He started coaching piano first at Juilliard then Yale, where he conducted his first opera. The transition was difficult and emotional, something no one warned him about. But Long, who wears ribbon shirts during special performances to represent his Indigenous identity, has since conducted all over the world, including in the only existing theater where Mozart did the same. In 2017, Long conducted “Missing,” an opera about the thousands of missing Indigenous women.
“In this world I’ve found, especially up to ‘Missing,’ I would be the first and only Native person [someone] met,” Long says. “So I was an exception, not a part of the Native community. After “Missing,” it became my duty for people to think about us every time they saw us anywhere. Not for me, but for the millions of people who have no voices.”
This mission reached a pitch during 2020, when Long said people started reaching out for music created by Indigenous artists. At the time, there wasn’t a repertoire for their songs, so Long and his father-in-law, Randy Plimpton, started work on the “North American Indigenous Songbook” under the Plimpton Foundation.
“We brought together Native composers from across the country to create original works,” Plimpton wrote in an email. “This idea of Tim's is unique and has never been done before — to bring Native and Indigenous musicians into one songbook, which will be available to anyone interested in performing these pieces.”
Additionally, as part of the foundation, two singers of Native descent in Oklahoma are awarded the Timothy Long Prize each year. The Prize’s first recipient just graduated with her Master’s from Juilliard.
Long has also turned his attention to composing something of his own. The work, titled “Sky Mother,” will combine various languages: Chuctow, Houdenasuennee and of course, Beethoven, the artist that started it all for Long.
“It’s a combination of the creation story of Sky Woman juxtaposed with my mother’s memoirs of growing up in the orphanage and sanatorium,” he said. “They’re both about loss and regaining a new world with hope.”
Being a musician the way Long is leaves imprints — a bruised neck from practicing violin all night, hands that seem to morph around keyboards — but to him all of this has been worth it, for the music that carries him through and the music he loves.
“Still, I am obsessed.” theplimptonfoundation.org
Katherine M ARIno
When Katherine Marino gets an idea, she usually makes it happen. Over the last decade, she’s woven herself into Rochester’s dance and theater fabric — creating multiple one-woman performances, co-founding RocHaha, the city’s first annual clown festival and now, opening a unique studio space in the largely repurposed post office on Cumberland Street. Marino’s grit and passion for clown and physical theater is echoed by an unmatched dedication to collaborate with the city’s broader performing arts community.
A Rochester native, Marino studied dance at the Hochstein School of Music under the late Christopher Morrison and completed her bachelor of arts degree at Hobart and William Smith Colleges. While teaching English in Argentina on a Fulbright Scholarship, Marino had her first taste of circus arts. Immersed in a different culture and a new art form, she fell in love with circus and physical theater.
Upon returning home to Rochester, Marino brought her new skillset and interests to PUSH Physical Theatre, which she toured and performed with for four years. It was during her years with PUSH that Marino met Ashley Jones, who is now a creative producer and performer with the company and Marino’s partner in launching RocHaha and the Auguste Roost studio on Cumberland.
Last September, the pair unveiled the RocHaha Clown Festival, a two-day celebration that brought world-class clown artists to Rochester for performances, workshops and community events.
“We wanted our community to experience high-quality work by visiting artists and to take clowning classes from people beyond the two of us,” Marino said. The duo’s shared vision led to a successful new festival, creating space for performers and audiences alike to laugh, experiment and get out of their comfort zones.
But as Marino and Jones organized RocHaha, they hit a familiar obstacle: a shortage of affordable, accessible rehearsal and teaching spaces. Most studios in Rochester are housed in academic institutions or cater exclusively to children’s dance classes. For artists like Marino and Jones, renting time in those spaces meant high fees, little administrative support and limited opportunity to build their own student base and income.
Their new space, Auguste Roost at 250 Cumberland St. — formerly the home of Rochester Dance Theatre — offers a solution to these problems. Jones and Marino spearheaded the have dedicated the studio to adult artists in physical theater, clowning and
dance. Not only is the space unique in its focus on adults, but it also offers teaching artists the chance to co-produce workshops and classes. Marino and Jones share the financial risks and support teachers with administrative aspects.
“We’re hoping to have a space that people can feel like is their own,” said Marino. “Teaching artists can have more ownership, bring in their own students, and grow their practices.”
One of the first consistent classes offered at the Roost is a dance-conditioning series taught by Elyssia Primus, a local freelance dancer and licensed physical therapist. Primus recently secured ArtsBloom funding through the City of Rochester to launch a nine-month, biweekly contemporary movement program hosted at the studio — offered free to local artists at a professional level.
“We have so much dance in the Rochester community, but unless you’re a company member with one of the local full-time groups, you don’t have consistent classes at your disposal,” said Primus.
She will enlist nine resident modern dance artists to lead workshops, forging new creative partnerships and giving freelancers reliable training. Primus has worked with Marino for many years throughout various artistic collaborations, and witnessed Marino’s career evolution firsthand.
“I thought it was a really brave transition, from contemporary dance to clowning,” Primus said. “Comedy is all about taking risks, because you have to be willing to fail to figure out what’s funny. And for dancers, failure is hard. We’re trained to keep everything perfect and precise. I admire her for taking risks.”
That spirit of risk-taking propels Marino’s work onstage and off. She’s quick to admit when she doesn’t have all the answers and eager to seek out new knowledge. With her innate drive to learn and grow — both as an artist and entrepreneur — Marino strives to make the Rochester dance and theater space funnier and fuller as a community.
“Rochester is my home,” she said. “I want to have exciting shows and opportunities for the vibrant community of artists that live here.” rochaha.com/theroost
profile by Sydney Burrows
Luvon SheppARd
Artist and educator Luvon Sheppard is an early bird.
Most mornings he’s at his studio in Joy Gallery at 498 West Main St., where he shows up by 6 a.m. to put pigment to paper while his wife Frances, a nurse and his partner of 57 years, receives dialysis treatment.
Luvon and Frances own the gallery together, and for more than 20 years they’ve shown work by area artists, from his students at Rochester Institute of Technology — where he has been an art professor since 1972 — to seasoned creatives, regional artists and those who haven’t yet broken out.
“In the beginning, when we were on Genesee Street, we had a group of people from all walks — there were Catholics, Protestants, white, Black, Puerto Rican,” said Luvon.
The gallery’s current location is still a place to find myriad artistic voices.
“He’s a force in the Rochester art community going back generations,” said Yaqub Shabazz, a Chicago transplant who is a painter and printmaker, MFA candidate at RIT and the founder-director of the 9th Floor Artist Collective on South Washington Street.
profile by Rebecca Rafferty
“And Joy Gallery is a watering hole,” Shabazz said. “Every Saturday morning he’s there, holding court, painting, making, instructing and guiding. He has a relationship with so many individual artists, I’ve scarcely met someone who hasn’t felt that impact.”
At the rear of the gallery is Sheppard’s studio, a lofted, sunlit space where he has a few projects going at once, pinned to the wall amid his massive, well-known massive watercolors.
Those are bright works of layered imagery of the sacred and the mundane, often depicting snapshots of Rochester street scenes from eras identifiable by the pedestrian fashions and signs of the businesses active when the painting was made. Juxtaposed above those vistas are spectral visions of the Four Horsemen, with crashing waves and snippets of Biblical scripture.
“I paint what is around me, what I’m seeing, and what’s going on inside,” he said.
Though Sheppard’s work contains religious symbolism and psalms, he doesn’t proselytize. He considers each person’s spiritual journey a private pursuit, and he’s much more interested in that pursuit than actually grasping the mystery behind it all.
“I’ll take students outside to look at a tree, and I aim for them to enjoy the expression and the activity of trying to paint the tree,” Sheppard said. “Then we sit and talk about the attempt.”
He speaks eagerly of giving himself over to the creative process. A grasp on technical skills is important, but shouldn’t be hampered by too much control. His practice involves relinquishing the outcome to intuitively doing the work, following the pull of current experiences and meditations and learning from reflections on it all, sometimes much later on.
Everything is elusive, and in perpetual flux, he said, and he’s intrigued by that.
“I let the changes influence me.”
Sheppard gets that from his mother, who moved him and his two younger brothers from Sanford, Florida, to Rochester when he was in the second grade, finding her way from the migrant camps in Sodus to working as a beautician and taking night classes to leading a nursery unit at Genesee Hospital. Eventually, she founded her own church, Joy Ministries — from which Sheppard’s gallery takes its name.
His own deep roots as a community mentor began while attending RIT, when he worked as the playground director at Brown Square, serving neighborhood kids from Black, Italian, and Latino families. In the ’70s, Sheppard was hired at Memorial Art Gallery as coordinator of neighborhood services, where he built programs geared toward minorities and brought art from the white walls to barber shops and beauty salons.
“It was not so much about teaching art, as introducing art to an indigenous community,” he said.
Sheppard founded various exposureoriented arts groups, including Aesthetics in Black, which had collaborations with Garth Fagan Dance for presentations at the former War Memorial and the now-razed Midtown Plaza. He was also forerunner of expanding arts presence in what became the Neighborhood of the Arts, where he founded All of Us, an arts workshop series with instructors from area universities and the Visual Studies Workshop, housed in Writers & Books’ current location on University Avenue.
Then, Sheppard was primarily a printmaker. (He got into watercolor because no one else wanted to teach it.) With Joy Gallery, he’s influenced a new, expanding arts quadrant. The space’s foothold on West Main paved the way for other neighborhood art spots like 540WMain, Sew Green and the 9th Floor Artist Collective. In a bit of a full-circle magic, Visual Studies Workshop has recently joined the lineup with its new location on King Street.
Sheppard is currently finishing a set of waterscape paintings for a September show at the Village Gallery at Stony Point Arts Studio in Fairport, which will celebrate both the bicentennial of the Erie Canal as well as his position as a creative leader in the region. The in-progress works showcase the terrain and infrastructure surrounding the storied waterway along with Sheppard’s chops as a plein-air painter.
Joy Gallery has also partnered with local arts supporter Richard A. Glaser to create the $5,000 Luvon Sheppard Award for Creative Excellence, which will be awarded to a regional artist during the Memorial Art Gallery’s M&T Bank Clothesline Art Festival, September 6-7. luvonsheppardart.com
Victor A n ToneTTI Jr.
Many terms can be used to describe Victor Antonetti Jr. He’s the founder of a community hub with the Avalon, a former dance studio-turnedevent venue on State Street. Geared toward Rochester’s Latinx population, the venue hosts everything from birthdays to small concerts.
He serves as director of marketing for Rochester’s first 24-hour Latin radio station, Poder 97.1 FM. He’s also an accomplished musician himself, playing piano in the family band, Orquesta Antonetti, through which he has collaborated with Grammy Awardwinning artists.
More than anything, Antonetti is a proud father. His daughter, Isa Antonetti, made her Broadway debut in “Buena Vista Social Club” this past year, and when the musical was in a three-way tie for most nominations (11 total), the Avalon hosted the family’s Tony Awards party.
“We did the red-carpet Tony thing. We had like 40 people and food,” Antonetti said. “It was like the Tony experience, so that was very cool.”
Music runs deep in the Antonetti family. He described his youth as fueled by music. Antonetti’s father moved to Rochester from Salinas, Puerto Rico in 1956 at the age of eight and later founded Orquesta Antonetti. It became a family affair, made up of Antonetti’s brothers and uncles. First focused on salsa, the band branched off into various other forms of Latin music.
“My brothers, my cousins, we all grew up in music,” Antonetti said. “Even now, people would come to my house and my daughter’s constantly singing, and they’d ask, ‘Is this all day?’ and I’d say, ‘Yeah,’ but we’re so used to it.’”
Orquesta Antonetti played at the Lilac Festival in May, and they are regular performers at the International Plaza on North Clinton Avenue.
Rosa Martinez has known Antonetti for about 30 years and describes him as one of her best friends. A singer herself, she’s performed with him over the years.
“He's a world class musician, and I don't think that people understand the magnitude of his contribution to the arts fully until you hear him on stage,” she said. “There's countless bands that are out here, but his sound, (you) definitely can tell the difference.”
Martinez described Antonetti as a true community leader, someone who is not seeking the limelight, but uses his influence to make a mark. That extends from music — pulling in acts from abroad that otherwise might skip over Rochester — to organizing food drives during the pandemic.
“I am happy to say that he is one of the most genuine, hard-working, selfless people ever,” Martinez said.
Antonetti’s work has not gone unnoticed. In 2022, he was awarded Hispanic Business Person of the Year by the Rochester Hispanic Business Association.
Rochester’s scene for salsa, merengue and Latin jazz is small, but Antonetti sees it not wanting for talent. He described the musicians in the city as being as good as anywhere else in the world. Getting great music in Rochester is not the issue, but rather getting people to look to the city for great music.
“A lot of the musicians here are top notch,” he said. “Sometimes the musicians here get frustrated, but I’m like, ‘Imagine this band in Mexico, or Peru or Puerto Rico. We would be playing every night.’” orquestaantonetti.com
profile by Gino Fanelli
Adam ChodAK
Adam Chodak is running out of time.
It’s just after 9 a.m., and if he doesn’t leave soon, he’ll be late for an interview. But before anchoring the evening news on local CBS affiliate News 8 WROC, he has to report his own story.
“It’s stressful,” he said. “But it’s better than being bored.”
Since joining News 8 in 2015, Chodak has anchored the 5 and 6 o’clock newscasts longer than anyone currently on air in Rochester.
Ten years may not seem like a long tenure in the city of Don Alhart, but the landscape has changed. The familiar, trusted newsman is mostly a relic. Still, Chodak appears in living rooms across the region every night, projecting thoughtful steadiness in a suit and tie.
Today, he’s training a new videographer: 27-year-old Kendra Simpson, fresh from a station in Missouri.
“It’s fun,” Simpson said of the job’s marathon editing and tight deadlines, “when you don’t have a migraine and want to die.”
Chodak grew up in Rochester. After working in Syracuse, Boston and Fort Collins, Colorado, he came home – first to 13WHAM, then News 8. On the road to his interview, he points out local landmarks and checks his watch.
“Everything throughout the day is like, how long is this going to take?” he said. “When will I be done?”
Broadcast news runs on time: a few hours to research, interview, script, edit. You’re on at 5 p.m.; you’ve got 90 seconds for a package, 15 seconds to fill.
“It’s fucking relentless,” Chodak said to his trainee. His job can take up 60 hours a week. That’s time away from his wife, Jill, and 13-yearold son, Isaac.
“There’s a little bit of heartbreak with that,” he said. “That’s the sacrifice you make to have an amazing career.”
Chodak has won several Emmy Awards for both anchoring and reporting. He’s been recognized by the New York State Associated Press for his investigative work and honored for his “Friday Thoughts” segments, which are a blend of journalism and personal reflection.
Today’s story is about a woman fighting to keep her daughter’s killer in prison. In her home, Sue Ann Cross keeps a framed photo of her daughter, Staci Ackerman, on the couch beside her through the whole interview. Her raw emotion is what drew Chodak to the story.
“Huge laughter, huge tears, grief,” he said. “This is how we connect to each other.”
It’s part of why the traditional newsman distrusts social media.
“There’s no time to have human emotion with this,” he said, gesturing at his phone. If that attitude seems old-fashioned, it’s a necessity for him.
“I don’t have the time or the ability to take in schlock.”
When the interview ends, he and Cross hug.
“The most valuable thing that we own is our own story,” he said on the drive home. “When someone shares theirs with me, that’s such a gift.”
Almost two years ago, Chodak went public with his own story. In a 2023 Friday Thoughts segment, he told viewers he was going blind.
Chodak has Stargardt disease, a rare genetic disorder that affects central vision. It could deteriorate to the point where he can’t read or recognize faces. The disorder usually causes blindness in early adulthood. In that sense, he said, he’s lucky.
“I got to play varsity baseball, meet my wife, build a career and family without even the slightest notion that, as my eye doc said, ‘something’s wrong,’” he said in the 2023 TV segment.
At first, he kept the diagnosis private. But that changed, as did many things, after the pandemic.
“I thought, if I let people know I’m struggling, maybe they’ll feel less alone,” he said. Chodak could be legally blind in two months or two years. He could lose his independence, or benefit from breakthrough treatment.
“I have no idea what the next few months will bring,” he said. “It’s encouraged me to live more in the present.”
Later, Chodak co-anchors the news with Theresa Marsenburg. The broadcast covers stabbings, a traffic jam on 490, a literacy program for kids in the city and a recurring segment called Backyard Barbecue, where fans visit the station for Bill Gray’s burgers and a tour.
One of the fans, Judy Jones, beamed.
“I like Adam Chodak,” she said. “I like how he presents. It’s very personal.”
That relationship is rare, but it matters.
“There is always going to be an audience of people who like what we deliver,” Chodak said. “I just hope it's enough to keep me employed.”
He’s not sure how long that will be. But in the meantime, he said he’s fortunate.
“The more I do this, the more I’m grateful I can play that role for people and be a steadying force in their lives.”
facebook.com/adamchodak1
profile by Veronica Volk
Midge T homA s
profile by Justin Murphy
On September 1, Midge Thomas will turn 99 years old. The times and accomplishments for which she’s most remembered — her marriage to Dr. Freddie Thomas, the establishment of a foundation and community center in his honor after his untimely death, the dedication of the Miss Jane Pittman drinking fountain at the Liberty Pole — are all decades past.
What remains is smaller and quieter. A modest first-floor apartment on Liberty Pole Way. Inside, a kitchen table with a crisp red tablecloth and a glass of cool water for a visitor.
“We talk a lot about the red tablecloth,” Thomas said. “A lot of good stuff happens right here. … It’s a comfortable environment where people sort of relax.”
Smaller and quieter, in the same way that Thomas’ voice has softened, but still deeply resonant with the presence she has maintained in Rochester since she moved here from Mumford in 1957.
In her 2023 book, “Letters to Freddie: The Biography of Midge Thomas,” biographer Laura Shillitoe DiCaprio described the home Thomas shared with her husband more than 50 years ago, and its place in the local Black community:
“Midge supported Freddie’s accumulation of bright, ambitious students, many of whom visited the Thomases daily. … She asked how their days were … [and] loaded up on half-priced cookies and brownies from the local bakery to provide as after-school snacks.”
A dignified place setting, a simple act of hospitality, a comfortable environment for relaxation, understanding and inspiration — those are the things on which Thomas’ legacy rests.
“The thing is, I can’t let go,” she said. “It’s in me. … I’ve lived long enough to know the whole thread.”
It would be inaccurate to say that Midge Thomas has finished her work. That’s certainly not how she sees it.
She’s working with the Gamma Iota Boule Foundation to help launch a scholarship fund for teenagers looking to enter the trades. She’s active with Downtown ROCS, a beautification organization in the
city center, and is soon to be honored with the Midge Thomas Community Garden at South Clinton Avenue and Andrews Street. There will be a celebration of her life at 6 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 28 at City Hall.
“God uses her as a vehicle to get her work done, and she’s not concerned about what she’s going to get out of it,” said Mario Howell, a close friend. “We all have the qualities, but it’s a matter of what we prefer most. ‘What am I going to get out of it?’ … She cuts all of that loose.”
That frame of mind is something Thomas inherited from her mother and father. Increasingly, she thinks back across the century to them.
“The foundation and the strength of who I am and what it’s about – my identity – it’s because of my parents,” she said.
Both sides of her family have roots in antebellum Virginia. Her father, Milton Banks, belonged to one of the first Black families to come to Mumford from Culpeper, Virginia, after the Civil War. They donated the land on which the Black church there was built. Her mother, Ethel, was born in Richmond; Midge’s maternal grandfather established a string of African Methodist Episcopal churches across the state.
The Banks were hard workers and churchgoers who instilled in their children the importance of education and the obligation to serve their community. Midge, their oldest daughter, brought those qualities to her marriage with Freddie Thomas, an early Black scientist in Rochester who dedicated his tooshort life to the same principles.
Following his death in 1974, Midge has carried on in his memory.
“God has already ordained who you are,” she said. “He has already got a plan that you’re going to do: one, two, three, four, five, whatever it is. And you are obligated to follow what He has planned for you.”
What does God have ordained for Midge Thomas? Only He and she know that. For as many more years as she’s given, she’ll continue to carry it out from her seat at the table with the red tablecloth.
Quynh BuI
In Vietnam, coffee shops eclipse bars as the gathering place of choice. Caffeine flows late, and everyone from freelancers to families is encouraged to stay, work and socialize. Many of the shops have both indoor and outdoor spaces, especially given the warmer climate.
It was this part of her native culture Quynh Bui missed most when she moved to the United States from Vietnam at age 16. Bui’s grandparents and uncles had immigrated to Rochester after the Vietnam War, and her parents later decided to join the family. After completing her last two years of high school at Greece Olympia, Bui enrolled at Rochester Institute of Technology for marketing and management, which led to meeting her husband, Tin Seekaew, and accepting a job at Paychex after graduation.
“Like any immigrant child, I followed what my parents wanted me to do — get a job in the corporate world, climb the ladder, ‘you need stability,’ and all of that,” said Bui. “I always wanted to have something of my own, but I didn’t have the guts to do it. Rochester still felt strange to me, I didn’t have that connection yet.”
Throughout college and beyond, Bui continued to search for the kind of coffee shop she’d left in Thủ Dầu Một. As an RIT student, Java’s on campus or downtown on Gibbs Street came close.
“In Vietnam, when you say, ‘Hey, you want to go get coffee,’ it's not just to drink coffee,’” Bui said. “It's, ‘Hey, I want to meet you, I want to see you, I want to hang out.’ The courtesy of a good coffee shop there is WiFi and plenty of seating. The owners don't care how long you sit there.”
A few years into her corporate life came the pandemic — a career reset for so many — and the death of her beloved grandparents within a year of each other.
“After that, I didn't feel fulfilled anymore at my corporate job, even though I loved the people I worked with,” Bui said. “And then it was COVID, and I didn't feel like I was there for my family.”
Coffee was still at the forefront of her mind. Bui began to experiment more at home, and she and Seekaew — her biggest advocate, who one day in November 2020 walked out of Best Buy with an espresso machine — created a YouTube channel. Still, Bui had never actually worked behind the counter at a shop.
When businesses reopened, she applied at nearly every coffee shop in the city. Finger Lakes Coffee Roasters was the first to give her a chance, and then RoCoCo (in the Mercantile on Main).
In May 2022, she launched her own mobile cart: Winter Swan Coffee, a moniker that nods to both the weather in Rochester and Bui’s first latte art design. The small menu was anchored in traditional Vietnamese coffee, which brews dark Robusta beans through a slow-drip phin filter and mixes it with condensed milk.
Tanvi Asher, owner of Shop Peppermint and founder of Themata (The Market at the Armory) met Bui through their mutual friend Catt Hsu, owner of Happy Gut Sanctuary, then located in The Hungerford Building.
“I love Vietnamese coffee and you can only find it at restaurants,” said Asher. “When I heard someone was actually doing it from scratch, I was all ears. I immediately reached out and asked if she would do the next Themata.”
Bui agreed, and was the only coffee vendor for the almost 4,000 visitors to Themata.
“It was a hit, and we hit it off, and she started doing almost every market,” said Asher. “Just watching her add more than four items to her menu, going from the cart to a shop — it's been awesome to see her grow.”
After operating the cart at events around Rochester, Bui was offered the opportunity to open a brick and mortar in partnership with Stacy K Floral on 43 Russell St., a gift and floral shop with a large communal seating area. Winter Swan officially opened in August 2023.
“As a fellow immigrant, I see the cultural pride (Bui) has for what she does — her menu is reflective of where she comes from, the ingredients are made from scratch,” said Asher. “She thought people would misunderstand her coffee or think it was too expensive, but quality always speaks for itself."
Asher, whose family emigrated from India, also attended RIT and ended up in a creative field — something she and Bui often talk about.
“We’re immigrant women in creative fields rather than working as engineers or doctors, how is that perceived?” she said. “Finding a creative path that brings you joy and money — that's a dream. She’s paving the way for other Vietnamese women who want to do coffee or anything else.”
As a female business owner who’s been given opportunities by other local women like Asher, Hsu of Happy Gut and Stacy Ercan of Stacy K, Bui takes her role as a mentor to her own (right now, all-female) staff very seriously.
“We keep communication open,” she said. “I want this job to be easy on their mental health. I want them to show up, enjoy the work and leave without carrying any feelings home.” Bui is also grateful for the welcoming, inclusive coffee community in Rochester.
“No coffee shop is exactly like another. We’ve all found our neighborhoods and support each other in doing good things,” she said. “We want this culture to be more than just caffeine to get you through the day.” winterswancoffee.com
David C oR bIn
The epigraph to David Corbin’s heartbreaking and funny new memoir, “Ninety-Eight Nights,” comes from Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami: “In a world of time, nothing can go back to the way it was.”
It’s a fitting preamble to Corbin’s story. On March 9, 1996, while traveling on the New York State Thruway, the car that carried Corbin and three friends skidded on ice and stopped dead. A bus hit them at 60 miles per hour, leaving Corbin, then 20 years old, paralyzed.
But as Corbin writes, that was merely the beginning. The book follows his three-month stay in the hospital after the accident and all the fear and anguish that accompanied it. Pacemaker surgery. Constant blood-pressure issues. Brushes with death that still reverberate.
That’s why he wanted a second epigraph (that he ultimately couldn’t secure permission to use): “Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt,” from Kurt Vonnegut’s “Slaughterhouse-Five.”
It was meant to be ironic.
“I felt like, not that people were lying, but am I the only person that thinks this sucked?” Corbin said. “It didn't seem like anybody was being real honest.”
It took 10 years before he even began thinking about writing down his experiences, albeit in a much different form. The initial idea, he admitted, would have a “bitter” book; he also considered making a short film.
Corbin was a pen-and-ink commercial art student at Cazenovia College at the time of the accident. Years after he returned home, he picked up a camera and learned about film photography at the Flower City Arts Center. That unlocked a new avenue of creative expression via a darkroom in his basement that his father helped install.
His photo work has been shown locally at cafes. But for a self-described people pleaser — “I felt like I was a bad patient for saying no,” he writes about his first experience in a wheelchair — having a showcase was nervewracking. It also helped Corbin feel confident in his abilities.
“It was scary, because I viewed the stuff as a representation of me,” he said. “I was very nervous if someone was gonna like it or not, and so I put too much weight on it.”
Painting helped. Corbin initially resisted holding a brush during occupational therapy, but when he returned home from the hospital, he eventually found peace in creating watercolor images of pets.
“It's one of the only times when [I was] so externally focused that I wasn't worried about anything,” he said. “I wasn't thinking, is my blood pressure going to go down?”
“Ninety-Eight Nights,” in its final form, is the result of nearly 30 years of processing trauma, and though it’s a heavy read, Corbin’s natural humor cuts through the prose. (A urologist who “electrocuted my butt” is thanked in the acknowledgements.)
SUNY Brockport lecturer and published author Sarah Cedeño edited the memoir. She praised Corbin’s ability to convey his own natural humor and charm.
“He just has this spirit that keeps him creating,” she said. “He’s got such a bright and smart sense of humor, and it's not something that you can teach a writer.”
The book originated in a series of haunting Polaroid images Corbin took called “PTSD Self Portraits.” Every time he had a troubling flashback, he’d set up the camera and capture his face — and then his wife, Devon, would help him get to the hospital.
“You're re-feeling what it's like, for me at least, to die, and so it's not something you want to go through,” Corbin said. “But at the same time, I was like, when's the next one gonna happen? Because this is going to [look] so great.”
Once he shared those photos in an exhibition, he realized the power that came with vulnerability. The same could be said for penning his memoir.
Though he lives in Greece, Corbin has found an artistic home in Brockport. His paintings have been presented at Hart Gallery 27, and this fall, Corbin will pursue a master’s degree in creative writing from the college. (He earned his bachelor’s there in 2009.)
Corbin has the liberty of a creative life, even in his daily practices. He mentioned a new motorized power wheelchair that allows him to sit under trees with his feet elevated, regulating his blood pressure while also communing with nature.
“He exudes joy and loves life,” writes his friend Christina Ness in the memoir’s foreword. “I love that he still goes to a punk rock show! He’s a hero in my book.” david-corbin.com
profile by Patrick Hosken
Marie-Adélina De l A FeRRIÈRe
What does it mean to live authentically? For Marie-Adélina de la Ferrière, it means to be unafraid.
“I’m not fearful of living my life,” she said, describing herself as “reserved but amicable with funny, but very auntie energy.” Within moments of being in her presence, a sense of safety is quickly established; a feeling of being gifted permission to be one’s true self.
As a first-generation Haitian-American trans woman, de la Ferrière not only lives authentically every day — she inspires and advocates for others to live their own authenticity through the power of the arts, or what she describes as “a creative force for change.”
This change comes in different forms, but began in 2018, when de la Ferrière founded Flower City Queens, a calendrical celebration of drag culture in Rochester. It features queens in spaces throughout the city through stunning photographs that show individuals as their truest, most authentic selves. Flower City Queens is, at its core, a love letter to the Rochester drag community.
“Rochester, to me, is a place of hope,” said de la Ferrière. She has found hope from professors at Monroe Community College and SUNY Brockport, from her queer elders who frequent Bachelor Forum and from the sisterhood she has curated with her many trans “siblings” and beloved queens.
Her professional career has centered around the arts, in roles at the Memorial Art Gallery and the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. Currently, de la Ferrière is the community editor at equalpride, the nation’s leading LGBTQ+ media company, which publishes internationally-acclaimed brands including “Out” and “The Advocate” magazines.
Through her writing and work as an editor, de la Ferrière creates safe, brave spaces on the page and in the world. From topics such as coming out as trans in the workplace to navigating stressful holiday dinners with family members, she always circles back to prioritizing one’s mental and emotional safety.
Wendy Boyce, president of the Public Relations Society of America Rochester, has witnessed de la Ferrière’s impact firsthand.
“Marie-Adélina’s dedication to elevating LGBTQ+ voices and educating others is incredible,” said Boyce. “She’s helping put Rochester on the map as a leader in advocacy nationwide. When you first meet her, (she) might seem soft-spoken, but her words yield great power — and she’s using them to change our world for the better.”
As a role model to many, de la Ferrière also finds inspiration from many. Her mother, Dominique, is perhaps the one who inspires her the most.
“I’m my mother’s daughter,” said de la Ferrière. “She’s always demonstrated how to live your most authentic life in a world that constantly tells us we’re not worthy.”
In an effort to show the trans community just how worthy they are, de la Ferrière is in the process of launching a first-of-its-kind civic initiative that will celebrate transgender voices proud and out loud: The Bernadine Casseus Trans Laureate Program, named in honor of de la Ferrière’s late aunt, a Black trans woman and fierce activist.
The community-powered program will honor one individual each year who identifies as transgender or gender-expansive. With a stipend to help financially support the honoree, the goal is to magnify trans voices through art.
“Now, more than ever, we need a way to fully amplify our voices,” said de la Ferrière. What does it mean to live authentically? Maybe it depends on the person — on their life experiences and ability to create spaces where others can find answers to this very question.
Authenticity can’t be shoved into a box or made to fit a social “norm.” For de la Ferrière, it is about showing up and generating some good every day.
“Create the world that you not only want to live in,” she said, “but that you want others to live in as well.” instagram.com/thetranslaureate
JuliaTedesco
In and around Rochester, there are more than 150,000 people who don’t have consistent, reliable access to food, according to Feeding America’s Map the Meal Gap report, and those numbers are only going up. Julia Tedesco, president and CEO of Foodlink, is leading the way to solve that problem.
“No one grows up thinking they're going to work at a food bank,” said Tedesco.
But in her 17th year at the nonprofit food bank that distributes food to people in need across 10 counties around Rochester and the Finger Lakes, Tedesco admitted it felt inevitable, because food is at the core of everything in life.
Since Foodlink’s beginnings in the 1970s, the operation has greatly expanded its efforts to get food out to the community and work toward its ultimate goal: eradicating poverty.
“When you're living in poverty, every problem is compounded,” Tedesco said. “If you don't have access to healthy, affordable food, your health suffers. It's really hard to go to school and learn or to hold down a job. If you can't do that, you can't make money and secure stable housing. It's just a vicious cycle.”
Since Tedesco started at Foodlink in 2009, she’s held a number of roles and pushed the organization to tackle the complex problem of food insecurity from new angles. To improve accessibility, there’s a mobile curbside market that brings food directly to more than 60 locations in underserved neighborhoods. For job training, there’s an affordable cafe located in the Central Library in downtown Rochester where Foodlink fellows can learn the ropes of food service. To provide agency and food knowledge, there’s an urban community farm on Lexington Avenue where people in the city’s Northwest Quadrant can grow their own food and learn about agriculture and ecology.
“We have had a lot of new Americans with agricultural backgrounds come to this country carrying seeds from their native lands, so we developed that vacant land and made it this thriving, beautiful space for those community members,” Tedesco said.
The farm project began in 2011 and has since doubled in size. New this summer at the Foodlink Community Farm is a greenhouse and an Edible Education Center, where Foodlink has teamed up with Rochester Ecology Partners to put on a free summer program for elementary aged kids to learn about nature, gardening and growing food.
Mary Ellen Burris, 91, retired from her job as senior vice president of consumer affairs at Wegmans in 2020 and is a Foodlink donor. Since meeting Foodlink founder Tom Ferraro in the ‘70s, she has been a fan of the food bank’s efforts and helped Wegmans become the huge partner it is today. Burris noted that Foodlink’s key strength over the years has been innovation, and she’s an admirer of Tedesco’s leadership.
“She has no ego and she’s not a selfpromoter,” Burris said. “That goes a long way in building trust in the community and extending their reach beyond Rochester.”
Diversifying outreach is key to fulfilling Foodlink’s mission, as well as a necessary response to community needs that aren’t being fulfilled by the government.
“The biggest barrier in place right now that is keeping people in poverty is the federal government,” Tedesco said. “I don't care if it sounds political.”
With the Trump administration’s appetite for funding cuts and layoffs across countless government programs, Tedesco said Foodlink has had to gear up and grow their own facilities and operations. Cuts to SNAP (the U.S. government’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) will tear holes in the safety net that more than 50,000 people in the city of Rochester rely on. Foodlink is looking at the highest level of need they’ve seen in their organization’s history.
“Without warning, this administration cut USDA truckloads of food that were headed to food banks,” Tedesco said. “So in a six-month span, 24 truckloads of food that we anticipated didn't make it to Foodlink. It's over $1 million worth of food.”
But Tedesco and Foodlink are pushing onward, exploring new ways to help those who are underserved. This year, there’s a new program for feeding seniors, and new infrastructure like larger work spaces and major expansions of cold and dry storage to ensure Foodlink can keep up with demand.
“If people want to get involved, Foodlink always has volunteer opportunities,” Tedesco said. “I'd also encourage them to reach out to the food pantry or meal program in their neighborhood. Every zip code in our region — whether rural, suburban or urban — has a food cupboard that could use your time, food donations or financial support.” foodlinkny.org
PUZZLE
BY S.J. AUSTIN & J. REYNOLDS
1. Key for Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On" (Abbr.)
5. How many freelancers work
All over again
Taboo, cutely 20. Christmas, in Italy
Nothing special 22. Subj. for an MBA student
23. Pressed steel vehicles named after a lake in Minnesota (2001 inductee)
25. Die-cast miniatures designed to compete with Matchbox (2011 inductee)
27. New York states indigenous "People of the Upright Stone"
28. British afternoon treat
30. Muse of lyric poetry
31. Lying down yoga pose
34. Swanson of "Parks and Recreation"
35. William of "Star Trek"
37. Egg cells
40. Leonardo ___, a.k.a. Fibonacci
42. "That's _____ quit!"
44. Filmmaker DuVernay
45. Product array that launched with a ball that "can't hurt babies or old people" (2023 inductee)
47. Soft vinyl equines with silky manes and unique rump marks (2024 inductee)
53. Mythological world-lifter
54. Pursue
56. Expedition, for one
57. Kung _____chicken
58. Gamer who might get pwned
59. "_____ she blows!"
60. Architectural wings
64. Ending for a professor's email address
65. Sitarist Shankar
67. Beer brand named for a Dutch river
69. Lesson implicit in a fairy tale
71. 3x3 rotating puzzle recently solved by Xuanyi Geng in 3.05 seconds (2014 inductee)
75. Eight-holed sphere whose charming box, largely unchanged since the 1950s, proclaims "It curves!" (2017 inductee)
78. Friends, in Florence
79. Shifts some custodians work
81. Assist illegally
82. Nigerian people in "Things Fall Apart"
83. Crackpot
86. Nikon F2 and Canon 5D, for two
88. Stat!
92. Vietnamese New Year
93. Vietnamese soup
94. Without _____ (quieter than a mouse)
96. Mrs. Flintstone
97. Shape-changing robots that spawned a film franchise (2024 inductee)
102. Tiles since the 1300s that can be played like cards or set up and toppled (2012 inductee)
104. Ike's domain in W.W. II
105. Michael's wife in "The Godfather"
106. Serves in the role of
108. Opposite of 1-Down
109. Send along, as an email
113. Startled scream
115. Coffee alternative
117. "Could I see _____?" (Diner's request)
118. Information awaiting analysis
121. "What a shame"
125. Mosaic-making product whose original 25-watt bulb has been replaced with LEDs (2022 inductee)
127. High-powered squirt gun invented by a nuclear engineer (2015 inductee)
