Tapestry

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August 7, 2008...

• Canceling the Bravo Arts Festival
• How many songs can you name that were written for a book?
• Red Mountain Theatre Company presents Tinyard Hill
• Tight harmonies with an alt-pop twist from Birmingham band The Bridges

Each year in Birmingham, right around this time, local arts organizations come together for the Bravo Festival. It's a celebration of visual and performing arts at Caldwell Park and the Virginia Samford Theatre. Dancers dance, artists make art, and actors act. But this year there will be no Bravo Festival. The Virginia Samford Theatre has cancelled it, because of the Jefferson County Commission's decision to stop funding the Cultural Alliance. WBHM's Tanya Ott spoke with Virginia Samford Theatre's president Cathy Rye Gilmore about the future of the Bravo Festival and the arts community in Birmingham.

The Bravo Festival is cancelled...

The Cultural Alliance of Greater Birmingham expects to announce a new Executive Director soon.

Literature and music share creative juices, flowing from the right side of the brain. Indeed some of the most profound lyrics have their roots in literary circles. But it's not too often they intersect -- each work drawing from and evolving with the other. Sure, there seems to be a plethora of soundtracks to movies, but how many songs can you name that were written for a book? David Seale and Richard Murff tell WBHM's Steve Chiotakis they want to change that. Seale -- and his Birmingham-based company Warning Track Records -- has been working on several numbers that follow the characters and narrative in Murff's new book One Last Hour, which chronicles the world of bond dealings and quick money-making.

David Seale and Richard Muff interview...

Musician David Seale and author Richard Murff, speaking with WBHM's Steve Chiotakis. There's a CD release party at Rojo on Birmingham's Southside, August 17 at 7 p.m.

Each year, Keith Cromwell reads hundreds of musical theatre scripts. In addition to serving as executive director of Birmingham's Red Mountain Theatre Company, Cromwell is a member of the selection committee for the National Alliance of Musical Theatre. He and other committee members screen new musicals, choosing the top 20 for a national competition that has uncovered Broadway winners like The Drowsy Chaperone. It's a blind process. Committee members don't know the identities of the composers. So what are the chances one of the recent finalists would come from two composers with ties to Alabama? Tommy Newman wrote the book and the lyrics and Mark Allen wrote the music for Tinyard Hill, which has its world premiere this weekend at the Red Mountain Theatre cabaret. They spoke with WBHM's Tanya Ott.

RMCT presents Tinyard Hill...

What to know what's going on around town? Activeculture.info is a one-stop source for finding out what's going on in the Birmingham metro area.

If you love Fleetwood Mac, and Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young, you'll probably enjoy The Bridges major label debut. The band is family - in the true sense of the word - and has been making music together for years. They've got the tight harmonies to show for it. Brittany Painter provides vocals and acoustic guitar. Her cousin Stacey Byrd plays lead, and Stacey's brother, Jeremy, plays drums. Two more sisters round out the group, and they all got help from producer Matthew Sweet. (AUDIO MONTAGE)

For a limited time, we've also got a free download from their new CD.

Tapestry is produced by Tanya Ott and Michael Krall, with help this week from Steve Chiotakis, Coleman Lipsey, Islara Vazquez and Marlon Glenn. Next week on the program, re-versioning Gidget. It's Psycho Beach Party!! I'm Greg Bass, and we'll see you next week.