NICE, Calif. – The award-winning Featherbed Railroad is hosting an open event featuring the art of Lake County artist Jim Colling on Sunday, May 26.
This special reception, which takes place from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. will feature special food pairing with Lake County wines and supports charities in Lake County.
Colling will be painting “plein aire” during the reception with a wide variety of his exceptional works on display.
Attendees can participate in the wine and appetizer pairing for a $15 donation which includes wine tasting and appetizer pairing.
To round out the afternoon, local musician Michael Barrish will be on hand to make ears happy, too.
Featherbed Railroad is located at 2870 Lakeshore Blvd., Nice.
UPPER LAKE, Calif. – Lake County Wine Studio (LCWS) is presenting a one-night performance show with guitarist/song writer Jack Williams at 7 p.m. Wednesday, June 5.
Williams’ music, rooted in his native South Carolina, was shaped by a 54-year career of playing folk, rock, jazz, R&B, classical and the popular music of the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. He is counted among the most dynamic performers on today’s “folk” music circuit.
Williams is an uncommonly unique guitarist, a writer of vivid songs with a strong sense of place, and a storyteller in an old Southern tradition who further illustrates each tale with his guitar.
A sought-after artist on all contemporary acoustic music stages, from coffeehouses and festivals to music halls and city arts stages; from acclaimed appearances at Newport, Boston, Philadelphia, Kerrville, New Bedford SummerFest Folk Festivals, his musicianship, songs, stories and commanding presence have established him as an uncommonly inspiring and influential performer.
Friendships with two great singers had an enormous impact on Williams’ career and on the development of his own singing voice.
In 1973, his relationship with the late Harry Nilsson resulted in an album effort at RCA during an ill-fated period of music industry turmoil.
Until 2002, he sometimes toured as solo accompanist to his friend, the late Mickey Newbury, with whom he co-wrote, co-produced and recorded a live album and video, Nights when I am Sane (reissued as Winter Winds).
From 1958 through 1988, along with playing jazz trumpet and classical guitar, Williams was best known as an electric guitarist in a series of original rock bands and smaller acoustic ensembles.
As a hired-gun guitarist in the Deep South of the Civil Rights-Easy Rider 1960s, Williams’ bands accompanied the likes of John Lee Hooker, Big Joe turner, Jerry Butler, Hank Ballard, the Shirelles and the Del-Vikings.
Enriched from these varied influences, Williams’ music is truly an “All-American Southern” music. In the late 1960s he gave in to his troubadour nature and began performing solo – singing and playing a gut-string guitar and touring from coast to coast.
Lake County Wine Studio is located at 9505 Main St. in Upper Lake.
For reservations and additional information, contact Susan Feiler at 707-275-8030 or 707-293-8752, or e-mail This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .
If we haven’t done it ourselves, we’ve known people who have, it seems: taken a vacation mostly to photograph a vacation, not really looking at what’s there, but seeing everything through the viewfinder with the idea of looking at it when they get home.
Wendell Berry of Kentucky, one of our most distinguished poets, captures this perfectly.
The Vacation
Once there was a man who filmed his vacation. He went flying down the river in his boat with his video camera to his eye, making a moving picture of the moving river upon which his sleek boat moved swiftly toward the end of his vacation. He showed his vacation to his camera, which pictured it, preserving it forever: the river, the trees, the sky, the light, the bow of his rushing boat behind which he stood with his camera preserving his vacation even as he was having it so that after he had had it he would still have it. It would be there. With a flick of a switch, there it would be. But he would not be in it. He would never be in it.
American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation ( www.poetryfoundation.org ), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright 2012 by Wendell Berry, whose most recent book of poems is New Collected Poems, Counterpoint, 2012. Poem reprinted from New Collected Poems, Counterpoint, 2012, and used with permission of Wendell Berry and the publisher. Introduction copyright 2013 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. They do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.
Never attracted to the dozen or so “Star Trek” television shows and about equal number of films with original TV cast members, I would never be mistaken for a Trekkie.
Until George Lucas mucked up his franchise with inane “prequels” of increasingly dubious merit, “Star Wars” was terrific, namely for interesting characters, good humor and exciting action.
On the other hand, the original “Star Trek,” at least to my untrained eye, appeared more cerebral and weighed down by too much mystical philosophy. That’s not a bad thing, but the action was usually paced by gradualism.
As unlikely as it is that I would ever become a Trekkie, I have been won over by director J.J. Abrams’ new vision of a rebooted “Star Trek” pulsating with high-octane action and plenty of humor.
“Star Trek Into Darkness” even improves upon Abrams’ maiden voyage with the 2009 “Star Trek,” which introduced the young generation of Starfleet leaders, including the brash James T. Kirk (Chris Pine) trying to live up to his father’s legacy.
The action picks up soon after where things left off four years ago. Captain Kirk’s command of the USS Enterprise is tested when he and his crew attempt to save a primitive society from a volcano poised to erupt.
Spock (Zachary Quinto), the half-human, half-Vulcan first officer trapped in harm’s way on the volcano’s edge, is rescued by Captain Kirk in direct violation of a prime directive from the Federation.
Returning his ship safely to Earth, Kirk is demoted to First Officer by Admiral Pike (Bruce Greenwood). We know from the first film that the swaggering Kirk is impulsive and willing to bend the rules, and here he is no different.
While punished for insubordination and writing false reports, Kirk is soon pressed back into service when a terrorist attack destroys the Federation underground headquarters in 23rd Century London.
On top of that, rogue Starfleet officer John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch) also conducts an above-ground aerial assault on a Federation conclave, killing some key members and thus necessitating Kirk’s return to command of the Enterprise.
The motivations of the dastardly terrorist are not immediately known, though later revelations prove that he’s a recognizable foe with an agenda more fully explained by mysterious torpedo tubes placed aboard the Enterprise.
On a mission to exterminate Harrison with extreme prejudice, the Enterprise is sent to the planet Kronos by a belligerent Admiral Marcus (Peter Weller) to seek the hiding place of the renegade.
Capturing Harrison is fraught with great risk and danger, since Kronos is an outpost for the hostile Klingons, who view any incursion on their planet as an act of war.
Turning the Enterprise into a warship creates onboard conflicts between Kirk and Spock, as they argue over the moral issues of an order to assassinate Harrison rather than to bring him back to stand trial.
As unlikely as it may seem, Spock, the pensive, logical Vulcan who can never tell a lie, is in the middle of a rocky romantic entanglement with Zoe Saldana’s tough-minded, yet sexy Uhura.
The Enterprise is populated with other familiar, lovable characters, from Simon Pegg’s funny and frantic Scotty to Karl Urban’s sardonic yet urgently attentive medical officer Bones.
As expected, John Cho’s Sulu is aloof and confident at the controls, while Anton Yeltsin plays Chekov with youthful, untested resolve.
New to the Enterprise crew is a stowaway, the uninvited science officer Carol Marcus (Alice Eve) with suspect motives, an attractive blonde who most certainly will get Kirk’s attention. Creating some wariness for the crew is the fact that she’s the daughter of Admiral Marcus.
The action sequences in “Star Trek Into Darkness” are cranked up to an impressive magnitude, from the violent confrontation with the Klingons to an intergalactic battle in space that nearly destroys the Enterprise, causing Kirk to improvise to bring the ship back to San Francisco.
The return to the City by the Bay results in a massive amount of destruction to the skyscraper buildings, resulting in a stunningly visual representation of wholesale destruction of property and human lives.
Though this may be presumptuous on my part, I feel there are many segments of this film that evoke memories of the past, perhaps to breed familiarity or to render homage. Some may point to the need to revisit some of the early “Star Trek” films.
Whatever the case may be, the thrilling “Star Trek Into Darkness” delivers genuine excitement that allows this venerable franchise to continue to go boldly forward and to live long and prosper.
I hope the hardcore “Star Trek” fans may find this new direction appealing, but I do not feel qualified to speak for that constituency.
Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.
NORTH COAST, Calif. – U.S. Rep. Mike Thompson (CA-5) announced Benjamin Yu from Jesse M Bethel High School in Vallejo as the winner of the 2013 Congressional Art Competition.
Benjamin’s artwork, titled “Monotony,” will represent California’s 5th Congressional District in the U.S. Capitol, where it will be displayed starting June 4 for one year.
Benjamin and a guest will be flown to Washington, D.C. to attend an awards ceremony in June.
“Every year I am impressed by our student artists’ talent and creativity,” said Thompson. “Many thanks to everyone who participated in this year’s competition, and the parents, teachers and judges who make this annual event possible. Congratulations to Benjamin. I am honored to be able feature his artwork in the U.S. Capitol.”
“He really has a gift for embracing discoveries in his work. Although, he’s a perfectionist and spends a lot of his time pre-thinking what he is going to do, he does come across some experimental moments and he actually discovers in his work something new,” said Jesse M Bethel High School Art Teacher, Dr. Randall Goni.
Benjamin is a senior in high school. This fall he will attend the Academy of Art University in San Francisco as a Fine Arts Major on a full scholarship.
Benjamin was one of five regional winners chosen by local artist judges. The four other finalists were:
Lake County winner: Micah McDaniel from Kelseyville High School;
Contra Costa: Jessica Loyd from John Swett High School;
Napa winner: Maia Rios from Vintage High School;
Sonoma County: Annika White from Cardinal Newman High School.
The Congressional Art Competition began in 1982 to provide an opportunity for members of Congress to encourage and recognize the artistic talents of their young constituents. Since then, over 650,000 high school students have been involved with the nation-wide competition.
Congressman Mike Thompson is proud to represent California’s 5th Congressional District, which includes all or part of Contra Costa, Lake, Napa, Solano and Sonoma counties.
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