Under a blazing sun at 11 a.m. Saturday, June 30, approximately 500 people gathered at the Old State Capitol plaza for a rally in opposition to current federal immigration policy. Part of a coordinated nationwide effort and organized locally by nonprofit organization Action Illinois, the speakers at Springfield’s rally mainly commented on the recent family […]
Scott Faingold
Scott Faingold is a journalist, educator and musician. He has been director of student media at University of Illinois Springfield, founding editor of Activator magazine, a staff reporter for Illinois Times and co-host of Old School Bleep, a music-centered podcast.
Posted inNews
HISO Music is moving on up
Since 2014, Springfield-based multiple-platform entertainment conglomerate HISO Music has been building its business steadily, to the point where it has started to feel growing pains. Now the company is preparing to open a new, self-contained complex at 1401 S. Fifth St.The brainchild of relentlessly energetic and positive 28-year-old CEO Ayo Abitogun (see “The business of […]
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‘Poor People’ rally for minimum wage
“Show me what democracy looks like! This is what democracy looks like!” More than 50 people of various ages and races – many wearing red T-shirts with large white letters reading “Fight for $15” – made their way along Fifth Street at 2 p.m. Monday, June 11. The mood was upbeat, with time being kept […]
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Vachel comes alive!
In his 1920 novel, The Golden Book of Springfield, Vachel Lindsay conjured up mystical, utopian images of what his hometown of Springfield, Illinois, might look like in the “golden year” of 2018. Now that time has caught up with Lindsay’s visionary book, the city and its artists have been paying tribute to Lindsay’s vision, none […]
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Party like it’s (Vachel Lindsay’s version of) 2018
In his wildly ambitious 1920 novel, The Golden Book of Springfield, author and visual artist Vachel Lindsay (1879-1931) portrays himself time-traveling a century forward to a 2018 rendition of his hometown, where he encounters “a group of…Springfield painters, sculptors, and architects who are always dynamiting our stagnant exhibitions with appropriate bombs of paint.” Fittingly, beginning […]
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Muni’s season of high-spirited fun
The Springfield Muni Opera is starting its 2018 season on skid row. Specifically, the cartoonish version of skid row which serves as the setting for Little Shop of Horrors. The cheerfully dark musical comedy, which opens Friday, June 1, follows a good-natured, nebbishy flower store employee named Seymour (Kevin Hart) as he inadvertently unleashes bedlam […]
Posted inSpecial Issues
Playing around
Fittingly for a theater situated within a village once called home by the future 16th U.S. president, New Salem’s Theatre in the Park kicks off its summer season with The Last of Mrs. Lincoln (June 7-10), taking a dramatic look at the former Mary Todd’s life in the years following her husband’s 1865 assassination. As […]
Posted inSpecial Issues
Sizzling summer of sound
So many summer concerts, so little time. From big festivals to tiny venues and from hard rock to bro-country and from new wave to hardcore to hip-hop, here’s an overview of some of the best music heading for the area. SpringfieldThe award-winning Boondocks continues its winning streak this summer with rising Delaware-bred, African-American country star […]
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Digging the state out of the hole it’s in
On Thursday, May 10, at the Rendezvous Room in the Wyndham Springfield City Centre, NPR Illinois and Illinois Issues presented the first in their most recent series of traveling forums happening across the state, sponsored by AARP Illinois. The forums are collectively entitled “Election 2018: Seeking Solutions” and the Springfield event was moderated by NPR […]
Posted inMusic
New Orleans groove, excellent cause
“I’m just another New Orleans musician, that’s all I am,” said Charmaine Neville, who will be returning to Springfield to perform with her band at Erin’s Pavilion on Friday, May 11. The singer and bandleader is being modest. A member of one of the most influential and longstanding families in American music, Neville has relatives […]
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Celebrating three decades, Skank Skates needs help
George Sinclair started building skateboard ramps as a bored Petersburg teenager in the 1970s. At 16, the city of Petersburg paid him $300 to build a 10-foot half-pipe for a contest at a citywide event. “I built it, they had the contest, and then they gave the ramp to me,” he said. The young Sinclair’s […]
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NPR Illinois is on a roll
“NPR is one of the top news sources in the country today,” said Randy Eccles, general manager and publisher for NPR Illinois, the radio station housed at the University of Illinois Springfield and previously branded as WUIS. “It is rated highly and seen as very credible. All the member stations are a part of that, […]
