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It’s the Fourth of July! Why should you be spending your time hearing music, watching theatre, and seeing art?

Because supporting your community supports your country, without residual political guilt and without resort to the glorification of redemptive violence.

The Teen Arts and Music Festival gives rising artists a little space and time to share their music with the community. A more youthful counterpart to June’s Independent Music and Art Festival, but the idea remains the same: a day of free music, theatre, and art, with lots of the warm, fuzzy feelings one gets from supporting local, independent artists and not military might.

An all-day affair. Go to the MySpace page for the line-up (15 bands of teenagers), or the event website for contact information.

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What do al-Husseini, Hitler, and John Rothmann have in common? They are all going to be featured at Barnes & Noble, of course!*

But the similarities pretty much stop there. Hitler and al-Husseini were perpetrators of crimes against humanity, while Rothmann is the humble co-author of Icon of Evil: Hitler’s Mufti and the Rise of Radical Islam.

The book, which Rothmann co-wrote with David G. Dalin, was released June 24th. It’s got the goods: near-unlimited linguistic resources, access to primary documents, and all the dirt on the honorary Aryan’s support of Hitler and his Final Solution. It’s a page-turner (according to the author’s in-laws) and it’s got verve (according to their publisher).

Publishers Weekly (the 7th review down) and the Middle East Times have given it stamps of approval.

Rothmann will be at the Clearwater Crossing Barnes & Noble in Indianapolis on July 9th at 7:00 p.m. to talk about his work and perhaps sell a few copies. The event promises to be an interesting and thought-provoking one, and plus there will be food.

Barnes & Noble @ Clearwater Crossing

3748 E 82nd St.

Indianapolis, IN 46240

*Thematically only! No in-person appearances by al-Husseini or Hitler

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The Indianapolis Chamber Orchestra performs a family-friendly concert Saturday, June 28th at 2:30 p.m. in the outdoor Celebration Amphitheater (at the west end of Celebration Plaza in White River State Park). This Family Arts Series Concert features one Bill Harley, who was described by Billboard Magazine as a grown up (and probably less cartoony) Calvin. And he’s a Grammy award winner!

With a mock-epic about a kid who refuses to eat a pea, Harley shows his sense of humor and teaches his philosophy of not being educational. He believes that kids learn by experience. This concert, then, is sure to be an experience not to be missed if there are kids in your life.

For more information, hit up the ICO at (317) 940-9607 or info@icomusic.org.

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These concerts offer a classical music education in one concentrated dose, for the parent who might want to believe in the efficacy of classical music brain enhancement but who might not want to spend hours actually listening to it. Performances are designed with a hands-on approach (including an instrument petting zoo) so that kids learn all about the weird-shaped things that make those noises.

The last one was about a girl with long hair, but this month offers a bit more substance: a small, omnivorous mammal that tricks some amphibians (”How Br’er Raccoon Outsmarts the Frogs”). And next month (on August 7th) some maize will tantalize the musical imagination from inside a stone (a Hispanic story called “Corn in the Rock”).

The concerts show twice, at 5:30 and at 6:30 p.m., on the first Thursday of the month at the Children’s Museum.

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These concerts offer a classical music education in one concentrated dose, for the parent who might want to believe in the efficacy of classical music brain enhancement but who might not want to spend hours actually listening to it. Performances are designed with a hands-on approach (including an instrument petting zoo) so that kids learn all about the weird-shaped things that make those noises.

The last one was about a girl with long hair, but this month offers a bit more substance: a small, omnivorous mammal that tricks some amphibians (”How Br’er Raccoon Outsmarts the Frogs”). And next month (on August 7th) some maize will tantalize the musical imagination from inside a stone (a Hispanic story called “Corn in the Rock”).

The concerts show twice, at 5:30 and at 6:30 p.m., on the first Thursday of the month at the Children’s Museum.

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Ever feel like finite sheets of paper are always putting artificial constraints on your creativity? Jack Kerouac did. Nothing about his 120-foot-long scroll manuscript, typed on a zillion 12-foot-long sheets of tracing paper he taped together, suggests that Kerouac was one for limitations. The product of his three-week-long typing binge will be on display in almost all its glory (only 84 feet of it will be unrolled).

So will the product of Robert Frank’s two-year odyssey across the United States. The IMA has borrowed 83 of Frank’s photographs, which debuted in book form across the pond in 1958, to escort the Kerouac manuscript.

And to create the ultimate Beat experience, they have invited David Amram, a contemporary of Kerouac and Frank, to play the very sort of jazz that accompanied Kerouac’s poetry readings. It’s a veritable trifecta!

“On the Road Again with Jack Kerouac and Robert Frank” opens with a concert Thursday, June 26th, for a three-month run at the Indianapolis Museum of Art. The special opening concert will go from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. in Pulliam Hall at the IMA.

The combination of Kerouac, Frank and Amram should basically re-create the entire Beat experience, so if you’re a Gen-Xer and wish you hadn’t missed it, here’s your chance to pretend like you didn’t.

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Together, Indiana Avenue and MLK Street carve out the triangular Madame Walker Theatre Center on the Indianapolis grid. It’s an intersection with a lot of soul. And together, the Madame Walker Theatre and Asante Children’s Theatre of Indianapolis will carve out a slice of soul to serve up to the public, starting June 26th with the dance musical titled “Soul Clap & Dance [Bodies in Motion, Words in Rhythm, Celebrating the Meaning of Soul].”

Jeffrey Page, an alumnus of the ACT program and an Emmy-nominated choreographer, choreographed the performance, which will look at the folklore of dance. He told NUVO he’s “waiting for the day when Indianapolis realizes that art is as worthy, as important as business and medicine, that it’s worthy of support by the general population. I’m waiting for the day when I can be supported in my own town.” His return lives up to the motto of Asante Children’s Theatre - “Taking community theater back to the community.” As a part of that philosophy, ACT is very much a program for all children, not just those fortunate enough to afford tutelage. ACT offers scholarships to many of the carefully-selected kids that participate. And it’s also one more voice telling Indianapolis that art means something to the community.

The Madame Walker Theatre is a national historic landmark. The venue “represents the achievements, art forms, culture and history of African-American people,” according to its website. The famous locale is tied to African-American history by its connection to Madame C. J. Walker, the first female self-made millionaire in the United States and a noted entrepreneur.

Thursday night is a special Community Night showing of the dance musical. Admission is only $5 - a steal compared to the $12 advance and $15 door tickets on other nights. Call the ACT box office at 317.895.6712 to reserve tickets or 317.297.0020 for more details. Show starts at 8 p.m.

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A year and a half in the making, so many numbers that will thrill autistic savants, sweeping predictions about the future of the Indiana economy, recommendations about new ways of thinking about trust and civil society … this will be big summer blockbuster for policy wonks. Check back here for sneak previews.

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This free film showing is put on by Indy Parks. Movies start at dusk (around 9:15). This one’s 100 minutes long, so plan on staying around until 11.

“Breaking Away” is one of the classics of the ’70s. The film, which won Best Screenplay at the 1979 Academy Awards, chronicles the life of a young aspiring cyclist named Dave Stoller and his three hapless friends as they adjust to life as townies in Bloomington, Indiana. Dave agonizes over going to college, falling in love, and not being Italian, immortalizing the joys of cycling in celluloid.

The parks department is screening this one at the Major Taylor Velodrome, an unusual place for the Movies in the Park series. The Velodrome is a 333 1/3-meter-long smooth concrete biking track with banked turns, one of only 18 in the United States, and has hosted all kinds of bike races. But there can be no better place to view “Breaking Away,” which was filmed entirely in Indiana, using IU students as extras in the climactic Little 500 scene.

The Major Taylor Velodrome
3649 Cold Spring Rd., Indianapolis, IN 46222
Phone: 317-327-8356

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Why don’t more of us live greener lives? It’s too expensive? We don’t know what impact our consumption has on the environment? We don’t know which local businesses are ecologically sound? John Steinbach will explain how a simple guide can answer these and many more questions.
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