Blues and Heritage Festival
11 a.m. to 7 p.m., Sunday, Oct. 20
Rillito Park Race Track4502 N. First Ave.
If you're getting more and more apathetic about the monotonous, amorphous slop that is Top 40 mainstream music, listen up because October is about to get interesting. Ever seen a man play the guitar so long that his fingers bleed? That's the blues, baby. And it's blues season in Tucson.
On Sunday, the Southern Arizona Blues Heritage Foundation is hosting its 27th annual Blues and Heritage Festival—a day filled with food, good people and, of course, blues music. A staple of the Tucson music scene, the festival is primed to showcase not only the big names, but also local talent.
"Tucson has such amazing musical talent; it's something we take for granted," said Susan Holden, marketing director for the festival. "We are the music capital of the Southwest." And festival organizers seem hungry to prove that. The festival features seven acts, including Roy Rogers (who has played alongside the likes of John Lee Hooker and Carlos Santana, according to Holden) and his band, the Delta Rhythm Kings; Australian singer-guitarist Kara Grainger; and local heroes the Coolers, the Ed de Lucia Blues Band, Anna Warr and Giant Blue, Chicha Dust and the Cholla High School Blues Band.
Admission is $10 and tickets are available at azblues.org. And if you're 18 or younger, you get in free. Stay an hour, stay for the afternoon, or stay all day and bask in the glory of the blues.
You may think mistletoe is just a good excuse to get a smooch out of your sweetheart. But Noah Whiteman knows better.
Whiteman, an assistant professor in UA's department of ecology and evolutionary biology, will expose mistletoe's true colors during a talk that is part of the monthly Tumamoc Hill Lecture Series. Whiteman will discuss how the parasitic plant has taken over many of the Tucson area's mesquite trees, and what the consequences of this massive infestation are for both mesquite trees and wildlife. The UA lecture series is in its fifth year.
"Tumamoc is an incredibly varied place," says Michael Rosenzweig, director of Tumamoc and a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at UA. "We have our fingers in environmental science, archaeology, ancient culture, conservation biology ... and in addition to all of that we have thousands upon thousands of people who walk that hill every week."
Tumamoc Hill is a national historical landmark and the longest-running ecological restoration project in the world. Pioneering plant ecologists began investigations on the hill west of downtown in 1903, and scientists continue to study Tumamoc to this day.
For the lectures, "We try to bring people in who relate to some aspect of what goes on at Tumamoc and let them illuminate that aspect," Rosenzweig says. The series "is focused on Tumamoc Hill but in a very broad sense."
While this month's talk is focused on Tumamoc's vegetation, the November lecture, to be given by Rosenzweig, will highlight both flora and fauna, and how Tucsonans can help in efforts to conserve native species.