Shows
A Line Around Your ThoughtsAlex Calbick & Tiffany Bubna of Spokane PuppetryWe're sitting down this week with Alex Calbick and Tiffany Bubna of Spokane Puppetry, which is a new organization that aims to share their passion for puppetry as a craft and puppets as a creative medium.This year, Spokane Puppetry's previously ad hoc workshops are now a regular monthly event at both Art Salvage and Spark Central.The first workshop of 2026 is at Art Salvage on January 10, and the second is at Spark Central on January 17. This month's workshop theme is shadow puppets.Alex and Tiffany came in ahead of those workshops to...
2026-01-091h 19A Line Around Your ThoughtsLightning Round "Best Of" 2025: Part 2Happy New Year!Because of the holidays, we've had special episodes last week and this week. Together they make a two-part retrospective featuring moments from the Lightning Round that closes every interview.Whereas last week's episode drew from the podcast's first four months, this episode features guests from the latter part of 2025. They include Mel Antuna Hewitt, Preston Singletary & Miranda Belarde-Lewis, Ginger Ewing & Jackie Caro, Charlie Pepiton & Michael Kropf, Olivia Brownlee, Susie Leonard Weller, Darien Mack, Christina Villagomez & Sara Mortier, Karin Wedemeyer and Brett & Rose Noble.
2026-01-0139 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsLightning Round "Best Of" 2025: Part 1Merry Christmas! As regular listeners know—and as our guests are sometimes surprised to discover—every interview on A Line Around Your Thoughts closes with a Lightning Round.This is the first of two special holiday episodes that revisit some Lightning Round moments from the past year. The selections in this episode are from ALAYT's first four months.Featured guests include Troy Nickerson & Chris Jensen, James Lowe, Shelly Wynecoop, Bryan Harnetiaux, Jess Walter, Dominique Betts & Celeste Bidwell Williams, Gwyn Pevonka, Zuill Bailey, Rachel Bade-McMurphy, Jim Mohr and Joe & Sienna Henson.
2025-12-2527 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsDon Hamilton, photographer, filmmaker & owner of The Listening RoomThis week's guest is also acting as our host. He is the lighting designer, photographer and filmmaker turned venue owner, Don Hamilton.For this episode, Don invited A Line Around Your Thoughts to record at the Hamilton Studio, a former gym and auditorium in West Central that now moonlights as The Listening Room.Since launching almost two years ago to the day, this roughly 200-seat venue has become a favorite destination for intimate music and theatrical performances — in part because of its great acoustics.Don gets into the history of The Listening Room, th...
2025-12-1852 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsBrett & Rose Noble of 2-2-1 PressThis episode features Brett & Rose Noble, the husband-and-wife team behind the DIY record label and event promoter 2-2-1 Press.The now Spokane-based (by way of Illinois) label recently put out a scene compilation titled Beneath the Falls. They hosted the release concert for that back in November.2-2-1 Press is, among many other things, also the organizer of the upcoming Sonic Solstice festival, which is now in its third year and will showcase 20 bands over two days on December 19 and 20 at the Garland Theater.Rose and Brett talk about the ethos...
2025-12-111h 14A Line Around Your ThoughtsKarin Wedemeyer of Bel Canto Opera & The Music Conservatory of SandpointThis week we're sitting down with Karin Wedemeyer, founder and executive director of both the Music Conservatory of Sandpoint and Sandpoint's Bel Canto Opera.Since its founding in 2009, the Sandpoint Conservatory has grown to the point where it has an accredited, professional staff of around 20 and teaches several hundred students every year.The conservatory also hosts and organizes events like the North Idaho Flute Festival, the Music Matters! after-school program, concerts by the North Idaho Philharmonia as well as Bel Canto's vocal performances and light operas.Karin sheds some light on how this v...
2025-12-041h 03A Line Around Your ThoughtsSuzanne Ostersmith, dancer, choreographer, arts advocate & potterOur guest for this Thanksgiving Day episode is the choreographer, dancer, arts advocate and potter Suzanne Ostersmith.Up until a few months ago, Suzanne was the chair of Gonzaga University's dance program — a program that she herself founded.She retired in May after 25 years at the university, but she certainly hasn't been idle since then.For one, she's been a multifaceted creative force behind Gonzaga's upcoming production of Thumbelina. The original story ballet is based on Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale and will include young dancers from local studios.Suzanne also cu...
2025-11-2755 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsSara Mortier & Christina Villagomez, tattoo artistsOn this week's episode, our guests are Sara Mortier and Christina Villagomez, who are tattoo artists based, respectively, in Spokane and Coeur d'Alene.They currently have a joint exhibition titled Body of Work at the Terrain Gallery in Spokane. It runs until the end of November 2025.One unique thing about this exhibition is its separation of tattoos from the human body. Instead the artists use silicone objects and mannequins as their medium.Christina and Sara talk about the choices behind that and the growing acceptance of tattoos, not just in terms of fashion...
2025-11-201h 05A Line Around Your ThoughtsDarrien Mack, DJ, hip-hop artist, graphic designer, writer & videographerWe explore multiple disciplines with this week's guest, Darrien Mack.Darrien is a DJ, a hip-hop artist, a videographer, a writer, a graphic designer and much, much more.One night you might see him curating a DJ set as Rosethrow, whereas the next night he'll performing with his group Truehoods. And the night after that he'll be capturing video for an event with Terrain or Pivot.And with such a broad creative portfolio to his name, this episode's conversation naturally runs the gamut. We talk about obscure words, obscure music, connecting with other...
2025-11-131h 16A Line Around Your ThoughtsDean Davis, photographerThis week our guest is the Spokane photographer Dean Davis.Dean's work is the subject of a new retrospective exhibition at Spokane Falls Community College. It features select photos from his more than 30-year career in both commercial and fine-art photography. In this interview, Dean recaps that long career to give some context to those featured photos. Along the way, we end up talking about his early adoption of techniques like HDR and tilt shift as well as processes like giclée printing.We also get into his ongoing projects like Pictures of P...
2025-11-061h 02A Line Around Your ThoughtsSusie Leonard Weller, writerThe writer Susie Leonard Weller is our guest this week. She recently published 52 Global Reflections: A Pilgrim’s Travel Memoir — a book that's part memoir, part travel diary and part discussion starter.Susie gives some background on why she wrote the book as well as some of the places and experiences that left the most lasting impressions on her.As part of that conversation, we also talk about travel as an act that connects us to humankind.You can find out more about Susie's book at the 52 Global Reflections website.And a bi...
2025-10-3049 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsKatie Patterson Larson of Art SalvageIf you purchase art supplies in the Spokane area, then you've almost certainly stopped into Art Salvage.Art Salvage is a resale outlet for the materials used in the making of all kinds of visual and tactile art. That could be paints and textiles, or it could be found objects that end up being creatively repurposed.My guest this week is the founder, owner and executive director of Art Salvage, Katie Patterson Larson.She talks us through their intake processes, the nexus of the circular and the creative economies, as well as Spokane's...
2025-10-2346 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsOlivia Brownlee, singer, songwriter, musicianThe singer, songwriter and musician Olivia Brownlee is our guest on A Line Around Your Thoughts this week.Recently, Olivia's been musing on a project that combines oral history and music. And if you're familiar with her work, that's a logical next step after her album This Is Where You Live, which commemorated the people and places of Spokane in song.We do indeed talk about that oral history project as well as This Is Where You Live, her long tenure with Zonky Jazz Band and her single-per-month club.But we can't help...
2025-10-1659 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsCharlie Pepiton of Square Top Theatre & Michael Kropf of LuminiaThis week we're covering both music and film with guests Charlie Pepiton and Michael Kropf.They are two Gonzaga University professors who've pooled their talents for a new short film titled Love, Eleanor. Charlie is the film's director, and Michael composed the score.A preview screening of Love, Eleanor is coming up on October 18, 2025 with live accompaniment and a debut concert from the new chamber string orchestra Luminia. In anticipation of that, we sat down to talk about how Michael's music helped inspire Charlie's film, which in turn helped inspire the string ensemble...
2025-10-1058 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsGinger Ewing & Jackie Caro of TerrainThis episode is going out on on Thursday, October 2, 2025, which means Terrain's big annual arts showcase takes place tomorrow night (Oct. 3) in downtown Spokane. The VIP preview night is tonight.For its (Sweet) 16th year, Terrain is featuring 850 works of art by 483 regional artists. There are also literature readings, short films, choreography, site specific installations and live performances by a number of bands across multiple genres.This week's guests preview as much as of that as they can. They are Terrain's co-founder and executive director Ginger Ewing and the organization's operations director Jackie Caro.
2025-10-021h 01A Line Around Your ThoughtsAimee Brooks & Morganne Elkins of Banana Slug BooksThis week we're sitting down and chatting with Aimee Brooks and Morganne Elkins of Banana Slug Books.Banana Slug recently published its first book, a short-story anthology titled Spokane Campfire Stories.It features work by 23 writers, including Sam Ligon, Kate Lebo, Kris Dinnison, Katy Shedlock, Gregory Spatz and Aimee herself.Spokane Campfire Stories had its official launch at a reading in Manito Park in late August. Not long after that Aimee and Morganne came into the Rogue Heart Media studio to talk about the anthology in more detail.Through the course...
2025-09-2558 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsPreston Singletary, glass artist & Miranda Belarde-Lewis, independent curatorWe departed the Rogue Heart Media studio and went on location for this week's episode to sit down with glass artist Preston Singletary and independent curator Miranda Belarde-Lewis.Preston's exhibition Raven and the Box of Daylight is currently showing at the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture until January 4, 2026.This episode was recorded onsite during the installation of that exhibition, which depicts the story of the mischievous Raven bringing light to the world as recounted in Tlingit lore.The three of us talked about Raven as a figure in tribal mythology, the universality...
2025-09-181h 06A Line Around Your ThoughtsMel Antuna Hewitt, book artistThis week's episode features a conversation with the bookbinder and book artist Mel Antuna Hewitt, who goes by Mel the Maker.Mel came in to talk about her own work with the printed page and the act of creating something unique in a medium that's usually about reproducibility.She also prompts some reflection on what makes a book a book, which is a thought she'll continue in her forthcoming exhibition, titled "Communications." That opens on October 3, 2025 at the Terrain Gallery.Thanks to our episode sponsor, the Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture. The MAC is cu...
2025-09-111h 02A Line Around Your ThoughtsJeni Riplinger & Jaiden Haley of Emerge Coeur d'AleneOn this week's episode, our guests are Jeni Riplinger and Jaiden Haley of the arts incubator Emerge Coeur d'Alene.Jaiden is the nonprofit organization's operations manager, and Jeni is the executive director.Emerge just had its annual Block Party in July, and it's now gearing up for the INK! Print Rally on September 13, 2025. That community event, which is themed "Portals," will gather nearly two dozen artists to create large-scale block prints with the help of an asphalt roller.Jeni and Jaiden highlight all the ways they're augmenting that event this year, and we...
2025-09-041h 00A Line Around Your ThoughtsSienna & Joe Henson of Hitchhiker's TheatreWe have two guests on this week's episode: Joe and Sienna Henson of Hitchhiker's Theatre.The two of them co-founded Hitchhiker's Theatre last year with a view to bringing live performances to unconventional spaces.The nomadic troupe's second season opens next week with a two-evening (Sept. 5 & 6, 2025) performance of the play 5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche at The Guardian in Spokane.We definitely get into the details of that play as well as the opportunities Hitchhiker's Theatre is opening up for new talent — not to mention some digressions about audience interaction and clown college....
2025-08-281h 06A Line Around Your ThoughtsJim Mohr of the Blue Door TheatreThis week's episode brings Jim Mohr into the Rogue Heart Media studio.Jim wears at least two hats in the Spokane community — one as the interim vice president of student affairs at Spokane Falls Community College, the other as the executive director of the Blue Door Theatre.He sat down to talk about the second of those, including their Spokane School of Improv, the BOOST center for professional development, their updated schedule for improv shows and the new Yes, And gallery.We dig into the meaning of that phrase "Yes, And" and why it...
2025-08-2157 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsJon Kuritz of Live from SomewhereOn this week's episode, we're in conversation with Jon Kuritz, a video director who co-founded the nonprofit production house Live from Somewhere.Live from Somewhere is the group behind the music video series of the same name, which got its start during the pandemic by filming regional bands in all kinds of settings. They've since branched out into organizing the new Curators of Sound concert series at the Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture.The next Curators of Sound event is on Wednesday, August 20, and features the bands Museum of Light, Kung Fu Vinyl, True Hoods...
2025-08-1450 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsRachel Bade-McMurphy of Imagine JazzFor this week's episode, Rachel Bade-McMurphy—jazz musician, composer and music advocate—is in the Rogue Heart Media studio to talk about, among other things, her new project, the Glass Bead Orchestra.The Glass Bead Orchestra is 10-piece ensemble that received a prestigious and very competitive Chamber Music America grant for women and minority bandleaders.The group debuts in its full incarnation this weekend (Aug. 10) at the Hamilton Studio's popular Listening Room. After that, they head to Washington State University to record a full-length album.Rachel outlines all that the CMA grant is enab...
2025-08-071h 06A Line Around Your ThoughtsDanny Anderson of My Turn TheaterThis week we're in conversation with Danny Anderson, a longtime actor who's now leading My Turn Theater, a Spokane-based organization that provides performing arts opportunities to adults with disabilities.My Turn Theater's new production of The Lion King, Jr. is opening this weekend (Saturday, Aug. 2) at the Spokane Civic Theatre and will run there for a little over a week.Danny talks about the origins of My Turn Theater, its unique shadow actor model and what's been happening since it went on hiatus in 2023.He also gives an update on Stage Left Theater's...
2025-07-3157 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsGwyn Pevonka, visual artist & founder of 33 Artists MarketWe sit down this week with visual artist Gwyn Pevonka, who also happens to be the driving force behind the 33 Artists Market.There's a 33 Artists Market coming up this weekend (Saturday, July 26, 2025). It's in a brand new location at the Pergola Event Center, and the number of participating artists has tripled for this particular event.Gwyn talks about why she chose to make this her biggest market yet, all the ways that 33 Artists Market has changed since it launched in 2022 as well as the changes that she's making to her own art. The conversation ended u...
2025-07-2450 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsZuill Bailey of Northwest BachFestOn this week's episode we catch up with Zuill Bailey, who is not only an internationally touring cellist but also artistic director of the Northwest BachFest.There are three BachFest concerts coming up next week. First, there's Music in Manito on July 22 and 23. That's followed by the Afterglow performance at Barrister Winery on July 24. All three shows feature the same guest artists — namely, the Brazilian-inspired trio Biribá Union as well as the violinist Helen Hwaya Kim.But the two different venues mean that the concerts are going be very different experiences. Zuill talks abo...
2025-07-1752 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsDominique Betts & Celeste Bidwell-Williams of Bright Comet TheatreThis week we're talking with Dominique Betts, the co-founder of Bright Comet Theatre, and Celeste Bidwell-Williams, who has the lead role in BCT's upcoming production of Carrie: The Musical.Carrie opens Friday, July 18 at Stage Left Theater. More info on the show is available at either the Bright Comet or Stage Left websites (linked in this description).Dominique and Celeste naturally provided some insight into this staging of Carrie, but they also put the production in the context of Bright Comet's mission to provide opportunities to underrepresented actors.And we couldn't help but...
2025-07-1046 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsMelody Chang & Andrea Olsen of Spokane Valley Summer TheatreThis week's episode features another pair of guests: Melody Chang and Andrea Olsen of Spokane Valley Summer Theatre — and by extension the Idaho Central Spokane Valley Performing Arts Center.Andrea is the organization's associate artistic director, and Melody is the communications & marketing director.Melody and Andrea came into the Rogue Heart Media studio to reflect on SVST's 10th anniversary and update us on the progress on the new performing arts center. They also talked about what's in store for the rest of this season, which kicked off in June with Gilbert & Sullivan's Pirates of...
2025-07-031h 00A Line Around Your ThoughtsPollyanne Birge of the Office of Neighborhood Services & Madison Merica, artistOur guests this week are Pollyanne Birge of the City of Spokane's Office of Neighborhood Services as well as independent artist Madison Merica.Pollyanne and Madison came in to talk about This Is Spokane:A Civic Guide for Neighbors, which is a new zine that the city has put out to help residents get a better fix on how local government works. Madison was the lead artist on that project.We talk about what a zine is, why it was a really good medium for this kind of content, and how it's one a few...
2025-06-2653 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsJess Walter, authorThis week's episode features a conversation with author Jess Walter, whose new novel is titled So Far Gone and was just published by HarperCollins.So Far Gone is set in and around Spokane but its story isn't region-specific. It's meant to be a portrait of a country where people who might be sitting around the same Thanksgiving table can be living in entirely different realities.Jess and host E.J. Iannelli talk about that phenomenon as well as how much overlap there is between the author and his outspoken protagonistMany thanks to o...
2025-06-1948 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsBryan Harnetiaux, playwrightFor this week's episode of A Line Around Your Thoughts, we're joined by Bryan Harnetiaux, the Spokane Civic Theatre's playwright in residence since 1982.Bryan came in to provide the lowdown on the upcoming Playwrights' Forum Festival that bears his name.In 2025, the festival runs from June 19–22 in the Spokane Civic Theatre's Firth J. Chew studio space. This year, its 35th, there are a dozen one-act plays that will be performed in two different rotations over those four days.Out of our festival-focused conversation sprang a number of other topics. We also ended up di...
2025-06-1251 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsMallory Battista, metalworker, sculptor & illustratorOur guest on this week's episode of A Line Around Your Thoughts is Mallory Battista, an independent artist who works in a variety of media.You've probably already come across Mallory's work in the form of murals, mosaic sculptures, holiday window displays, ironworking or comics. She was even kind enough to design the logo for this podcast.We ended up talking about, among other things, zines, the Garbage Goat and the importance of public art — as well as the recent renaissance of public art in Spokane, and why that might be under threat by the cur...
2025-06-0542 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsMarit Fischer & Rob Worstell of the MACThis week's episode puts us in conversation with Marit Fischer and Rob Worstell. Marit is the chief marketing officer at the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture; Rob is the organization's education director.Although most MAC conversations tend to focus on the exhibitions, what we talk about instead are the museum's educational and outreach initiatives. They include everything from a youth arts leadership program called Teens at the MAC to the new Curators of Sound concert series.That means there are plenty of dates for your calendar, including the annual ArtFest, which is coming up t...
2025-05-291h 05A Line Around Your ThoughtsDarya Pilram, artist and Economic Recovery Corps FellowOn this episode we sit down with Darya Pilram, an artist and Economic Recovery Corps Fellow.We discuss both of those roles, starting with her very first solo exhibition titled "Embracing Imperfection: The Art of Kintsugi Repair." It runs at Spokane's Trackside Studio until May 30, 2025.Then we dive into her work helping to establish creative districts in Garland and Hillyard in Spokane well as in Coeur d'Alene and Kellogg, Idaho.Along the way we talk about the dynamics of Washington State's nearly $120 billion creative economy and why the creative economy itself can be s...
2025-05-221h 26A Line Around Your ThoughtsShelly Wynecoop of Spokane ArtsOur guest on this week's episode of A Line Around Your Thoughts is Shelly Wynecoop, director of grantmaking at Spokane Arts.Fresh off the announcement of the most recent round of Spokane Arts Grant Award (SAGA) recipients, Shelly came in to talk about the projects that were funded and the ins and outs of the process itself.We start by going behind the scenes of SAGA and then move on to address the wider impact that the grant program has had over the past nine years — including how important that impact might be at a time...
2025-05-1547 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsJames Lowe of the Spokane SymphonyThis week's guest is James Lowe, music director of the Spokane Symphony.James previews this weekend's Masterworks #9 concert featuring cellist Zuill Bailey, which also happens to be the finale for the SSO's 79th season.He also talks about some of the overarching themes and anticipated highlights for the symphony's recently announced 80th season in 2025–'26.Along the way we chat about the unusual casualties of Star Wars, the frequently heralded death of classical music and the joys of singing ABBA songs in the shower.A huge thanks to our founding sponsor Ro...
2025-05-0857 minA Line Around Your ThoughtsTroy Nickerson & Chris Jensen of Theater on the VergeFor our very first episode, we're joined by director Troy Nickerson and his creative partner Chris Jensen.Their new theater company, Theater on the Verge, launched late last year and recently closed its inaugural production, Every Brilliant Thing.Troy and Chris talk about why they founded Theater on the Verge and the lessons learned during Every Brilliant Thing — including why they had to walk back the announcement of their second production at the end of the run.Stay tuned for the revealing Lightning Round questions at the end.A big thanks to...
2025-05-0140 min