Diverse Radio for Minnesota’s Communities

Pipestone National Monument is one of Minnesota’s most important cultural treasures. Close to Home visited the site and talked with Park Ranger Katheryn Hill.

Have you ever felt like just quitting everything to pursue a dream? Maybe it was a dream of being a musician or being a dancer or maybe even being a playwright.

Well, in today’s Untold Stories of Central Minnesota, Arts & Cultural Heritage Producer Jeff Carmack talks with three folks involved with the following of dreams and the zigzag path those dreams have taken them down. Lucille Guinta-Bates and Scarlette Revolver are local dance artists in their own rights, yet both are recovering from injuries that have sidelined their professional careers at the moment. Part of their recovery process, however, is to partner up with Anthony Schrock, a first-time playwright and director.

Schrock’s play is “Two Days in St. Cloud” and is a result of his decision to move back to town from the west coast to pursue his dream. Written in the depths of last winter, this original comedic drama has attracted actors and partner organizations willing to give Schrock’s vision a chance. Here is that story!

Two Days in St. Cloud will have a “table-read” in September at Jules’ Bistro and then again as a full staged performance in November at GREAT Theater’s Helgeson Learning Lab Theatre.

This program is funded in part by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Legacy Grant

On this episode of Don’t Cha Know we sit down with DeAnna Goddard to talk about the Warrior Success Center at Winona State University. DeAnna fills us in on the many programs that are offered to students and how they can benefit from utilizing the Warrior Success Center.

Grant Frashier visits Camp Rabideau in the Chippewa National Forest. It is the best preserved Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp in existance and is located a few miles south of Blackduck, MN.

In this extended podcast of the Untold Stories of Central Minnesota, Arts & Cultural Heritage Producer Jeff Carmack visits with members of a surprising institution in the St. Cloud theater scene that has just dropped its final curtain.

The Veranda Variety Hour was a late night, adult comedy variety show that made its home at the Pioneer Place Theater for the past ten years. With a myriad of rotating and returning cast members, many of which were SCSU Theater students at some point, the show hit the stage about every other month as a mixture of part Muppet Show, part Saturday Night Live, and part avant-garde experimental theater.

Yet, as with all good things, it has come to an end.

Due to the vast amount of material produced, remembered, and recorded in the process of creating this story, it felt right to include as much of it as possible . . . so here it is!

Seriously, though, the VVH was rude, crude, and lewd. This podcast is Not Safe For Work (which is what NSFW means for those not quite on fleek), so proceed with caution!