Festival Stories

Festival Executive Director Mary Lou Aleskie, along with Festival artists and Ideas panelists will be feature on WNPR's Where We Live with John Dankosky and The Colin McEnroe Show.

Tonight's Courtyard Concert, Bang on a Can All-Stars, has been moved indoors to the Yale Repertory Theatre, 1120 Chapel Street (at York).

For details from Festival Executive Director Mary Lou Aleskie, click here.

Five months ago I drove to Boston in the snow to see the first stop on the U.S. tour of the Druid theater company’s “Cripple of Inishmaan”, and it was almost impossible to imagine that come June we would be reuniting in New Haven for the close of the “Cripple” tour.  Over these past months the company has performed at the Center Theatre Group in Los Angeles, at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, and all points in between.  And today, they arrive in New Haven and begin loading in to the University Theatre!  We open the production on Wednesday night, June 15, and this is one of the festival’s...

Load in has started on Frame Dances at the Yale University Art School Gallery @ 1156 Chapel St. Frame Dances presents a new way of looking at dance.

There are so many people who have had a big impact on my life, but there is only one person who has changed my life for years to come. My mom has had a strong, profound effect on me as an individual. She raised my brother and me by herself, and I can only imagine what she had to go through. It amazes me that she was still able to work, pay the bills, and spend time with me without relying on anyone else but herself.

I know times were tough for her without my father. I could hear her crying in her room sometimes, but every time she looked at my face, the more determined she became to...

When I first acknowledged the fact that we were going to be interviewing board members, I wasn’t as nervous, but when I stepped inside that room it was like someone flicked on the nervous switch. I managed to get through it, and I’m still not sure how, but maybe it had to do with the fact that my interviewee, Kevin, made me laugh.

Mr. Kevin told me that being a board member is not hard, but there’s lots of discussion. I asked him if he ever volunteered anywhere else, he replied, “No, just here is really time-consuming, it’s a very active board.”
He added that he was bribed into becoming a...

I have been through a lot throughout the course of my life. When I was born, my mother and father were in the military, which involved a lot of moving around. I was born in Middletown, Connecticut and from there we moved to San Diego, California, where my other two sisters were born. From California we moved all the way back across the United States to Virginia, where my youngest sister was born.
Shortly after that, when I was still just a young girl, my parents got divorced and my mother and I, along with my three sisters, moved to another part of Virginia. After a few years of living there...

Read the article from the Huffington Post: The International Festival of Arts and Ideas: A Sure Sign of Summer in New Haven

Click here to read an article from the New York Times about the Bang on a Can All-Stars upcoming Courtyard Concert at the Festival, Tuesday June 14 at 8pm.

Here is a selection of press related to this weekend's opening!

Arts & Ideas: Only Martin McDonagh could have written 'The Cripple of Inishmaan'

Arts & Ideas: Its theatricality and sound make 'Adamantine' more than a dance

Beginning Festival With a Bang (On a Can — and Others Arts, Ideas)

The decision for today’s concert: Jose Condé with opening act Cosmic Jibaros will remain outside as scheduled.

Click here for a note from Executive Director Mary Lou Aleskie.

The decision for today’s concert: The Silk Road Ensemble with Yo-Yo Ma will remain outside as scheduled.

Meteorologists from three television stations in the state, as well as the support of the musicians helped the Festival make this decision. The Festival looks forward to an exciting and successful event.

Click here for a note from Executive Director Mary Lou Aleskie.