Arts Calling

Hi there, National Poetry Month Extravaganza continues! Today I am so thrilled to be arts calling Alison Lubar! About: Alison Lubar teaches high school English by day and yoga by night. They are a queer, nonbinary femme of color whose life work (aside from wordsmithing) has evolved into bringing mindfulness practices, and sometimes even poetry, to young people.  Their debut chapbook, Philosophers...

Hi there, National Poetry Month Extravaganza begins! Ecstatic to be arts calling Karla Linn Merrifield! Karla Linn Merrifield has had 1000+ poems appear in dozens of journals and anthologies. She has 15 books to her credit. Following her 2018 Psyche’s Scroll (Poetry Box Select) is the full-length book Athabaskan Fractal: Poems of the Far North from Cirque Press. Her newest poetry collection, My Bo...

Hi there, Poetry Month Extravaganza continues! I'm overjoyed to be arts calling Christopher Soriano-Palma! About: Christopher Soriano-Palma is a writer and bookseller. Born and raised in Watsonville, CA., he earned his MFA in Writing from the University of San Francisco. He is a contributor to Reclamation Magazine and a staff writer for Alebrijes Review . He has briefly volunteered as a screenwrit...

Hi there, My name is Jaime and I interview creatives from all walks of life. Today I am over the moon to be arts calling Christian J. Collier! About Christian: “He’s got a compelling voice, and he can electrify an audience.” -Michael Edward Miller, Host of Around & About Perhaps the best way to describe him is by what he doesn’t do. Christian is a modern renaissance man (poet, musician, educat...

Hi there, Today I'm thrilled to be arts calling Joseph Lezza! Joseph Lezza is a writer in New York, NY. Holding an MFA in creative writing from The University of Texas at El Paso, his work has been featured in, among others, The Hopper, Stoneboat Literary Journal, Still: The Journal, West Trade Review, and Santa Fe Writers Project. His debut memoir in essays, "I'm Never Fine," is due out...

Hi there, Today I am excited to be arts calling writer/director Janet Swainston! Janet's Pitch: Forged in a small town in Southern Ontario, Canada with the chance to learn and make films bleak and non-existent, my passion for writing focused like a laser on the stage, but by the time I was 16, after seeing a little film called Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark, my passion was engulfed...

Hi there, Today I am incredibly excited to be arts calling Joseph Fasano! Joseph Fasano is a writer and educator. He studied mathematics and astrophysics at Harvard University before changing his course of study and earning a degree in philosophy, with a focus on philosophy of language after Wittgenstein. He did his graduate study in poetry at Columbia University, where he now teaches. Beyond his...

Hi there, Today I am Arts Calling Paul Myles Zambrano! About my guest: With a stylistic versatility ranging from hybrid soundscapes to Old Hollywood, Bernard Herrmann inspired scores, Paul Zambrano's versatility and range makes him constantly in demand to content creators of all kinds. Since his departure from South Florida, Paul has composed the score to a number of indie films, including Binlowe...

Hi friends, Today I am Arts Calling Norm Reynolds! Norm Reynolds is a Toronto-based playwright and actor. He is adapting Anne Tyler's "Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant" for the stage. “An October Crisis” is slated for the Toronto Queer Theatre Festival. "Gay Positive" was short-listed for the Short & Sweet Festival (Sydney, Australia). "Two-Hander" played at the...

Last one of the year! Today I am thrilled to be arts calling my friend Máire Higgins! Bio: Máire Higgins is a stage and film actor, accredited nationally and abroad. Recent credits include MACBETH (Telluride Theatre), THE WOLVES (BETC), and HOAX (Rum River). Máire holds a Masters of Philosophy in Theatre from Trinity College Dublin, and is based in Telluride, Colorado. For more information, please...

Hi all, I'm continuing this end of year sprint by Arts Calling my wonderfully talented friend A.J. Ross! So happy to catch up, have a few laughs, and learn how she is crafting the world of her web comic, Familiar Monsters! A few words from the author: My name is A.J. Ross, I am the author and illustrator of Familiar Monsters. Familiar Monsters is about two childhood friends, torn apart by a werewo...

Hello all! Happy to be back from the holiday break! Today I'm arts calling Shaine Greenwood! Shaine Greenwood is a Seattle-based writer, artist, and weirdo. He writes poetry, sci-fi, and literary fiction with a focus on people and what makes them tick. You can find his work here: youaremuted.com Check out The Aether, now on Amazon! Also, here's Shaine's poetry collection, Faces....

Hey there! Today I am arts calling my new Twitter friend Dre Ellis of Prophecy Comics! D'Andre Ellis is a self-taught multidisciplinary artist from East St. Louis, IL, with years of experience in musical performance & production, screenwriting, and Auteur filmmaking. Stop by Kickstater to support his latest project, Heavy is the Hand. A comic book series about a black woman who plots revenge w...

Hi there, Today I am arts calling Oscar Moreno from InkFilms ! A great conversation with an outstanding talent, who is writing and directing films on the US/Mexico border with an incredibly refreshing perspective. A pleasure talking with you, my friend. Te deseo lo mejor en todos tus proyectos! OSCAR'S BIO: I'm an optioned bilingual Mexican writer and filmmaker from the U.S./Mexico border. My life...

Hi there, This time around, I'm catching up with an amazing theatre artist: Today I'm arts calling L. Nicol Cabe! ARTIST BIO: I am a new media theatre artist. I create shows inspired by our potential future, using speculative fiction, science fiction, and fantasy tropes. I write and perform scifi story-telling shows, direct new plays, and help playwrights develop their work. Since 2016, I have tra...

Hi there, Today, I am overjoyed to catch up with a dear friend and outstanding theater artist and educator. I'm Arts Calling Billy Higgins! About Billy: Currently serving as Artistic Producing Director at Ferndale Repertory Theatre , Billy Higgins (He/They) has worked as a director, producer, actor, devised theatre maker, and circus artist, creating live performance and providing arts leadership t...

Hello friends! Today I am thrilled to be Arts Calling the very awesome playwright/compa José Casas! Thanks so much for joining us today with your wisdom, anecdotes, and good cheer! And a shoutout to Alvaro Saar Rios for making this happen! A part 2 episode with José and Alvaro will definitely be happening someday soon! José Casas is a playwright, director, and Assistant Professor who heads the Pla...

Hi friends, Today I'm so excited to be arts calling Raegen Pietrucha! Raegen Pietrucha is a professional and creative writer, editor, consultant, and educator with two degrees in English and more than 20 years of combined experience. Her chapbook,  An Animal I Can’t Name , won the 2015 Two of Cups Press competition; her debut poetry collection,  Head of a Gorgon , is forthcoming with  Vegetarian A...

Hi there, Today I am arts calling one of my best friends and supremely talented collaborator: Dane Halvorson! We recollect the many lessons of learning our craft together. We also discuss the importance of the sandbox mentality when starting out, his time with Second City, and his creative journey as a performer and composer. About Dane: Born and raised in Montana, Dane began practicing piano and...

Hi friends, Today I am so excited to be arts calling writer/creator/producer Madelyn Dorta! We had an incredibly inspiring conversation about audio narratives, and how Madelyn and her sibling collaborators are creating outstanding work on their own terms at Wrightwood Studios. Hope you join us! A few words from the author: At the age of six, I got superpowers. That’s what I thought at the time. I...

Hi friends, Today I'm arts calling my friend Daniel Damiano to discuss the many facets of his creativity! He is an actor/writer/inspiring human being and I'm thrilled to have him on the show. Let's learn from his insights today! Daniel Damiano is an Award-winning Playwright, Screenwriter, Poet and Novelist based in Brooklyn, NY. His plays have been performed throughout many areas of the U.S., as w...

Hi there, This is Jaime Alejandro and today I am arts calling playwright Alvaro Saar Rios to talk about his origin story, creative process, and so much more!! Alvaro Saar Rios is a Texican playwright living in Chicago. His plays have been performed in New York City, Mexico City, Hawaii, Chicago, St. Louis, Milwaukee and all over Texas. He has received playwriting commissions from various organizat...

Hi there! Today I am arts calling my friend Becca Diamond. We discuss what life is like for a working voice actor, a creative's work ethic, an origin story of Disney movies, and much more! Becca Diamond is a voice actor living in Los Angeles. Becca has a BFA in theatre performance and can be heard on the Off-Broadway soundtrack Puffs: Or Seven Increasingly Eventful Years at a Certain School of Mag...

Hey there! Today I am Arts Calling an outstanding creative and one of my best friends: Ahren Buhmann. Ahren is a theatre maker, video designer, and musician based in Seattle. He is currently a Level 3 Deep Gnome Artificer. Ahren and I discuss the challenges of becoming creatives in a small Wyoming town, Ahren's path into professional theatre, and why we every person and every community needs the a...

Welcome to the first episode of Arts Calling! We begin by starting at the very beginning. I asked Brenda Zamora (my actress sister) to help me even slightly unpack some of the things we experienced growing up that made us into the creatives we are today. About Brenda: Brenda Zamora is a Mexican actress; she was born in Jalisco, Mexico, and raised in the United States in Wyoming. While attending Cl...