Kansas City, MO – It's been two years since Kansas City Kansas native Janet Murguia was named president and CEO of the National Council of La Raza, a leading Latino civil rights organization. She was in town on Friday to address young people at a leadership conference at UMKC. Sylvia Maria Gross asked her about some current challenges in educating Latino youth, both locally and nationally.
Musician and artist Loren Pickford is a veteran of jazz scenes in Los Angeles, Boston, and Paris. Pickford lived in New Orleans from 1990 to 2005, and here shares the story of his first day in the Big Easy.
By Laura Spencer
Kansas City, MO – Pickford and his wife, Sheila, relocated from New Orleans to Kansas City, Missouri after Hurricane Katrina.
Cultural Convention and Visitors Bureau President Anita Dixon says her vision of 12th Street, from the Paseo to Brooklyn, is as an enclave for jazz artists.
Earlier this year, the Kansas City Ballet School offered a weekly ballet class to twenty Latina girls at Gladstone and Primitivo Garcia elementary schools. And five of those girls were cast in this year's production of The Nutcracker, including 5th grader Christina Sayed who's a lead angel.
Kansas City, MO – In order to unravel the mystery of the Steptoe neighborhood in Westport, you'd have to go back about one-hundred-forty years to the times of the Civil War when Missouri's fate as a free versus a slave state hung in the balance.
Joe Louis Mattox, a historian at the Bruce R. Watkins Cultural Heritage Center, has looked into the neighborhood's history. He sat down with Sylvia Maria Gross to tell us how he first became interested in Steptoe.
Kansas City, MO – El Dia de los Muertos (the Day of the Dead) is a Mexican celebration to celebrate, remember and prepare special foods in honor of those who have departed. The holiday reflects the Mexicans tradition of reacting to death with mourning along with happiness and joy.
Kansas City, MO – Muslims began fasting from dawn to dusk earlier this month when a new crescent moon signaled the start of Ramadan, Islam's holiest month. The month-long holiday commemorates the time 1500 years ago that Muslims believe the first verses of the Koran were revealed to the Prophet Mohammed. The faithful try to be especially pious this month and refrain from food, drink, smoking and sex - all the sensual pleasures - during daylight.
The face of jazz music on KCUR will change after this weekend. The long running program Just Jazz will end.
By Laura Ziegler
Kansas City, MO – The face of jazz music on KCUR will change after this weekend. The long running program Just Jazz will end. Laura Ziegler has this look back at the show and the hosts who made it unique.
Years before the first of her 76 appearances on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson - years before there was a Tonight Show with Johnny Carson - vocalist Marilyn Maye was learning the art of putting across a song from someone she heard mostly on the radio: Frank Sinatra.
Kansas City, MO – In recent years, the 18th and Vine area has been redeveloped, but 12th and Vine has really been the jazz center of Kansas City. Ollie Gates of Gates Barbeque is now coordinating the redevelopment of the 18th and Vine plaza and tours the area.
Kansas City, MO – UMKC professor Louis Imperiale talks about the Argentine film Wild Horses. Imperiale will be presenting the 1995 film at the Latin American Cinema Festival of Kansas City, which begins this month at the Rio Theater in Overland Park. Films from Argentina, Mexico, Colombia and Peru will be presented every Saturday until October 1.
Kansas City, MO – Recent Dillard University graduate Angela Cozart fled New Orleans just before Hurricane Katrina hit. She tells the story to KCUR's Delores Jones.
