EARTH FROM FROGS TO CROPS TO FURNITURE, HERE’S HOW YOU CAN GET INVOLVED. BY
PATRICK HOSKEN
10
FASHION LOCAL BOUTIQUES BATTLE CLIMATE CHANGE, ONE PRE-LOVED PIECE AT A TIME. BY
TEN GARDNER
12 SHOPPING WHETHER YOU’RE HOPING TO DECREASE YOUR GROCERY BILL, FIND COMMUNITY OR REDUCE PLASTIC WASTE, THESE LOCAL ALTERNATIVES OFFER MYRIAD SOLUTIONS. BY CITY STAFF
18 CLIMATE THE ENVIRONMENTAL COST OF CRYPTO IN THE FINGER LAKES. BY GEORGE PAYNE
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Director, Strategy: Ryan Williamson
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26 PHOTO ESSAY HOW A PLANT-BASED MEAL DELIVERY SERVES MORE THAN NUTRITION. BY ROBERTO F. LAGARES
60 FLX LAKE DRUM SETS A STEADY TEMPO OF SOCIETAL BETTERMENT IN GENEVA. BY PETE WAYNER
64 FOOD & BEV THE FORMER GRINNELL’S BUILDING IS NOW REDD WOOD, THE SECOND LOCAL RESTAURANT FROM MICHELIN-STARRED CHEF RICHARD REDDINGTON. BY LEAH STACY
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ARTS. MUSIC. CULTURE.
Illustration by Jacob Walsh
In a Barbie world
EDITOR'S LETTER
BY LEAH STACY LEAH@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM
Along the basement stairwell in my childhood home, there was a plastic bag filled with plastic bags that we used for transporting lunches, wet swimsuits, disposing of cat litter — the list went on. A few weeks ago, my mom handed me leftovers wrapped up in a plastic bag and I must’ve looked at her like it was contraband. “I got an Etsy order filled with plastic bags as packing materials!” she said. “Haven’t seen that many in one place for a long time.”
In that same house, an entire corner of my adolescent bedroom was pink-hued, with a lingering scent of rubber and plastic. From waist-high houses and convertible cars to Velcro-fastening outfits and tiny shoes that my little brother tried to eat, I spent my allowance dollars in the towering Mattel aisles of Toys“R”Us.
From Barbies to bags, plastic wasn’t a bad word when I was a kid.
Thirty years later, I have three nieces and two nephews, and our family just found out two more (of the cutest babies ever, ahem) will be joining the ranks later this year. As CITY put this issue together, I thought a lot about the world these children are born into, and the problems their generation will have to solve in order to be OK.
The academic journal “Nature Medicine” published the results of a study in February 2025 that examined brain tissue samples from 10 deceased individuals. The article found that the average brain contained approximately 7 grams of microplastics (equivalent to the weight of a plastic spoon). Microplastics come from the breakdown and ingestion of larger plastic items, and it’s scary how many we encounter each day.
We can always make smarter choices when it comes to the environment, right? This issue isn't trying to get preachy or paint a doomand-gloom scenario, but point us toward a few (local) solutions for a better earth. For ourselves and for future generations. For my sixth and seventh niece or nephew.
Let’s take care of what we’ve been given.
CITY Social
Scenes from our March CITY social at Jack's Extra Fancy on March 5. PHOTOS BY RUDY FABRE
READING: I’m a purist when it comes to reading. I want a book with pages to read every night before I pass out — even if I drop it on my face trying to stay awake through “one more page.” I’m currently reading “The Power” by Naomi Alderman, which I’m enjoying very much.
It seems extra relevant to what is currently happening in our world right now. I just finished “Wayward” by Emilia Hart and “Circe” by Madeline Miller. I loved them both and was sad when I finished. I didn’t want the stories to ever end.
EATING: I don’t have a whole lot of time to cook, but if I do, I usually make big batches of soup to jar up and have ready for the week. I’m all about “heat and eat” if I can swing it. I just made a yummy coconut curry soup with shrimp and veggies that was bangin’! I’m currently obsessed with Fly By Jing Sichuan chili crisp, which is amazing on just about everything. I’ve also discovered the dangerously delicious egg tarts
at Jenny’s Bakery. Get there early because they go fast! Abundance on South Avenue has delicious coffee and their savory breakfast pastries are my go-to, especially if I’m in a hurry. And Voula’s on Monroe Avenue is next-level yum! I usually get the spanakopita plate with the Greek salad and lemon potatoes. And don’t forget the melitzanosalata! My mouth is watering just thinking about it.
PLAYING: I wish I had more time for podcasts because I obsess over them, so if I start on one I won’t get any work done. But if I was going to listen, it’s to true crime or something spooky. I tend to watch a bit of TV at night, usually while stressing over a stack of bills and unanswered emails, but there is so much good stuff streaming it takes the edge off a bit. I love “The White Lotus,” “Severance,” “Silo,” “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver,” and the new “Match Game.” I’m not much of a gamer but the “Block Jam 3-D” app is my kryptonite. It has stolen a piece of my soul and I’m kinda okay with it.
OBSESSING OVER: I like to stay on top of all the craziness that is happening in the world, but it can get super exhausting and a drain on my sanity. Following social media accounts like “Under The Desk News,” “Goodtrouble.tt,” and “Pattiegonia” are great because they are smart, informed, relatable and can cut through the BS. They are my superheroes right now. Anyone who is standing up and speaking out against the insanity of our current administration should get all the praise, an open bar and a lifetime of free therapy. Also — I’m obsessed with Umai Revolving Sushi on Monroe Avenue, and the musical serving robot gives me the giggles. It’s so cute!
RECOMMENDING: Any way to support small, local businesses is a huge winwin. I know the past few months have been brutal for my fellow small-business owners so get off your cozy couch (I know, it’s hard sometimes) and put your money back into your neighborhoods. It’s so important and the last thing Amazon needs is more of your hard-earned cash. Rochester is jampacked with cool things to do, so do them! Catch a movie at The Little or ROC Cinema, check out the Rochester Museum & Science Center and Strasenburgh Planetarium, see a show at Geva, throw back some cocktails at your local watering hole, grab some locally grown veggies at the Public Market and plan more day trips with friends.
TREATING MYSELF TO: My dream day would be a good cup of coffee, crossword puzzles, cellphone off, lounging in my backyard hammock, surrounded by my dogs and a nice campfire. If you top it with a saucy, thin-crust pizza from Little Venice, I’m over the moon. And if I really want to be kind to myself, I will get my back adjusted followed up by an hour massage at Mt. Hope Chiropractic. Stress be gone!
SHOUTING OUT: I’m going to be a bit selfish and remind everyone that Roc Paper Straws is one of only a handful of paper straw manufacturers in the country, and we are proud to be based here in Rochester — the city we love so much! It would mean the world to have our straws in every bar, restaurant, coffee shop and college campus in town. We are on a mission to help rid the planet of toxic single-use plastics and with the community’s support, we can do it. I would also like to give a big shout-out to all the local businesses that are focusing on sustainability and the future of our planet. What’s Good in Fairport and Marilla’s on South Avenue are two great examples. They both have a huge selection of eco-friendly products and have put a lot of work into making sure they only offer the best in the market. They have done the hard work for you. Please check them out!
Interested in being a CITY R.E.P.O.R.T.S. interviewee? Send an email to leah@rochester-citynews.com.
Climate change is local — and so are the solutions
From frogs to crops to furniture, here’s how you can get involved.
BY PATRICK HOSKEN
Lately, the news feels like a storm. Headlines yell about government cuts, appeals of those cuts and, occasionally, reversals of those cuts.
By slashing jobs at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, for example — as Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency did in late February — the tempests become literal. The very experts who help save lives by tracking severe storms and monitoring the climate are hamstrung.
Those jobs may return, or not. The storm rages on.
Cold climate means more emissions
As the past few months have reminded, Rochester endures particularly cold winters. As such, the natural gas we use to stay warm is, per the Climate Solutions Accelerator, the top source of emissions in our region. Since lowering emissions is a core tenet of combating climate change, the group recommends installing heat pumps and other electric appliances that can make a difference. On this front, the AMPED initiative has some suggestions on where to begin. ampedproject.org
A shake-up on fruit farms
The Finger Lakes are synonymous with agricultural hauls of grapes and apples. But late spring frosts have shaken up apple farms in recent years, rendering some fruit unsellable and other crops lost entirely. Grape growers, meanwhile, see a mixed bag, as warmer temperatures in the region can yield more diverse wines. But for vineyards, the variability of weather presents the biggest challenges. Luckily, groups like New York Sustainable Winegrowing are keeping pace with some of those changes. newyorkwines.org/industry/sustainability
It can feel abstract, especially amid unequivocal evidence that human-caused climate change remains the defining issue of our time. It can also feel demoralizing. But look locally, and you’ll find folks leading the charge.
“We can focus on the doom and gloom but also focus on the positive, emphasizing the opportunities and solutions,” said Abigail McHugh-Grifa, the executive director of Climate Solutions Accelerator of the Genesee-Finger Lakes Region, in a training video from the nonprofit’s website. “For our region in particular, there are a lot.”
Here are a few places to start:
The sweet life
New York is the second-largest producer of maple syrup in the U.S.; only Vermont yields more per year. But temperature fluctuations have caused maple farmers to adjust their tapping windows. If the changes persist, the sap could flow earlier in the season, and there may end up being less of it in the long run. Luckily, maple syrup celebrations at the Genesee Country Village & Museum, Kettle Ridge Farm and RMSC Cumming Nature Center aim to educate — and promise delicious results. gcv.org | kettleridgefarm.com | rmsc.org
Keeping furniture out of landfills
Because we’ve all seen “Toy Story 3,” we know that landfills are garbage mountains full of plastic, old furniture, food scraps and yard debris. The latter two release methane, which made up 12% of all domestic greenhouse gas emissions in 2022, per the Environmental Protection Agency. One way to make a difference? Rehome your desks, tables and chairs instead of chucking them in the dumpster. Habitat for Humanity’s ReStore program, with its three locations in the Rochester area, can help. grhabitat.org/restore
Saving the frogs
Rising temperatures and more sunlight have increased the number of harmful algal blooms — toxic bacteria — in the Finger Lakes. But a less frequently told story involves frogs. Increased development and climate change factors have put the amphibians at risk. Diminishing frogs means less food for larger predators all the way up the food chain. What can be done? As WXXI’s Jasmin Singer recently highlighted on the monthly “Environmental Connections,” new vernal pools, like those proposed by A Frog House in Pittsford, can help give the green creatures breeding grounds while also helping preserve soil and vegetation. afroghouse.org
Local boutiques battle climate change, one
pre-loved piece at a time.
The karmic cycle of clothing
BY TEN GARDNER
“ Your jeans are so cute! Where did you get them?” What if you had to wear a respirator mask because of them? Choking on smog in the heat of summer, the sky painted with a dull orange hue. According to a March 2019 report from United Nations Trade & Development, it takes 2,000 gallons of water to produce a single pair of jeans. That’s each pair that makes up the towering walls of denim in stores like Old Navy and American Eagle. The textile industry is a growing concern to our environment, one that requires consumers to grapple with everyday decisions that could be quickening our planet’s descent into environmental destruction. The drought that fueled devastating wildfires in California this year is a reminder of the price paid. But there is hope. With consistent action, individual consumers can push the market toward more sustainable practices. One powerful way to embody this shift is by shopping secondhand. Rochester is home to a thriving thrift community, with boutique vintage shops offering curated collections to make the process more accessible than ever.
Each shop offers a unique character and offerings curated from the owners. Sometimes featuring vendor pop-ups like the ones at KIAKS. PHOTOS BY ROBERTO F. LAGARES
The boutique shopping experience is a quintessential American rite of passage — picture movie montages of characters trying on “quirky” outfits until finally landing on the one that perfectly reflects their personality. Shoppers are no longer standing in a dimly lit Goodwill; suddenly, they’re Tyra Banks in “Life-Size.” Brittany Murphy in “Clueless.” Hilary Duff in “A Cinderella Story.” Ware to Wear, 777 Culver Rd., is a secondhand boutique that blends new and vintage clothing to modernize the thrifting experience. Owner and operator Nick Schroeder opened his first brick-and-mortar store after years of selling vintage online and vending at popups like The Lucky Flea, and his stock reflects his time as a collector. Housed in a former hydroponics store, the industrial space is lined with rolling garment racks and floorto-ceiling shelves stacked with shoes and accessories. Curated secondhand shops like Schroeder’s offer the convenience of stylized, sustainable fashion at a higher price point than conventional thrift shops.
At Goodwill, one might spend an hour sifting through oil-stained rejects before striking gold with a killer knit tube top tucked away in the scarf section. But at Ware to Wear, shoppers can find their dream pair of corduroy bell bottoms before the next song on the playlist queues. Schroeder also emphasized the importance of quality fabrics.
“If you treat something well, whether it’s silk, wool or cotton, it’ll last forever,” he said. “If you buy quality to begin with, you won’t need to continue to buy.”
This highlights one of the most crucial facets of sustainability: keeping and
know better. Then, when you know better, do better.”
Sarah Pavia embodies this statement at her newly opened shop, Second Look Styling & Boutique, 709 South Ave., where shoppers can give something old a second chance and learn something new along the way. Mixing luxury items with casual wear, home goods and books, Pavia touches every corner of the secondhand market.
Second Look is also a venue for weekly seminars on sustainable topics like upcycling denim, sewing
and fast fashion.
“I feel a responsibility because I have a passion for this to not just sell clothing, but to help people understand why and the importance of it,” Pavia said.
Tucked inconspicuously along a busy area, KIAKS, 806 Monroe Ave., is another recent addition to Rochester’s vintage scene and offers a carefully curated mix of new and vintage goods. Sunlight pours through south-facing windows into
every corner of the shop, catching the delicate hues of vintage crystal glasses in pale green and pink.
Owner Jenson Ruggiero understands her customers and considers them in her process; by rotating local vendors, she exposes patrons to eclectic styles while also supporting fellow small business owners. Ruggiero also knows that sustainable change starts with uncomfortable conversations.
“It starts with us talking about the problem and spreading the word as best we can,” she said. “Not only spreading the word on social media but in our personal relationships too, with older folk and people who typically would never consider shopping secondhand and start talking to them.”
Shopping secondhand is a small but impactful step. It makes climate activism approachable and actionable in the face of daunting environmental degradation. And when we start conversations about sustainability in our communities, we can spark ripples of change that grow into waves of transformation bigger than we might ever expect.
Sarah Pavia (Second Look Styling & Boutique.) PHOTO BY ROBERTO F. LAGARES.
Nick Schroeder (Ware to Wear).
PHOTO BY ROBERTO F. LAGARES.
Jenson Ruggiero (KIAKS), PHOTO BY JULIA KRYK
Pantry staples
Whether you’re hoping to decrease your grocery bill, find community or reduce plastic waste, these local alternatives offer myriad solutions.
The minimalist aesthetic of Marilla’s is equally elegant and enticing. The walls (and shelves that line them) are a crisp white, which makes the colorful unpackaged bar soaps pop; neat displays of cleansers, lotions and body oils invite a closer look at their impact on a more sustainable self-care industry.
Handwritten signs on carefully-cut cardboard spruce up the walls, suggesting store favorites with a personal flair. Emblazoned across many of the large jugs and cans of cleaning vinegar, hair conditioners and laundry powder is the Marilla’s tagline, which sums their mission up aptly: “Fill jars, not landfills.”
The store, which sells products with as little plastic packaging as possible, offers free glass containers for customers to fill while purchasing bulk goods like teas and nuts. As a result, they gladly accept extra jars for donation, which can be brought to the front and will be met with a thankful smile — likely from manager Hallie Varenka.
Varenka first encountered Marilla’s flagship store in Geneva (run by Marilla Gonzalez herself). As a fellow small business owner, Varenka was taken with the shop’s dedication to providing practical eco-friendly alternatives in support of conscious, thoughtful consumerism. In particular, she recommends their price-effective spices — fill up a jar for cents on the dollar.
There’s plenty to stock up on at Marilla’s, from standard purchases like bulk spices and plant-based toilet paper to fun additions that line the window sill, like reusable water balloons and all-natural play dough in candle-like jars. There are treats of all varieties, including Varenka’s favorite; fruity pear bubs, which have the consistency of a marshmallow while being vegan and gluten free.
Many of the options the store offers are locally made, including the zingy Sudsy’s hot sauce and shower steamers made by Craft Farm out in Elmira, which offer a soothing aromatherapy blend as a treat for the nose.
Want to spice up a self-care routine? Snag some toothpaste tablets or soap nuts; when they’re gone, Marilla’s has in-store refills. All their refill options are listed online, and if there isn’t currently a product they offer at one location, the store will have it in stock for pickup by request.
Looking for climate-conscious gifts? Free shipping is available for all orders over $75; for under that price point, there is a flat rate, but a portion of shipping costs goes to The Ocean Cleanup, a nonprofit that develops technology to stem trash flow from rivers and remove current plastics that pollute the oceans. —ALYSSA KOH
MARILLA’S MINDFUL SUPPLIES, 661 SOUTH AVE. | MARILLAS.COM
PHOTO BY ALYSSA KOH
PHOTO BY ALYSSA KOH
PHOTO BY ROBERTO FELIPE LAGARES
Apop of sunshine peeks around the corner of the Genesee Valley Regional Market building, but it’s not in the sky — it’s a landscape with bright yellow sunflowers and cows grazing an open field, a mural that spans across the front of Lori’s Natural Foods Center.
Inside, customers are greeted with aisles of products labeled organic, glutenfree or made with vegetables. Looking for a snack? Enter the row of chip bags making a rainbow of colors down the aisle, everything from pepperoncini potato chips to cauliflower puffs.
After gathering a few snacks, the journey to find fruits and vegetables begins (for balance, of course). Down the slim produce aisle is a gallery of nature’s artwork with red, yellow and orange peaking through the leafy greens. Next door to the produce is the bulk section, with a back wall featuring seasonings and herbs from adobo to za’atar, along with a variety of nuts, rice and flour. An aroma of jasmine tea and rose hips lingers in the aisle.
The cart is filling up, and the path leads to the back corner of refrigerated and frozen items. Employees smile, ready to answer any questions as they stock shelves.
General manager Andrew Frackenpohl said Lori’s is not only known for their dancing fruit commercials, but for their vast wellness department. Many supplements, herbs and essential oils are available at the store; some under the store’s own namebrand. Frackenpohl was initially drawn to Lori’s 16 years ago because it was a local, standalone store. He also appreciated their care for the community and environmental conscience.
“There’s a lot of good causes that come through these doors,” Frackenpohl said, adding that one of the store’s values is limiting waste.
At the end of a tour through the Lori’s, smells of brewed coffee and hot prepared soup linger by the registers up front. A last-minute snack for the car — a Red Fern jam bar and a kombucha — seems necessary. And after cashing out a cart full of healthy items and waving goodbye to the cows on the mural outside, suddenly, the old commercial tune, “Be good to yourself, shop at Lori’s,” really means more. —MICHALA SCHRAM
ABUNDANCE CO-OP, 571 SOUTH AVE. | ABUNDANCE.COOP
If there was an award for living up to their name the best, Abundance Co-Op would win it singlehandedly.
Every month, the organic-store-slash-eventspace-slash-bulk-goodsprovider continues to up their offerings for both shareholding members (who get owner-only deals and an annual vote in the co-op’s initiatives) and standard shoppers. With full online accessibility to shop their growing list of grocery items as well as a constantly diversifying list of workshops and social events (advertised regularly on their social media channels), it’s hard to tell what isn’t in abundance at Abundance.
Want to have your pet blessed by a pastor? The Greek Orthodox Church of the Holy Spirit gave out treats and blessings around Christmastime at Abundance. Have an art project that needs finishing or old clothes to swap? Little Button Craft — right across the street — hosts free community craft nights weekly. Community members are welcome and encouraged to share their talents at Abundance, with everything from chainmail creation to compost classes.
As a way to mitigate the price of groceries, Abundance offers organic bulk goods; these range from the edible (nuts, rice varieties and honey, to name a few) to soaps in jugs big enough to be mistaken for acrylic paint. Shoppers can use their own containers or snag a bag or jar to load up. The co-op also offers discounted prices for purchasing products in wholesale quantities — for example, getting a gallon of soap rather than a standard bottle.
Abundance also offers discount programs for shoppers with limited incomes, such as their FLOWER program, which provides a 10% discount on all regularly priced items for those benefiting from programs such as Medicaid or the Free School Lunch Program. Similar to local Foodlink markets, Abundance participates in the Double Up Food Bucks program, which gives people with SNAP EBT cards up to $10 a day in matched credit for every dollar spent on fresh produce at the store.
The store also gives shoppers multiple opportunities to support their surroundings financially and sustainably. Every month, the co-op chooses a different organization to benefit from their Round-Up program, where shoppers can donate the difference between their grocery total and a rounded-up amount at the register. Past recipients include the Black Community Focus Fund, which supports local black families, and Bethany House, which provides free resources to disenfranchised women. —ALYSSA KOH
Brighton may be known for its delicious bagels and walkable neighborhoods, but the Rochester suburb also makes significant strides in sustainable living. Established in 2007, the Green Brighton Task Force spearheaded several initiatives, including the ever-popular Brighton Farmers Market.
“Its mission from the beginning has been to support a stronger local food system and to bring people together around the shared experience of enjoying local sustainably-produced food,” said Sue Gardner Smith, the manager of the Brighton Farmers Market.
One visit is enough to see the market succeed in its mission. During the summer months, crowds can be found mingling, listening to live music by local musicians, and shopping the vast array of offerings in the parking lot of Brighton High School. Some shoppers have go-to vendors, while others wander through colorful produce or chase after a wayward toddler.
Unlike most farmers’ markets, Brighton’s operates year-round. In winter, it moves to a newly renovated, expanded barn on Westfall Road, supporting local farmers even after the ground freezes. The market is also working toward making sustainable food more accessible. Members of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) can use their program benefits to buy products and receive bonus dollars on purchases.
Beyond delicious and healthy food, the market fosters community. It hosts events like a Bike Rodeo, Pride Day, Public Safety Day, and a Juneteenth celebration alongside the regular Sunday gatherings. One of its most extensive yearly events is the Eco Fair, featuring organizations and vendors promoting sustainability. Sponsored by Color Brighton Green, the fair offers tips on energy efficiency, green products, demonstrations of the latest technologies, and student-led projects on alternative energy.
To uphold its local-first mission, the market is producer-only — vendors are required to grow or make what they sell. Farmers must use sustainable or organic methods, while bakers and food vendors are asked to prioritize local ingredients. All 45 vendors are located within 100 miles of Brighton.
“These standards allow the market to offer high-quality, delicious, and healthy foods grown with minimal impact on the health of our planet’s soil, water, and air,” said Gardner Smith.
The market is open 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sundays at the Westfall Road location during the winter season, and 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sundays at the Brighton High School location during the summer season. —SYDNEY BURROWS
PHOTOS PROVIDED
GROWING FAMILY FARMS CSA, PARMA | GROWINGFAMILYFARMS.COM
For those unfamiliar, a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) share is essentially a subscription to a weekly box of fresh, peak-season, locally grown produce. The option offers a sustainable, package-free alternative to traditional shopping or meal delivery kits while also supporting a local farm(er).
Many CSAs, like Growing Family Farms in Parma, offer shares with expanded pick-up locations and an accompanying virtual newsletter featuring recipe ideas (score). GFF CSA members also support organic, pesticide-free, regenerative farming techniques — and in return, they get a weekly curated box with ingredients at their freshest. Think button-sized strawberries in June, colorful and edible nasturtium flower blossoms in July and tomatoes with peach-like juice in August.
As a chef, I am committed to cooking with the seasons, and when cooking with your CSA share, the produce from local farmers will guide you toward preparing meals with peak flavor. Give leeks the spotlight they deserve with a buttery, umami lemon braise atop pillowy whipped cheese. Elevate your next charcuterie board with unctuous lavender and peppercorn pickled strawberries or use a hot honey vinaigrette to make peak summer tomatoes even more irresistible.
Although the most exciting element is one of surprise, a sample box structure could look like: A bunched green (swiss chard, kale or dandelion); an allium or two (scallions, onions, garlic, shallots, leeks, garlic scapes); salad greens (arugula, spinach, baby mustard greens, lettuce mix, baby kale, gem lettuce, romaine); an herb (thyme, sage, oregano, parsley, cilantro, mint, chives, basil, dill); and rotating fruits and vegetables at their peak (including but not limited to eggplant, elderberries, artichokes, radishes, asian pears, melons and peas).
This year, Growing Family Farm’s CSA share is more customizable than ever with three pickup locations — onsite at the farm, at Living Roots Winery downtown and at the Brighton Farmers Market — and two share plans (June 8 to Aug. 24, with an add-on option Sept. 7 to Nov. 9).
—NATASHA COTRUPI
PHOTOS PROVIDED
Mining for digital gold
ENVIRONMENT
BY GEORGE PAYNE
An invisible force is reshaping the landscape of Dresden, a quiet village nestled by the sparkling waters of Seneca Lake. No, it’s not a new eco-tourism initiative or solar farm — it’s cryptocurrency mining, a digital gold rush that promises economic growth but carries a heavy environmental price tag.
Bitcoin (BTC) is a decentralized digital currency created in 2008 by the pseudonymous Satoshi Nakamoto, an elusive person (or group) that has never been definitively identified. Bitcoin operates without a central authority, such as a government or bank. Instead, it uses blockchain technology — a secure, transparent and public ledger that records all transactions.
Bitcoin transactions are verified through a process called mining, where powerful computers called ASICs (Application-Specific Integrated Circuits) solve complex mathematical problems to validate transactions and add them to the blockchain. This process ensures that Bitcoin is not double-spent and remains secure. Interested in buying an ASIC? Prices range from $6,000 to $12,000 for new models.
Bitcoins can be used for online purchases, investments or as a store of value. The supply of Bitcoin is
The environmental cost of crypto in the Finger Lakes.
capped at 21 million, which gives it a scarcity similar to precious metals like gold.
What wasn’t clear in the beginning was the immense energy demand behind the mining process.
Mining for digital currencies has become highly competitive and energy-intensive. For communities like Dresden, the revitalization of Greenidge Generation — a natural gas plant now powering a Bitcoin mining operation — has sparked fierce debates over the balance between economic growth and environmental responsibility.
Miners like Greenidge process transactions, create new “blocks” every 10 minutes, and earn a 6.25
BTC reward plus transaction fees, profiting by continuously securing the network and earning digital assets. The process, known as proof-of-work, demands enormous amounts of electricity — more than 15 megawatts, enough to power thousands of homes.
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, mining for digital assets consumes 2.3% of all U.S. electrical demand, equivalent to the annual consumption of Argentina. By 2030, this figure is projected to rise to 8%, and Upstate New York has become a hub for such operations.
While the plant’s operators argue that mining will revive the local economy in Dresden and the region, environmental advocates point out that its reliance on natural gas contradicts New York State’s ambitious goals to decarbonize. The Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, signed into law in 2019, aims to reduce emissions to 40% below 1990 levels by 2030 and 85% by 2050.
Greenidge’s continued use of fossil fuels undermines these goals, increasing emissions and air pollution. The plant sources its natural gas from pipelines that bring the fuel from the Marcellus Shale region, primarily located in Pennsylvania, one of the largest sources of natural gas in the United States.
In addition to emissions, the plant’s massive water consumption raises concerns about the health of Seneca Lake. According to New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) records, Greenidge withdraws up to 139 million gallons of water daily from the lake for cooling, discharging it back at temperatures as high as 108°F. These hot water discharges may be contributing to harmful algae blooms that threaten aquatic ecosystems and recreational activities on the lake.
“The northwest quadrant of Seneca Lake, where Greenidge is located, had the highest incidence of harmful algae blooms last summer,” said Yvonne Taylor, founder of Seneca Lake Guardian, a NYS nonprofit dedicated to preserving and protecting the health of the Finger Lakes.
And as climate change
exacerbates rising water temperatures, Taylor points out that the problem is likely to worsen.
“This is not just a New York State or Finger Lakes issue,” she said. “Communities across the country are dealing with the same problems — air, noise, and water pollution — and it’s time to have a national conversation about the true cost of crypto mining.”
Taylor, who has deep family roots in the region, continued.
“This land is the only constant I’ve ever known,” she said. “To see a predatory corporation exploit our air and water like this is personal.”
The rapid global growth of the cryptocurrency industry has fueled debates about sustainability. Environmentalists have long raised alarms about crypto’s carbon footprint, especially in areas where operations rely on fossil fuels.
Greenidge’s use of natural gas in New York, a state committed to clean energy, is viewed by many as “greenwashing” — the practice of giving a false impression of environmental responsibility.
Cristiano Bellavitis, a Syracuse University professor specializing in entrepreneurship, has warned about the volatility of cryptocurrency mining operations.
“The market for digital assets swings wildly,” he said. “When the market crashes, these operations often scale back or shut down, leaving behind empty buildings and unmet local obligations.”
For a small community like Dresden, this could mean the loss of jobs, tax revenue and damage to local businesses that have come to rely on the plant. Bill Roege, president of Seneca Lake Pure Waters Association, echoed these concerns.
“The local community benefit from Greenidge is very small,” he said. “The company reaps the rewards, not the community. The extra local taxes raised by the operation are negligible. There are a few jobs, but this doesn’t employ many people. Tourism, which is a big industry here, is hurt by it.”
Across the globe, some Bitcoin mining operations have sought to reduce their environmental impact. For instance, Genesis Mining, one of the largest globally, moved
much of its business to Iceland and Sweden, where it uses renewable hydroelectric and geothermal energy. Riot Platforms in Texas has integrated wind power into its operations. But in places like Dresden, where the transition to renewable energy is still in its infancy, reliance on natural gas remains the easiest option for keeping operations running.
“It would be better for them to use renewable energy, but increasing demand for cryptocurrency could raise the price of solar panels and wind turbines, which would hurt everyone else,” Roege said.
New York has made efforts to address the environmental toll. In 2022, Gov. Kathy Hochul signed a two-year moratorium on new fossil fuel-powered mining projects, making the state the first in the U.S. to take such action. The moratorium targets new operations, but Greenidge has been grandfathered in, leaving advocates and residents like Taylor and Roege feeling the state’s actions are insufficient.
The DEC initially denied Greenidge’s Title V air permit renewal in 2022. That decision has been upheld three times by state courts, but Greenidge has continued operations while appealing against each ruling. The company has argued that the DEC doesn’t have the authority to deny air permits based on climate standard guidelines and that the facility is 100% carbon neutral due to the purchase of carbon offsets. (The effectiveness and transparency of such offsets are often questioned by environmental groups.)
For now, the plant continues with business as usual. The future of both cryptocurrency and Seneca Lake hangs in the balance, and it’s clear that the clock is ticking.
As the global demand for digital currencies continues to grow, it raises the fundamental question: Is this digital economy sustainable, or are we allowing it to compromise our planet’s future for a fleeting promise of financial prosperity? The question of whether mining operations like Greenidge’s are sustainable — or simply a digital energy vampire — has never been more urgent. greenidge.com
Growing together
BY ALYSSA KOH ALYSSA@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM
Madison Zeng never expected that 10 weeks of her sophomore summer in college would be dedicated to digging in dirt.
“I had never held a hoe, I had never gardened before, had never worked with plants,” she said. “It’s something I never thought I would experience.” As a city kid who grew up in Queens, her first experience with community gardening was in Rochester — and, specifically, with the nonprofit Taproot Collective.
Zeng worked with Taproot through Urban Fellows, a civic engagement internship program through the University of Rochester. She worked daily in Taproot’s educational home garden, First Market Farm on First Street, and visited over 100 community garden sites across the city for a report planned for release in summer 2025. In maintaining the space, Zeng learned how to water, plant and harvest the sometimes-literal fruits of her labor; on her first day, she got to enjoy the sweet victory of fresh-picked strawberries.
Her experience reflects the broader mission of Taproot, which is dedicated to engaging youth in urban agriculture and community building while addressing the invisible fragility of the current food system.
Founded in 2017, Taproot has always centered youth employment as a main tenet of its
Taproot teaches leadership skills to youth through community gardening.
work. While Zeng was the first Urban Fellow to work with Taproot, she was one of over 30 young people contributing to their vision over the summer.
Through the RochesterWorks Summer Youth Employment Program (SYEP), Taproot will be employing 24 students this summer for their Community Food Team. Students are taught skills in gardening, landscaping, system design and carpentry. They grow native squashes and beans, learn how to prepare gardens for winter and are involved in the weekly planning process for each site they work on.
They are also pushed to increase their comfort zone in nature — which can include things as simple as eating new plants or becoming desensitized to bugs. One former intern wrote about her experience with the program in her college essay; another learned to tolerate
“Our goal is to prepare these youth with the leadership and job readiness skills that can prepare them for whatever is next, and to be able to graduate high school with a long-term relationship with an employer,” said executive director Nathaniel Mich. “We’re able to say, yeah, this kid started with us when he was 14, and hated the taste of green — and now he’s out here pulling edible leaves.”
Mich grew up in Rochester and fell in love with community gardening after working with the South Wedge Victory Yard. To them, community gardening is a linchpin for building support networks that
“To this day, I’ve never found a better context for making friends and developing relationships with people who don’t look like me, who aren’t in my age or generation, who aren’t from my socio-economic background,” he said. “My best friends in that garden were 70-year-
Last year, Taproot supported 68 community gardens through the Community Food Team. The students that work with Taproot can find growth opportunities within the collective; through the ROC Your Job After School Program, Taproot has eight students who have been planning projects throughout the school year for the incoming cohort. For these students, the growing season is year-round. This includes weekly meetings, a winter retreat and a leadership position leading training at First Market Farm.
“We have kind of moved into our hibernation, where we come inside and are learning leadership skills that still relate to growing a garden,” said youth employment program manager Asimi Coleman. “They’re determining the things they want to grow and the things they
Coleman saw the transformative impact of gardening on youth firsthand growing up — their mother worked at a community center with a student-aided greenhouse.
“I was in college at the time, and I was able to see this big greenhouse on McCree Way and see the kids be really active in the growing and then taking what they grew and selling it at Westside Farmers Market,” they said. “It’s this very holistic program, and I would see the impact on not just them, but adults in the community who were able to support this business.”
Taproot’s initiatives also extend far beyond student employment, into the schools themselves. Last year, they partnered with RCSD educators and garden clubs to increase education in urban agriculture and food systems and expanded six community gardens throughout all four quadrants of the city. This attention, especially within areas that face food insecurity, puts the power back into the hands of the people. “Community gardens are largely run by low-income folks in lowincome neighborhoods,” said Mich. “Taproot is a direct investment in local resilient food systems that actually support people.” taprootcollective.org
PHOTOS PROVIDED
Plant-based chemistry
PHOTOGRAPHY
BY PATRICK HOSKEN PATRICK@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM
The description “locally sourced, plant-based ingredients” conjures images of delicious veg-friendly cuisine. But for Alice Cazenave, a photo artist and doctoral researcher, it’s a means of reinventing film photography and centering ecology in the process.
Cazenave is an adviser to The Sustainable Darkroom, a charity which aims to promote methods of developing film with lowtoxicity photo chemistries. Film photography requires the use of heavy metals both in the photo paper itself (silver) and the solutions needed to make the image bloom.
But in Cazenave’s world, dandelions and nettles can be boiled to make the same solutions. A stroll along a river or through a freshcut lawn yields a handful of useful materials for developing film.
“What I love about working this way is that the focus shifts massively from the final photograph, and it shifts towards the process of finding materials and trying things out together,” Cazenave said during a talk with Visual Studies Workshop in November 2024.
As part of her research with Goldsmiths University of London, Cazenave came to Rochester from the United Kingdom in 2024 to better understand Kodak’s role in
Photo artist Alice Cazenave’s work reflects Kodak’s past ecological impact while presenting sustainable solutions for the future.
Alice Cazenave led workshops at RIT on her film work, which incorporates yard trimmings and weeds in plant-based solutions. PHOTOS BY CAITLYN DAPROZA
in the local ecological devastation described, “film photography, settler colonialism and ecological violence.”
photograph is, or what the correct
gathered and used during each step
through the summer made a mark. Rochester Institute of Technology hosted her as a visiting scholar for its Art and Sustainability series in 2024, where she walked students through how to make plant-based solutions and even cultivate their own gardens for photo materials.
“You can go out, literally grab some plants out of the garden and develop your photos and not even have it be kind of funky,” said Joshua Thorson, director of RIT’s MFA program in photography and related media, who helped arrange the sessions. “It more or less looks normal if you’re using regular photo paper.”
Thorson said the concept of plant-based photo chemistry goes hand-in-hand with a renewed interest in analog photography he sees among his students.
“I think the consciousness of younger students is that they want to try to be accountable to these things and at the very least know what they’re using, not just taking it for granted,” he said.
Cazenave’s attention to the natural world led to a unique photo walk with members of The Lilac Collective, a local group connecting women and queer creatives. Five photographers hiked down to the Genesee River on a warm day in June, passing around a camera loaded with black and white film.
They collected plants as they moved along the trail, and Cazenave eventually used a portable hot plate to boil them into a solution with river water. Jen Carlson, a co-founder of The Lilac Collective, brought a bag as a makeshift darkroom.
“We were skipping rocks in the river. It was a whole experience
of nature,” Carlson said. “We just happened to be doing a chemical process without the chemicals.”
It fit squarely into Cazenave’s emerging work in Rochester. In a series titled “Red. Lined.,” she captured images of her bicycle commute from the leafy greens of East Avenue, where she stayed, to the starker northern parts of the city characterized by Kodak’s industrial footprint.
Other processes were more metaphorical. As Cazenave experimented with how to visualize the toxicity in the photos themselves, she shook dirt and grit from local highways into film emulsions depicting Kodak landmarks, signifying the company’s well-documented history of pollution.
She used water from the Genesee, contaminated with silver, to distort a picture of the High Falls neighborhood with Kodak Tower prominently centered. It presented her with a unique challenge, as she mentioned during her VSW talk: “How do you speak about toxicity through a medium that is inherently toxic?”
Another work provided a commentary on the region’s colonial history. Cazenave’s research brought her to photographer Kalen Fontenelle, whom she asked to photograph white corn, a culturally important crop to the Haudenosaunee.
Fontenelle’s black and white image shows braids of corn hanging
vertically, with one illuminated in sunlight. White corn is often prepared with culinary lye, which helps the kernels soften and is useful for photo chemistry as well. Cazenave used that solution to develop the photo.
“We definitely weren’t taking corn and wasting it,” she said in the VSW talk. “This was a way to give it another life.”
The work, which Fontenelle titled “a:yetíya’ dágeha’ [We Should Help Her],” centers the need to protect the earth in spite of continued harm done by humans.
“It’s a moving piece,” Fontenelle said. “It definitely seems like the beginning of a movement. People are starting to think about the earth as something we should take care of. The first step is always the hardest. I think Alice is a great person to be taking that first step.”
Her other local collaborators agree. Thorson said the RIT photo garden, full of heavy-metal remediating plants, will provide material for continued sustainable photo practices.
For Carlson, Cazenave’s knowledge was second only to her companionship.
“Everyone here who met Alice that I’ve talked to just loves her and misses her,” she said. “She really made an impact on all of us.” alice.cazenave.co.uk
Students learned to cultivate a garden with heavy metal-remediating plants and develop photos using plants. PHOTO BY CAITLYN DAPROZA
Local e-waste recycling facilities provide conscious
disposal for consumers and businesses.
Creating a circular economy
ENVIRONMENT
BY SUHASINI PATNI
It is difficult to remember a time when families shared a single landline and an entire room was dedicated to a shared computer that connected to the internet via dial-up. In fact, according to the United Nations Global E-Waste Monitor, global e-waste rose 82% in 2022, compared to 2010.
This means that not only are people consuming more electronic products than ever before, the life cycle has also reduced significantly. In the United States, there are 28 states, as well as Washington, D.C., with e-waste recycling laws, but no federal law requires e-waste recycling or forbids exporting e-waste to developing countries.
In 2015, New York State’s Department of Conservation announced that “consumers could no longer dispose of certain types of electronic equipment in landfills, waste-to-energy facilities, in the trash or at curbside for trash pickup.” The act further stated “consumers are required to recycle many electronic waste items, such as computers, computer peripherals, televisions, small scale servers and small electronic equipment, etc., in an environmentally responsible manner.”
“Not only are we producing waste that is shipped to countries that don’t have the same regulations as the U.S., we are also discarding valuable resources from that waste that could help us build renewable sources of energy.”
While this seems simple enough — find an electronic recycling site near your zip code to dispose of your e-waste — the act does not cover the hundreds of other electronic household devices such as vacuum cleaners, baby monitors, washers and dryers, microwaves and more. Only about 20% of e-waste gets recycled, while the rest of it may be shipped to other countries or sit in landfills.
Dr. Karen Berger, a professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Rochester, said the issue of e-waste is multifold; electronic waste has also provided an unprecedented contribution to the climate crisis.
“Not only are we producing waste that is shipped to countries that don’t have the same regulations as the U.S., we are also discarding valuable resources from that waste that could help us build renewable sources of energy,” she said.
The concept of a circular economy — where materials are either refurbished or recycled — is more important than ever before, especially when our e-waste has copper, iron, tin, cobalt, aluminum and other valuable resources. The UN’s Global E-waste Monitor reported that the U.S. has $62 billion worth of recoverable natural resources unaccounted for.
“It’s very hard for a consumer to know what’s happening to their e-waste,” said Berger. “In Monroe County, we’re very fortunate that we have the ecopark.”
The ecopark (all lowercase) is a one-stop, drop off location open Wednesdays and Saturdays, made possible through a partnership between Monroe County and Waste Management of New York.
Of course, proper disposal begins with education.
“I’m surprised how often someone will leave a TV next to their trash cans even though that’s illegal,” said Berger. “I don’t think people are trying to get around the law, but there is a lack of knowledge.”
Established in 2000, Sunnking Sustainable Solutions in Brockport processes over 25 million pounds of renewable resource materials annually and holds the distinction of being New York State’s first R2certified recycler. This certification assures customers that private data from their devices is wiped clean to prevent security issues, as well as guaranteeing e-waste is not just shipped to a different country and instead, it is either recycled or refurbished.
But Paola Viera, community programs manager at Sunnking, added that electronic waste has also provided an unprecedented contribution to the climate crisis.
“E-waste by weight in landfills only accounts for somewhere between 2-5% of space, but makes for over 70% of the toxic materials that run off with the water in landfills,” she said. “We’re fortunate that we have e-waste laws in place but even with that, New York’s recycling rate is under 30% and we only have about 16 years of landfill space left.”
Kali Smith, director of sustainability and compliance at Sunnking, said responsible recycling is the top priority.
“We want to make sure that recycled items are sent back to the circular economy,” she said. “We have a reporting tool for clients so they can actually see how many emissions they are avoiding by sending their products to us.”
In their warehouse, they recycle and refurbish electronics as well as process Styrofoam and cardboard to send to other recycling facilities.
The Sunnking website has a drop off locator; with about 120 collection sites that operate year-round, all registered with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC).
Equal to the recycling itself, Sunnking focuses on bridging the digital divide and empowering people through sustainable practices. Notably, their partnership with Camp Good Days, e-Scrap for Camp, has recycled over 6.8 million pounds of electronics and donated more than $160,000 to bring joy to children facing life-threatening challenges.
“We don’t know the value of the materials that are just sitting in our closet,” said Berger. “E-waste recycling is a key factor in transitioning into renewable energy sources such as solar panels and electric cars,” said Berger. “We don’t know the value of the materials that are just sitting in our closet.” sunnking.com
ILLUSTRATION BY JACOB WALSH
PUSHING PEAS
WORDS AND PHOTOS BY ROBERTO FELIPE LAGARES
Sustainability is a word that gets tossed around plenty when discussing the planet. It is also — like many important things IRL (in real life) — not visually glamorous. At Sweet Pea Plant-Based Kitchen, for instance, it’s often a delivered pallet of organic goods, containers of prep ingredients in a walk-in cooler and buckets of compostable scrap. Despite these less-than-instagrammable moments, chef Ryan Jennings, cofounder of Sweet Pea, holds his work in high regard. These are the pillars that help the company create delicious, highly nutritious whole food, plant-based (WFPB) meals.
I shadowed Jennings as he crafted a recipe — a Dandan noodle bowl that I tasted and will never forget — and discussed the company’s approach to remaining sustainable environmentally, while simultaneously keeping the lights on and creating a large, lasting impact at scale.
“Meet people where they are,” he said, adding that advice goes beyond diet and health. “That (approach) includes talking to people who you don’t agree with, talking to people in other businesses and industries.”
BEHIND THE LINE
Sweet Pea Plant-Based Kitchen, which is now headquartered at 777 Culver Rd., was founded in 2019 after Jennings’s co-founder Mike Linehan was inspired to change his own lifestyle by taking on and benefiting from whole food, plant-based nutrition. Since then, the two have teamed up to spread the information of the benefits of WFPB nutrition, make it attainable, convenient and — of course — delicious.
SUSTAINABILITY EFFORTS
A major goal for Sweet Pea is to mirror the sustainable lifestyle they help cultivate for their clients in their own business practices. The company sources 60% of its ingredients from local farms, has an in-house compostable packaging machine and is partnered with a delivery service that plans to move to an all-electric fleet within the next year.
Ryan Jennings, left, with Mike Wilson, owner of The Fun Guys, inspecting the day’s mushroom delivery.
PAYING IT FORWARD
Sweet Pea’s position and experience has positioned it as a resource for other small businesses, most notably through the company’s affiliation with Grow NY — a food and agriculture competition through which Sweet Pea was an awarded finalist. Jennings credits Grow NY for helping propel the business and creating their current initiative of co-manufacturing, which helps bridge the gap between small startups and large-scale production. Sweet Pea is able to guide businesses — including those in vastly different industries — to make more environmentally friendly choices, such as composting waste and utilizing sustainable packaging.
UPWARD AND ONWARD
The incremental growth of Sweet Pea has proven sustainable, and they expect to add a Syracuse location, expanding the reach of their plant-based meals. They have also extended into multiple co-manufacturing partnerships — most recently, adding both TiA Coffee based in Honeoye Falls and Spotted Duck Creamery of the Finger Lakes region to the mix. This rapid growth has also allowed the company to continue cultivating their relationship with Foodlink, with whom they have an externship program that includes a full training-to-hiring pipeline for new chefs.
The City of Rochester creates a plan to protect
against more record-breaking temps this summer.
Keep it cool
BY GINO FANELLI GFANELLI@WXXI.ORG
In 2024, Rochester set a record for its warmest year ever, as did the rest of the planet.
The average temperature last year in the region was 52.6 degrees, beating out the previous record of 51.8 degrees set in 2012. Likewise, the city set 12 daily high temperature records in 2024, according to the National Weather Service.
Put simply, the region appears to be getting warmer. That reality has spurred the City of Rochester to develop an extreme heat plan, meant to guide city resources in dealing with incidents where the heat index remains above 90 for more than two days. Heat index is calculated based on Fahrenheit temperature and humidity. For example, an 82-degree day with a humidity of 100% would have a heat index of 95.
At that temperature, heat stroke and exhaustion are possible, especially for populations like the homeless, children and elderly.
“When we did this plan, we of course wanted to look at the whole city, but we especially wanted to look at how does this effect vulnerable populations,” said Shalini Beath, manager of the city’s office of energy and sustainability.
The plan, funded by a grant from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, is meant to build a collaborative disaster response with other key emergency organizations like the American Red Cross and
the Monroe County Public Health Department. Included in the work sessions were representatives from a slew of other organizations — Rochester Institute of Technology, RG&E and the University of Rochester Medical Center.
The plan was approved by unanimous vote of the Rochester City Council in February 2025. In many ways, it mirrors something the city has already been doing for the opposite end of the weather spectrum. The Code Blue protocol is meant for extreme cold conditions and focuses on activating resources including the shelter system to get
people off of the streets.
Likewise, the extreme heat plan is meant to implement things ranging from pools to local hospitals to address extreme heat patterns. The top priority, for the city, is also similar to Code Blue: a good communications strategy.
“We will probably have a nice campaign around it to make sure everybody is aware of it,” said Carlet Cleare, press officer for the city. “Moving forward, we’ll beef it up, trying to target different people and demographics is really a touch point of it all.”
The plan comes as the city projects severe changes to heat
patterns in coming decades, based on data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. It predicts that, at current trends, average temperatures could rise by about 7.5 degrees by 2050. If emission trends increase, average temperatures could increase by upwards of 15 degrees by 2100.
Beath emphasized that the city will keep making amends to the plan according to future weather events.
“The plan is a living document,” she said, “just our first step gathering the groups so we can have a combined force when we have to address these issues.”
GLOBAL WARMING
ILLUSTRATION BY JACOB WALSH
As we observe Earth Day this month, WXXI presents several programs that shine a light on environmental issues and inspire you to take action to protect our planet.
Environmental
Connections with Jasmin Singer
Monday, April 21 through Friday, April 25 at 3 p.m. & 3:30 p.m. on WXXI-TV
This half-hour series hosted by Jasmin Singer discusses what matters — and what should — when it comes to environmental preservation. Watch all ten episodes. Also catch a two-hour live "Environment Connections" on WXXI News + WXXI News YouTube channel on March 25 from 12-2 p.m.
NOVA
“Secrets of the Forest”
Tuesday, April 22 at 7 p.m. on WXXI-WORLD
Single-Use Planet
Monday, April 21 at 9 p.m. on WXXI-TV
Plastic is vital to our modern way of life — but not all forms of it. In search of why more single-use plastic debris enters the ocean each year despite all recycling efforts, this film goes upstream in the U.S. where millions of tons of raw plastic are being made with generous government support. How have other countries solved pollution? The quest eventually leads to France.
Can forests help cool the planet? Follow scientists working in spectacular forest landscapes in Costa Rica, Brazil, Australia, and beyond as they try to untangle complex networks of trees, fungi, and creatures large and small – all in a quest to tackle the twin threats of climate change and species extinction.
Changing Planet
Wednesday, April 23 at 10 p.m. on WXXI-TV
In the third year of this 7-year project examining the issues facing the planet’s most threatened ecosystems, Dr. M. Sanjayan visits the Maldives to take an in-depth look at coral reefs and the urgent efforts to help them survive climate change.
Photo: Dr. M. Sanjayan/Credit: Jennifer Jones/BBC Studios
Three things Jasmin Singer suggests you can do right now to live more eco-friendly.
1. Eliminate or reduce your consumption of animal products, as they wreak havoc on the planet. My biggest piece of advice here is to not let perfect be the enemy of the good; really, truly do what you can, given your unique set of circumstances.
2. Move toward electrifying your home as much as possible, removing our dependence on fossil fuels to heat and cool our homes.
3. No longer use single-use plastics; there’s a whole world of alternatives available to you.
Photo provided by PBS
Photo provided by PBS
Credit: Natalie Sinisgalli
Meet five musicians whose devotion to their craft defies generational trends.
In this six-part series you’ll meet Peyton Crony, who plays the viola and studies under Roberta Zalkind of the Eastman Community School of Music; Helena Dixon, who plays the cello and studies under Kathy Kemp at The Hochstein School; Erica Liu, who plays the violin and studies under Marcos Kreutzer at The Hochstein School; Ashley Park, who plays the violin and studies under YooJin Jang at the Eastman School of Music, University of Rochester; and Benjamin Watson, who plays piano and French horn. He is an Eastman Community Music School student studying French horn under Maura McCune Corvington and Michael Stevens.
America The Bountiful
Saturdays at 1:30 p.m. on WXXI-TV
Hosted, created, and produced by TV personality Carpi Cafaro, America The Bountiful takes you through personal chronicles of farmers, artisans, restaurateurs, and home cooks by way of the food that they grow, produce, and eat. The series features 13 episodes, with a visit to the Naples’ Grape Festival and the Finger Lakes Wine region in episode eight (airing on May 24).
Photo: Carpi Cafaro/Provided by APT
Subscribe to WXXI’s YouTube channel to binge our latest series, "In the Key of Z: Classical". You can also watch it on WXXI.org/keyofz and an audio version on WXXI Classical every Monday several times a day throughout the month.
This series is made possible with support from: The Jane and Robert C. Stevens Fund for New Programming.
Independent Lens “We Want the Funk”
Tuesday, April 8 at 9 p.m. on WXXI-TV
We Want the Funk is a syncopated voyage through the history of funk music, spanning from African, soul, and early jazz roots, to its rise into the public consciousness. Featuring James Brown’s dynamism, the extraterrestrial funk of George Clinton’s Parliament Funkadelic, transformed girl group Labelle, and Fela Kuti’s Afrobeat, the story also traces funk’s influences on both new wave and hip-hop.
Photo: Songwriter and producer, Marcus Miller/Credit: Firelight Films
The Corridors of Power
Monday, April 14 at 10 p.m. on WXXI-TV
A riveting exploration of how American leaders have made foreign policy decisions when faced with reports of genocide, war crimes, and mass atrocities after the fall of the Soviet Union, when America stood as the only global superpower. Rare archival footage and indepth interviews with political leaders offer insight into the workings of the White House to understand not only what happened, but why it happened.
Photo: President Obama in brief with Generals/Credit: Barack Obama Presidential Library
Whitstable Pearl
Thursdays at 9 p.m., starting April 17 on WXXI-TV
This six-part series follows single mother Pearl (Kerry Godliman of After Life) as she pursues her lifelong dream to start a private detective agency, which she runs from her family restaurant in the coastal English town of Whitstable. Drawn by her caring nature, locals soon flock to her with all kinds of cases. But when a friend dies suspiciously, Pearl finds herself in conflict with a gruff new cop in town, DCI Mike McGuire.
Photo: Kerry Godliman/Provided by APT
WXXI is pleased to host Indie Lens Pop-Up, a neighborhood series that brings people together for film screenings and community-driven conversations. The screenings are free and open to the public. For more information, visit WXXI.org/events
Free for All: Inside the Public Library
Thursday, April 10 from 2-6 p.m.
The Kate Gleason Auditorium of the Central Library of Rochester & Monroe County 115 South Avenue, Rochester
From the pioneering women behind the “Free Library Movement” to today’s librarians who service the public despite working in a contentious age of closures and book bans, meet those who created a civic institution where everything is free and the doors are open to all. Panel discussion to follow the screening.
Matter of Mind: My Alzheimer’s
Monday, April 28 from 6:30-8:30 p.m.
The Little Theatre, Theatre 1 240 East Avenue, Rochester
An intimate portrayal of three families confronting the unique challenges of Alzheimer’s and how this progressive neurodegenerative disease transforms roles and relationships. Panel discussion to follow the screening.
Watch Live Weekdays
You can watch Connections live weekdays 12-2 on WXXI News YouTube! Past episodes are also available so never miss out on what Rochester is talking about!
Live
from
Hochstein
Wednesdays at 12:10 p.m. on WXXI Classical
This lunchtime concert series that is broadcast live from The Hochstein School is hosted by WXXI Classical's Mona Seghatoleslami. Each week Mona introduces some of the finest artists from the Rochester area’s musical community to the stage to perform. Attend in person at The Hochstein School or listen on WXXI Classical or streaming on WXXIClassical.org. Concerts run from 12:10-12:50 p.m.
Performances in April include:
April 2
fivebyfive and Emily Pinkerton
Featuring fivebyfive (Laura Lentz, flute; Marcy Bacon, clarinet; Ken Luk, electric guitar; Eric J. Polenik, bass; Haeyeun Jeun, piano) and Emily Pinkerton, voice and banjo.
April 9
Concentus Women’s Chorus
Featuring Concentus Women’s Chorus; Anna Atwater, Music Director.
April 16: Spring Recess – no concert
April 23
Gateways Brass Collective
Featuring Gateways Brass Collective (Herbert Smith and Courtney Jones, trumpet; Larry Williams, horn; Isrea Butler, trombone; and Jerome Stover, tuba).
April 30
Hochstein 2025 Merit Scholarship Winners
Featuring Noah Busch, violin; Christian Chan, cello; and Allison Glaza, cello.
You can hear an encore broadcast of Live from Hochstein later the same day at 10 p.m. on WXXI Classical.
TO TUNE INTO ON SHOWS4
Road to Joy
Tuesdays from 6-8 p.m. on The Route
Hitch a ride with your host Maureen Rich as she takes you on a musical journey of joy, passion, happiness, comfort, and sorrow.
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Whole Lotta Shakin’
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Saturdays at 4 p.m. on The Route Rockabilly, R&B, Instrumental, Surf, Twist, British Invasion, Garage Rock, and a bit of '77 style Punk – that’s what host Mike Murray brings to you every week.
Q. Tell us a little about yourself.
A. I was born in Mount Vernon, New York and moved to Rochester when I was 6 years old. I am also a local independent promoter. My company is called Live! My wife and I have cats and the newest addition to the family is named Muna. I love the NBA, English Premier League, music, traveling, wildlife, science fiction movies, and writing/performing music.
Q. What inspired you to become a radio host, and how did you land this role?
A.I have been involved on and off with college/public radio since the early 90s. One music director asked if I wanted to become a DJ so I could get "closer to the music" and I think that was very accurate. I have also always loved making playlists for people. Of course, back in the day it was mixed tapes/CDs. I also attended a music college, so music has always been a very important part of my life.
Blacks & Blues
Fridays from 9 p.m. to Midnight on The Route
Each week, host Doug Curry highlights the full spectrum of blues music past and present, acoustic and electric, with a perspective that spotlights the history of the people, places, and even the politics behind the recordings.
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Rejuvenation
Fridays from 6-9 p.m. on The Route
Host Scott Wallace shares his vast collection of R&B, soul, and funk music, which are sure to revive your soul.
Q. How would you describe your personal music taste, and how does it influence your show?
Take 5 with Tony Brown
Tony hosts Thursday nights from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. on The Route. We asked him five questions about himself and his music taste. Here's what he had to say.
A. Anything that moves me. Genre doesn't make much difference, but it has to move me in some way. I also love when artists interpret other artist's songs by doing covers, and when they put out live versions of their music. Music has always been my soundtrack to life and so I play/ listen to music that fits and hope other people can relate to some of it.
Q. What’s the most exciting part of hosting a live radio show, and what’s the most challenging?
A. The most exciting part of hosting a live radio show is getting some feedback. If just one person calls in or sends a text or email, it really makes my day.
The most challenging aspect is putting together a cohesive show and when to stop second guessing myself.
Q. What’s one song or album that’s been a game-changer for you, and why?
A. There are too many songs that have made a huge difference to me over the years. Music has played a very important part of my entire life. I cannot imagine getting through the day without it. Some current favorites include Michael Kiwanuka, Celeste, Nils Frahm, Duvall Timothy, Max Richter, Moses Sumney, and Hiatus Kaiyote.
A LYTTLE LYNCH FILM SERIES
DETAILS AT THELITTLE.ORG
With the passing of David Lynch in January 2025, modern cinema lost one of its enigmatic masters. Over a career of 45 years, Lynch touched the worlds of television, film, music, and more. To honor his life and celebrate his work, the Dryden and The Little will be screening selections from the director’s filmography.
Saturday, April 12 AT THE LITTLE Mulholland Drive
Saturday, April 19 AT THE LITTLE The Short Films of David Lynch
Wednesday, April 30 AT THE DRYDEN Wild at Heart
Thursday, April 10 at 7pm Saturday, April 12 at 3pm
One Take Documentary Series • thelittle.org
GOODBYE HORSES: THE MANY LIVES OF Q LAZZARUS
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 9 AT 7:30PM TICKETS AT THELITTLE.ORG
A feature documentary about the life and music of singer-songwriter Diane Luckey, also known as Q Lazzarus. Q sang the hit song ‘Goodbye Horses’, which appeared in the Jonathan Demme films Married to the Mob and Silence of the Lambs, and had a brief moment of fame in the late 1980s/early 1990s before mysteriously disappearing for 25 years.
There will be a Q&A with director Eva Aridjis following the screening.
In 2003,
eight Rhode Island artists created a secret apartment inside the busy Providence Place Mall and lived there for four years, filming everything along the way. They snuck in furniture, tapped into the mall’s electricity, and even constructed a wall, smuggling in more than two tons of cinderblock.
Far more than just a wild prank, the secret apartment became a deeply meaningful place for its inhabitants. It was a personal expression of defiance against local gentrification, a boundary-pushing work of public/ private art, and a clubhouse in which large-scale charitable art projects were planned.
Presented with community part Rochester Contemporary Art Center (RoCo) There will be a virtual Q&A with Director Jeremy Workman after the Thursday, April 10 screening.
This fundraising event will be an evening of reflection, celebration, and a look towards the future, as we take time to honor those whose dedication ensured The Little’s existence and viability for current and future generations to enjoy. Proceeds from this event will directly support operational needs and the endowment of The Little.
at
todo DAILY
Full calendar of events online at roccitymag.com
SATURDAY, APRIL 5
MUSIC
Flower City Thaw
Mutiple venues, events.humanitix.com/ flower-city-thaw Springtime is here. Time for some walkable tunes. The brainchild of The Local Sound Collaborative’s Ray Mahar, Three Heads Brewing’s Geoff Dale and property manager Max Gianniny, this ambitious event spans several venues in the East and Alexander area, including the recently reopened Anthology. All of them boast musical acts throughout the night. Sets from local faves A Girl Named Genny, Overhand Sam and Bad Weapon, Aaron Lipp, Bellwether Breaks and more. Music begins every 30 minutes. 5 p.m. to midnight. One $20 ticket is all you need.
PATRICK HOSKEN
ART
ARTISANworks
25th Anniversary Gala Celebration
ARTISANworks, artisanworks.net For a quarter century, ARTISANworks founder Louis Perticone transformed a Blossom Road warehouse into a 40,000 squarefoot art haven. This gala is a tribute to Perticone, who passed away this past July. To honor his work, the space will do what it does best — bring
artists and art lovers together in a vivid extravaganza. In the words of Bill Hader’s “SNL” character Stefan, this place has everything: live music and painting, aerial artists, caricatures and a silent auction. 6-10 p.m. Tickets $100, with sponsorship opportunities available online. ALYSSA KOH
GAMING
ROC Game Fest
Spring Mini Show
Irondequoit Library, rocgamefest.com
It can be easy to feel like the world of gaming exists in Triple-A titles, but Rochester’s college game design programs have led to a lively developer community right in our backyard. To find some hidden gems for your coffee table or Steam catalog, ROC Game Dev’s festival will have you succeeding that investigation check. Try out board games and video games from dozens of designers and find your next weeknight obsession from noon to 5 p.m. Admission is free. AK
SUNDAY, APRIL 6
LECTURE
Don Alhart
Fort Hill Performing Arts Center, forthillpac.com
When he signed off for the final time in June 2024, longtime 13WHAM anchor Don Alhart did so as a record holder. Guinness World Records
recognized him for the longest career as a male television news broadcaster, with 58 years behind the desk. Naturally, the newscaster who’s been called “the Walter Cronkite of Rochester” has plenty of knowledge to impart. He’ll do so in this chat with fellow 13WHAM alum Ginny Ryan. 4 p.m. $29 cash, $30.16 credit card.
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MUSIC
Monteverdi’s “Vespers of 1610”
Asbury First United Methodist Church, pegasusearlymusic.org
When the Pegasus Early Music group presents a performance of Italian composer Claudio Monteverdi’s “Vespro della Beata Vergine,” often called the “Vespers of 1610,” it does so using period-precise instruments like the organ, strings, theorbos, cornettos and trombones. It’s really the only way to experience the piece, which will be brought to life with 25 players at 4 p.m. Ticket info: Students/limited income tickets $10, general tickets $30 and patron tickets $80. PH
MONDAY, APRIL 7
MUSIC
Jenny Scheinman presents All Species Parade
Bop Shop Records, bopshop.com
Violinist and composer Jenny Scheinman serves as proof that the modern mind’s attention span can extend for far longer than the 3:30 normally allocated to our radio hits. Her newest 2024 release, which will be performed live at Bop Shop, has multiple songs over 11 minutes long. Despite their length, there is nothing droll about these pieces. Scheinman herself refers to the album as “nature
worship music,” which resonates as ethereal and nostalgic, like tracing the rings of a tree trunk and feeling the age of the wood on your fingertips. Tickets $30. Doors at 7 p.m., concert at 8 p.m. AK
TUESDAY, APRIL 8
THEATER
“Funny Girl”
West Herr Auditorium Theatre, rbtl.org
“Don’t Rain on My Parade” is one of the most iconic and well-known songs in musical theater history. It’s been sung by no less than Barbra Streisand, Bea Arthur and, on Broadway in 2022, Beanie Feldstein and Lea Michele. RBTL brings this touring production of a so-called “love letter to the theater” — the musical, biographical story of comedian Fanny Brice — to the stage for ample opportunity to hear it sung once more. When the tune is this good, it simply never goes out of style. Eight performances through Apr. 13. Tickets $38-$109. PH
LITERATURE
Keetje Kuipers
Writers & Books, wab.org
Poet Keetje Kuipers’s newest book, “Lonely Women Make Good Lovers,” is a collection of love poems with occasional complications. It shares its title with a 1972 country song that ultimately resolves with a bit of sagely advice: “So if you got a woman, you better treat her just as good as you can.” Kuipers, who lives in Missoula, Montana, will speak virtually with BOA Editions’ Peter Conners at 7 p.m. Pay what you can up to $20. PH
CONTINUED ON PAGE 42
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 9
RECREATION
Yoga at Ganondagan
Grasslands Yoga Circle, ganondagan.org/events
As the cold weather starts to wane, your body might be itching to get outside and soak up the sun. Why not do so while also experiencing the wonders of the only New York State Historic Site dedicated to the lives of the Haudenosaunee people? Ganondagan’s yoga classes, which run on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays 7:30-8:30 a.m., are located right down the street from its full-size reproduced longhouse and Seneca Art & Culture Center (where yoga is held in case of inclement weather). Breathe in, remember those who came before you and breathe out. Free or donationbased from $5-$20. AK
DANCE
Kizz Intel
Wednesdays
Village Gate Center, instagram.com/kizz_intel
Right in the heart of Village Gate’s second floor, Tin Man and Breezy bring their dedication and chemistry to Kizz Intel. They teach Urban Kiz, a partner-based social dance that evolved from the Angolan dance music genre kizomba and is mainly done to Afrobeat and R&B-style music. Classes are all-level, which means there’s no excuse to not bring a friend or partner and pick up some smooth, slow grooves. Every Wednesday 7-9 p.m. Tickets $5-$20. AK
THURSDAY, APRIL 10
RECREATION
Adults Night
Skate Luvers, skateluvers.com
As a kid, there is nothing cooler than being able to cruise around on wheels. Whether it’s a car, skateboard or roller skates, going beyond the bounds of your own two feet can feel freeing — and it’s that wonderstruck energy that Skate Luvers looks to bring back to its patrons. Thursdays are adults-only 7-10 p.m., and this month, Skate Luvers is offering rhythm skate lessons from 5-6 p.m. for $50 for all four weeks. Let the music move you — or, if the sidelines feel more appropriate after that lesson, ditch your friends in favor of the arcades and game tables to “give your legs a break.” Open skate is $15, with skate rental included. AK
FRIDAY, APRIL 11
FESTIVAL
Roc City Tattoo Expo
DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Rochester, roccitytattooexpo.com
Picking a tattoo artist is like picking someone to marry — the result of your actions might stay with you forever, unless you’re willing to pay to get it removed. As a result, it’s good to discern between a bunch of options before getting down on one knee (and bracing for the needle in the other). To help you get the tattoo of your dreams, Roc City Tattoo Expo has artists from across the nation and recommends contacting them in advance to secure a slot. You have all weekend to make your mark on the expo — or, more accurately, have them make their mark on you — 11 a.m. to 11 p.m., with Sunday ending a little earlier (at 7 p.m.). Tickets $15 per day or $40 for the weekend. AK
SATURDAY, APRIL 12
BENEFIT
City of Rochester Black Heritage Gala: African Americans and Labor
Rochester Riverside Convention Center, blackheritagerochester.org
Celebrating Black history in Rochester spans far beyond the month of February; for the City of Rochester, this event is a night to honor Black community members who have changed Rochester for the better. Dinner and entertainment are provided, and formal attire is encouraged. The event starts at 5:30 p.m. Tickets $100. Available online or in person (cash only) at City Hall. AK
FESTIVAL
Rochester Indie Comics Expo 2025
Sibley Square, wnycomicarts.com/rice-2025
There’s more to comics than your standard Marvel edition or Webtoon — and at Rochester Indie Comics Expo (RICE), over 75 independent artists and publishers will be displaying the greatest the art form has to offer. From Apr. 10-12, RICE also facilitates free workshops and panels across the city — some of which require pre-registration to attend. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Free parking is available in the Mortimer Street Garage. AK
CONCERT
BossMan Dlow
Water Street Music Hall, waterstreetmusichall.live
The BossMan is on a new wave — a new surfboard, even, as his opening bars to “Dlow Curry” state — which makes Water Street the perfect venue for the Floridian rapper as he tours up north. His 2024 album is full of
what he once described to “Billboard” as “motivation music” and features collaborations with other notable artists breaking into the current hiphop scene, including Ice Spice, French Montana and GloRilla. He performs solo. 21+. Tickets $76-$111. Doors at 7 p.m., show at 8 p.m. AK
SUNDAY,
APRIL 13
SHOPPING
Community Garage Sales and Super Fleas
Rochester Public Market, cityofrochester.gov
For some, the most wonderful time of the year comes with holiday shopping; for others, the trusty cost-effective garage sale brings even more childlike wonder. To bring cheer to all, the City of Rochester is starting its biweekly Sunday flea markets. Within them, a treasure trove of bargains awaits; everything from practical household supplies to intricate trinkets and tchotchkes is ready to find a new home. 7 a.m.-1 p.m. AK
BENEFIT
Makers to the Rescue!
Lento Restaurant, facebook.com/ RocOnlyEvents
Fun, food, fostering community and furry friends. What else does one need? At ROC Only Events’s partnership with Lento Restaurant and Verona Street Animal Society, small businesses will offer pampering opportunities for pets and owners alike. Get a chair massage or animalthemed flash tattoo; for fur babies, gourmet treats, toys and custom pet portraits will be available for purchase. Proceeds go toward supporting local shelter Rochester Animal Services. 11 a.m.-4 p.m. AK
Rochester International Film Festival
MONDAY, APRIL 14
MUSIC
Worry Club
•
Montage Music Hall, rocentevents.com Pop-punk from Chicago run through with the influence of both Motion City Soundtrack and lo-fi study beats. References to self-pleasure and heartbreak. An EP called “All Frogs Go to Heaven.” If any of these attributes appeal to you, make your way to see Worry Club, whose artist photo on Spotify is an extended middle finger. “Crycore” band Scarlet Demore opens. Doors at 7 p.m., music at 8. 16+ with ID. General admission tickets $28.34. PH
TUESDAY, APRIL 15
MUSIC
Dweezil Zappa
Kodak Center, kodakcenter.com
Believe it or not, Dweezil Zappa, the son of the late Frank Zappa, is in his mid 50s now, and he brings his Rox(postroph)y Tour to Rochester on Tax Day. It’s a celebration of his father’s albums “Roxy & Elsewhere” and “Apostrophe.” Born Ian Donald Calvin Euclid Zappa, Dweezil got his first guitar at age 6 and was 12 when he first performed on stage. He’s a rock guitarist and an occasional actor, too. 7:30 p.m. Tickets range from $35.50 to $85.50. ALEX CRICHTON
THEATER
“Pure Native”
Geva Theatre, gevatheatre.org
Tuscarora playwright Vickie Ramirez pens this tale of identity and commerce, in which protagonist Brewster returns to the Rez, where he grew up, to find his new way of life challenged. Catch the East Coast premiere on Geva’s Wilson Stage, helmed by Randy Reinholz — Choctaw director and founder of Los Angeles theater group Native Voices — through May 11. The show is presented in associated with Native Voices and Friends of Ganondagan. Ticket information available online.
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WEDNESDAY, APRIL 16
FILM
“Foragers”
The Little Theatre, onfilmrochester.org In visual artist Jumana Manna’s film 2022 “Foragers,” older folks aim to find their own wild akkoub and za’atar growing in Palestine/Israel for cooking, only to be met with a brick wall of regulations against that practice. The University of Rochester’s student group OnFilm presents a screening at 7:30 p.m. along with a post-film panel discussion and a photo pop-up with work from Joseph Ciembroniewicz. PH
THURSDAY, APRIL 17
FOOD + BEV
Murder arrives at Flight Wine Bar
Flight Wine Bar, winebarflight.com Wine won’t be the only red to look out for at Flight Wine Bar. With the bar transformed into an interactive murder mystery show, the wine is only part of what might make your head spin. Prizes will be awarded for those best dressed in 1920s attire, so dust off those century-old shoes before dusting
for fingerprints. 6:30-8:30 p.m. Tickets $65 for one drink, three small plate courses and gratuity. AK
MUSIC
Third Thursdays with Eastman’s Italian Baroque Organ
Memorial Art Gallery, esm.rochester. edu/organ/events/third-thursdays
There are plenty of classical music offerings in Rochester, but how many give you a chance to hear a theorbo — a bass-range lute used mainly in Baroque music from Italy and France? The concert starts at 7 p.m., but seating is first-come, first-serve. Admission is free for University of Rochester ID holders and included in MAG gallery admission. AK
FRIDAY, APRIL 18
MUSIC
Joan Osborne
JCC Hart Theater, jccrochester.org/arts-culture
Community Players’ centennial season. Directed by Jean Gordon Ryon, the show runs through May 3. Performances are at 7 p.m., with one matinee on Apr. 27. ASL-interpreted performance on Apr. 26. $20 general admission tickets and $15 for seniors and students. PH
EASTER SERVICES
In 1995, Joan Osborne asked a potent question: “What if God was one of us?” The song which bears that chorus, penned by Eric Bazilian, earned three Grammy nominations and became her signature tune. But two decades later, Osborne pivoted to an even more familiar songbook, covering a baker’s dozen Bob Dylan tracks. She honors favorites from “Blood on the Tracks” and his mid-’60s peak but likewise shines digging deep into songs like “Dark Eyes” and “Ring Them Bells.” Osborne pulls from those covers for this 7 p.m. set. $55-$75. PH
THEATER “The Ferryman”
MuCCC, rochestercommunityplayers.org
Jez Butterworth’s tale of a former IRA volunteer takes center stage for the second production of Rochester
Dawn of Hope
Easter Morning at Downtown Presbyterian Church e Rev. Val Fowler, preaching
Festive music for Choir, Brass and Organ
11am Worship, Nursery care provided.
121 N. Fitzhugh St., Rochester NY downtownpresbyterian.org • 585-325-4000
Lee Wright, director of music ministry Salem United Church of Christ 60 Bittner Street 14604 • www.christinthecity.com
Easter Sunday Service April 20th, 10am Traditional Tenebrae service with readings telling the story of the Last Supper & Jesus’ betrayal. Join us in celebrating the good news of Christ’s resurrection! Won’t you join us?
Maundy Thursday Tenebrae Service April 17th, 7:30pm
Good Friday April 18th, 12-3pm
Sanctuary will be open for personal reflection.
Hope to see you there. We'll save you a seat.
SATURDAY, APRIL 19
MUSIC
EXTC
Lovin’ Cup, bopshoprecords.com
From 1979 to 1982, Terry Chambers set the beat for highly influential English New Wave band XTC. But when the group decided to stop touring and become a studio entity, Chambers made his exit. Several decades later (with approval from XTC leader Andy Partridge), Chambers recruited guitarist Steve Hampton and bassist Terry Lines to bring XTC to life on stage once more. The appropriately named EXTC plays hits like “Making Plans for Nigel”
and “Senses Working Overtime” with occasional dips into the group’s more experimental post-Chambers output. Music’s at 8 p.m. $30 advance, $35 at the door. PH
The third collaboration between fitness trainer Alex Alletto and infrared sauna Lumos will give all participants a cleanse of their bodies (with a 30-minute free sauna session) and hearts (with a portion of their entry fee going towards AutismUp, which provides support services for children with autism across the greater Rochester area). Roll out your mat by 10 a.m. at the Culver Road Armory location. Tickets $30. AK
SUNDAY,
APRIL 20
GAMING
Dungeons & Dragons at Legacy Games
Legacy Game Store, legacygamestore.com
D&D is mainstream, if the success of “Stranger Things,” “Critical Role” and “Dimension 20” have anything to say about it. If leafing through the PHB home is too daunting, Legacy Games is a perfect place to start your intrepid journey with weekly DM Greg. 11 a.m.-2 p.m. $10 per player. AK
MUSIC
Candlelight Concert and Compline with Schola Cantorum
Christ Church, events.rochester.edu
You don’t have to be spiritual to feel how music moves you — and with Schola Cantorum, it is easy to feel weightless in a world that seemingly seeks to leave you downtrodden. The ensemble, which also serves as a course at Eastman School of Music, specializes in Gregorian “plainsong” chant (monophonic and arhythmic) alongside a litany of Baroque and Renaissance choral compositions. Take in the candlelit ambiance and high, reverberant ceilings — both a treat for the ears and the eyes. 9 p.m. AK
MONDAY, APRIL 21
MUSIC
Alice Di Micele & Sarah De Valliere
Abilene Bar & Lounge, abilenebarandlounge.com
Americana artist Alice Di Micele released her first album in 1988; her latest, 2022’s “Every Seed We Plant,” continues her story as a gifted musician pulling inspiration from the natural world. She’s joined by local opener Sarah De Vallière, whose own work delves into images of rivers and skies. Doors at 6:30 p.m., music at 7. $10 at the door. PH
TUESDAY, APRIL 22
THEATER
The Simon & Garfunkel Story
Kodak Center, kodakcenter.com
Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel are living legends, and like all legends, their story has been told and reinterpreted by many creators. This tale blends a theatrical narrative with the energy and staging of a concert and takes you on a two-decade journey of successes, splits and sounds of silence. Show starts at 7 p.m. Tickets $65-$192. AK
COMMUNITY
The NEMNU From The Old
North Winton Village Association, nemnu.org
Award-winning blogger Geoffrey Zeiner is entrenched within the lost archives of Rochester culture; his blog, Gonechester, covers everything from long-gone cafes in NOTA to Rochester’s history with the pipe cleaner. For this talk, Zeiner will be presenting on the historical figures who most impacted the North East Main area. Talk starts at 7 p.m. AK
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 23
RECREATION
Yoga & Meditation
Blk Haus Boutique, instagram.com/revampnation1
This Black-owned art sanctuary run by Jasmine Benjamin lives a double life: hosting small businesses of color within its store during the day and yoga practitioners at night. All experience levels are welcome and encouraged. 6-7 p.m. Tickets $3-5, with kids under 13 provided free entry. AK
CONTINUED ON PAGE 46
CROSSWORD PUZZLE ANSWERS
THURSDAY, APRIL 24
MUSIC
Gateways Festival Orchestra
Kodak Hall at Eastman Theatre, esm. rochester.edu/theatre/events
When you think of classical music, what comes to mind? As a celebration of Black classical artistry, Gateways Music Festival looks to reinvent your expectations. The festival’s orchestra will perform William Levi Dawson’s “Negro Folk Symphony.” The piece broke from customary etiquette when it was first performed, with audiences applauding before the symphony had even concluded. 7:30 p.m. Tickets $28-$38. AK
MUSIC
Beth Hart
Kodak Center, kodakcenter.com
Beth Hart has been belting from the heart for nationwide audiences since 1999, and her most recent album, “You Still Got Me,” is full of the same grit and showmanship as all the rest. A consistent winner of blues music awards, Hart’s energy and dynamism may have even increased at the age of 53 — and, as she would say, “Never Underestimate a Gal.” Tickets $49$221. Show starts at 7:30 p.m. AK
FRIDAY, APRIL 25
Community Design Center of Rochester Gallery, bit.ly/engagement25
Whether you’re trying to live carlite or want to know more about Reconnect’s new Downtown SmART Streets Project, Reconnect’s free quarterly engagement breakfast is a vital foot in the door to talk shop about mobility in the city. 8:30-10 a.m. AK
MUSIC
Piano music of Rachmaninov and Schumann
The Church of St. Luke & St. Simon Cyrene, twosaints.org
A lunchtime half-hour of piano music would feel right in any weather. But on a late-April Friday afternoon, it has the potential to hit even more sweetly. Jennie Jiang performs Rachmaninov’s Sonata No. 2 (first movement), Schumann’s Faschingsschwank aus Wien, op. 26 and Busoni’s transcription of Bach’s “Wachet Auf, Ruft Uns Die Stimme,” BWV 645. 12:15 p.m. Free. PH
CONTINUED ON PAGE 50
THEATER
Playwrights’ Play Readings
Geneva Public Library, genevatheatreguild.org/tickets
Now in its 27th year, Geneva Theatre Guild’s “Playwrights’ Play Readings” offers budding writers an opportunity to showcase their short plays — and a diverse crew of local actors to bring them to life. From Apr. 25-27, the 150 plays will be read by thespians both veteran and new; the first event occurs at Geneva Public Library at 7 p.m. Pay what you wish. Follow it with two more readings at the Anthony Road Winery and The Dove Block, respectively, over the course of the weekend. PH
SATURDAY, APRIL 26
MUSIC
Steven Page
Smith Opera House, thesmith.org
Though Ontario’s Barenaked Ladies earned a rep for their humorous take on ‘90s college rock, Steven Page’s thoughtful songwriting held the entire
enterprise together. Case in point: For every nerd-rap “One Week,” there’s a moody romantic ballad like “Call and Answer.” Or “Break Your Heart.” Or “Conventioneers.” Page left the group in 2009, and his solo career has been full of left turns. The latest is a hookladen album called “Excelsior” and a new supergroup called The TransCanada Highwaymen. He pulls from his deep catalog for this intimate 8 p.m. show in Geneva. $39.56-$81.58. PH
BENEFIT
Ugly Disco
Hyatt Regency Hotel, uglydisco.com
What if partying all night helped save lives, Ugly Disco asks? For Golisano Children’s Hospital, where all the proceeds from this bash will be donated, this hypothetical is a reality — and one that anyone 21+ can contribute to. DJs and local bands will be performing top ‘70s hits all night. Tickets $43-$158. 8 p.m.-1 a.m. AK
FESTIVAL
BrickUniverse
LEGO Fan Expo
ROC Dome Arena, brickuniverseusa. com
Everything is awesome when you’re living the dream (and as a LEGO fan, a full display of exhibits and chances to create builds of your own sounds pretty idyllic). Tickets $19-$36. General admission runs from 10 a.m.12:30 p.m. and 1:30-4., with VIP admission adding an extra hour. AK
SUNDAY, APRIL 27
MUSIC
Rochester Record Fair
Radio Social, rochesterrecordfair.com
Every spring, for a bit anyway, the smell of vinyl mingles with that of budding flowers. The annual Rochester Record Fair brings dozens of vendors — and even more hungry crate-diggers — to Radio Social for an all-you-can-forage fest. Not just records, either; CDs, movies, books and other miscellaneous cultural artifacts are up for grabs. If you see Miracle Legion’s 1987 album
“Surprise Surprise Surprise,” let me know. Free admission 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Early birds get in at 10 for $10. PH
FESTIVAL
Rochester Regional Health Flower City Challenge
Parcel 5, flowercitychallenge.com
Yellowjacket Racing is rewarding athletes of all ages and abilities for running at events around Monroe County. The Flower City Challenge kicks off (pun intended) the 2025 Fleet Feet Grand Prix. Want to run?
The half marathon starts at 7:30 a.m., with a 5K commencing 10 minutes after and the kids’ half-mile race starting at 10:30. For all options, you can also register to participate virtually. Local party band Uptown Groove will play live during all the races. Afterwards, runners and onlookers can enjoy a post-race party, complete with free pizza, physical therapy and chiropractic professionals and a kids’ bounce house. $16-$114, depending on the race and time of registration. AK
MUSIC
The Lightfoot Band
Theater at Innovation Square, theaterais.com
Though Gordon Lightfoot died in 2023, his musical legacy lives on — quite literally, thanks to the musicians who played with him on tour for years. The Lightfoot Band pulls from the Canadian troubadour’s prolific songbook, with an emphasis on hits like “Sundown” and “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.” But the stories behind the songs are just as alluring, and the Lightfoot Band members tell them authoritatively. After all, who would know better than
the people who lived them? Doors for the 3 p.m. afternoon show open an hour earlier. Tickets $40.53-$50.72.
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MONDAY, APRIL 28
MUSIC
Gamelan Lila Muni and Gamelan Sanjiwani
Kilbourn Hall, events.rochester.edu Gamelan, a traditional ensemblebased music style from Indonesia, uses mainly percussive metal instruments and hand drums to keep a beat and establish a melody. During the free concert, both ensembles, whose players come from Eastman and ECMS, will be accompanied by guest dancers throughout the performance. 7:30-9:30 p.m. AK
TUESDAY, APRIL 29
Lila’s in the Lobby, lilasinthelobby.com
In a town with no shortage of jazz performers, Victrola Voilà! sweetens the pot by focusing on the early 20thcentury Parisian variety, hot jazz and gypsy jazz, à la Django Reinhardt. Anchored by Gavin Rice on banjo, Melanie Moralez on guitar, Brian Williams on bass and Jim Santa on guitar. 5-8 p.m. PH
CONTINUED ON PAGE 52
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 30
FOOD + BEV
Food Truck Rodeo
Rochester Public Market, cityofrochester.gov
Spring arrives when the Food Truck Rodeo comes to town, with its first appearance kicking off the most vibrant months of the Public Market. Make sure to bring a chair — as fun as window-shopping at all the food trucks is, getting to sit, listen to live music and eat might be an even sweeter deal. 5-9 p.m. AK
THURSDAY, MAY 1
Rochester International Film Festival
Dryden Theatre, rochesterfilmfest.org
As the home of the Eastman Museum and Kodak, Rochester has deep historical ties to film that make it a perfect place to host diverse filmmakers. Four distinct free screenings will be held alongside educational tours and opportunities to connect with other movie buffs. Donations welcome. AK
FRIDAY, MAY 2
DANCE
Roc Dances!
Hochstein School, hochstein.org
Alongside its music class offerings, Hochstein does a weekly free community dance class taught by local professionals. Classes are open to anyone age 7+. May kicks off a month of samba dancing taught by Euridice Seche, who currently is a member of Biodance Company. 6:30-7:30 p.m. AK
RECREATION
Introduction to Fencing
Rochester Fencing Club, linktr.ee/ rocfencing
Ever practiced jousting as a child in your backyard with long sticks? Grab onto a foil and learn some basic footwork and defensive maneuvers to feel like a revered knight. All skill levels are welcome. 18+. Tickets $35. 6:30-8 p.m. AK
Drummer Juan “Jay Cali” Calixto readies a new solo career.
The rhythm and the wave
MUSIC
BY PATRICK HOSKEN PATRICK@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM
In 2015, Juan Calixto found himself in the Hollywood Hills. The Rochester-born musician had been living in Los Angeles, gigging and doing odd jobs, when he connected with fellow 585er David Schuler, whose new synthesizer-heavy project, The Bad Dreamers, needed a drummer.
“We’re Rochester dudes out in L.A.,” Calixto recalled thinking at the time. “Let’s do something together.”
It took three years, but eventually The Bad Dreamers released an album. Calixto — who also goes by his nickname Jay Cali — played some shows with them out west. After years spent in local heavy bands like A Thousand Shades of Cold, he became immersed in synthwave, a musical genre that evokes the cinematic, digital soundscapes of the 1980s.
That education has served him well. Calixto recently completed a tour with the Dutch synthwave artist Timecop1983 that brought him through cities like Atlanta, New York and Chicago. The tour preceded the debut single from Calixto’s own creative project, DRUMxWAVE, which he plans to release via the indie label RetroSynth Records on April 25.
“I want it to be a synth project but I want it to be a combination of all the things I’ve been able to do,” Calixto said. “Cater to the EDM fans but also to the rock fans and even touch on the goth scene.”
The synthwave community has given Calixto a comfortable home, for which he’s grateful. (He used that word several times in conversation with CITY.) He stays busy both at home — where he plays in local hard rock band All Them Squares — and on tour. He’s happy for work that allows him a chance to shine.
In fact, when that band wound down, he was keen to expand his percussion skills even further.
Case in point: the fun drum covers Calixto has posted to social media. After one of them landed on the timeline of Timecop1983 artist Jordy Leenaerts, he asked Calixto to join his band.
“Couldn’t be a better match,” Leenaerts said.
Calixto began playing saxophone in his grade-school band, but he always had his eyes on the drumkit. He convinced his grandparents to get him one at age 11 and took to emulating the music of his youth, Motown and Michael Jackson, though his own tastes evolved toward nu-metal groups like Korn, Disturbed and Orgy.
When Calixto was still a teen, he got a chance to audition for the local group A Thousand Shades of Cold. Naturally, he nailed it. The group released music on Buffalo’s Amherst Records, technically making them labelmates with soul singer Solomon Burke and Johnny Carson’s bandleader Doc Severinsen.
Apart from the notoriety, the experience taught Calixto how to navigate a group, how to tour and, in essence, how to be a drummer.
“I wanted to do more of a session player-for-hire kind of thing,” he said. “Being that I had listened to so many different styles of music growing up, I was like, now I can finally apply that.”
Calixto moved to L.A. and made some progress on that front, but he also worked at Home Depot and as a mail carrier to pay the bills. He gigged where he could and found some work with a metal band on “one of those just-scraping-by tours.”
In 2019, he made a decision. It was time to come home to Rochester.
He’s made good on the return as a backline tech for concert production company Audio Images. He also works part-time at the House of Guitars, just down the street from his home, selling guitars and drums with a smile.
“He’s super into music, knows all the instruments and really takes pleasure in being here,” said shop owner Bruce Schaubroeck. “Everybody here loves him.”
Calixto’s years of experience are also helping All Them Squares level up. The group released its first-ever collection, “Vol. 1,” in October 2024. Calixto’s range shines on the tracks. “Fluid” has a bit of swing to it, while “Sleep”
features some electronic percussion elements. He has to be nimble for the material given to him by vocalist and songwriter Cece Vile.
Calixto joined the band three years ago on an invitation from guitarist Jordan Foehner. Vile said Calixto — or “Papa Juan,” as they call him — has become an essential collaborator thanks to both his percussion prowess and his winning attitude.
“He’s definitely the most professional one in our band,” Vile said. “He’s extremely fun and a lighthearted dude, but he is so pro at everything he does. Everything got better once he joined.”
DRUMxWAVE, meanwhile, marks Calixto’s first foray as the central creative in a musical project — he writes, produces and, of course, plays drums. The slick first single, “Flames in the Sky,” features vocals from Columbus, Ohio synth group Chroma Cloud.
Calixto feels encouraged by the electronic-friendly music scene in Rochester and believes his new tunes will find a receptive crowd.
That’s largely because, after decades of being a musician, he’s thankful music has become his full-time job. His Timecop1983 tour in March ended, naturally, with a stop at L.A.’s Echoplex — just a few miles south of the Hollywood Hills.
On a long car ride from Massachusetts to Chicago a few weeks before that gig, he reflected on his good fortune.
“It’s a blessing to be able to go and play music and have people show up.” @jaycalidrums
Juan “Jay Cali” Calixto’s drumming impressed synthwave artist Timecop1983 so much that he asked Calixto to join the band.
PHOTOS PROVIDED
“NATURE TAKES ITS COURSE” BY GOAT FARM
Just in time for spring, Rochester-based Goat Farm’s debut EP feels like some semblance of dark hope clawing its way back out of the tomb. In keeping with the band’s self-described “ethereal doom metal,” the three tracks on “Nature Takes Its Course” serve up sludgy guitar riffs, cinematic pacing and feather-light vocals that drop into cathartic screams at just the right moments.
The EP kicks off with an ominous title track about karma that feels as though it’s alive with its heartbeat-like throb of bass and drums. A warbling vein of guitar tremolo flows through the track before the drum and bass flatline, leaving you to reckon with almost a minute of particularly memorable guitar feedback.
The first track disintegrates and segues into “Lucy,” a more alt-metal track that really got itself stuck in my head. Singing about a destructive push-and-pull cycle, the track is melancholy right up until it gets furious. Over a bare bassline, vocalist Mimi eschews the classic death growl to dreamily beg you “don’t let go” over and over again. She’s accompanied by a sticky, heavy guitar riff that climbs until her plea rises up into a scream.
While the first two tracks pull you along at a deliberately honey-thick pace, the final track brings fast guitar breaks that invite you into the mosh pit. “Old Curse” provides the most intense metal energy of the EP with a runtime over eight minutes long. Pointing the finger at an “old curse,” the closer wraps the album up topically: I believed you were what / What I deserved / I have learned what I am worth.
For anyone caught up in the winter blues, this EP indulges that inner darkness. But even though Goat Farm lays on the sonic gloom, nature’s course takes us back to the spring, too.
— LIZ HOGREFE
“DANCE” BY MOUNTAIN RIVER TRAVELER
Do you know the traditional Chinese instrument the pipa? It’s a beautiful pearshaped, fretted, plucked string instrument; a type of lute.
Next question: Did you know that the pipa can rock?
I didn’t, not really, until I heard one of Rochester’s newest bands: Mountain River Traveler. They describe themselves as “supercharged Chinese folk music,” which you can hear in their debut release, “Dance,” a single that is part of a compilation called “The Avant Garde a Clue Companion.”
This instrumental track absolutely lives up to its name. The rhythms evoke Celtic step dances and a bit of Dropkick Murphys flair. While I’m at it, my other left-field comparison is to the dual lead-guitar sound of Thin Lizzy, only here, it’s the lockstep riffs of pipa and guitar.
Those riffs are based on the distinctive sound of the pentatonic (five-note) scale found in traditional Chinese music and in various forms in music from around the world — from traditional Native American music, Balinese gamelans and more.
Here in Rochester, Leah Ou (pipa) has earned a following playing indie music like The Decemberists alongside traditional and classical Chinese music and her own original compositions. She has collaborated with fiddlers, dancers and jazz and folk musicians.
Teaming up with guitarist Xuhao (Haishen, Ten Finger Manual) takes her into heavier territory, while he finds new directions for his explorations of his Chinese heritage through guitar-driven rock and metal. Randy Rowe, who is also part of Xuhao’s metal outfit Haishen, locks in with bassist/composer/producer Lochlan Boebel to hold down a rhythmically driving low end.
The creativity and the intensity of what they have just begun creating makes me excited to hear more. Catch them at the Lilac Festival this spring; they take the stage at 1 p.m. on Sunday, May 18.
— MONA SEGHATOLESLAMI
“ILLUMINATE” BY THE HEROIC ENTHUSIASTS
Rochester musicians James Tabbi and Thomas Ferrara continue their fruitful partnership as The Heroic Enthusiasts with the new album “Illuminate,” which releases digitally and on vinyl on Apr. 11 via ECR Music Group’s Meridian label.
Initially a quartet, The Heroic Enthusiasts’ current form as an electro-pop duo began in 2022; “Illuminate” is the first proper fulllength album with this lineup.
The fresh batch of 10 tracks picks up right where The Heroic Enthusiasts’ pair of EPs — “Fits and Fashions” and “Crimes and Passions” — left its listeners. The band’s sound is indebted to New Wave artists such as New Order and Depeche Mode, whose anthems came in the wake of the post-punk explosion in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s.
Because of its sources of inspiration, The Heroic Enthusiasts’ music inevitably ushers in waves of wistfulness for the atmospheric romance that is vintage synth-pop’s calling card. Reverberating keyboard hooks and propulsive rhythms provide the soundtrack for ardent singers stuck between past regrets and the promise of liberation — particularly in matters of love.
Poignant vocals are often needed to cut through the mix to complement the dreamy hooks and danceable rhythms and transcend being mere background music. “Illuminate” doesn’t achieve this delicate balance on every track, but some songs stand out.
“Jaded” boasts a gradual build with vocal melodies and synth lines that subtly evolve above the locomotive beat and bassline.
“Wake Me When It’s Over” showcases the complementary relationship between Tabbi’s sensitive singing and Ferrara’s always thoughtful, sometimes striking guitar hooks.
Throughout the album, Ferrara’s musical choices are considered and economical, lending added poignancy to Tabbi’s vocal sincerity in key moments and allowing the singer’s lines to expand and dominate the soundscape in other moments.
“Illuminate” gets a release party at Record Archive from 4-7 p.m. on Friday, April 25. — DANIEL J. KUSHNER
“FORGOTTEN TURNS” BY TWIN
COURT
Steeped in the traditions of Javanese gamelan ensemble music, while seeking communion with shoegaze and indie rock, Ithaca’s Twin Court traces a delicate trail through an ancient sonic understory, surrendering and melting its listeners into artful meditative states.
The eight-piece ensemble boasts traditional and modern alternative rock instrumentation, from guitar to gendèr, and places equal emphasis on koan-like, lyrical song structures. Distant bells fade and swirl together with guttural low-end ambient stacks, crafting a specific yet strangely open universe ripe for self-projection. “Buka (Opening)” glazes into “Sounds of the Rise”, exploring reflections on time in a tidal sense: I heard it all through the tide / I watched your steps to place mine / Submerge me, I’ll fly / Resurface me in time.
Providing riffy indie splendor, “Out to Pasture” is solace for guitar-culture lovers who might’ve worried the youth were going electronica, now decades into fading EDM afterglow. Turns out, they were listening to shoegaze and post-rock the whole time. Twin Court weaves these effects-laden, rock-oriented sensibilities with the hypnotic, transcendent rhythmic structures of Javanese gamelan.
“Different Harbors” inspires a Sigur Rós headspace but offers more approachable R.E.M.-esque vocal phrases, yawning open with an elementary guitar hook. A more direct verse-chorus structure gives way and descends into a tingling breakdown, with more conventional drumming forward on “Broken Strands.”
Lyrically, we are drawn to experience rather than process and are provoked by intense banjo-like syncopation and Pavement guitar work: If the wind blew clouds astray, would you find heaven in the rain?
Blowing on ash before cracking with embers, acoustic pinpricks layer the introduction of “Iroh,” synthesizing into a wooden ocean of surf, cascading behind the track’s sole lyric like a carefully set sleeper sofa, sheets and all: Everything blows away.
— RYAN M. YARMEL
Man of steel
BY REBECCA RAFFERTY
You’ve seen his work. It’s the low row of water sprite-like wings on the bridge railing where Main Street spans the Genesee. It’s the upright portal crossed by a see-saw on the Strong National Museum of Play’s grounds, the bouquet of sylvan fronds and weightless festoons in “Soliloquy” on the Memorial Art Gallery’s campus and the goldenspired gates in the MAG atrium. It’s the 110-ton steel and bronze behemoth dubbed “Sentinel” that, at 73-feet tall, dwarfs many of the surrounding buildings at Rochester Institute of Technology.
Albert Paley’s art is part of the living fabric of Rochester, and beyond.
“Everybody thinks of steel as firm and structural,” said Paley. “But when heated and formed, it can become very lyrical. When an individual sees organic forms built out of hard and rigid steel, they are experiencing motion and life — they see one thing and experience something else.”
Part of the earth’s core is molten iron, he noted, and it both grounds us in gravity and keeps us spinning in our cosmic dance.
“The only way to reconcile the two is through paradox,” Paley continued. “I just find that incredibly intriguing, because one doesn’t negate the other. It unifies. And that ability of perception and understanding is a basic part of the human condition.”
He is a philosopher’s artist who, for more than 50 years, has been making work that has embodied
Sculptor Albert Paley is honored with a lifetime achievement award in contemporary sculpture.
the contrast between commonplace and numinous environments. Paley’s gates, monumental sculptures and decorative artworks alike combine highly structured, architectural elements with shapes that immortalize the ephemeral — be it allusions to nature, the sweeping gestures of music and the wind or a nameless emotion frozen in form. His work is soaring, dynamic from all sides, a visual anthem.
After forging his way to international renown, the Rochester-based sculptor, now 81, has greatly downsized his artistic operations in recent years, focusing on the placement of his archive of artworks, papers and entrepreneurial expertise.
And he continues to reap accolades for his achievements.
On April 16, the New Jerseybased International Sculpture Center will honor Paley with the 2025 Lifetime Achievement in Contemporary Sculpture Award during its annual Night of Excellence celebration at Tribeca Rooftop in New York City. It will be a celebration that represents regional artistic greatness, as Paley shares this year’s distinction with Buffalo-based sculptor Jaume Plensa.
Paley is being recognized not only for his significant contribution to the field of sculpture, but for his generosity of spirit where other artists are concerned, said the International Sculpture Center's executive director, Johannah Hutchison.
“He has a laudable body of work, an amazing body of work, but he’s also committed to other artists and the community, committed to helping other people understand legacy,” she said. “He’s an incredibly generous and caring individual.”
Preservation of legacy currently occupies a large part of Paley’s time, but not just for his own sake. He aims to leave a well-paved path in that relatively wild territory for other artists to follow. Paley hasn’t really put down his torch; he’s passing it.
But teaching and sharing the wealth of his knowledge have always been fundamental to his life’s work. Paley has a strong and
enduring relationship with RIT, where he has been a professor and artist-in-residence at the School for American Crafts and Arts and Sciences since 1984. In February, he bequeathed his personal archive to RIT, joining other consequential artists and entrepreneurs in the school’s collections, including artist Milton Glaser, designers Massimo and Lella Vignelli, photojournalist Bernie Boston and businessman Tom Golisano.
The Paley archive includes sketchbooks and documents on creative processes, innovative technology applications, business practices and correspondence, “basically the guts that went into making a piece,” said RIT's university archivist, Liz Call.
“The archive is his entire ideation realm,” she said. “For every single project he worked on, he was a meticulous, intentioned record-keeper with incredible, comprehensive foresight. There’s layers and layers — I see myriad ways students and researchers can dig into this collection.”
As his archive reflects, Paley describes the development of his artistic practice and the know-how of making it all happen as dual vines, growing in tandem.
“It has to do with selfrealization,” he said. “Each one of the works that I would do would be in the present tense of what I was thinking at that time, what I was experiencing in that time, and what I wanted to express, what I learned from that process. That became the basis for the next project, and for the next project. So it’s building an understanding, it’s building a vocabulary, building depth. And so, it’s a continual solution.”
Paley’s work has always required business acumen and connections with professionals who help bring his vision into practical fruition. These have included his close relationships and collaborations with Klein Steel, the Corning Museum of Glass, RIT and other various institutions and cities around the world.
“A lot of these large projects take three to five years to do, with feasibility studies and the design phase, and all of the structural engineering,” he told CITY in a 2017 interview, when he was
beginning to wrap up his large-scale work.
In 2020, Paley closed down the largest of his three studios, a 40,000 square-foot space on Lyell Avenue, where he and a team of — at peak — 16 studio assistants forged and fabricated his artwork. Then, he shifted his attention to independent, non-commissioned design.
Paley’s presence around the world is vast. His distinctive, often site-specific sculptures serve as threshold guardians and portals at private residences and public spaces. They are in government and corporate office buildings, on academic campuses, on bridges and at sports stadiums. They’re in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Smithsonian, Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts, London’s Victoria and Albert — the list continues to grow as Paley continues the work of finding the right placements for unclaimed pieces from his oeuvre.
Three pillars span the various creative media Paley has worked with: a profound aesthetic appreciation of nature, the balance between the natural and built environments and the human relationship to both.
But he began as a metalsmith, shaping gold and jewels into regal adornments. After he shifted to the landmark sculptural work he is known for, he expanded into furniture design and decorative work (including small sculptures for interiors, tables, lamps, menorahs and more). His art prints bear the same visual language as his sculptures and portray incredible dimensionality despite being works on paper.
These days, Paley is experimenting with verse. He says he’s not ready for his poetic endeavors, which emerged over the past year or so, to meet the public eye. But he feels quickened by the new medium.
“It’s a different vocabulary,” he said. “My work has always come from that intangible place that defies logic. Even though it’s always been non-literal, steel has an edge on it that’s very clear. Words can persuade in a way that tangible, visual reality cannot.” albertpaley.com
Left, Albert Paley. PHOTO BY JOHN MYERS
Right, formed and fabricated stainless steel with a painted finish. Created for the exhibition Paley on Park Avenue, New York, NY (2013). PROVIDED
Drum of Seneca
BY PETE WAYNER
Amystery echoes around the shores of Seneca Lake.
Deep, rolling booms, like distant cannon fire, can be heard in centuries-old Haudenosaunee legend, the 19th century travel writing of James Fennimore Cooper and scientific reports in the archives of the University of Rochester. The most popular name for the phenomenon is the Drums of Seneca, a ghostly auditory apparition said to portend everything from divine judgment to societal change.
Whatever the cause or possible meaning, they certainly would have been audible from Lake Drum, a brewery and cidery which stands a few hundred feet from Seneca’s pebbly shore. Victor and Jenna Pultinas opened the location after winning Geneva’s Race for the Space award in 2013, and named it after the local legend.
“Lake Drum started just by having access to a potential thing that could work,” said Jenna Pultinas as she sat at the bar, redhandled pruning shears sticking out of her Carhartt overalls.
“What I’m talking about is essentially producing something that is a product of oneself, that is constantly resilient and changing within a community to meet its needs.”
The couple saw a need for a place in downtown Geneva where people could gather, feel comfortable, engage in friendly dialogue and have an affordable
Lake Drum sets a steady tempo of societal betterment in Geneva.
drink, if they wanted. Evidently, the community agreed; Lake Drum raised more than $12,000 to fund the brewery’s opening.
They installed brewing equipment and ripped out a drop ceiling and partition. The result was a raw, open room that Victor, a muralist whose work adorns the byways of Geneva, could feather into the nest Lake Drum is today — a warm, cozy nook by winter and breezy beach bar by summer. The bar in the brewery seems almost symbolically unusual: Patrons sit on either side, allowing face-to-face conversation rather than the typical column of visitors staring at the bartender over a separating parapet.
Outside is a parklet developed with trees and planters where guests can sit to enjoy the sunshine that blazes down Castle Street while looking at the lake on the
other side of Routes 5 and 20.
This is also where guests can get a pizza delivered, where Fellenz Family Farm sets up its CSA in the summer and fall and where dogs are often found waiting for their next best friend.
“We always try to make it accessible, or in reach of anyone who needs to come in. If somebody needs to use the bathroom, we make it a safe space. The parklet, people come and have lunch there,” said Pultinas. “Before we opened, this entire block was basically vacant and now it’s essentially an activist block.”
The Dove Block Project, a community art nonprofit, Seneca Lake Pure Waters Association and Ibero-American Action League are all within a two-minute walk of Lake Drum’s front door.
“Certain people have the hutzpah, the fire in them and the
light inside of them,” said Pultinas. “And they’re the people that are always looking to make it a more inclusive and equal place.”
Chuck McCadd, Lake Drum’s marketing director, grew up in Chicago and ran high-end bike shops in Washington, D.C. for almost a decade. He and his wife, Shanelle France, moved to Geneva right before the COVID-19 lockdown, then found themselves moored in a new place with few connections. Eventually, they made their way to Lake Drum. France attended Hobart and William Smith Colleges at the same time as Jenna and Victor.
“They adopted us,” said McCadd. “We found a home here ... This is my escape and I also feel like I’m doing something here that’s meaningful.”
A barley stout in Lake Drum’s outdoor area, next to the parklet where patrons can enjoy the sunshine and lake breeze.
PHOTO BY PETE WAYNER
Lake Drum co-founder Victor Pultinas (left), chats with patrons Judy Treisbeck and Eric Houppert.
PHOTO BY PETE WAYNER
Lake Drum patrons can pick an album from the massive collection of vinyl and hand it to the bartender to be played over the house speakers. PHOTO BY PETE WAYNER
He described a recent birthday party Lake Drum threw for one of its most beloved regulars — Judy Treisbeck, who turned 78. To McCadd, the party was representative of an ethos that flows through the brewery like beer and cider flows through its taps.
“Like the mug wall here,” he said, gesturing to a panoply of mugs,
steins and flagons hanging behind the bar; guests can pay a membership to join. “Literally someone comes in, the bartender turns around, grabs their exact mug — and there’s no names on these mugs — pulls it down, hands it to them like, alright, cool, let’s go. It’s the small details that matter here.”
At every turn, the staff of Lake
Lake Drum’s beers and ciders span the genre, with special emphasis on lagers and stouts. PHOTO BY PETE WAYNER
Drum mindfully coaxes its identity, patrons and the city it calls home toward a philosophy of openness and access. Free live music every week, shelves stretching to the ceiling packed with books and vinyl to enjoy, Dove Block collaborations that teach crafts to kids followed by bring-your-own vinyl events Sunday evenings, a collab with Geneva’s historical society to teach residents how the past continues to influence their lives today, a free music, art and culture “Drumstock” festival in the nearby orchard that supplies some of the ingredients in Lake Drum’s beverages — and the fact that those ingredients, such as sage and sumac, are inspired by Haudenosaunee tradition. The culmination of these details impresses McCadd again and again, especially coming from larger urban centers.
“That is the goal of everything for me, to make sure that this place is being viewed as the gem that it is within Geneva,” he said.
McCadd has another job, as is the case with most of the Lake Drum staff. By day, he’s the head of bicycle tech for a company based in the United Kingdom, but his dream is to open an independent bike shop in Geneva. As he spoke about this ambition, Pultinas beamed.
“The way it happens is (by) listening,” she said. “Sharing a beverage, doing these craft things, taking part in cross-community organizations, working together. We found if we just listen to people … we’ve somehow been able to retain this across the aisle thing, which is really special … We need more people who are willing to act and be kind and help and not instill fear.”
It’s tempting to see the brewery as a supernatural place that galvanizes doers and inspires positive change, but Pultinas brushed the idea off.
“It’s nothing to do with the place,” she said. “It’s bigger than that.” lakedrumbrewing.com
Chuck McCadd, Lake Drum’s marketing director. PHOTO BY PETE WAYNER
Jenna Pultinas, one of the leaders and co-founders of Lake Drum.
PHOTO BY PETE WAYNER
Act two
FOOD & BEV
BY LEAH STACY LEAH@ROCHESTER-CITYNEWS.COM
The only night Richard Reddington ate dinner at Grinnell’s, he was with his dad, and it was right around the time news leaked that the Michelin-starred chef was moving back to open a restaurant in the former 2Vine space downtown.
“This newscaster comes up to our table and says, ‘hey, can you come in and do an interview?’ and I’m like, ‘yeah, sure,’” said Reddington. “He walks away, and my dad, who’s lived here his whole life, goes, ‘Oh my god, that’s Don Alhart.’ And I said, ‘Dad, don’t get too excited. I’m probably not gonna do it.’”
(Spoiler: He didn’t do the interview.)
Roughly seven years later, Reddington is sitting close to that exact spot, he thinks, only instead of a small table he’s in a green leather corner booth, and his name is on the building outside.
General manager Doug Court brings a double shot of espresso to the table, Reddington knocks it back, we start the audio recording and he’s off. But he doesn’t tell the story chronologically, or even logically. Which makes a little sense when you’ve just worked 23 days in a row. And also when you own two restaurants in California (which closed in 2018 and 2020, respectively) that share names with your two restaurants in Rochester.
Between frequent asides of “off the record” during the interview, Reddington, a Pittsford
From left, chefs Richard Reddington and Brad Pareira.
PHOTO BY ABBY QUATRO
native, weaves in strands from his many years in California and what finally brought him home. Like so many others who boomerang back to Rochester, it was family first. After his mom died, Reddington moved home to help his three siblings with their dad, and soon his part-time plan became full-time.
“My sisters used to cry because I’d be like, how old is Sadie? How old is Clara?” he said. “I was so focused on the restaurants I wasn’t visiting a lot, and they’d all come to California because it was a fun getaway. Now, I go to my niece’s basketball games. We had a family dinner last night.”
Next came the business opportunities. Redd Wood is Reddington’s second local venture; he opened Redd at 24 Winthrop Street with business partner Dennis Wilmot in 2019.
“Jerry (Vorrasi) was in Napa and he told me how 2Vine was closing, so I flew back to see it and we worked out a deal,” he said. “I wanted an existing space. I’m not interested in new construction.”
Reddington was in Mexico a few years later when he got the call about Grinnell’s. The much-loved Brighton restaurant that had been family owned and operated for 62 years closing in July 2023. A business partnership with Marty O’Sullivan came about through mutual friends like chef Mark Cupolo of Rocco as well as a shared love of partying and basketball, and after the two looked at the space they decided to gut it and create Redd Wood.
O’Sullivan has been operating food truck fleet Marty’s Meats since 2012, but his only brick and mortar experience comes from a several-year stint on Park Avenue (in the space that’s currently home to Leonore’s).
“The opportunity to open a restaurant with a renowned chef like Richard, in an iconic space that has meant so much to the community and my family, was too hard to pass up,” said O’Sullivan, who works full-time in medical technology sales.
It’s been a bit of a family affair — O’Sullivan’s wife, Laura Fox O’Sullivan, and her parents Bob and Linda Fox brought a love of contemporary art to the already-opulent interiors by Erin Martin Design and DJCA Cornerstone. Along the walls hang original pieces curated by Ronnen Fine Art, which provides services like installation and appraisal for collectors.
“It’s rare for a commercial venture to invest in original art, making this an especially exciting opportunity,” said
Jennifer Burger, director of Ronnen Fine Art. “When (they) came to us with the idea, it was an immediate yes.”
The final collection includes several works by Sol LeWitt, whose “Wavy Horizontal Lines” (1996) creates a showstopping wall in the dining room; Erica Baum’s “Naked Eye” photo-based series (Baum will have a solo exhibit at the George Eastman Museum in November); and Mel Bochner’s “Thank You” (2024), a vibrant, cheeky, threedimensional monoprint.
“Ultimately, the Redd Wood collection features works by some of the most important artists of the 20th and 21st centuries — pioneering figures
in conceptual art — alongside a new generation of artists pushing boundaries in fresh and exciting ways,” said Burger. Redd Wood began as a classic steakhouse concept, but shifted with the opening of SCN’s Patron Saint downtown and the close proximity of Max Chophouse on Monroe Avenue; Reddington saw, instead, an opportunity to lean into his French culinary roots (he worked at three-star Michelin spot Arpège in Paris and Le Moulin de Mougins in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region).
It’s training he has passed down to his longtime sous chef — and, with the CONTINUED ON PAGE 66
PHOTOS BY ABBY QUATRO
opening of Redd Wood, now executive chef — Brad Pareira, who began his culinary journey in his hometown of Saranac Lake before moving to California and landing a job at Redd in Yountville in 2014.
“It was this crazy intense place,” said Pareira. “And I just kind of fell in love with it — what do they call it? Fatal attraction?”
Pareira was 21 at the time, and other than a brief stint at State Bird Provisions in San Francisco, he’s worked with Reddington for the last 11 years. When Reddington announced he was closing his California restaurants and relocating to Rochester in 2018, Pareira packed up his life as well, driving a U-Haul full of pots and pans across the country.
“I trust him. I knew that there would be growth for me, and I was ready for another start,” said Pareira, who, six years later is not only at the helm of two restaurants, but has made a new life here, including meeting his girlfriend and finding time to ski and travel.
The menu at Redd Wood has been a collaborative effort between Pareira, Reddington and O’Sullivan: Italian and French cuisine, complemented by an Old World-leaning wine list from sommelier Ian Criticos and tableside bar cart service from bar manager Matt Koch. On the current menu are classics like pissaladière (a flatbread-like tart topped with onions and olives) and sweetbreads (calf or lamb organ meat with a smooth, creamy texture). Pareira’s favorite opening dish is the tuna crudo.
And even though it’s not a steakhouse, there’s a raw bar and an open hearth where nearby seated guests can watch their food prepared as a dinner theater of sorts.
“And of course, we’re selling a lot of steaks,” said Reddington, shaking his head.
But he’s adamant there won’t be a burger on the menu, even though O’Sullivan has attempted to change his mind. For Reddington, both Redd and Redd Wood are about raising standards in every way.
“I told my friends in California I think this is the best food I’ve been doing — ever,” he said, “Even with the Michelin stars.” reddwoodroc.com
Mel Bochner's 'Thank You' (2024).
PHOTO BY ABBY QUATRO
The Dish
WHET YOUR PALATE
Seasons’ Noodle, a hand-pulled noodle stand in the lobby of the Columbus Building, 50 Chestnut St., announced on social media that it will relocate to the Mercantile on Main, 240 E. Main St., in May. (AKA get those nostalgic lunch dates in while you can.) Redd Wood, the second concept from Michelin-starred chef Richard Reddington — and this time, a collaboration with Marty O’Sullivan of Marty’s Meats — opened March 8 in a stunningly renovated building that was once home to Grinnell’s, 1690 Monroe Ave. (Look for the full story on page 64.)
Popular East Henrietta Road spot Mamma G’s announced it plans to open a second location in both the
spots in Pittsford Plaza; and the building that once housed beloved dive Acme Bar at 495 Monroe Avenue will become The Red Cup Bar and Grill. The Swan Family of Restaurants will open Bevy, a chicken and ice cream shop with kid-friendly offerings and an outdoor patio, in the former Public House off Park Avenue.
The currently mobile Mercury Coffee announced it will open a brick and mortar at 681 South Ave., replacing Coffee Connection (they’ll continue mobile coffee bar operations as well). The Old Toad, a longtime Alexander Street fixture that had a staff exchange program with a Sheffield, United Kingdom pub, is for sale on Loopnet.
FOR THE LOCAVORES
Fans of the show “Hot Ones,” which featured local business Karma Sauce, can now order “Hot Ones” sauced wings and sandwiches exclusively from MicGinny’s on the River, 2246 E River Rd., via HotOnesDelivery.com for pick-up and delivery.
FOOD FÊTES
The Miscela Project — an Italianleaning, interactive dining experience designed to build community and create fun through food (read: pasta-making party!) offers private events for those who want to recreate the monthly series at Pearson’s. themiscelaproject.com
The Rochester Culinary Throwdown series that began at Jackrabbit Club, 40 Anderson Ave., last fall returns — and it’s down to the final two chefs. The final round of the throwdown on Sun., April 27. Doors at 8 p.m., competition at 9 p.m. Free and open to the public.
Anatomy of a Composition
BY S.J. AUSTIN & J. REYNOLDS
Buffalo-born folk singer DiFranco
Condition causing patchy fur
Alloy used in wall framing 40. Foreigner song with the lyric “If you wanna win you gotta learn how to play”
First name in fragrance 46. “Lowkey” or “weird flex”, e.g.
50. ____ Tai
51. Wanderers
53. Org. that no longer requires its members to be retired
55. Alma mater for Robert Mueller, Rudy Giuliani & Lady Gaga
56. Guitarist’s accessory
59. Horseplay?
60. Co. awarded over 9,000 patents in 2019
61. Ruler of the Huns
64. Tailor (to)
66. Canadian gasoline brand
68. Howard Hughes, or a movie about him
69. John Mayer song with the lyric “Discover me discovering you” - or the theme to this puzzle
74. Hemingway, Shackleton & others
75. Water source for 11 countries
76. Painter’s stand
77. Sony Music subsidiary that signed Whitney Houston & The Grateful Dead
78. TV journalist Curry
79. Shake or break follower
81. War-torn Mediterranean nation
85. 2010 NCAA Frozen Four participant
86. Ornate fabric on some garments 88. Emergency 90. QB’s error
Nasty smile 94. Freshwater fish with vertical stripes
96. Kenny Loggins song with the lyric “Please, Louise, pull me up off of my knees”
99. Company that went bankrupt in 2018 after 126 years
101. Like Cheerios
103. Voice, as grievances
104. Brie, as compared to cheddar
107. Regarding
108. Harmful in effect
112. Irving Berlin song with the lyric “I love to climb a mountain and reach the highest peak”
115. Cleveland’s lake
116. German grandpa
117. Sufficiently skilled
118. “____ Andy Warhol,” 1996 film
119. Peter Gabriel song with the lyric “I see the doorway to a thousand churches”
122. Extendable arm for a microphone
123. 10 Commandments helping verb
124. California NFLer before 1994, or after 2016
125. Fall far short (in comparison)
126. Thesaurus entries: Abbr.
127. How a student might be marked in Spanish class
128. Lascivious looks
129. Shakespeare title starter
Picard’s Lieutenant Commander
Subject of critique on “The Great British Baking Show” 15. Westbrook who twice led the NBA in scoring
Horns for Cannonball Adderly and Charlie Parker, familiarly
63. Running score
65. Sum up
67. “Blueberries for ____” (1949 Caldecott winner)
68. Musical notation meaning “slowly with expression”
69. Fractions of decades
70. Former colleague of Kirsten & Kamala
71. “Workers of the world, ____!”
72. Word with child or tube
73. Schiffer’s romancer in “Love Actually”
78. Versatile blackjack cards
80. One waiting for retirement
82. 2011 animated feature starting Anne Hathaway and Jamie Foxx
83. Connections
84. Consumed
87. Fig. for a mortgage
88. Rub the wrong way
89. Wembley and Arrowhead
92. Holds in high regard
93. Stink
95. Orphan in “Les Misérables”
97. Detoxifying organ
98. Prospector’s find
100. Caravaggio, e.g.
102. Infinitive found in titles by Lee and Grisham
