This week Nina speaks about opening The Aurora Center for Creative and Spiritual Arts and her up and down journey making the decision. And how: "Ever since I signed that lease, I've shifted." Nina talks about learning to hold creative endeavors gently, being patient, listening for guidance. What wants to happen? What wants to come through you?…

After a 2-month summer break, I sat down one September Saturday morning and talked with Dan about what I wanted Lit Up to be. Trying to get to something richer and more personal, more artful and fun. Not that I don't love the 14 interviews I've done, but that I knew it was time for Lit Up to take the next step in its evolution. This week's episode …

Rochester theater up-and-comers Alec Michael Powell and Kate Royal talk about collaborating on their first musical "The Weekends," a show about the disillusionment the current crop of 20-somethings feel transitioning from college to "the real world." They discuss allowing character personalities to inform music style, and how their goal is to portr…

Meet singer-songwriter Susanna Rose: lovely, humble, and the real deal. She's heard songs playing in her head since she was a child, but it wasn't until she learned guitar at 21 that she found a way to get them out. In this episode, Susanna Rose gives us a live performance of "Song to Myself," as well as recorded versions of the first song she ever…

Have you ever dreamed of quitting your job and becoming a professional blogger? Travel and food blogger Jessica DeJesus is making the plunge this summer. She talks to us about her #litup moment, how she got started, the ups and downs of building her visibility and audience, how Wayne Dyer's The Power of Intention inspires her to stay positive, and …

Meet Tate DeCaro, a newly minted yoga instructor. In 2013, while asking the question "What do I want to do with my life," an unexpected illness struck. This started a chain of events in which she changed her diet and her relationship with exercise and yoga. In 2014 she decided to take a trip to Kalani, Hawaii to practice yoga. That trip would turn …

This week we talk with poet and fiction writer Alan Hilfiker about his newly published book MEMORIAL DAY (Meliora Publications), his formative experiences in his first English class at the University of Rochester: "I was struck, I was inspired. I never got over it." We discuss his interest in World War II, as well as the inspiration for his story "…

Reading of the poem "Memorial Day" by Alan Hilfiker (published May 24, 2015). Narrated by Jonathan Foss. In this stark and solemnly paced story-poem, inspired by a New York Times cover photo of a young woman sitting by a military gravestone, poet Alan Hilfiker introduces two characters: Old Steadman, and a young widow, each keeping vigil through a …

Spend a half-hour with the infectious spirit of young but accomplished Director/ Actor/ Producer Melyssa Hall. We talk about her booth "The Art of Conversation" at the Venice, New York Biennale, her newly minted role as an artistic intern at Ithaca's Kitchen Theater, her love of fantasy over realism, her experiences directing the vastly different p…

Meet Rochester writer and essayist Robin Flanigan, whose words and work chronicle the deep meaning behind everyday life. Her journey from writing for free for a community newspaper to making a living as a successful writer is the blueprint every young writer needs to study. Hear about how the mind-bending coincidences that catalyzed the biography s…

Interview with Rochester actor/director Jack Simel on a lifetime of loving applause, the much-missed Shipping Dock theater, community theater as it's changed over the past 40 years, and why coming back to Rochester to get back into acting was a good idea. He also discusses his upcoming directorial debut "Deathtrap," produced by the Penfield Players…

Poet and therapist Charlie Cote brings a sense of deep listening to his work and writing. In this interview, Charlie reads some of his recent work, we talk about how he became a poet, and we discuss Poetically Connect, Charlie's on-the-fly poems-on-demand.

This week I interview Dramaturg Claudia Nolan and Playwright Kate Royal on the dynamic, creative, and research-oriented role of the dramaturg in the production of Royal's recent play "Mammoth" and her upcoming staged reading of "Girls Can Tell," a play about sexual assault on college campuses.

Interview with novelist Julian Foster, who has a lot to say about the art of writing, and the realities we live in. Foster is one of those rare people who can speak across dividing lines of class, race, gender, We talk about his book Before I Wake, recent violence among young girls in urban environments, and his next book Beautiful Me.…

Interview with Kate Royal on the role of the playwright, director, and actors as conduits in a cycle of channeled humanity; and how her recent play "Mammoth" was her coming out play, even though she didn't know it when she was writing it.

Interview with writer Christine Green on how she got through her writers block using an accountability buddy, intuition, and re-creating the conditions of the last time she felt good about herself as a writer.