Connections Podcast

The Gateways Music Festival is not only coming back next week, but there are big plans to grow it. The festival, which begins August 8, celebrates diversity in classical music. We talk with Lee Koonce , president and artistic director of the Gateways Music Festival, about the events and how to bring more diversity to the classical music scene. He also shares his musical journey.

When you see a label that says, "Made in America," it may not mean what you think it does. A recent piece in the conservative publication, the National Review, argued that "buying American" has little meaning in today's global supply chain and we should scrap the phrase, or stop giving it such romantic idealism. Writer Kevin Williamson says if everything you bought were truly local, our economy would be similar to that of North Korea or Venezuela. Is that statement accurate? We discuss what

Our Summer of Food series continues with a conversation about Rochester's food identity. If someone was visiting Rochester from abroad or even out of town and wanted to learn about Rochester's food culture, what would be at the top of the list? A Garbage Plate? Red and white hots? Dinosaur Bar-B-Que? Would you introduce visitors to the local farm-to-table movement? We discuss Rochester's food identity and the future of our food culture. Our guests: Chris Lindstrom , founder of the podcast Food

Filmmakers Ken Burns and Lynn Novick believe now is the time to turn back to the Vietnam War. They say to understand war, we need the passage of time. Their forthcoming 10-episode series called The Vietnam War , launches Sunday, September 17 at 8 p.m. on WXXI-TV. It's an immersive narrative featuring archival footage, photographs, and conversations with nearly 100 witnesses, both in American and Vietnam. You can watch a 30-minute preview here . Lynn Novick is the co-director and producer of the

Is war simply part of the human condition? In other words, is world peace - true world peace - possible? Iraq War veteran Paul Chappell says yes. He speaks to crowds about peace literacy, and he says the idea that human beings are naturally violent is a myth. Chappell is in Rochester as a guest of the Gandhi Institute, but first, he's on Connections, along with Kit Miller of the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence .

Things got weird when President Trump spoke to the Boy Scouts . He veered into stories about friends making millions, buying yachts, and hosting wild parties. That put the organization into the awkward position of having to respond. In this hour, we discuss values: decorum, honor, and what it means to be a scout in 2017. Our guests: Stephen Hoitt, scout executive and CEO of Seneca Waterways Council Charles Brady, former scout and Scout leader Joel Helfrich, local historian and former Eagle Scout

Bernie Sanders is planning another trip to Iowa, and, well, we're not Canada, are we? This isn't Canada. It's the United States, where presidential campaigns last for years, and we're always on to the next race. But this time, Democrats feel that it's not too early to get serious about this. They lost the White House. They lost Congress. They're getting crushed in state races. So the decision starting at the top -- Sanders in 2020? -- is the first domino in a national strategy for winning.

We're getting wonky. It's time to go to school to understand a term we hear tossed around all the time these days: "neoliberalism." Justice Kennedy is a neoliberal? Hillary Clinton? What exactly does that mean? Before your eyes get glassy, our guests will explain how our lives are impacted when everything -- from health care to education to politics -- is commoditized. Our guests: Lyle Jeremy Rubin , Ph.D. candidate in history at the University of Rochester, and is writing his dissertation on

The opera community has a lot going on, and by popular demand, we're staging an intervention. If you've resisted opera's charms, we'll see if we can figure out why, and how to turn you into an opera fan. Our guests: Mona Seghatoleslami , afternoon host on Classical 91.5 Deborah Fox, artistic director, Pegasus Early Music Gerard Floriano of Finger Lakes Opera

Al Gore is back at the center of the climate conversation. Is that a good thing? Some progressives fear that Gore -- perhaps unintentionally -- turned the climate issue into a political debate. Pragmatically, they worry that he'll push more fence-sitters into the denial camp. But Gore's fans say that he has helped give the issue the urgency it requires. Our guests will discuss it: Seamus McGraw , author of Betting the Farm on a Drought Susan Spencer , CEO of ROCSPOT and a former attendee of Gore