The bhangra music that originated in the Punjab region of northern India, performed during harvest celebrations, combined ecstatic singing and rapid percussive flurries on the dholak, a two-headed drum vaguely related to the tabla. The migration of Indians to England over the past 30 years has transformed the traditional style, cross-pollinating it with the music of the Brits and of immigrants from the Caribbean. The mutating bhangra flourished in Indian communities during the 70s and early 80s, eventually incorporating pop-music technology and finding a warm reception in British clubs....

As a youth in the late 40s, harmonica player Billy Boy Arnold sat briefly at the feet of John Lee “Sonny Boy” Williamson, then turned his ear toward the likes of Junior Wells and Little Walter. He seemed destined for blues stardom: his tone was supple and powerful, and he combined the lessons he’d learned from masters like Williamson with a youthful hipness that allowed him to fit in with everyone from Howlin’ Wolf to Bo Diddley....

It was the lights and Santas from her Christmas past that inspired Mary Edsey to write her book. In many ways the book’s a tribute to old-fashioned kitsch and Americana. There is, for instance, the story of William Brown, an 82-year-old retired factory worker in Elgin who spends “three to four weeks zigzagging 75 sets of large and small lights up and down the sides of [his] house, around the rails, over the fence and across the bushes,” Edsey writes....

Ian Schneller made his first guitar about eight years ago in a logical pairing of his abilities as a sculptor and a musician. He had come to Chicago from Memphis to attend graduate school at the Art Institute, and was a founding member of the band Shrimp Boat. He now fronts the group Falstaff. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » After graduate school, Schneller showed his sculptures–playful constructions of rockets, optical toys, and clocks–at art galleries....

Arguably America’s favorite classical singer, Dawn Upshaw exudes a girl-next-door sincerity that puts listeners at ease. Her voice is an amazingly flexible, silver-toned instrument with a pure intonation that’s mesmerizing, as evidenced in the best-selling CD of Gorecki’s Third Symphony. Her taste, another source of her popularity, is broad yet astute. So far in operas–her Met debut was only a few seasons ago–she’s taken on mostly soubrette roles, but in lieder recitals she lets her versatility fly....

To celebrate the Fourth of July I can’t think of a more thoughtful alternative to the jingoism of Sousa marches than this showcase of folk and jazz ballads of the last century and a half, including “Listen to the Mocking Bird” and “Little Brown Jug” (wryly sentimental tunes by the Winner brothers that were huge hits in the late 1800s), jazz standbys like Fats Waller’s “Ain’t Misbehavin’” and Joe Garland’s “In the Mood,” and sophisticatedly naughty declarations of independence like Porter’s “Anything Goes” and Ellington’s “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore....

By Michael Miner In the beginning Dubin thought he had a free hand. But early last year Mattel began suggesting changes to the essay Exhibitions International had commissioned him to write for the catalog of the show (which opened last month in the World Financial Center). Trims were negotiated, particularly over a passage that began, “The company has been slowly blending a gay sensibility into its product. In 1993 Mattel introduced Earring Magic Ken, replete with pierced ear, faux-leather vest, and lavender mesh shirt....

Bebop has launched few saxophonists as artistically vital as James Moody, who got in on the ground floor: he joined Dizzy Gillespie’s band at the age of 21, when bebop itself was still quite new, and rose to his first successes within a few years. Bebop still lies at the root of Moody’s music, and his growth as an artist concerns the mature flowering of those revolutionary seeds. The same spirit of adventure that first led him to bebop also pushed him to brilliantly reinvestigate the form, starting in the early 70s, and then to tinker with electronics in the late 80s, with mixed success....

For this solo recital John Anthony Cheek, a pianist with advanced degrees from Indiana University and the Manhattan School of Music who’s prepped with Gilbert Kalish and Menahem Pressler, has selected five works that offer an informed survey of the ways modern experimentalists have extended the range of keyboard techniques since the 19th century. One such pioneer, Debussy, is represented by four of his etudes, which emphasize subtly contrasted sonorities achieved largely through the use of arpeggios....

Lead Story A judge in Riverside, California, ruled in September that David Reese, 39, must pay his ex-wife $982 a month in child support for their two children, age nine and five, even though he learned during the heated divorce proceeding that the children were really fathered by a “family friend.” Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » During the San Diego trial of Cleophus “Little Pie” Prince Jr....

Lead Story Frances Bobnar of Adamsburg, Pennsylvania, filed a lawsuit against the Pennsylvania Lottery Commission in March, claiming that she and family members have spent more than $150,000 on lottery tickets during the last ten years but have never won. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » In November Tom Stafford of Mission Viejo, California, won $8,500 in a lawsuit against a local golf course. He hit an errant shot that ricocheted off a steel pole and smacked him in the forehead....

Hip-hop Gives Peace a Chance Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » During its years-long hold on the charts, moralists have criticized gangsta rap for promoting violence, but artistically speaking it has a bigger problem: The gangstas are wallowing in a creative tar pit, a profusion of sound-alike one-hit wonders (stars like Tupac Shakur and Bone Thugs-n-Harmony excepted) who are still treading territory Dr. Dre covered three years ago....

LIR 1/27, SCHUBAS Modern rock would seem to be the only way to tag this Irish quintet, but don’t ask me what that is. Like the band itself it seems to cover anything from INXS to Big Head Todd and the Monsters. On their American debut, Magico Magico! (W.A.R.), they frame the preening vocals of David McGuinness with myriad musical settings, from straight guitar rock to unctuous balladeering to quasi-psychedelic bombast to wan white-boy funk and all the ineffectual shades in between....

Please debunk the “missing day” theory described in the enclosed flier. –Ross Rhone, Chicago Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » The best-known version of the tale, a classic bit of “Xeroxlore” that creationists have been passing around for more than 20 years, is attributed to one Harold Hill, supposedly a consultant to the NASA space program. It seems a bunch of “astronauts and space scientists” at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, were using a computer to calculate the orbits of the sun, moon, and planets so that a satellite sent up today would not crash into something a hundred years from now....

Why is it that Cecil Adams [February 10], as well as the NRA, have different copies of the United States Constitution from my own? The Second Amendment in my own library clearly starts out with the words “A well-regulated militia…” What is well-regulated about a private citizen with a stash of guns in his basement? The opening words of this amendment seem to clearly indicate that the possession of guns was not meant to be beyond control....

Those crazy kids at Southport Records never take off their thinking caps: now that they have a small stable of female vocalists, they’ve borrowed the city’s most intimate cabaret spot to show them off, over the quietest week of the year for live music. (Titling the series like a Playboy pictorial will probably attract a little attention as well.) The best bet of the four is the hyperexpressive vocalist (and Southport cofounder) Joanie Pallatto, who joins pianist Marshall Vente to re-create their recently released Two....

BONANZA Id/Ego Productions at Live bait Theater Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » It’s certainly not Othello, The Cherry Orchard, or even Hello, Dolly! But hey–what do you expect from a late-night spoof of a cheesy TV western? Besides, a lot of people like Bonanza–just like a lot of people like The Brady Bunch. And a lot of people like to see women lampoon cheesy icons of masculinity....

By Cara Jepsen SATURDAY 31 Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Originally begun by officers two decades ago as a way to teach kids about careers in law enforcement and the legal system, the 25th District’s Police Explorers program nowadays also serves as an alternative to gang-banging. Interspersed with the lectures about drugs are demonstrations on fingerprinting and self-defense and excursions to miniature golf courses and water slides....

Friday 18 Historian and journalist Garry Wills is the star of the ninth annual Printers Row Book Fair, which runs from 10 to 5 today and tomorrow along Dearborn between Polk and Congress and features offerings from booksellers throughout the midwest. Accompanying this literary gold mine are a variety of readings on several stages. Wills kicks things off at the Dearborn Station stage (Dearborn and Polk) with an 11 AM reading....

With a three-horn front line, Charlie Kohlhase has to work hard to keep his quintet’s thick middle from turning to mud. But the Bostonian baritone and alto saxophonist is an ingenious arranger who’s been compared to Mingus, and one listen to the band’s 1991 debut, Research & Development, or better yet the newer Good Deeds (both on Accurate) demonstrates the fact. Also a member of the Either/Orchestra and the Mandala Octet, Kohlhase combines buoyant swing–ably handled by the rhythm section of John Turner (bass) and Matt Wilson (drums)–with a startling sense of musical quest, sectional compositions, and smart voicings....