StudioTulsa on 89.5-1

On StudioTulsa today, we speak by phone with Dr. Steve Perry, a passionate, down-to-earth, and plainspoken --- make that outspoken --- education-reform advocate who's best known as the founder and principal of Capital Preparatory Magnet School in Hartford, Connecticut. This school has sent one-hundred percent of its predominantly low-income, minority, first-generation high-school graduates to four-year colleges every year since its first class graduated in 2006. Dr.

On February 23rd, March 1st, and March 3rd, Tulsa Opera will present Frank Loesser's masterful "Broadway opera" --- as some have called it --- "The Most Happy Fella," with all three performances happening at the Tulsa PAC. A classic American musical that dates back to the middle 1950s, "The Most Happy Fella" is the show that gave us the beloved pop tunes "Standing on the Corner" and "Big D." Our guest on StudioTulsa is the internationally renowned baritone --- and current associate professor of voice at the University of Oklahoma --- Kim Josephson, who stars in this production.

Our guest on this installment of ST is Richard Blackett, the Andrew Jackson Professor of History at Vanderbilt University, who joins us by phone.

For this installment of ST, on the day after Presidents' Day, we are looking back on the war-torn tenure of our nation's greatest president, Abe Lincoln. Our guest is the author and journalist David Von Drehle, whose widely acclaimed and most recent book, "Rise to Greatness: Abraham Lincoln and America's Most Perilous Year," was named one of the Kansas City Star's Top 100 Books of 2012.

The Tulsa Youth Symphony, now comprised of more than 150 middle-school and high-school musicians from throughout Northeastern Oklahoma, will celebrate its 50th anniversary this year. For more than 40 of those years, our guest on ST has been at the helm of this outstanding local arts organization; in fact, just last month, Ron Wheeler --- who's been the CEO and conductor of the Tulsa Youth Symphony since 1972, and who's also a violinist with the Tulsa Symphony --- was given the prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award from the Oklahoma Music Educators Association.

Our two guests on this edition of ST are Michael Wright and Steven Marzolf. Both are directing plays currently being presented in repertory by the TU Department of Theatre and Musical Theatre; Wright is directing Neil Simon's classic comedy/drama, "Biloxi Blues," which opens tonight, and Marzolf is directing John Murrell's "Waiting for the Parade," which opened last night. Both plays concern the Second World War, yet they differ in some interesting ways --- for example, Simon's play is essentially an all-male saga about coming of age amid the struggles of basic training in the U.S.

When Bruce Sorrell was starting his tenure, about a year ago, as Executive Director of Chamber Music Tulsa, someone told him that this outstanding organization --- which will turn 60 next year, and which has been bringing world-class music ensembles to our community for decades --- was "one of Tulsa's best-kept secrets." As he tells us on this edition of ST, Sorrell wants to change this.

When we say that someone is a "tinkerer," we might be offering a word of praise...or a put-down. Today's edition of ST explores the positive definition of the "tinkerer," as a creative inventor or innovator.

On today's ST, we're spinning a seriously tasty variety --- a gumbo, in fact --- of great Mardi Gras music with Denis McGilvray, a local music blogger and longtime New Orleans music enthusiast.

Our guest on this installment of StudioTulsa is Robert Caro, the widely celebrated historian and biographer whose detailed, tirelessly researched writings have been awarded the Pulitzer Prize (twice), the National Book Critics Circle Award, the National Book Award, and the Francis Parkman Prize, among other honors. Tomorrow night, Tuesday the 12th, he'll deliver a Presidential Lecture in the Allen Chapman Activity Center here on the TU campus. The lecture begins at 7:30pm and is free to the public. (The Presidential Lecture Series is sponsored by TU's Darcy O'Brien Endowed Chair.) Mr.