Local arts organization free103point9 begins public workshops for a new community radio station this month with events at the Catskill Community Center and hosted by the Cairo Library at the Cairo Town Hall. free103point9, an 11-year-old arts organization, recently won a license for a 3,300-watt non-commercial radio station broadcasting at 90.7-FM that will be a community-run media project, re-envisioning radio as an innovative platform for local participation. The station’s inclusive programming will connect diverse voices, and distribute information across the public spectrum in New York's Greene and Columbia Counties.

Studios for the station will be in the Catskill Community Center as well as in Hudson, Cairo, and other towns throughout the two counties, and live programming may also originate from a number of other local venues, and including town meetings, workshops, lectures, school events, and local performances. “We are being overwhelmed with people calling and e-mailing that want to be involved,” says free103point9 Program Director Tom Roe. “These first public meetings are a chance for anyone who wants to be be a DJ, or help organize fundraisers, or interview your neighbors, to come out and meet others who are working to bring community radio to this area in person.” The station is hosting a community meeting and workshop for anyone who wants to get involved. The first is from 1-3 p.m. Sat. Feb. 14 at the Catskill Community Center, with a live internet radio show. Admission is free. Tune in at www.free103point9.org.

The meeting at the Catskill Community Center will be in conjunction with a children’s Valentine’s Day program there. Children (ages 5 - 10) will participate in arts and crafts, have a snack, and watch a Valentine's Day movie. (The children’s program is free, but registration is required. To register please call 518-719-8244.) “Murals of Catskill’s Historical Buildings” is the current art show on view at the Catskill Community Center. Admission on Feb. 14 to this work by local fourth-grade students, a joint project of the Catskill Central School District, Arts in Education Program of the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) and Ruth Leonard, artist and teacher, is free. Folks who stop by that afternoon can also record audio for the new community station, and meet organizers behind the effort.

An online version of the new community radio station will begin in May, and the FM community radio station is expected to get on the air by June, 2010. To volunteer to help get the radio station started contact Tom Roe at tr@free103point9.org, or call 518-622-2598. A web site with more information about the station and these events is at: http://www.free103point9.org/communityradio/

The Catskill Community Center is located at 344 Main St. in Catskill, 518-719-8244.

Percussionist William Hooker, the genre-bending free jazz legend, will improvise a soundtrack to pioneering African-American filmmaker Oscar Micheaux’s 1920 silent film classic — originally advertised as a chance to come see “the annihilation of the Ku Klux Klan.” Live video feed from Troy, New York. Watch video below or at www.free103point9.org. Use controls below video to adjust audio. Refresh page if video freezes. Video will only show image during live event.

The poet icon and political activist Amiri Baraka performs with Rob Brown, one of the New York City downtown music scene’s most in-demand saxophonists, in a reading of his new book “Somebody Blew Up America & Other Poems.” Live video below during the show from The Sanctuary for Independent Media in Troy, NY. Refresh page if image freezes.

We will play field recordings and pieces composed and from, San Francisco, with a minimum of talking and other "packaging." Recordings from Chris Watson, Jim McKee, Andrew Roth, Robert Beahrs, Joseph Lawrence, James Goode, Aaron Ximm, and Jeremiah Moore, among others. A guest program produced by Jeremiah Moore and Aaron Ximm from Bay Area Sound Ecology will be included. Bay Area Sound Ecology (BASE) is an interdisciplinary forum centered around listening and the soundscape. We create projects and events to promote sound-environment awareness, making and encouraging opportunities for ear-opening sonic encounters, such as this radio program and our BASEbot listening salon series. Visit us on the web, and subscribe to our podcast, at http://www.basoundecology.org/

Local arts organization free103point9 begins public workshops for a new community radio station this month with events at the Catskill Community Center and hosted by the Cairo Library at the Cairo Town Hall. free103point9, an 11-year-old arts organization, recently won a license for a 3,300-watt non-commercial radio station broadcasting at 90.7-FM that will be a community-run media project, re-envisioning radio as an innovative platform for local participation. The station’s inclusive programming will connect diverse voices, and distribute information across the public spectrum in New York's Greene and Columbia Counties.

Studios for the station will be in the Catskill Community Center as well as in Hudson, Cairo, and other towns throughout the two counties, and live programming may also originate from a number of other local venues, and including town meetings, workshops, lectures, school events, and local performances. “We are being overwhelmed with people calling and e-mailing that want to be involved,” says free103point9 Program Director Tom Roe. “These first public meetings are a chance for anyone who wants to be be a DJ, or help organize fundraisers, or interview your neighbors, to come out and meet others who are working to bring community radio to this area in person.” The station is hosting a community meeting and workshop for anyone who wants to get involved. The workshops with the Cairo Public Library are at Cairo Town Hall Thu. Feb. 26 from 6:30-8 p.m., and Sat. March 7, 12:30-2 p.m. Admission is free.

The two Cairo Library meetings will be a chance to get involved with the radio station, and are also workshops training future radio journalists and DJs how to use a digital recorder that will be available at the Cairo Library for locals to record community events, performances, meetings, and lectures, to play later on the radio station, and to be archived on the station’s web site. The Cairo Library is hosting these meetings in the Town Hall.

An online version of the new community radio station will begin in May, and the FM community radio station is expected to get on the air by June, 2010. To volunteer to help get the radio station started contact Tom Roe at tr@free103point9.org, or call 518-622-2598. A web site with more information about the station and these events is at: http://www.free103point9.org/communityradio/

The Cairo Public Library and Cairo Town Hall are located at 512 Main St. in Cairo, 518-622-9864.

This rare assembly brings together Todd Reynolds (Bang on a Can, Yo Yo Ma, Meredith Monk) on violins/laptop, Ed Mann (Zappa) on percussion/electronics, David Barrett (Banda Elastica, Splatter Trio) on saxophones, and Michael Bisio on bass. Watch live video and listen to audio on this event page (below, or click "more info"), on The Sancturary for Independent Media's home page, or at www.free103point9.org. Refresh page if image or audio freeze during the performance.

Experimental Intermedia The Thirty-fifth Anniversary of EI performances at 224 Centre Street, The Fortieth Anniversary of the Founding of Experimental Intermedia, the Fortieth Anniversary of the 224 Centre Street loft, and, not least, The Nineteenth Annual Festival with no fancy name, Part Two (or B). Phill Niblock, curator March 2009.

All of the EI March concerts will be streamed on free103point9 Online Radio; click here to hear the live stream during the posted events: http://www.comm.free103point9.org:8000/ei.mp3.m3u

Michael Thieke and Kai Fagaschinski (Berlin) Friday 6
Andre Goncalves (Lisbon), Margarida Garcia (Lisbon, New York), Barry Weisblat (New York) Monday 9
Kato Hideki (USA/Japan) and Ursula Scherrer (USA/Switzerland) Tuesday 10
Screen Compositions 5 Tuesday 17
Thomas Buckner (US) and Matthias Kaul (Germany) Wednesday 18
Zbigniew Karkowski (Poland, Japan) Thursday 19
Alexei Borisov (Moscow) & Jeffrey Surak (Washington DC) Friday 20
David Daniell (Chicago) Saturday 21

Local arts organization free103point9 begins public workshops for a new community radio station this month with events at the Catskill Community Center and hosted by the Cairo Library at the Cairo Town Hall. free103point9, an 11-year-old arts organization, recently won a license for a 3,300-watt non-commercial radio station broadcasting at 90.7-FM that will be a community-run media project, re-envisioning radio as an innovative platform for local participation. The station’s inclusive programming will connect diverse voices, and distribute information across the public spectrum in New York's Greene and Columbia Counties.

Studios for the station will be in the Catskill Community Center as well as in Hudson, Cairo, and other towns throughout the two counties, and live programming may also originate from a number of other local venues, and including town meetings, workshops, lectures, school events, and local performances. “We are being overwhelmed with people calling and e-mailing that want to be involved,” says free103point9 Program Director Tom Roe. “These first public meetings are a chance for anyone who wants to be be a DJ, or help organize fundraisers, or interview your neighbors, to come out and meet others who are working to bring community radio to this area in person.” The station is hosting a community meeting and workshop for anyone who wants to get involved. The workshops with the Cairo Public Library are at Cairo Town Hall Thu. Feb. 26 from 6:30-8 p.m., and Sat. March 7, 12:30-2 p.m. Admission is free.

The two Cairo Library meetings will be a chance to get involved with the radio station, and are also workshops training future radio journalists and DJs how to use a digital recorder that will be available at the Cairo Library for locals to record community events, performances, meetings, and lectures, to play later on the radio station, and to be archived on the station’s web site. The Cairo Library is hosting these meetings in the Town Hall.

An online version of the new community radio station will begin in May, and the FM community radio station is expected to get on the air by June, 2010. To volunteer to help get the radio station started contact Tom Roe at tr@free103point9.org, or call 518-622-2598. A web site with more information about the station and these events is at: http://www.free103point9.org/communityradio/

The Cairo Public Library and Cairo Town Hall are located at 512 Main St. in Cairo, 518-622-9864.

Readings from Capital Region writers Chase Twichell, Sam Truitt, Christian Peet, Laura Didyk, and others in celebration of Fence magazine’s brand new anthology of poetry, creative nonfiction, short fiction and more. Refreshments will be served and copies of “A Best of Fence” will be available for purchase. Watch video stream below (or click "more info") during event. Refresh page if image or audio freeze.

Iraqi–American digital artist Wafaa Bilal’s new book “Shoot an Iraqi: Life, Art and Resistance Under the Gun” tells the story of the Domestic Tension project that placed him 24/7 on the receiving end of a paintball gun accessible online to a global audience—and what really happened on his infamous visit to Troy last spring. Watch video stream below (or click "more info") during event. Refresh page if image or audio freeze. Admission by donation.