Think the Age of Aquarius is just some half-forgotten pop tune from the 60’s musical Hair? Then think again...it’s been with us a long time, and we’ve been living it every day of this lifetime. See the big picture about how this age is both wonderful and daunting. The connections are amazing - is it possible the Jetsons, Ed Snowden, Escape from Alcatraz, the iPhone and Lady Diana all fit together? Yes, totally. Come find out how on September 13 at this interesting & dynamic talk by local astrologist Ken McGhee.

Ever since there has been spectacle there have been those critical of it, who believe that it turns audiences into passive consumers who are unable to think for themselves. Plato famously illustrated this position in his Allegory of the Cave. Many artists and movements have sought to explode the spectacle in an attempt to rouse the audience from their somnambulistic trance, transforming them into more active participants in the world. We will look at several examples from art history, spanning from Heironymous Bosch's 1502 painting, The Conjurer, to contemporary art, investigating how as spectacle and media evolve over time, so does the critique and resistance. We'll also critique the critique; analyzing the ideology, tactics, and effectiveness of different works and movements

As has been seen in recent tsunami and hurricane disasters, many lives depend on the interpretation of complex global information. A series of languages for communicating this mass of data is evolving, and part of that development includes sound. Artist and scholar Andrea Polli, Professor of Art and Ecology at the University of New Mexico, discusses her journey towards activist art related to climate change, including work in the Arctic and Antarctic.  Her talk will ask participants to consider the complex question of how we might reach towards understanding climate change through sonic experience and design.

Morgan Evans-Weiler will be in residency at Rhizome from August 1-8 showcasing his installation Structures: Glass. Join us for an artist talk about the installation, as well as a performance featuring Morgan on violin and electronics. Morgan will be joined by Andy Hayleck (Baltimore), and the duo will be accompanied by the installation as well. Also performing Luke Stewart/Layne Garrett, and Echolalia.

During the primary campaign season, millions of Americans came out in enthusiastic support of Bernie Sanders' call for a 'political revolution in this country'. Now that the Sanders campaign is officially over, what can people yearning for meaningful social and political change do?

Please join us on Sunday evening July 31st as nationally-known activist, author, and Socialist Vice-Presidential candidate Eugene Puryear leads a community forum on the future of issues such as universal healthcare, free higher education, racial justice and worker's rights. We will also discuss 'Democratic Socialism' and how it differs from revolutionary politics, and what a re-invigorated Socialist movement in the United States can achieve.

Ecstatic & Wingless is an audio documentary project on early 20th century birdsong and its direct relationship on human performance - and human action on birdsong. It tells the story not only of the first recordings of cagebirds but also the practice of bird-imitation, a field that produced amazing and eccentric celebrities during the 1910s-20s. With Ecstatic & Wingless, music researcher Ian Nagoski has opened his exploration to the world of vaudevillians and bird-fanciers, of canaries, nightingales, finches, and the people who studied them, poeticized them, and tried to be them.

Please join us May 27th for an artist talk and reception with Nicole Salimbene in association with her Scapular Room installation at Rhizome DC.

Robert Millis presents an illustrated lecture about the first sound recordings made in India (in 1902), about Indian music and musicians from the 78rpm era, about Indian record collectors, and about his recent book, Indian Talking Machine (Sublime Frequencies, 2015).

The result of nearly a year in India as a Fulbright Research Scholar Indian Talking Machine is a personal take on the vast worlds of Indian music and the intricacies of collecting sound.

What can we learn about the drum used by nomadic peoples tens of thousands of years ago? What does the drum have to teach us today?  Join us for a philosophical journey in search of the meaning of the shamanic drum. Along the way we will encounter Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, whose nomadic thought opened up new ways of thinking about the world around us. With their help, we may learn how the drum not only serves as a window into another culture but also acts as a mirror that reflects our own. Following the discussion will be a music performance with Larry Gomez on percussion accompanied by Ted Zook of the group Lost Civilizations.

Talk by William Richards, clinical director of the States of Consciousness Research at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. The talk will be followed by a community discussion/dialogue facilitated by Dr. Richards.

In this program we'll take a look at Takoma Park’s interesting birth chart and find out why it’s such a remarkable place. We'll explore how Franz Kafka, John Fahey and Berkeley, California are all connected to Takoma Park, and not just in ways that you might think. We'll also examine Jungian archetypes, and how they fit with this place.

Before the Golden Age of Americana on Record, immigrants from the dissolving Ottoman Empire were singing their joys and sorrows to disc in New York City. The virtuosic musicians from Anatolia, the Eastern Mediterranean, and the Levant living in the U.S. who recorded between WWI and the Depression imported their memories on shellac-and-stone in the form of 78rpm records.  Join us for a fascinating, new view of American Folk Music as acclaimed musicologist Ian Nagoski presents a work described by Pitchfork as being "‎as essential to an understanding of American music as anything else.”

Just in time for the holiday season, learn practical tools to address the vexing and difficult problem of insomnia using an Integrative Medicine approach.