Minnesota Minds: Cultivating Creativity Rachel Lauer and Aleisha Theisen

This season flew by! We're so grateful to our guests and listeners for making this a super fun and rewarding experience. In the season one wrap-up, we discuss what it was like to get to know some of Minnesota's fascinating multidisciplinary creatives and what we plan to carry into the next season. In the meantime, follow us for updates at: https://www.instagram.com/minnesota_minds_podcast/.

Belen Rodriguez has a rich community here in Minnesota, but when she first moved from Argentina to Minnesota, she found herself homesick and missing the long-standing tradition of Sundays spent sharing meals with her family. She began to recreate that tradition for friends and family in the U.S., and her passion for sharing this experience grew. Over the past five years, her rapidly expanding frozen empanada company, Quebracho, has become a way for her to share the story of her family, culture, and community in Rosario, Argentina, with a wider audience. She tells us how creativity was crucial for crystalizing her vision, communicating that through Quebracho's branding, and then pivoting numerous times during the pandemic to keep her company growing despite the obstacles of an unpredictable time. You can read more about Belen and Quebracho at https://www.quebrachomn.com/pages/our-story.

Follow Quebracho:

Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/quebrachoempanadas/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/QuebrachoEmpanadas/

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@quebrachoempanadas

Follow Belen on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rodriguezbelenm/

Minnesota native Anna Segner's art is at once whimsical, intriguing, and thought-provoking. She's a studio artist focused on painting, mixed media, and assemblage. Her work pulls you in with familiar imagery of things like Beanie Babies and rhinos, and it holds your attention as you begin to see the rich layers of meaning. Anna uses critical animal studies and other research to explore the human act of “toying” with animals and nature, and she discusses how her art has evolved to focus on this area. Anna and host Rachel Lauer met when they both worked in journalism, and Anna now teaches drawing in the Department of Art and Visual Culture at Iowa State University. You can view her work on her website: http://www.annasegner.com/ and follow her on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/painted_annamal/.

We also discussed per capita spending on state arts agencies and how that affects quality of life. You can find this data in Table 6 of this document for fiscal year 2019: https://nasaa-arts.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/NASAA-FY2019-SAA-Revenues-Report.pdf

Rachel and Aleisha talked about NaNoWriMo and London Writers Salon Writers' Hour at the start of the episode:

https://nanowrimo.org/

https://community.londonwriterssalon.com/c/writers-hour-links

From working with wine sellers in Minnesota to vineyards in Napa, certified sommelier Emily Anderson has seen the ins and outs of the wine industry from many angles. She loves sharing her passion and has interesting and creative thoughts on factors the industry will need to address in the coming years, such as approachability, affordability and adapting to a changing climate. She also loves creating the perfect wine and food pairing, and she tells us about some delightful dinner parties she's hosted using this skill.

Through her journal entries and personal essays, Minneapolis writer, editor, and Loft Literary Center educator Marianne Manzler is building a body of work around her experience being diagnosed with cancer in her 20s as well as shining a light on the person behind the illness. In this interview, she tells about experiencing imposter syndrome as a biracial child growing up in a predominantly white suburb, how she learned to lean into her voice as a writer, and why she has a goal of 100 rejections per year. Her creative process has also yielded great success. She was a Fulbright scholar in Malaysia in 2016. Her essay “On the Making of a Mumu,” which originally appeared in Fourth Genre, received a notable in Best American Essays 2022. Her work can also be found in The Seventh Wave and 5280. Marianne is currently the interim education program manager at the Loft Literary Center.



Marianne Manzler's website:

www.mariannemanzler.com/bio



The Loft Literary Center:

https://loft.org/

If you've been to a major theater production, opera, or ballet in Minneapolis or St. Paul, chances are you've heard string bass and Hammond keyboard player Dave Berg in his element. He's been a big part of the Twin Cities music scene for decades. He shares with us how he built a diverse, sustainable music career, and he tells us about some of the fun surprises along the way, like getting to chat with acclaimed tenor Luciano Pavarotti or recording the soundtrack to an award-winning (and hilarious) Super Bowl ad. Dave currently can be heard at work in the Chanhassen Dinner Theatres Orchestra.


Track list in episode:


28:16: "Overture - The Marriage of Figaro" by Mozart, performed by a local chamber orchestra. Dave is on string bass.
35:22: "Power of My Love" from the musical "All Shook Up," performed by the Chanhassen Dinner Theater Orchestra. Dave is on Hammond keyboard.
43:33: "Poor Old Daddy" from the musical "Puss In Boots," recorded at Sound 80 in Minneapolis. Dave is on string bass accompanying vocalist Jearlyn Steele.
45:34: "Cat Herders," a national television ad for EDS that first ran during the Super Bowl in 1999. It was recorded at Asche and Spencer in Minneapolis. Dave is on string bass.
63:26: "Simon Zealotes" from the musical "Jesus Christ Superstar," performed by the Chanhassen Dinner Theatres Orchestra. Dave is on Hammond keyboard.