“Blue Collar,” a five-member acoustic band known for its blend of American Roots music features original works by Carl Stewart, who was formerly signed to Warner Brothers. He is the lead singer, guitar and harmonica player for the band.

Bill MacDougall plays bass and brings his experience in all styles of music to the group. He has written and performed his own original music and has recorded a solo CD – “Trickle Creek Sessions.”

Bill Bordisso plays accordion, banjo, percussion and vocals. He teaches guitar, saxophone and voice, and has performed at San Francisco’s Cow Palace and with many professional bands throughout California.

Clovice Lewis plays the cello and is a noted composer, teacher, a member of the Ukiah Symphony, the CLPA Lake County Symphony and a former professor of computer music. He has performed with numerous groups throughout California.

Sue Condit plays violin, mandolin, percussion and vocals. She has performed in bands, musicals and singing groups throughout California. She directs the CLPA Youth Orchestra and is a member of the CLPA Lake County Symphony and Konocti Fiddle Club.

The Fargo Brothers is a four-member group that offers a mixture of originals and cover tunes in a blues, root rock and Americana style. Since 1979 they have played over four thousand live shows from California to the Canadian Border. They are known for their vocal harmonies and tight ensemble playing.

Michael Lester Adams is the group’s composer and plays guitar and vocals. Other members are Russ Whitehead, bass, vocals; Joost Vonk, drums, vocals; and Mojo Larry Platz, guitars, vocals.

The final concert of the series is on August 20 and will feature Blue Collar and Twice as Good.

Cactus Grill and Terrill Cellars Winery will be on the premises for food and wine purchase. All concerts start at 6 p.m. Cost of admission is $10 at the door.

Go to www.tuscanmusicfiesta.com for directions and details.

This column has now hit a trifecta with its third consecutive review of a family film. You can’t get more kid friendly than a G-rated Pixar animation film.

The good news is that “Cars 2” has moved the car racing franchise into a whole new international territory that is all the better for its global cast.

“Cars 2” opens by playing homage to the James Bond franchise that easily recalls several key elements in the best of the Sean Connery works. For one, the coolest car is the Aston Martin that belongs to a suave British secret agent.

Naturally, Michael Caine has the perfect quality to his voice that embodies the ultimate cool and suave British spy. His sporty British car is loaded with James Bond-type gadgets.

Caine’s Finn McMissile is teamed with the fetching Holley Shiftwell (voice of Emily Mortimer), a rookie field agent. Together, they launch an assault on a deep sea oil rig run by a nefarious gang.

Back in the States, noted race car Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson) returns to Radiator Springs for rest and relaxation with his best buddy, the tow truck Mater (Larry the Cable Guy).

Meanwhile, billionaire Miles Axlerod (Eddie Izzard), eager to promote his alternative fuel called Allinol, is staging a series of World Grand Prix races in Europe and Asia.

After being taunted by arrogant Formula champion Francesco Bernoulli (John Turturro), McQueen and Mater, along with their hometown pit crew, head off to Tokyo for the inaugural Grand Prix race.

In a series of contests to occur as well in Italy, France and England, McQueen is eager to prove that he is worthy to compete with the cocky, flamboyant and self-absorbed Francesco.

As the racing gets under way, Mater, who sounds like a backwoods hillbilly from Arkansas, is mistaken by McMissile for an undercover American agent on a similar mission to take down a villainous East German scientist.

To make matters worse, the attractive Holley Shiftwell chats up Mater for his supposed prowess in international espionage, while the clueless tow truck imagines that they might actually go out on a dinner date.

Easily distracted, Mater finds himself torn between assisting his good pal McQueen in the high-profile race and falling in with the top-secret mission orchestrated by the smooth, debonair Finn McMissile.

Mater’s charm, which does wear a little thin after too many cornpone witticisms, anchors much of the action around his unwitting ability to chug along on his hapless path to ultimate vindication.

Much of the fast-paced action is filled with a global conspiracy to sabotage the race, which has as much to do with political intrigue as garnering market share in a new fuel source.

The ongoing intrigue plays well for the adult audience, while taking nothing away from the enjoyment of “Cars 2” at a level appealing to grade school kids.

The colorful settings of the Tokyo streets, the coastal beauty of the Italian Riviera, the cosmopolitan charm of Paris and the elegance of London make for very great visuals.

“Cars 2” proves to be a worthy addition to the pantheon of Pixar animated films, enjoyable for its deft combination of comedy and international intrigue.

DVD RELEASE UPDATE

“Elektra Luxx” arrived in theaters to little fanfare, but the thought of Carla Gugino playing a pregnant ex-porn star sounded intriguing.

Gugino’s adult film star Elektra Luxx has decided to quit the industry and become a “sexology” instructor at a community college.

“Elektra Luxx” has been released on DVD, a copy of which arrived unsolicited in the mail.

I thought it might be interesting, given a cast of characters that include Timothy Olyphant, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Malin Akerman and Emmanuelle Chriqui.

The right comedic elements seemed to be in place, what with Elektra coping with a clothing-challenged neighbor, a criminal twin sister and other assorted oddballs.

Unfortunately, “Elektra Luxx” just didn’t deliver the comedic goods, so spare yourself any trouble or expense.

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.

The evening of art and music will take place from 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. at the gallery, 325 N. Main Street, Lakeport.

New works from the following local artists will be introduced: Colleen La Plante – artistic, colorful fused glass table settings and more; George Waterstraat – one-of-a kind burl wood (maple, redwood, walnut, bay laurel), redwood, ash vases and bowls; Lois Feron – acrylic on canvas and boards; and Judy Cardinale – abstracts watercolor.

Currently showing at the gallery are Konocti Pleine Air Plus – landscapes of Lake County painted on location by the Pleine Air Artists Group; Amy Heppen – figurative; Diane Constable – acrylic; Linda Richmond – acrylic/collage; Bruce Vandraiss – colored pencil; Terry Durnil – pastels; Wanda Quitiquit – turn-of-the-century Pomo design, hand-painted gourds; Bill Rose – stained glass, fused glass, carved eggs of the ostrich, emu, duck and rhea.

The gallery also is putting on an abstract show, including 23 painted entries and two sculptures. Two

wall spaces in the main saloon and the Linda Carpenter Student gallery are full of these marvelous abstract paintings and sculptures

There will be finger food, a chance to meet the artists, music by Shady Tree (Michael Barrish, Janet Berrian, Tom Nixon and Scott Somers) and wine poured by Beaver Creek Winery.

For more information contact the Main Street Gallery at 707-263-6658.

Ted Kooser, US Poet Laureate from 2004 to 2006. Photo by UNL Publications and Photography.

Some of us have more active fantasy lives than others, but all of us have them. Here Karin Gottshall, who lives in Vermont, shares a variety of loneliness that some of our readers may have experienced.

More Lies

Sometimes I say I’m going to meet my sister at the café—

even though I have no sister—just because it’s such

a beautiful thing to say. I’ve always thought so, ever since

I read a novel in which two sisters were constantly meeting

in cafés. Today, for example, I walked alone

on the wet sidewalk, wearing my rain boots, expecting

someone might ask where I was headed. I bought

a steno pad and a watch battery, the store windows

fogged up. Rain in April is a kind of promise, and it costs

nothing. I carried a bag of books to the café and ordered

tea. I like a place that’s lit by lamps. I like a place

where you can hear people talk about small things,

like the difference between azure and cerulean,

and the price of tulips. It’s going down. I watched

someone who could be my sister walk in, shaking the rain

from her hair. I thought, even now florists are filling

their coolers with tulips, five dollars a bundle. All over

the city there are sisters. Any one of them could be mine.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation, publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2010 by Karin Gottshall, whose most recent book of poetry is Crocus, Fordham University Press, 2007. Poem reprinted from the New Ohio Review, No. 8, Fall 2010, by permission of Karin Gottshall and the publisher. Introduction copyright ©2011 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. They do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – The Lake County Arts Council invites Lake County photographers to participate in the next of its summer series of juried shows, “Lake County Landscape in Photography.”

The judging is open to all original, unenhanced digital photographs, image size not to exceed 8 by 10 inches.

Entries for jury will be received on Friday, July 22, at the Main Street Gallery in Lakeport.

Curator Ray Farrow welcomes Jan Hambrick back to judge work submitted for jury into this show. Many will remember the great show that Hambrick selected for the last Main Street Gallery photographers show.

Hambrick is founder of many successful art-related businesses and has four decades in the commercial and fine art industry. She has received numerous awards and accolades for her published work. Since 2006 she has been teaching the next generation of aspiring artists and photographers at Clearlake High School.

Entry information and guidelines are available at the Main Street Gallery, 325 N. Main St., Lakeport, during regular business hours, Tuesday through Saturday, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Ted Kooser, US Poet Laureate from 2004 to 2006. Photo by UNL Publications and Photography.

I am especially fond of what we might call landscape poems, describing places, scenes. Here April Lindner, who lives in Philadelphia, paints a scene we might come upon on the back side of any great American city.

Our Lady of Perpetual Help

The burnt church up the street yawns to the sky,

its empty windows edged in soot, its portals

boarded up and slathered with graffiti,

oily layers, urgent but illegible.

All that can be plundered has been, all

but the carapace—the hollow bell tower,

the fieldstone box that once served as a nave.

The tidy row of homes that line this block

have tended lawns and scalloped bathtub shrines.

Each front porch holds a chair where no one sits.

Those who live here triple lock their doors

day and night. Some mornings they step out

to find a smoking car stripped to its skeleton

abandoned at the curb. Most afternoons

the street is still but for a mourning dove

and gangs of pigeons picking through the grass.

Our Lady of Perpetual Help is gray,

a dead incisor in a wary smile.

A crevice in her wall allows a glimpse

into the chancel, where a sodden mattress

and dirty blanket indicate that someone

finds this place a sanctuary still,

takes his rest here, held and held apart

from passers by, their cruelties and their kindnesses,

watched over by the night’s blind congregation,

by the blank eyes of a concrete saint.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation, publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2010 by Able Muse Review and April Lindner, whose most recent novel is Jane, Poppy, 2010. Poem reprinted from Able Muse Anthology, Able Muse Press, 2010, by permission of the publisher. Introduction copyright ©2011 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. They do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.