Culture Nights

Appointed Curated Cultural
Programming in Your Own Home

What Are Culture Nights?

The idea behind Culture Nights is that you take some time every week for a good movie, a fantastic concert, an interesting talk, or some other curated content to watch or listen to.

If you find something to your liking (and we hope you will like just all of it), you simply tap a button to add the event to your digital calendar.

Once the appointed time has come, you simply tap on the link provided for the program notes, put on the content, and enjoy. Think of it as having bought a ticket.

You don’t have to leave the house, just make some tea or pour a glass of wine, turn off all distractions and enjoy an evening of good, cultured entertainment carefully curated.

Pencil drawing of a young woman with long hair
One ought, every day at least, to hear a little song,
read a good poem, see a fine picture, and,
if it were possible, to speak a few reasonable words.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship

This Week's Events ()

This Week

Psst ... This is some random and outdated content. Culture Nights is on a short hiatus and will be back in January 2024.

Monday
11
April
7:00 pm
(EST)
NETFLIX
prime video
A pencil drawing of the Amazon Prime Video logo
HBO
A pencil drawing of The Criterion Channel logo
THE
CRITERION
CHANNEL
A pencil drawing of the YouTube logo
YouTube
hulu
A pencil drawing of the Apple logo
Music
A pencil drawing of the Spotify logo
Spotify
Alternative sources
may exist (see details)
🎷🌜Jazz
|
Understated

Anouar Brahem | Conte de l'Incroyable Amour

Now for something entirely different... It's otherworldly, but involving, gripping. The title piece (The Incredible Tale of Love) might be the most understated anthem ever. A wonderful album that, upon repeated listening, reveals many transcendent moments.

See Details
Wednesday
13
April
7:30 pm
(EST)
NETFLIX
prime video
A pencil drawing of the Amazon Prime Video logo
HBO
A pencil drawing of The Criterion Channel logo
THE
CRITERION
CHANNEL
A pencil drawing of the YouTube logo
YouTube
hulu
A pencil drawing of the Apple logo
Music
A pencil drawing of the Spotify logo
Spotify
Alternative sources
may exist (see details)
🎷🌜Jazz
|
This will calm you down

Avishai Cohen | Aurora

Singing – in Hebrew, English, Spanish, and Ladino. The music draws its source in the earth of his home country, at the crossroads of many cultures. Arab-Andalusian and Hebraic, it tells the story of Bedouins of the desert and speaks of life, love, youth and freedom.

Jazz naturally remains at the heart of this original universe – the ideal meeting place for all kinds of encounters. Aurora is a work of synergy under the Blue Note label, which for years seems to have been at the centre of all futures in jazz, of which Avishai Cohen is undeniably the most modern and irresistible standard-bearer.


See Details
Friday
15
April
7:00 pm
(EST)
NETFLIX
prime video
A pencil drawing of the Amazon Prime Video logo
HBO
A pencil drawing of The Criterion Channel logo
THE
CRITERION
CHANNEL
A pencil drawing of the YouTube logo
YouTube
hulu
A pencil drawing of the Apple logo
Music
A pencil drawing of the Spotify logo
Spotify
Alternative sources
may exist (see details)
🎥🌜Film
|
Getting Real

Maria Full of Grace

A 17-year-old Colombian girl in search of adventure and a better life elects to become a 'mule' for international drug smugglers.

See Details

Questions We've Heard Before

When Are Culture Nights?

Culture Nights usually start on a given day sometime between 6:45pm and 8pm (EST). The length can vary, but we are trying to keep it under two hours.

If you are in a different time zone, you can cheat a little and move it to a different time that works better for where the moon is positioned when you have time but at least keep the day. Sometimes we have pre- or post-talks on Zoom, if you are changing the time, you will miss out on those.

A set of geometric object drawn with pencil shading.
Is This For Elitist Schmucks?

Yes. And for their affiliates & associates (and for those who don't like 'em).

What Do I Need to Participate?
For Movies & Documentaries
A pencil drawing of an old school TV set with room antenna

For the most part we are recommending movies or documentaries on NETFLIX and hulu (both with their U.S. catalogs). But we also link to logo prime video (sometimes to paid content), log YouTube, and (in rare cases) to HBO or logTHE CRITERION CHANNEL.

For Music & Other Audio Content
A pencil drawing of an old school turntable playing a record.

For audio content of any kind it is suffice to have access to either [S]Spotify or [AMusic. We will try to provide both links if the content is available on both platforms*.

* If you happen to be on TIDAL or some other slightly less mainstream platform, you might have to do a little extra work

How Much Is This?

All of Culture Nights is editorial content. It is designed to inform, educate, entertain, and delight. It is not designed to sell you anything.

We assume that you already have access to various streaming services.

Subscribe

Thank you! Your submission has been received!
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.
Do I Need To Subscribe to Participate?

With the subscription you get one weekly reminder email with the program for the following week. That's all.

If you just come over on a given Sunday afternoon, the new program will be up for you. There will simply be no email reminder.

A close-up of a power amplifier

About the Curator

I first met the curator over a casual six-course dinner in his loft apartment in a small college town. His 16-foot walls were lined floor to ceiling with bookshelves. The books were in the thousands, mostly in English, many in German, some in French. They had clearly been read, lent to friends, returned, and read again. They were in conversation with each other, with the music collection that lined the adjacent shelves, with the art work and film posters that burst with color on the walls, with the spices in the kitchen that had been freshly ground and wafted aromatically throughout the room.

The fragrance of tarragon, the lingering scent of caramelized onions, the tart-sweet of apricot: the sensory delights of the evening were carefully curated. The wine flowed, the music flowed, the conversation flowed furtherⁱ.

This is the secret heart of the curator: not to control what we see and hear, but to cultivate an atmosphere that evokes a response to what we see and hear. A connoisseur is content with simply knowing. The curator, by contrast, expands our capacity to know – by asking us to commit to an evening and immerse ourselves in other worlds.

And it still does. I have fallen deeply in love. I would say hopelessly, but I am done with the hopeless kind, and what’s more, loving the curator actually fills me with great hope. The point is to take this ‘about the curator’ perspective with a grain of salt² and a pinch of cayenne. See for yourself. Beware of becoming smitten.

²
A grain really does mean a grain. Singular, not plural. This household is on a strict low-sodium diet.