It’s all about character in this week’s installment of Fresh Start: A cultural observer from Shaker Heights tries to find the essence of the Perfect Man in his new book. A modest local organization feeds the needs of a city’s residents (in part) by feeding its donors. The heart and soul of the Cleveland Heights’ arts scene supports its present tense with the help of one of the region’s oldest galleries. This region’s got soul and continues to make history. These three events carry a torch that says the area’s best and brightest are here to stay.  

Training Day

Award-winning Shaker Heights journalist, author and cultural observer Jimi Izrael is not one to pull punches. It’s what makes his work moderating “The Barbershop” for National Public Radio’s Tell Me More with Michel Martin and his blog “The Hardline” for the Washington Post site The Root.com positively crucial. Izrael spins the a narrative of love, African American experience, episodic pop culture and opinion in his new book, The Denzel Principle: Why Black Women Can't Find Good Black Men (St. Martin’s Press). The book introduces the theory that The Perfect Man – in the form of Academy Award-winning actor Denzel Washington – actually exists off-screen and that all African American women “can snag a Denzel of their very own.” He signs and discusses the book at Joseph-Beth Booksellers in Lyndhurst this Tuesday, March 9 at 7PM. And if you’ve heard him on NPR, you know you’re in for a real treat. 

Chicken Soup for the Clevelander’s Soul

St. Malachi Center has long been a champion of Cleveland’s less fortunate children and families, nourishing the minds and lives that lean on it during particularly trying times. The Superior Viaduct organization offers no-cost showers, afterschool programs, adult education, health clinics and much more to those who arrive there. But none of it happens in a vacuum. Generous support of donors and attendees of their annual Soup for the Soul Benefit help St. Malachi’s mission financially. On Saturday, March 13 at 6PM, hit the center’s largest fundraising effort at St. Ignatius High School. Angelo Petitti (Petitti Garden Centers) receives honors, while celebrity servers offer up scrumptious, gourmet soups prepared by area restaurants. Appetizers, desserts, a silent auction, raffle, and live entertainment round out the evening, and all for one of Cleveland’s greatest causes: the community it serves.

Such Great Heights

Another Plumtown institution, Heights Arts, is in the midst of their own annual benefit: a sale of antique prints from the Vixseboxse Art Gallery. A painter and avid art collector, William Vixseboxse established Cleveland’s oldest art gallery three generations ago; his spirit is still carried on at the namesake gallery on Cedar Road. Prints by Nast and Homer from Harper’s Weekly, botanicals, chromolithographs, mezzotints, Civil War-era art and more are a part of the saleable stash. The sale launched over the weekend – and continues through mid-April during regular Heights Arts hours – but there’s still plenty to take in. Admit it, your pad needs a little sprucing up; your score helps one of the region’s art institutions thrive.

Cross-Checking

And hey, don’t forget that the Burning River Roller Girls season starts this Saturday, March 13 at 6PM at the Wolstein Center at Cleveland State University. Read my interview with some of those skatin’, cross-checkin’ ladies in OA this month.

Spring is right around the corner, and if that isn’t welcome news for your frost-addled soul, then this week’s Fresh Start is sure to thaw you out and warm you up. Some of our personal defrosters kicked into high gear with last month’s Forbes magazine critique of Northeast Ohio; we can’t help but think if perennial Forbes lemonface Kurt Badenhausen experienced a real weekend here, he’d have to can those sour grapes. Assuming he would agree to such a weekend, we’d get Badenhausen to some great food and nightlife, the requisite tourist traps and some of the region’s best kept secrets. Along the way, stops at a rockin’ anniversary party, an exclusive Native American art exhibition and an annual horticultural reverie would be mandatory. You’re right, why waste the effort. We’re guessing it wouldn’t change Badenhausen’s mind, but it would confirm who the real #1 on the “most miserable” list should be.

The Modern Dance

This weekend, the Beachland Ballroom in Collinwood celebrates its 10th anniversary weekend, with a rundown of rare melodic treats sure to rock your gypsy soul. Cleveland’s legendary Pere Ubu, post-punkers This Moment in Black History, and psych-rock iconoclast Roky Erickson headline the affair, with deftly dizzying support from Sun God, Short Rabbits, The Alarm Clocks, JJ Magazine, Living Stereo and more. Ubu, fronted by the ever-compelling David Thomas, will perform their album The Modern Dance in its entirety Friday, March 5 at 9PM, while conjuring cogent woe and cinematic psychosis. Texas native Erickson performs Saturday, March 6 at 9PM, and will tap his 13th Floor Elevators catalog and work from his Okkervil River co-piloted album, True Love Cast Out All Evil. It’s his first album of new work in 14 years. The weekend also launches the new This Moment in Black History record.

In Bloom

Every year, the Cleveland Botanical Garden finds the art and meaning found in one of the world’s most exotic plants: the seductive orchid. The Garden’s Orchid Mania celebration ushers in spring with a bevy of programming, displays and a plant sale that can’t be missed. This weekend, the Garden honors the enchanting plant and its flowers by bringing in the region’s best orchid growers for their Vendor Weekend Saturday, March 6 and Sunday, March 7. A vast array of orchids and growing supplies available will be available for purchase, along with access to the Garden’s resplendent celebration of said floral species. Orchids are symbols of love and beauty, elegance and luxury, virility and perseverance. In Cleveland, they symbolize a change of seasons and a lift in mood for residents.

Native Tongue

Native American art enthusiasts are sure to thrill at the exhibition objects arriving at the Cleveland Museum of Art starting this Sunday, March 7. Cleveland is just one of three cities offered a rare glimpse at The Eugene and Clare Thaw Collection from the Fenimore Art Museum in Cooperstown, New York. It’s one of the art world’s most elusive collections of treasures and has been raved about by The New York Times as an indispensible document of Native American art achievements before (and after) our country’s colonization. At its heart, Thaw triangulates cerebral, spiritual and cultural significance behind the works with stunning clarity. The CMA exhibition runs through the end of May.

Although largely a social media construct, the idea that “value is a perception and perception is a value” applies to our everyday lives. Everything around us is a patchwork of considerations, competing for our attention and resources, and in Cleveland, there’s a lot vying for both. OhioAuthority’s Fresh Start helps you, the reader, sort through those options. This week, our attentions turn to the nouveau historical – something old wrapped up in something new – from the amazing music and student-musicians coming from the world-renowned Cleveland Institute of Music, to the buzz drawn by a proletariat auction house on the Lakewood-Cleveland border. Throw in the annual fundraising/awareness shindig by PlayhouseSquare Partners, the young professionals group tasked with “succession planning” for the vital arts organization and theater district, and you’ve scored yourself a week full of value and perception.

Dirty Composition

Ariadne auf Naxos showcases late Romantic-era composer Richard Strauss at his most quick-and-dirty. This romantic comedy is a spin on Molière’s play Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, offering insight into what might happen when a “serious opera” company and comedy troupe are plunged into working together. There’s plenty of Bacchus, burlesque and nymphs in this behind-the-scenes, opera-within-an-opera, which is brought to life through the fine musical craftsmanship of CIM students. You need not be an opera fan to enjoy this. It starts Wednesday, February 24 and runs through the weekend at the institute’s Kulas Hall. Call 216-791-5000 for tickets.

Get Back to Where the Art Belongs

There’s little doubt that the generation studying at CIM will go on to participate in (and patronize) the fine arts. That’s what makes PlayhouseSquare Partners, and what they do, so vitally important to the community. This group of young professionals works tirelessly to insure that future generations of northeast Ohio residents will have their venerable arts district to enjoy. The Partners’ Jump Back Ball 2010 is a top-shelf benefit, a formal evening with panache, cocktails, live music, an epicurean buffet, gambling, and much more. The Ball benefits the theatre district, and it definitely brings out the crowds. Nearly 1,000 people are expected Saturday, February 27, so we suggest getting on the horn and snagging some tickets for yourself and friends. This is real social networking, and for a worthy cause.

Throw the Gavel Down

With an amazing array of fine art, antiques, home furnishings and decorations in their auctions the folks at Gray’s Auctioneers pride themselves on providing a second life for antiquities. This Saturday, February 27 at 1PM, your life and living quarters will be poised for a little lift. Previews of the current auction start on Thursday at noon. Think you’ve got something that might be “Antiques Roadshow”-worthy for the next auction? The website has all your details on getting an appraisal. We think Gray’s Auctions are beyond price. But you should judge for yourself.

News recently spread among audiophiles that Ultrasound in Willoughby is closing in March. With its shuttering, another local, independent record store will be gone. It's a sadly familiar scenario, and one that brought a flood of memories.

As a pubescent boy living in Rocky River, I was blessed with wonderful nearby record stores. I'd ride my bike to Platter Puss Records, across the Detroit bridge that links River to Lakewood. There, owner John McNea and I would chat about music, and I listened intently as he shared his vast musical expertise. He carried an amazing array of CDs and vinyl, and he always had the latest Brit Pop singles that I wanted. He knew more about the Beatles than anybody else I knew, and he let me hold the original vinyl pressing of Guns 'n' Roses' Appetite for Destruction, featuring the cover with the Richard Williams painting of the same name that was later moved to the inside cover, with the GNR "cross" on the front of the album. It was a mint back then, and I was happy just to hold the LP. Then Platter Puss closed.

Luckily, for a poor high school student, Lakewood's Record Exchange on Detroit offered an unbeatable treasure trove of used CDs and LPs. I took dates here, it was that interesting (for me, anyway). We'd scour through vintage vinyl, laughing at curious fashions from decades past, and stand with others gathered around the towering wall of used CDs. It was exciting to find the $1 promo version of a CD, or a 25-cent copy of an album that you wanted, though it was missing the liner notes. When the store briefly closed for a remodel, my friends and I were bummed, though not nearly as upset as when it reopened with much of its used selection eviscerated to make room for video games and consoles.

In Westlake, my high school tastes were thrilled to discover My Generation. My friends and I would spend hours there, trolling the CD bins, exchanging notes on things we'd heard. We always left with something - Echo & the Bunnymen, Jesus and Mary Chain, Ride, The Saints. It was a place to hang out. The owners didn't seem to mind either, until us mindless hoodlums acted our age. Faced with the import price of $35 to purchase the Japanese-only edition of Blur Live at the Budokan, my good friend agreed to take it through the front door for me - bypassing the cash register. Before he did that, another, more sensible pal, paid for a Cause for Alarm 7-inch. As the pair passed through the door together, the inevitable sound of alarms rang through the store, at which point the merchandise was returned. We were all asked to leave. I returned not long after and bought the CD, and there were no hard feelings. For these were real people, with a keen understanding of the trappings of youth and the oft-foolish drive to acquire music. Years later, during a visit home from college, I made a carefully edited list of selections and gleefully headed out to peruse the CD bins. I arrived at the store, and to my chagrin, found it closed, with no explanation. I was genuinely heartbroken.

In Cleveland, it was tough to beat Shattered for its collection of punk releases. Located on Lorain, the owner would buzz you in through the metal door. It was akin to a secret club with a decidedly uninviting facade that belies a (mostly) welcoming atmosphere inside. The owner was a curious collector, traveling Europe for hard-to-find releases. No matter how much time elapsed between our visits, he'd remember the last records we bought, and make recommendations based on those. It was uncanny. It was there I bought my first copies of Cocksparrer and Adicts albums. Good stuff. It's closed now, too.

When I enrolled at St. Ignatius, I managed to befriend other pimply-faced malcontents who shared my interest in music. As many lived on the East Side, I was treated to new places, including Ultrasound, at its original location in Mentor. There were numerous Saturday pilgrimages to the shop, where I'd stock up on Converge, Zao and Blood for Blood albums, while giggling with friends at the always amusing selection of obscure metal to be had. I'm still a bit sad I never picked up that Corpse Vomit record.

I could go on with more tales of tragic closings. I understand that times change and often for the better; I don't want to sound like Andy Rooney. There's just something to be said about independent record stores beyond their retail selections. They were part of my young education, and they helped make sense of the world during awkward teen days. They gave my friends and I a place to go, when we were thought to be loitering everywhere else. You'll never make a friend shopping for iTunes, and a computer's suggested listening will never trump a person's recommendations. A free download simply can't compare to the tactile pleasure of holding a new CD, or the smell of old vinyl. An .mp3 album doesn't have great art and liner notes.

So, support your local record shop, such as Music Saves, Loop or Record Revolution. Even if you don't buy everything you want from them, make a point to go when you can. Robots are cool, but people are much more engaging. Most of the time, anyway.

Judson at University Circle is seeking nominations for its 2010 Smart Living Awards, which will be announced on WCLV FM 104.9 in April. Though Judson is well known for its programs and services focusing on active older adults, the Smart Living Awards honor people of all ages who contribute to the vitality of University Circle. Award categories are Arts, Education, Healthcare, Philanthropy and Volunteerism.

Among 2009's Smart Living Award winners was Ella Mae Johnson, who at 105 was the oldest attendee at President Barack Obama's inauguration. Senator Sherrod Brown provided tickets for Johnson, a lifelong social justice worker, to see the historic event.

Considering University Circle's continuing revitalization, it seems Judson could, and should, be swamped with worthy nominees. Volunteers in particular keep the Circle's vaunted institutions rolling along - who do you know that's had a serious impact on the neighborhood?

The deadline for nominations is March 22. For a nomination ballot, and to read about other previous winners, please visit www.judsonsmartliving.org, or call Rob Lucarelli at 216-791-2321.