CELEBRATING 32 YEARS AT THE HERBST THEATRE
Garrison Keillor revitalized radio in 1974 with the intimate and eclectic public radio program, A Prairie Home Companion. The weekly broadcasts showcase Keillor’s gifts as a writer, storyteller, producer, and performer, and are listened to by over four million Americans. With rich and meandering reports of the life and times of the fictitious Midwestern town, Lake Wobegon, A Prairie Home Companion features comedy sketches, music, and Keillor’s signature monologue. The prolific Keillor is the author of Lake Wobegon Days, Liberty, Pontoon, and Pilgrims. Keillor is a longtime advocate for poetry, which he spotlights on his daily radio broadcast, The Writer’s Almanac. He is also the editor of the poetry anthologies Good Poems, Good Poems for Hard Times, and Good Poems, American Places.
Humorist and long-time New Yorker staff writer Calvin Trillin, is a beloved chronicler of culture. Though his writing about food began as comic relief from his more serious pieces, it has earned him a dedicated readership and has been collected in three books including American Fried, Alice Let’s Eat, and Third Helpings. Trillin’s other works include Messages From My Father; Remembering Denny, and About Alice. His most recent book is, Dogfight: The 2012 Presidential Campaign in Verse.
Peter Duchin has performed as a pianist and bandleader for presidents and in high society for more than four decades. Starting with a residency at the St. Regis Hotel in New York City in 1962, Duchin and his band have traveled the world and released dozens of recordings in the traditional dance band style made popular by his father, the pianist Eddy Duchin. Ghost of a Chance, a memoir of Duchin’s life in music and his relationship with his father, was published in 1996. The book has been praised by many of Duchin’s longtime friends, including Frank Sinatra, Lauren Bacall, and Gay Talese.