Author: NY TIMES

Phil Wiggins, a harmonica player of such range that he could make his instrument sound like a clarinet one minute, an accordion the next and then an entire percussion section — all in the service of the complex melodies and steady rhythms of the style known as the Piedmont blues — died on May 7 at his home in Takoma Park, Md. He was 69.His daughter Martha Wiggins said the cause was cancer.For much of his career, Mr. Wiggins was best known as half of the duo Cephas and Wiggins, in which he performed and recorded with the guitarist and…

They were peering over their balconies, huddled at the top of lookouts or drinking coffee, eyes turned to the sky for a hint of color — any color.As night fell, chasers of the aurora borealis in the northern hemisphere on Friday were out again. The vivid hues, which are most often seen closer to the North Pole, lit up skies in an unusual showing in the lower latitudes of Europe and North America last week.Those who missed the lights, or who were eager to see another showing, set their alarms and monitored aurora watch apps, hopeful for another opportunity. Some…

Emma Hayes awkwardly had to explain to Mauricio Pochettino that someone more important was calling her during a chat with her male Chelsea team-mates.Sir Alex Ferguson has heard of her decision to leave Chelsea and become the new head coach of the US Women’s National Team. Pochettino understood his place in the team and Hayes took his place.”He calls me all the time, so I’m not surprised,” explained Hayes, whose first games coaching the U.S. women’s soccer team will be June 1 and June 4 in friendlies against South Korea. “I’ll take whatever he says to me.” So proud. He’s…

Fathers don’t fare well in my fiction. They are white supremacist killers and domestic abusers. They trick their wives into becoming pregnant. They have affairs. They abandon their families.My biological father, Albert Coleman Bryan Jr., was 22 when I was born. He was a dashing air force pilot who flew off into the wide blue yonder, leaving my mother and me grounded.He had red curly hair and freckles and a charming grin. It’s a face I don’t remember, if indeed I ever saw it. My parents split up around the time I was born.I grew up tasting the bitterness of…

Research shows that more adult children may find themselves unexpectedly inheriting wealth over the next two decades. The silent generation, or people born roughly between 1928 and 1945, and its successors, the baby boomers, are expected to transfer significant wealth to members of Generation X and millennials over the next 20 years, according to the Wealth Report, a publication from Knight Frank, a London global property consultant.Federal Reserve figures show that half of all inheritances are less than $50,000, but with boomers reaching 80 and beyond, members of their family may begin to inherit more wealth. More than half of…

It must say something about the anxious state of the movie world that two of the hottest tickets at this year’s Cannes Film Festival draw inspiration from ancient Rome. In George Miller’s “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga,” Chris Hemsworth zips around a wasteland like a heavy-metal charioteer, while in Francis Ford Coppola’s “Megalopolis,” Adam Driver plays a guy named Cesar. That each movie offers a vision of a culture in decline seems too on the nose for this festival, where attendees celebrate the art amid nervous chatter about the state of the industry.This year’s festival opened Tuesday under gray skies,…

A family struggles with daily survival and fears having to pack up again after going back to Khan Younis. Source link

After a generation running colleges in Iowa, Caitlin Clark starts her career this week in Indiana, where college graduates earn a median annual income of $100, according to the U.S. Census American Consumer Survey $52,267.But Clark is no ordinary young professional.When she entered the WNBA, she was one of the biggest stars in the country, with high profile and commercial appeal. She’s sold out arenas, signed a $28 million Nike endorsement deal and sent TV ratings soaring — while her career potential has sparked widespread debate about the economics of women’s basketball.In her first season with the Indiana Fever, she…

A 7-year-old girl hawks cat-themed souvenirs in Flemish outside her parents’ shop. Two women in matching cat print dresses wander down a crowded street looking for a place to buy stuffed plush kitties. In every store and restaurant window, a cat figurine or statue signals allegiance to the feline persuasion.This is Kattenstoet, Belgium’s cat-themed parade and festival.Tucked among rolling farmland in the West Flanders region near the border with France, Iepers, Belgium, has not always had such an adoring relationship with cats. In the Middle Ages, when the city’s main industry was cloth making, they used cats to keep wool…

After suffering a setback at two Mercedes-Benz plants in Alabama on Friday, the United Automobile Workers union’s efforts to organize other auto factories in the South is likely to slow and could struggle to make headway.About 56 percent of the Mercedes workers who voted rejected the U.A.W. in an election after the union chalked up two major wins this year. In April, workers at a Volkswagen plant in Tennessee voted to join the union, the first large nonunion auto plant in the South to do so. Weeks later, the union negotiated a new contract bringing significant pay and benefit improvements…