When Kathy Kepler was offered a job forty years ago to help sell sweet corn from a roadside farmstand, she took the job because she thought the guy managing it, Steve, was cute. She has good instincts: She’s now been both his business partner and his wife for decades. Steve had long been helping his older brother, Frank, with his…
2.05.2026
For decades, Julietta Fiscella built her career as a pathologist at the University of Rochester Medical Center, guided by scientific precision and a lifelong fascination with the human body. Born and raised in St. Lucia, an island nation in the Caribbean, her youth was shaped by village customs, time-honored remedies, and a deep respect for holistic care—experiences that quietly stayed…
2.05.2026
Photo by Michael Hanlon Founded in 1969, the Visual Studies Workshop (VSW) is one of the longest-running nonprofit media art spaces in the country. It began with a vision for a graduate program for artists, historians, and curators that would help build the field of photography. To support this vision, VSW developed its core programs of exhibitions, publications, and residencies,…
2.05.2026
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Date night to-do list

The (585) region is rich with culture and food—but sometimes, we take the work that happens behind-the-scenes for granted. Who are the players on stage and in the pits, really? Many of them are locals: our neighbors, perhaps, or people we push carts beside in the grocery store. Oh, and it turns out that quite …

Geneseo's Grammy nominee

When life gives you lemons, as the popular saying goes, the resourceful among us make lemonade. Such is the case with Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer-recording engineer, and Geneseo native Mike Brown, who doesn’t shy away from discussing the succession of hand injuries that forced him to come up with the workaround “trilling” method of guitar …

Shooting a music video

In the center of a room littered with antique chairs, discarded clothing, and something dubbed the “beer urinal,” the members of Talking Under Water were quoting The Big Lebowski. And much like The Dude—the protagonist in the Coen brothers’ cult classic—lead singer and pianist Dave Chisholm expressed his admiration for Creedence Clearwater Revival. But after a …

REVIEW // West Side Story on Westside Drive

When it opened on Broadway in 1957, West Side Story was a cutting edge, raw musical, almost ahead of its time—in the vein of recent musicals Rent, Book of Mormon, or Urinetown. The story is set in Upper West Side Manhattan (which was a blue collar community in the 50s) and centered on the rivalry …

Radio for the people

It would be pretty cool to have your own radio station and give all your friends their own shows. When Matt Werts posted this thought on Facebook in February 2012, he had no idea it would become reality just three years later. It may not have, had Mike Yates not emailed him to ask if …

WAYO’s (585) magazine mix

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