Arts & Culture

The world-renowned choral ensemble Chanticleer is coming to Western Kentucky University Thursday evening as part of the school's Cultural Enhancement Series. The performance is at 7:30pm C.T. at Van Meter Auditorium, and is free and open to the public.

The group will perform a program called The Siren's Call. This program celebrates the sea with music from New Zealand, Hawaii and China complemented by Chanticleer's signature treatments of Gregorian Chant and Renaissance music.

WKU Public Radio's Lee Stott spoke with Jace Wittig, Chanticleer's Music Director, about the group and its April 11 performance in Bowling Green.

It's a golden era for Kentucky's signature spirit. Bourbon has never been more popular in the U.S. or throughout the world. Bourbon's colorful history is shrouded in mystery, with a lot of tall tales and legends popping up throughout the years.

Michael Veach put bourbon under the microscope and put his skills as an historian to work in his new book, Kentucky Bourbon Whiskey: An American Heritage. Veach is the associate curator of special collections at the Filson Historical Society in Louisville.

He spoke to WKU Public Radio's Kevin Willis about how the term "bourbon" first became applied to Kentucky whiskey, where the idea of charring barrels came from, and who we should thank for the current popularity of bourbon:

There are a lot of legends surrounding bourbon that you have to debunk as an historian looking into the origins of Kentucky’s famous whiskey. One of those legends is that bourbon is named after Bourbon County, Kentucky. What did you find out?

“You know, I would love to have been able to prove that bourbon was named after Bourbon County, but the more I looked at it, the more I realized I just couldn’t do that.”