Have infant, will travel

Fatherhood has not curbed the peripatetic life of Abraham Cruzvillegas since he shot to international attention at the 2003 Venice Biennale. The Mexican artist was at Walker Art Center last week to oversee a midcareer retrospective of the assemblage sculpture, videos and installations that he has patched together over the past decade during residencies in Europe and his homeland. His wife, Alejandra Carrillo, a lawyer for refugees, was en route with Ana, their 3-month-old daughter who has already visited Paris, Madrid, Warsaw and Lima, Peru. "We're going back to Mexico City after the opening here and then we're going to Yucatán for a little break," Cruzvillegas said.

Mary Abbe

Big Bro at big mall

Anyone interested in auditioning for the next season of CBS' "Big Brother" will get a bonus this weekend: A chance to meet a former player. Janelle Pierzina, a "Big Brother" All Star who spent 178 days in the house and now lives in the Twin Cities, will be at the Mall of America rotunda Saturday to sign autographs and share war stories from her three seasons on the hit summer show. The open casting call will take place from 1 to 4 p.m. Saturday. Those who want to be on the show —and vie for a $500,000 cash prize — must be at least 21 and willing to be filmed 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Neal Justin

Who's the star?

Frank Theatre's "Misterman," a dark and enigmatic play by Enda Walsh, has only one actor (John Catron) but a sound design that includes almost a dozen voiceovers on nine reel-to-reel tape players (children, this is how people used to record audio). Director Wendy Knox credits sound man Michael Cros­well for choreographing all the swirling pieces, and she notes that one of her voice actors is a Mr. Joe Dowling. In an e-mail, Knox wrote: "We considered billing the show as this: JOE DOWLING in ENDA WALSH's MISTERMAN, with John Catron, but we figured the 10-second voiceover of a not-very-nice Irishman that Joe plays might not merit the top billing, even if it might sell some seats." The show opens April 5 at the Southern Theater in Minneapolis.

Graydon Royce

Mary Tyler Moore didn’t really live there, but the rambling Victorian near Lake of the Isles is commonly known as the Mary Tyler Moore house.

Fest of 10,000 sounds

City Pages is throwing a little dirt in the big hole left open by the River's Edge Festival postponement in June. The local alt-weekly announced details of its inaugural 10 Thousand Sounds, a one-day bash in downtown Minneapolis that will bring East Coast indie-rock darlings the Walkmen and Free Energy to town on June 22 (the same weekend River's Edge would have happened). Four local buzz acts will round out the bill: the Chalice, Greg Grease, Prissy Clerks and Strange Names. The event will take place 4 to 10 p.m. on one outdoor stage near 8th Street and Hennepin Avenue. Advance tickets go on sale April 12 via Ticketfly.com for $20, $45 for VIP.

Chris Riemenschneider

A distant howl

Ethan Nosowsky, former editor-at-large of Minneapolis-based Graywolf Press, is returning to Graywolf after nearly two years at McSweeney's. Nosowsky, who lives in San Francisco (and will continue to live there), will take the newly created position of editorial director, reporting to publisher Fiona McCrae. In his four years at Graywolf, Nosowsky acquired a number of big titles, including Geoff Dyer's "Otherwise Known as the Human Condition" and Deborah Baker's "The Convert." Nosowsky told Publishers Weekly that he had enjoyed working at McSweeney's but that McCrae had made him an offer he couldn't refuse, "to be godfatherly about it."

LAURIE HERTZEL

Love is all around

In his just-published memoir "Shell Shocked," Turtles singer Howard Kaylan owns up to his love of Mary Tyler Moore. In fact, the backroom in the RV in which the band traveled was called "Mary-Land" because it was decorated with cut-out photos of Moore. On tour in Minneapolis one night in the mid-1980s, Kaylan decided to drive to the house in the Kenwood neighborhood that was used in the opening of "Mary Tyler Moore" because that's where she "lived." "We silently stole rocks and pebbles from the garden," Kaylan confesses. "I still have my 'Mary rocks.' " Years later, he told the story to Moore. "She looked rather disturbed but chalked it up to our being musicians. I think her response was 'Yeah, right.' "

Jon Bream

Sendoff for a Sender

Twin Cities jump blues star Dave "Cool Breeze" Brown, longtime leader of the Senders, died March 16 of cardiac arrest. He was 58. An excellent guitarist, Brown was Mojo Buford's favorite Minnesota sideman. And Lynwood Slim's right-hand man. And Charmin Michelle's early duets partner. Brown loved the honkin' sax-driven blues sounds of the 1940s and 1950s, the wilder and more risqué the better, and his Senders, a great bar band, delivered the goods. They got to play live and record with one of the ultimate purveyors of jump blues, Big Jay McNeely, and also worked with Lowell Fulson, John Lee Hooker and Charles Brown. But Brown remained self-deprecating, often laughingly referring to his "Dean Martin-style crooning." Omnipresent on the 1990s bar scene, Brown was less prominent but still active in recent years, working with several groups, including some new Senders lineups and, most frequently, the Detroit Don King Blues Band. "Cool Breeze" blew no ill, and left behind thousands of smiles.

Tom Surowicz