Let the power of live music warm you Sunday, February 9, as the School for Arts and Creative Innovation presents Concerto Showcase, a special concert featuring the Windsor Community Orchestra and five soloists, all winners of a competition between UWindsor music students.

The program includes:

• soprano Donja Jean Trivers performing “Der Hölle Rache Kocht in Mienem Herzen” from Die Zauberflöte by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
• flutist Richard Kelly performing the first movement of Carl Nielson’s “Concerto for Flute and Orchestra”
• trumpeter Anthony Giglio performing “Trumpet Concerto in A-flat major (1950)” by Alexander Arutiunian
• flutist Lianne Harway performing “Ballade” by Frank Martin
• marimbist Christopher Chamberlain performing Fritz Kreisler’s “Tambourin Chinois, Op.3”

The Windsor Community Orchestra, under the direction of Peter Wiebe, is composed of about 50 musicians from the community, the University of Windsor and local high schools.

This performance will take place in Assumption University Chapel at 2:30 p.m. Tickets are $10 general admission, $5 for students, and may be purchased in advance by phone at 519-253-3000 ext. 4212; or online at http://www.uwindsor.ca/music/.

The University Players production of Oscar Wilde’s witty comedy A Woman of No Importance premiered Thursday at Essex Hall Theatre.

The play satirizes the moral inconsistencies of Victorian society; its run continues through February 16.

A “talk back” session with director Lee Wilson and members of the cast will follow the matinee performance on Sunday, February 9. For information or tickets, call 519-253-3000, ext. 2808 or visit www.UniversityPlayers.com.

You might think cooking an exotic meal for his family or invited guests would be a welcome distraction from his labour, but it actually brings Rob Nelson closer to his work as an historical researcher.

“Food has so much to do with culture and history, so cooking a recipe from a country like Senegal, for instance, can really enhance your understanding of a place, even if you’ve never been there,” said Dr. Nelson. “You just feel like you have some kind of connection through cooking.”

Nelson, a history professor who includes colonialism and modern European cultural history among his teaching and research interests, recently authored a piece about Indonesian satay cooking in Saveur, a gourmet food, wine and travel magazine that specializes in world cuisine.

For its 20th anniversary, the magazine’s editors asked 20 chefs, food writers and home cooks to pick an issue from the last two decades and reflect upon it. Nelson chose the May 2011 issue, focusing on an article about satay, which typically consists of spiced and skewered chicken, beef, mutton, pork or fish grilled over charcoal.

Nelson seemed like an obvious choice as a home cook. A regular reader of the magazine, he has amassed a collection of more than 1,000 of its recipes, which he keeps in Excel spread sheets on his home computer. He regularly comments about them on their on-line edition, which undoubtedly caught the attention of the magazine’s editors.

“It’s really a fun hobby,” says Nelson, whose wife Kim Nelson – a filmmaker and professor in the School for Arts and Creative Innovation – inspired him to take up cooking when she gave him a book authored by the magazine’s editor-in-chief for Christmas in 2006. “I’ve always loved food, and now I understand it on a different level. I have this voracious appetite for doing new things, which can be a problem. Now I want to work on perfecting some things, and come up with some dishes I can be really good at making.”

Nelson said he’s been asked to start contributing more regularly to the magazine.

Lancer men’s basketball players Enrico Diloreto, Josh Collins and Lien Phillip—all fifth-year seniors—broke some records last weekend.

In Saturday’s 76-62 win over Guelph, Diloreto’s 17 points, Collins’ five assists and Phillip’s 10 rebounds put the three atop the Lancer all-time career record list in each category.

They will have a chance to build on those leads when the team hosts McMaster for a 2 p.m. start Saturday, February 8, at the St. Denis Centre. The game feature the two best teams in the Ontario University Athletics west division, with the 15-3 Marauders ranked fifth nationally and the 13-5 Lancers currently seventh.

The women’s basketball team will tip off at 4 p.m. Saturday against McMaster, looking to extend its current 17-game winning streak.

Both the men’s and women’s squads will close out their regular-season home schedule on Tuesday, February 11, hosting the Western Mustangs to make up a contest originally scheduled for February 5 but postponed due to inclement weather. The women play at 6 p.m. and the men at 8 p.m. and both teams will celebrate Seniors’ Day to honour their graduating players.

To purchase tickets to the 2014 CIS Women’s Basketball Championships, please visit the Windsor Lancers website at www.goLancers.ca.

Also at home this weekend, the women’s hockey team will face off against the Laurier Golden Hawks at 7:30 p.m. Friday, February 7, and the Waterloo Warriors at 4 p.m. Saturday, February 8. The men’s hockey team will host the Toronto Varsity Blues at 7:30 p.m. Saturday; a win would secure Windsor home ice advantage to open the playoffs.

All the hockey action is set for South Windsor Arena. Saturday’s games mark “Hats on for Healthcare;” fans are encouraged to wear goofy hats and make donations in support of Windsor Regional Hospital.

The St. Denis Centre is the setting for the Track and Field Team Challenge on Sunday, February 9, following up on athletes’ appearance at the Meyo Invitational meet in South Bend, Indiana, on Friday and Saturday. The event will include the Seniors’ Day congratulations of graduating athletes and “Get Your Pink On,” breast cancer awareness activities featuring the sale of special T-shirts for $10.

Lancer volleyball is on the road this weekend to close out the regular season, Friday in Guelph to play the Gryphons and Saturday in Waterloo taking on the Warriors.

Get a detailed preview of the weekend’s action at goLancers.ca.

Home games available as webcast and radio broadcast

All this weekend’s Lancer home games: women’s hockey Friday, men’s and women’s hockey and basketball Saturday, will be webcast live at GoLancers.tv.

In addition, campus community radio station CJAM will broadcast live coverage of Saturday’s men’s basketball and men’s hockey games at 99.1 FM.

Mike Hugall and Kim Elliott will call the basketball action from the St. Denis Centre, with Ankur Kumar and Mike Specht providing a halftime report and a wrap-up show until 4:30 p.m. They invite fans to call the post-game show at 519-971-3630 to share their comments.

A show leading into the hockey game will start at 6:30 p.m. with Hugall and Keifer MacDonald, followed by action live from South Windsor Arena hosted by Kumar and Specht.

Students looking to keep up with the action in Sochi during the Winter Olympic Games can share their enthusiasms in the International Student Centre.

The lounge on the second floor of Laurier Hall will keep its television tuned to coverage of the Games every weekday until February 21, from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

“We’ll also have snacks available through the Olympic weeks,” says international student advisor Enrique Chacon.

Today will feature coverage of the opening ceremonies from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Find a full broadcast schedule of events.

The Roman Catholic Church is one of the world’s important institutions: powerful, wealthy and mysterious, says Alison Smith, a senior news correspondent with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

“To this day, religion shapes world history,” she says. “Whether or not we are believers, we are shaped by faith and the actions of the faithful.”

She will discuss the elements of what she terms a “fascinating and important news story” in a free public lecture entitled “Whose Story Is It? Telling the Church’s Story,” at 3 p.m. Sunday, February 9, in the Freed-Orman Centre, Assumption Hall.

Smith is host of CBC Radio’s flagship news program, The World at Six. Before assuming this position in the fall of 2009, she was the Washington correspondent for CBC Television. Her Windsor lecture is part of Assumption University’s Christian Culture Series.