Heck, why is it so hard to locate art events in Houston?
The Best
- Eventful’s Houston page seems to want to be “more meta” than the other event aggregators. Apparently, some of their events are being syndicated onto upcoming.org, which might mean upcoming.org is no longer a big deal. Check Books/Literature and Performing Arts (not to mention several other categories). What I like best: the ability to display up to 50 events per page, and the ability to show events within a 7 day or 30 day period. Terrific!
- Upcoming.org has a good interface and backing by yahoo, but it seems buggy and not as easy to use. Also, it has an RSS feed. However, since eventful.com now lets you submit your eventful event to upcoming as well, I suspect most people will start migrating to eventful.
- Spacetaker.org has an incredible listing of Houston events. They have categories for Readings, Theater,Seminars, Lectures, Repertory Film . Excellent things: nonprofit groups can submit their events for free! Also, you can download the ical event to Outlook. Not-so-excellent: no RSS feeds, and too many categories to browse through. This calendar was probably cool when it came out, but newer websites are cooler; also, the web server sometimes can be slow. Still, I’ve generally discovered some great things on spacetaker I haven’t find anywhere else.
- Artshound is a similar concept to Spacetaker, and in many ways superior, but it is less Houston-specific but a generic event site with subsections devoted to individual cities. Also, artshound seems to focus a little bit too much on Big Arts groups (in contrast to Spacetaker). Check out categories for Poetry/Literature, Performing Arts, Visual Arts , International/Cultural Events, Kids & Families. Also, look for their listing of free events.
- BusyTonight.com has a Houston event listing which you can browse by category. Still looks buggy, but it lets you do RSS feeds by categories and keywords. Also, it lets you view available for the weekend (not just a single day). Not great now, but has potential.
Weblogs & RSS Feeds
- the Handstamp weblog (maintained by two Chronicle writers about the Houston music scene) follows upcoming concerts pretty well. RSS feed and now a podcast apparently.
- Done Waiting’s Houston Calling has always provided reliable (and exhaustive) coverage of bands local and touring. RSS feed.
- Houstonist has a section devoted to Arts & Events with a pretty good culling of arts (mostly music events). The Houstonist has a general RSS feed, but not one specific to the events category.
Venue-Specific Calendars
- Museums : Museum of Fine Arts Calendar lists films and exhibits. Aurora Picture Show lists films by month. (and if you’re at the end of the month, you’re screwed). DiverseWorks
- Live Music: Can’t/won’t list everything here except my favorites. Mucky Duck, Continental Club, Unitunes Coffeehouse, JP Hops., Anderson Fair. All of these have wretched web pages for their events page. You can’t bookmark them because of java script or frames; and the calendar page requires another click to get to the actual events. Still, great venues for Houston.
- Free/Outdoor Events: Two notable venues: Miller Theater calendar of events and Houston International Festival (Featured Country for 2007: China!)
- Houseconcerts : I know house concerts are taking place in the Houston area, but it’s next to impossible to find out about them. Here’s a listing of Houston house concerts (by venue/organizer,not date).
Other Calendars
- Houston Press has a small but idiosyncratic selection of events.
- Houston Chronicle has a calendar listing of events which is completely unusable.
- KPFT Events Calendar (mediocre interface, but good listing of classes/workshops/civic kind of events). KUHF Arts Calendar (mostly repeats of events published elsewhere, but some UH-specific events).
- Craigslist also has a free event calendar for Houston, but it only shows one day at a time. Also, because it’s Craig’s List, you will find lots of “free sales seminars!” and random lodge meetings. Meetup.com also has a listing of Houston meetups.
- the Houston Institute for Culture calendar lists not only arts events but some cultural workshops. The SWAMP calendar also lists workshops related to audio and video production as well as special events in film/video.
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