The back-story of Mayberry, a play commissioned by Hancher that looks at race relations in Iowa City. Playwright Sean Christopher Lewis is a 2007 graduate of the UI Playwrights Workshop and lives in Iowa City. The soldout show runs April 26-29 at Riverside Theatre in Iowa City.

Ed Callaway of the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences, La Jolla, Calif., will be the featured speaker at the Sixth Raymond Fong Memorial Lecture at 4 p.m. Friday, April 27, in Kollros Auditorium, Biology Building East on the University of Iowa campus.

Rick Altman, a University of Iowa professor of cinema and comparative literature, discusses the history of "illustrated songs," which introduced pop songs into silent films during the late 1800s and early 1900s.

Dane Pratt started out washing dishes and taking out the trash in a research lab in the UI Department of Physical Therapy and Rehabilitation Science. Now, he's designing and conducting cutting-edge pain research.

A semester-long storytelling project will take place the day after the play 'Mayberry' concludes its successful run in Iowa City.

The University of Iowa School of Music will present its third free Improvisation for Classical Musicians event of the semester at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, May 8, in the Riverside Recital Hall.

The University of Iowa School of Journalism is adding video-game writing to its curriculum.

Writer Nathan Englander, an alumnus of the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop, will return as a guest of the workshop to present a free reading at 8 p.m. Monday, April 30, in the Frank Conroy Reading Room of the Dey House.

University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop alumni will be featured in free readings at 7 p.m. May 2 and 3, in Prairie Lights books and streamed live at www.writinguniversity.org.

Organist Gregory Hand will be joined by trumpeter Amy Schendel to present a University of Iowa School of Music faculty recital at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, May 8, in Iowa City’s Zion Lutheran Church.

The University of Iowa Department of Theatre Arts will present the 2012 Iowa New Play Festival, the most ambitious new-play festival in collegiate theater, with readings, staged productions, and discussion from Monday, April 30, through Saturday, May 5, in the UI Theatre Building.

The University of Iowa Chamber Orchestra and the All-University String Orchestra will share a free concert at 7:30 p.m. Sunday, April 29, in the Riverside Recital Hall.