Lectures For Lifelong Learners!

A lifelong film lover, Dan Hudak has worked extensively as a film critic in print, radio and television. He has provided film reviews and commentary for WPLG-TV (ABC) Miami-Ft. Lauderdale, ABCNews.com, the Baltimore Sun, Chicago Tribune, Christian Science Monitor, CNN.com, indieWIRE.com, New Orleans Times-Picayune, Newsday, Orlando Sentinel, San Francisco Examiner and the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

He is the owner of Hudak On Hollywood, Inc., an agency that provides lectures throughout the United States. He is the former chairman of the Florida Film Critics Circle and a member of the Southeastern Film Critics Association. He studied Film History and Criticism at Bard College and the University of Miami, where he received his M.A. in Film Studies. To give Dan a piece of your mind, e-mail him at dan@primetimepresenters.com.

Professor Karen Painter has taught music history to musicians and non-majors for nearly three decades—at Dartmouth College, Harvard University, and since 2007 at the University of Minnesota. An expert on musical listening in past eras, Painter loves engaging with a broader public on the subject of classical music, music in film, and popular music. She has organized scholarly events for the public, working with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Ojai Festival, the Berlin Academy, and the Friends of the Salzburg Festival. Painter’s past lecture venues include the New York Philharmonic, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Minnesota Orchestra, the Minnesota Opera, and the Orange County Performing Arts Center. Painter has published widely in scholarly journals as well as edited or authored books with academic presses.

Daniel E. Freeman is a music historian of international repute born in Everett, Washington. He has taught music history at the University of Illinois, the University of Southern California, and the University of Minnesota. He also appears regularly as a lecturer for the Smithsonian Institution. He is also a pianist with experience as a soloist and accompanist for instrumentalists, vocalists, and dancers.

Dr. John Leisenring is a long-time teacher and professional musician, having taught music for forty years, and performed as a trombonist for almost seventy years. John taught at the University of Texas-Austin, and the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

He has performed for some 20 years with the KC Opera Orchestra, the KC Ballet Orchestra, and as a jazz musician in some 20 states and nine foreign countries, including jazz festivals in Sydney, Melbourne, Berlin, Montreux, and Newport (twice!). John’s University teaching involved, among other coursework, classes in the History and Development of American Music, Jazz and Rock ‘n’ Roll.

Stefan Lund is a Minneapolis native and with nearly a decade of experience as an educator and writer in the field of American history. He received his PhD in history in 2022 after five years of work at the University of Virginia’s John Nau Center for Civil War History and now teaches college-level U.S. history to Twin Cities area high school students. His peer-reviewed work has appeared in the Annals of Iowa historical journal and his writing about American history has been published by the Washington Post and Star Tribune. Stefan began offering adult enrichment courses focusing on nineteenth-century America in 2022 with a series of lectures on the origins of the American Civil War and another on the Civil War’s influence on American art. With a passion for the early history of the United States, Stefan enjoys discussing anything from the Revolutionary crisis to the Reconstruction period.

Anthony W. Eichenlaub once spent 21 years working for a large, multinational technology company. His focus was on the coolest core software of the internet, which started with application servers and later included cloud computing and artificial intelligence. Themes from his time in tech find their way into his writing, including questions about AI that go beyond, “Is it a person?,” and the intricate and sometimes scary ways in which corporations interact with the ethical responsibilities of their workers. In his career in tech, Anthony was always a tester, so while everyone else asked, “How does it work?” his focus was on, “How does it break?”

Anthony’s stories have appeared in Daily Science Fiction, On-Spec Magazine, Little Blue Marble, and numerous anthologies including A Punk Rock Future and The Community of Magic Pens. His novels range from Minnesota technothrillers to space operas to cyberpunk Westerns. His writing philosophy is that even the most serious science fiction should be absurdly fun. Anthony teaches writing in his local community and is a teaching artist at the Loft Literary Center in Minneapolis. He is a proud member of the Rochester Writers Group and a member and volunteer of SFWA.

In 2020, Anthony left his career in tech to pursue writing and the far more satisfying life of a stay-at-home dad. In his spare time, Anthony enjoys landscaping, woodworking, and long walks with his lazy dog.

First-time author, and an avid movie buff, Rob Feeney earned his Master of Arts degree in Organizational Leadership from Adler Graduate School in 2008. A previous fine arts student, and professional fine artist, Rob has held several successful corporate responsibilities in sales and marketing for some of America’s favorite brands before finding himself unemployed assuming the role of publicist and spokesperson for the Judy Garland Children’s Museum. With the museum he made a major contribution to the “stolen” ruby slippers recovery efforts that generated global news coverage in every major media outlet between 2013-2018, such as TIME and Rolling Stone magazine, Vanity Fair, Harper’s Bizarre, Newsweek, and the National Examiner. Now employed by a top Global Life Safety and Security company, Rob’s contribution to the recovery of the ruby slippers also led to features on the “Today Show,” “Good Morning America,” Inside Edition,” and an appearance on the History Channel’s 16th season of “Pawn Stars.” Rob resides in Minneapolis with his beautiful 14-year old daughter, killer police dog, and black cat named “Elsie.”

Lucy Rose Fischer, PhD, is an award-winning Minnesota artist, author, and social scientist. She had a distinguished 25-year career as a researcher in aging and was honored as a Fellow of the Gerontological Society of America for “outstanding achievement and exemplary contributions to the field of aging.” She is the author of six books—her most recent titles are The Journalist: Life and Loss in America’s Secret War; Grow Old With Me, and I’m New at Being Old. As an artist, she specializes in creating fanciful and colorful designs on glass—painting upside-down, inside-out and backwards on hand blown glass. She is the founder and coordinator of the Interfaith Artist Circle of the Twin Cities. Lucy Rose is featured on the Twin Cities Public Television programs “The Creative Power of Aging” and “Life Changing Art.”

Dr. Edward Creagan is a cancer specialist who practiced for more than forty Minnesota winters until he transitioned from active clinical practice in late 2018. Dr. Ed (as he is known) received his medical training at New York Medical College and earned graduate degrees in internal medicine and oncology at the University of Michigan and the National Cancer Institute. He is the author of over 500 scientific papers and has given more than 1,000 presentations throughout the world, including his home state of New Jersey. An avid marathoner and golfer, father of three sons, and grandfather of two grandsons, Dr. Creagan and his wife, Peggy, live with two rescue Golden Retrievers, one of whom is blind, in Rochester, Minnesota.

Janice Novak has a Masters Degree in Health & Physical Education. She is an internationally acclaimed, best-selling author, speaker and wellness consultant who teaches workshops and seminars for hospitals, corporations and professional organizations. She developed her unique posture program over twenty years of working with individual clients and teaching thousands of workshops. Janice empowers people to take action toward attaining better health. Her easy-to-use techniques are informational and motivational and can easily be integrated into daily life. She presents up-to-date info on pertinent health/wellness topics that can improve productivity, alertness, energy and motivation. She has been quoted as the country’s premier expert on posture in national and regional publications and broadcasts, including the Oprah Winfrey Show discussing her best selling book, “Posture, Get It Straight!”.

Mark joined the Hubbard School of Journalism and Mass Communication faculty full-time as a Senior Lecturer in 2018 after being an adjunct at the University of Minnesota for 15 years. His work experience includes 35 years of building brands at ad agencies in Chicago and Minneapolis. He has led marketing communication efforts for an all-star list of companies including Andersen Windows, Catholic Health Initiatives, ConAgra, General Mills, HealthPartners, Johnsonville Sausage, Kraft, Land ‘O Lakes, Marvin Windows, Medtronic, Pillsbury, Polaris, and Tropicana.

After winning 1st prize at the prestigious Hong Kong Altamira International Guitar Competition in 2018, Momcilo “Moma” Aleksandric toured the world as a performer and lecturer by appearing at events such as the 2018 Thailand International Guitar Festival (Bangkok), 2019 ShenZhen Fuge International Guitar Week (China), 2019 Melbourne Guitar Winter Celebration (Australia), 2019 Heredia’s Universidad Nacional International Artist Series (Costa Rica), and many others. He is equally devoted to solo and chamber music guitar performance, music composition, and historical/theoretical research. His article concerning Miguel Llobet’s work was published by the Guitar Foundation of America’s Soundboard Journal (2019), and he presented his compositional research at the 50th Guitar Foundation of America’s Convention in NYC (2023). He is dedicated to teaching students of various ages and backgrounds on multiple topics, from classical guitar performance to historical topics related to rock music, history of guitar, and music and movies.