The history of almost every American city features a series of boom and bust cycles. Milwaukee in the 1950s was a bustling, manufacturing metropolis. But the city’s fortunes fell in subsequent decades, and while the downtown has made a recovery, other aspects of the city are still a work in progress.

The new production at the Milwaukee Rep, “Guards at the Taj,” is less than 90 minutes long, but that’s enough time for the two-person show to cover plenty of ground.  The play, which features two men standing guard of the Taj Mahal, is at turns funny, biting, thought-provoking and a little (sometimes a lot) bloody.

The Kavanaugh hearings took center stage last week in Washington, and both candidates is Wisconsin's U.S. Senate race weighed in on President Trump's nominee to the Supreme Court. 

Democratic incumbent Tammy Baldwin asked for an FBI investigation into claims that Brett Kavanaugh sexually assaulted a woman when the two were teenagers. Baldwin's Republican challenger Leah Vukmir, meanwhile, called for quick confirmation of Kavanaugh.  

New Wisconsin standardized test results for the 2017-18 school year were released this week. Statewide, there aren’t any dramatic changes from the last two years: Students’ math scores are inching up and reading scores have fallen slightly.

But the results are a reminder that just one in five Milwaukee students is proficient in reading and writing. And even fewer meet standards in math.

Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele presented his 2019 budget proposal to the Milwaukee County Board on Monday. It contains ideas on how to close a $23 million budget gap. Abele says among the ways to raise additional revenue is to allow camping in some county parks. He also wants to raise fees and bus fares.

When people think about the concept of arrangements in music (if they do at all), they often it in the folk music world, in which an arranger takes a piece of music from the folk canon and arranges it for an instrument. But arrangements have an important place in the classical music universe, as well.

Each month, we speak with contributor Robert Cohen about the work of a touring classical musician in a feature called “On That Note.” For October, Cohen spoke with Lake Effect’s Bonnie North about why arrangements are so important in classical music.

Research show that students of color are more likely to succeed if they have at least one teacher who looks like them. But in many urban districts like Milwaukee, there is a mismatch between students and teachers. Teachers are mostly white, and students are mostly black and Hispanic.