Music

Roots R&B/Americana singer/songwriter/piano player/guitarist Kelley Hunt challenges easy categorization. She is steeped in the blues, roots and gospel traditions yet has a refreshing originality.

Two weekend picks for you to audition. One with a name that not only implies fun, but is fun. And another, that chases perfection and passion in his work.

Rollie Pemberton is a poet — in fact, he was poet laureate of his hometown, Edmonton, Alberta, for a couple of years. That meant he was expected to write three poems a year about events in a town sometimes nicknamed "Dirt City." But outside of Edmonton, Pemberton is better known under a different name: Cadence Weapon, the hip-hop artist.

In poetry and song, Pemberton finds inspiration, tough and otherwise, in his Edmonton roots. The latest Cadence Weapon album, his third, is called Hope in Dirt City.