S2 Ep2132: Culture, Music & Nostalgia with Gabrielle Calisi, Tampa Bay Times

Renaissance woman Gabrielle Calise is the Culture, Music and Nostalgia Reporter for the Tampa Bay Times. She reports on offbeat Florida and her favorite stories are exploring Florida and  local oddities. We talked about recent stories including Crowbar's closing, Live Nation's proposed new venue near Ybor City, BTS sightings (pickleball, ice cream tastings), mermaid culture, peacock mania, Tampa Theater's retrospective book and a climb up the scaffolding to see the restoration first hand and more of her immersive, cinematic reporting...oh yes, and on the set with Paul Rudd during the Don Cesar filming of the new film. Says Gabrielle, who grew up here going to punk shows in Ybor and downtown St. Pete, taking photographs at 14 and just recently, forming Hex Appeal after a Ladies Rock Camp story led her to amazing friendships and a band that just won a Palladium artist grant and performed at a major Tampa festival. Says Gabrielle: "I also love profiling fascinating people in our community and both photographing and reviewing concerts. Before I joined the Tampa Bay Times as an intern on the digital team, I graduated from the University of Florida in 2018 and was a journalism fellow in Germany through the RIAS Berlin exchange program. I’m a big fan of long-lost tourist attractions, oat milk lattes and film photography."