Phoenix - Category of Things to Do

Not surprisingly, nightlife in Phoenix tends toward cowboy dance halls and Top 40 discos in the big hotels. For a rundown of what's on musically, pick up the free weekly New Times in local record-or bookstores, or check out the bars and clubs we've listed. Both the Phoenix Symphony Hall, 225 E Adams St (tel 602/495-1117), and the Scottsdale Center for the Arts, 7380 E Second St (tel 602/994-2787), put on classical music, theater and ballet . The Arizona Diamondbacks have been playing major league baseball beneath the retractable roof of the Bank One Ballpark since 1998 (tel 602/514-8500), while the Phoenix Suns play NBA basketball at the America West Arena, 201 E Jefferson St (tel 602/379-2000), and football's Arizona Cardinals are based at the university's Sun Devil Stadium (tel 602/379-0102).

Balboa Caf 404 S Mill Ave, Tempe tel 480/966-1300. Jazz, offbeat rock and acoustic music plus internet access near the university.

Char's Has The Blues 4631 N 7th Ave tel 602/230-0205. Phoenix's longest-standing, best-loved blues venue, attracting big-name touring stars and featuring live acts nightly.

Coyote Springs Brewing Company Town & Country Shopping Center, 4883 N 20th St tel 602/256-6645. Mall microbrewery that puts on R&B several nights of the week.

Mr Lucky's 3660 NW Grand Ave tel 602/246-0686. Massive country-music honky-tonk, featuring real-life bull-riding at weekends.

Phoenix Live! Arizona Center, 455 N 3rd Ave tel 602/252-2502. Anodyne but very central alliance of three separate clubs under a single roof, with a single cover charge.

Whatever its general appearance may suggest, Phoenix has managed to attract some visionary designers. Notable among them is Frank Lloyd Wright , who came to the city to work on the Biltmore Hotel , and stayed for most of the 25 years before his death in 1959. His winter studio, Taliesin West located at 114th Street and Frank Lloyd Wright Boulevard, at Scottsdale's northeastern edge is now an architecture school and a working design studio, with regular multimedia exhibits of the man's life and work (SeptJune daily 9am4pm; July & Aug daily except Tues & Wed 9am4pm; tel 480/860-2700). Three different guided tours operate according to complicated seasonal schedules: hour-long "Panorama" tours ($16), 1hr 30min "Insights" ($22), and less frequent 3hr "Behind The Scenes" tours ($35).

Less well known, but in many ways more compelling, is the Cosanti Foundation , four miles west of Taliesin at 6433 Doubletree Rd (daily 9am5pm; $1 donation). The buildings, designed by Paolo Soleri , an Italian-born ex-student of Wright, and constructed out of rammed earth and concrete, have a much more organic feel than Taliesin. Crafts workshops make bells and cast bronzes, and a small museum shows drawings and models of Soleri's life's work: Arcosanti , a space-age, environmentally sensitive project designed to be (someday) an entirely self-sufficient community of five thousand people, which emerges from the desert just an hour's drive north, a mile east of I-17 at Cordes Junction. Three-hour guided tours are given throughout the day ($8 donation; tel 520/632-6217, www.arcosanti.org ), and an airy and spacious caf serves healthy and tasty meals.