Jon Kalish

Inventing a new product is hard if you can't afford to build a prototype. Enter maker spaces, workshops boasting shared high-tech tools. Entrepreneurs love them, and big backers are taking notice.

The former fierce middleweight prizefighter became an international symbol after he was convicted twice for a 1966 triple murder. Carter's conviction was eventually overturned by a federal judge.

Collective Cadenza, or CDZA for short, is a loose-knit group of musicians — many of them graduates of Juilliard. They've made a name for themselves with funny YouTube videos that have received millions of views. As a result, the group was invited to perform live at the inaugural YouTube Music Awards alongside Eminem, Lady Gaga and Arcade Fire.

The Modzitzer sect of Chasidic Judaism, which originated in the Polish town of Modzitz, is known for its beautiful melodies. Among the most emblematic and prolific composers in this tradition is Brooklynite Ben Zion Shenker — who, at 88, continues to create new works.

Ed Sanders co-founded the legendary avant-rock band The Fugs, and went on to be an important member of the Youth International Party — the Yippies. He's also a classical scholar who's written a new memoir of life on New York's Lower East Side in the 1960s.

Started in 2009, Night Markets use rented box trucks to create a cluster of outlandish art installations and performance venues that last just 24 hours. With attractions ranging from smash trucks to singalongs, they bring a feast of the unlikely and unseen to even the wildest of imaginations.

Led by poets Ed Sanders and Tuli Kupferberg, the garage-rock band The Fugs became a pivotal player in the American underground of the mid- to late '60s. The group retired in 1969 but re-formed in the mid-'80s and has performed and recorded regularly ever since. The band is set to release what could be its last album.

From the late 1940s to the mid-'60s, Latin music was hugely popular in America's Jewish community. Entire albums were recorded as testaments to the phenomenon. One of them, which put Jewish classics to a Latin beat, has just been reissued. This weekend, it will be re-created in concert at Lincoln Center in New York.

It isn't easy to make money as an artist these days, but three crafty New Yorkers are managing to sell their work — and make a living — outside the traditional gallery system.

Scheinman is an in-demand violinist who's appeared with Aretha Franklin, Bill Frisell and Lou Reed. She also plays classical music with string quartets and orchestras, and has released many albums of instrumental jazz. But her latest album, Jenny Scheinman, features her singing.