This week on Morning Edition, there’s a pretty good chance that sports commentator Frank Deford will kvetch about how the NCAA’s rumored four-team playoff won’t solve all the problems in college sports. But why settle for the three-minute version? And why wait until Wednesday? Tonight Deford discusses his new memoir, Over Time: My Life as a Sportswriter, onstage at Sixth & I Historic Synagogue. He’ll share the bully pulpit with Morning Edition host Steve Inskeep, and no doubt talk current sporting events: the Caps, the Nats, and whether that proposed $2,000 NCAA stipend would keep athletes in school. (“No way,” he’s likely to say.) Over Time is Deford’s 18th book, but the first billed as a memoir, and its timing is right: 2012 marks his 50th year as a professional chronicler of American athletics. Deford came to Sports Illustrated in 1962, fresh out of Princeton University, and remains on the magazine’s staff as a senior editor. Inside the Beltway, he’s probably better known for his weekly NPR commentaries that occasionally come out of left field. You never know whether he’s going to take on a major scandal, like Ozzie Guillén’s recent “I love Castro” faux pas, or champion a small-town hero, like a stroke survivor playing D III basketball. Give him an hour onstage, and he’s sure to cover it all. Deford and Inskeep talk at 7:30 p.m. at Sixth & I Historic Synagogue, 600 I St. NW. $12. sixthandi.org. (202) 408-3100. (Rebecca J. Ritzel)

MUSIC

Swedes We Are Serenades recently recorded a cover of Magnetic Fields‘ “Washington, D.C.” as a “music postcard” to the District; otherwise, they make slick-sounding, emotionally ragged indie pop. With locals Bike Trip at 8 p.m. at Black Cat Backstage, 1811 14th St. NW. $10-$12. (202) 667-7960.

ART

Several colleagues and friends of the late war photographer Tim Hetherington—-Magnum’s Susan Meiselas, The New York Times’ Michael Kamber, and VII Photo Agency’s Stephen Mayes—-discuss how the visual documentation of combat has evolved. At 7 p.m. at the Corcoran 500 17th St. NW. Free, but you should probably RSVP. (202) 639-1700.

“Joan Miro: The Ladder of Escape” opened yesterday, and the exhibition explores the Spanish surrealist’s political side. Look for Jeffry Cudlin‘s Washington City Paper review later this week. To August 12 at the National Gallery of Art, 4th Street and Constitution Avenue NW. Free. (202) 737-4215.

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