Stereophonic

I met Alaina in 1999(!) and fell in love. Circumstances forced us into a long-distance relationship soon after and, when I disappeared to West Africa for a few months in 2001, we ended it. In my grieving, I found solace in Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours album; the songs captured so many of the emotions that I was feeling, love, loss, longing despair, hope, resignation and freedom. I knew that the band members had been experiencing intense relationship trauma while recording the album and somehow managed to navigate the emotional minefield to produce one of the greatest records of all-time. It is…

Sleep No More To Be No More

A few weeks ago, hanging out late with friends and discussing the impending closure of one of the most interesting art works I've ever seen, we purchased tickets to see Sleep No More one last time. I went when it opened in 2011 and loved it; the event involves wandering around a hotel in plain white masks watching performers in various scenes referencing Shakespeare's Scottish Play, MacBeth. Each floor of the six story hotel is a maze of installations that periodically come to life as performance venues while the ghostly audience follows the actors, at times sprinting up and down…

Transition and Evolution

I write here fairly infrequently; it's not part of my daily routine so months usually go by between missives. In fact, I neglected the site's maintenance for months and failed to notice that my registration had expired and the site was down for an extended period of time! I'm lucky nobody purchased the available domain (although someone did offer a not-insubstantial amount to buy it from me recently!) and I'm sorry for any inconvenience caused by the disruption, but you will be glad to know that I secured the supergood.org site for the next decade! I may be the only…

Summer 2023

We passed the solstice yesterday and officially crossed into Summer, when my work obligations shift from five days a week to two, and my cherished free time blossoms. I celebrated last night with The Cure at MSG and am eagerly anticipating Dead & Company tonight at Citi Field. I have seen some other great outdoor shows already this season including Taj Mahal at Prospect Park and Dave Matthews Band at Forest Hills and have another MSG jaunt next week with Tears For Fears before returning in August for a couple of Phish shows. I was thoroughly entertained by Shucked and…

Time

I can tell time, but don't know what Time is; it is one of the most obvious and important features of our existence but the more I think about it, the more I realize that my temporal comprehension is just a simplistic and survivalist adaptation for functional life. It's been five months since I last sat down to write here and all that exists of it is memories, accessed by patterns of electrical impulses in the synapses of my brain. Using the present to tap keys on my laptop creates a lettered breadcrumb trail of my past, which might be…

Influence

How lucky are we to be living in a world with so much incredible literature and entertainment unimaginably accessible? Growing up, I had bookstores (Barnes and Noble and Borders in the Chestnut Hill Mall), music stores (Newbury Comics and Tower Records just a short T ride away on Newbury St), walkable video rental (Newton Highlands Video and Blockbuster), movie theaters and some good music venues (Middle East, Ryles, Sanders Theater, The Orpheum, Great Woods). I thought I had it pretty good! Then computers and the internet shifted every paradigm! With the exception of live music, which I now enjoy at…

Back To The Beginning

The annual return to school and work is underway; a transition that lasts several weeks, ramping up to full employment again. It's hard to give up the freedom of Summer for the schedule of Fall but I have been really enjoying my reentry this year; I feel very fortunate to have such a fun job, playing music with enthusiastic kids! I have been teaching for 20 years, but I still strive to do it better every class, learning from my mistakes and always seeking new approaches to stimulating a love of music in my students! After attending a Kodály conference…

Inspiration!

I have just enjoyed a phenomenal 10 days of music! First was a trip to Nashville--we left the kids with grandma and spent four days in Nashville, Tennessee with eight of our closest friends. It was a true music safari, and I was blown away by the quantity and quality of musicians we heard. The main strip, Broadway, is known as The Honky Tonk Highway and it lives up to its name and reputation, with live music pouring out from every floor of its multi-storied bars from morning to late-night. Some venues, like Robert's Western World, focus on the country…

Mommom

She became a grandmother when I was born and when I first made noises, I dubbed her Mommom (and her husband Daddad, of course). Summers at her house, Asticou, on Cape Cod and holidays at her home in Bethesda, Maryland was ample time spent with the matriarch (and her four sons’ families). When I went to college, the time together dwindled, sometimes to just a day or two in the summer. When Daddad died almost 17 years ago, I lost my connection to her almost completely; I moved to Brooklyn, and started my own life. But when I had my…

Books

I have a few pockets in my schedule when I get to sit leisurely with a book and I have gotten through some really good ones over the past few months! Overstory by Richard Powers. An incredible work about intertwining roots and purpose. My appreciation of trees grew infinitely. How It Ends by Chris Impey. Basic comprehension of Time and Space for feeble minds like mine. Sum by David Eagleman. Postulates on the afterlife shifting perspective on the nowlife. Storm by George R. Stewart. Written in 1941, describing a storm forming in the Pacific that barrels through North America. Rudimentary…