They were young idealists picking up trash across America. One of them could nail a tune from "The Music Man." (NOT "76 Trombones.") Enter a ponytailed, cigar-chomping Cincinnati jazz pianist in a Parmesan-wedge of a club in the hazardous part of town.
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Take a 10-Minute Trip to Havana & Back
You couldn't have a better traveling companion than to head to Cuba with Susan Werner. Needing a trip out of quarantine? Take a ten-minute jaunt down south to Havana.
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Nature’s Not Sheltering in Place
t looks like the violets have returned from wherever violets over-winter. They are small, but distinctive. Kind of like the Pekinese of the front yard. Meanwhile, out on the deck the cardinals are just as prevalent as the violets. Flitting about like there's no tomorrow. Maybe for us. Not for them, it looks like.
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“SKATEBOARD MAN”: Bruising Tale of Determination Caught on Video
Take a few lessons from Skateboard Man. Not quite so much about how to skateboard. But about how to be determined! To skateboard through life. It's tough out there downtown.
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SONGS of COMFORT, SONGS of HOME: “Two Guitars, One Heart”
Here's an instrumental track I made yesterday, taking two passes on my Guild classical guitar. Calming music for crazy days. If you like it, download it for free at the link.
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The Long Life of a PopCult
As we settle into self-containment and life constricts to several rooms, I wish to look around and note folks still publishing worthy original content online. Back in the Days of Yore, pre-Plague, when we were all young and innocent and didn't tweet-rage or sh*tpost, there were these things called 'blogs.'
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SONGS of COMFORT, SONGS of HOME: A West Virginia Medley
I don't know whether spending the better part of a day crafting a music video from an old performance is the height of absurdity and uselessness as a tsunami of global suffering bears down upon the human race. But we could do worse, as we hunker down together, than to listen to this Clementines version of Hazel Dickens' great "West Virginia, My Home."
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10 Ways of Looking at West Virginia
With so many of us house-bound, my restless spirits may have been grunting about for some space and spaciousness. Here are 10 views from all around West Virginia for a little relief from cabin fever quarantine.
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SONGS of COMFORT, SONGS of HOME: Winging It for #LiveatHome
A soul-sister Appalachian pal sorta-kinda challenged me to record something straight to smartphone as part of the contagion social media movement afoot of Quarantine Performances. Here's a first take from the John Lennon Memorial Studio of Appalachia.
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The Joy of Little Things and Carrots, too
If we cannot feel joy in daily pandemic life at the moment, perhaps we can find some teensy joys in our shut-down experiences. as daily human interaction telescopes down to our living room couch. A contagion meditation on carrot videos, Falstaff and a 'furiouser and furiouser' ruling regime
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DEAR DOUG REYNOLDS
We all let out a sigh of relief in the building when HD Media bought the Charleston Gazette-Mail. A West Virginia guy with deep pockets, if a middle-of-the-road, non-fire-breathing dragon sort. But still! A sort-of, quasi-liberal new owner, for one of America’s renowned, way-liberal, fire-breathing, storied small newspapers. But... did we get that wrong?
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SONGS of COMFORT, SONGS OF HOME: “Wild Mountain Thyme”
In which we go deep on the gorgeous Scottish-Irish ballad "Wild Mountain Thyme and its faerie-filled backstory. And let you hear what this sweet ballad sounds like—twice. With thanks to Simon the Singer in a Quaker living room.
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Up, Up and Away: NewYorkCityNotebook 2
I am standing on Times Square. Just arrived from out of the ground, like some gopher. Probably like most everyone else who is not a jaded New Yorker, my sense organs are in a state of stasis. Of overwhelm. Of a weird mixture of delight and alarm.
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THE ARCHIVES: Ann Magnuson Channels David Bowie
Sometimes, nothing else will take your mind off crappy news of the day than Ann Magnuson channeling David Bowie. I've been combing through my old video archives and seeing what's worth preserving and—as an old therapist liked to tell me—"lifting up" for your attention.
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‘100 Seconds’ of “Wild Mountain Thyme”
Here's '100 Seconds' worth of what can happen when you gather eight people in a Quaker living room and teach them a classic Celtic ballad while your smartphone is listening.
